Thread: Expanding into annihilation?

So the universe is expanding at an accelerating rate.

Would this increasing rate of expansion possibly harm us in the future? I've heard of the Big Rip idea, pretty scary.

Anyway, in layman's terms, what might happen? Is it possible advanced technology could protect us from such a catastrophe?

The projected cosmic heat death of the universe is waaaay off in the future.
We face far more pressing issues than that - we're going to need to move further out into the solar system in
a billion or so years as our sun becomes too hot.

Thats assuming we have not wiped our selves out by then

I know there are closer issues, however I only want us to focus on this particular doomsday (as I should have specified earlier).

The projected cosmic heat death of the universe

Ah, yes. I forgot about the Big Freeze. Of course, it really is off for a long time, but...

Even if this cosmic heat death hasn't occurred yet, there's still a point where entropic consequences will prohibit us from us from supporting ourselves even before then.

And I'm still curious about the Rip hypothesis. Space itself might not care how much it expands, but our atoms held by electromagnetic forces definitely will. Is the Big Rip possible?