The End of Everything: (Astrophysically Speaking)

Written by Dr. Katie Mack, a witty cosmologist with a nice writing style, this book outlines a number of ways the universe might end.

Wait. The universe is going to end?

Yes, it would appear as such. The good news is that most apocalyptic scenarios will occur well after the Sun destroys the Earth. So, don’t fret.

However … not every scenario might happen deep in the future. My favorite universe-concluding possibility that Mack covers is known as “vacuum decay.” I’m going to embarrass myself describing this, but the gist is that a bubble of pure vacuum–not the silly false vacuum of existing space–will spread at the speed of light and destroy everything in its path. This could happen at any moment, but it’ll be so fast and so thorough you won’t see or feel it. It’ll all just be done.

Cheery, right? The book is full of fun stuff like that.

Mack doesn’t dig into formulas, but she offers a lot of thorough scientific context. I found it to be the kind of information that I understood for about 30 seconds and then lost completely. But you don’t need firm astrophysical footholds to enjoy Mack’s work. It’s okay if most of it zips over your head because you’ll still get a kick out of the reading experience.

Does any of it matter if it doesn’t last? The epilogue of The End of Everything spends a little time considering the existential dread some people feel when confronted by news that everything is going to end. For some weird reason, this conclusion doesn’t bug me. The “end” is probably so far into the future–billions and billions of years–that we might as well consider the universe to be “forever.” Also, the book makes it clear that our understanding of the universe is growing, but it’s still so very small. Major shifts in thinking happen with regularity, which means we might discover that an event that ends the universe also creates a new one, or opens up new dimensions, or initiates possibilities we could never imagine. I appreciate that Mack imbues her book with the joy of discovery and the thrill of open-endedness. To me, those qualities offset concerns that all of this is impermanent.