It’s the End of the World as You Know It

Just how WILL the world end? It’s a question often pondered by young, intrepid souls, seeking purpose and meaning in life, and just as often dismissed because of the sheer incomprehensibility of the topic. I, your friendly neighborhood speculator, am here to discuss this, as well as attempt to get you to swallow my opinions as fact, using a thin layer of scientific jargon to increase the overall believability. In other words, get ready to delve deep into my twisted subconscious as we explore the eventual deaths of humanity, the world, and the entire universe. NOTE: There actually is a small amount of fact in this, so don’t entirely dismiss it offhand. Plus, it’s not like this is actually going to apply in your lifetime…right?

Heat death! You all want one!

This is currently the most widely accepted view of the universe’s eventual conclusion, and scientists generally agree that this will indeed occur at some point in the future. However, just like many things scientists only sort-of understand, the vast majority of it is pure speculation. The basic concept is that when the universe was created, (through the Big Bang or because an old guy with a white beard said so, whatever floats your boat) the universe began to expand at the speed of light. Matter extended outward, and coalesced into stars and eventually planets. However, the “Oh yeah, by the way” is that when the universe was originally created, there was a set amount of energy. This “energy” stuff is important to us because of the concept of heat, without which humanity and life in general would cease to exist. This is what the scientific community calls “a bad thing.”

Why should you care?

Well, at this point, there really isn’t anything to worry about. Except, remember before how I said that the universe expands at the speed of light? Well, in theory, it does that “ad infinitum.” For you uncultured types, that’s Latin for “A really freaking long time.” Now because of this whole, “Set amount of energy, unset amount of space” thing, eventually, every sun in the universe will die out and there won’t be enough concentrated energy anywhere to produce any life anywhere ever again ever.

The good news

We’re all dead. Hundreds of thousands of millions of years before this “heat death” humans will have been dead and gone. At the rate we’re headed, Earth itself will be gone, a nasty result of World War MLMU4XXIV. Such is life. So in other words, don’t go out and start stealing from convenience stores with the alibi of, “It doesn’t matter, the heat death of the universe is nigh!” *Violently waves cross and passes out from one last swig from what smells like jet fuel in a paper bag* Nope, that would just get you arrested until the actual end of the universe, and that would be no fun at all. You would totally miss out on entirely justifiable convenience store robbing.