"Hey Bill Nye, What is Our Place in the Future of the Universe?" #tuesdayswithbill | Big Think

Hi. I’m Megi and I wanted to know what the future of the universe is and what is our place in it according to physics and engineering. Thank you.

Maggie, the future of the universe. That's literally a big question. First of all, the universe is accelerating, and when I was your age, everybody thought that the universe was slowing down. Everybody thought that the universe was going slower and slower, but it turns out it's going faster and faster, and nobody knows why.

So when it comes to predicting the future of the universe, there's just got to be an enormous amount of information that we don't know anything about, and that will help us figure out what the future might be. But I got to tell you, I think the universe will keep going, whether or not we're here. I mean, that just is what it seems like.

I've watched a lot of people come and go, and it just seems like the world keeps spinning, and the universe keeps circulating, ever so slowly, actually at enormous speeds; perceptively, it looks very slow to us.

With that said, it's a cool thing to think about, and it's also reasonable, Maggie, that you will, in trying to find out what happens in the future of the universe, you will discover something amazing, something astonishing.

And it's very reasonable to me that you'll find some source of energy that we haven't thought about. Ninety-four percent, depends who you talk to, ninety-six percent of the universe is dark matter and dark energy, and nobody really knows what that is.

And it's very reasonable if somebody could figure out what that is way out in deep space; that same stuff is here somewhere, and if you can figure out what that is, you could, dare I say it, change the world.

And I'm glad you're pondering this, but also think about your future. It's coming up a lot quicker than the next time the sun becomes a red giant, for example, but that's billions of years away.