My understanding is that the big bang did expand into nothing, or more precisely space, along with time, was created during the big bang, and before that neither space or time existed. I suppose English is not precise enough a language to accurately discuss the matter, because even though I said before that, there really was no before that to discuss. That’s what makes the issue so confounding. I suppose you could hypothesize a parallel universe with it’s own time and space dimensions that was the source of the big bang, but such a universe is probably forever beyond investigating.
I’ll add that to my mind, that means the universe has an edge of some sort. I’ve argued that point before as well, but I think it has bearing on the discussion. If there are only three spatial dimensions that are finite (since they have only existed for about 13.7 billion years and not forever), that implies that there is some kind of edge. Yes, I’ve heard the explanation about there being nothing north of the north pole as an analogy, but I don’t see how that can work. The reason it makes no sense to speak of what is north of the north pole is because north is a direction in a 2D world, and you get a nonsense answer when asking about going in a 2D direction and applying that to a 3D object. If you ask about a 3D direction in a 3D world, however, I think it does make sense. In other words, if I were to ask what is located one quadrillion light years away from Earth in (pick whatever direction you want), the correct answer is probably nothing. I don’t think it’s a nonsensical question unless you theorize some kind of fourth spatial dimension with the implication that the universe is a hypersphere rather than a sphere.
More nothing?
I think what trips many people up (myself included at times) is trying to distinguish between a nothing like the near empty vacuum in between galactic clusters, and nonexistence, which is how I would describe the theoretical location of one quadrillion light years away or the theoretical time of 30 billion years ago. They are nonexistent. It’s difficult to even think of the concept, and I confuse myself at times trying to thin of the difference 
It seems to me like there may be no “quadrillion light years away from Earth” any more than there is a Narnia. Just because one can make a grammatically coherent sentence describing a location, doesn’t mean that it exists. If you try to travel to that region, even at the speed of light. Space-time will expand faster than you can close the distance and you could never in principle reach your destination.
I would state that if there was a true “nothing” we wouldn’t be around to debate its non existence.
That’s kind of what I’m trying to get at, but the English language, and probably all other manmade languages, makes it difficult to describe. A location four quadrillion light years away is a different kind of nothing than the nothing that exists in between galactic superclusters. It just sounds odd to me to describe it by saying that “nothing exists” which implies that there is some kind of nothing that exists in that location, rather than the nonexistence of it. That and I have no idea how to begin to even imagine what a true nonexistence is. I can picture what it is for me to not exist, such as before as I was born or after I die, because the rest of the world still existed and will still exist even if I don’t. But total nonexistence? That is beyond my feeble mind to comprehend, even though I know that there is such a thing (again the imprecision in the English language makes it difficult to describe what I mean). :smack:
Well I have heard that sequence many times, that’s why I said so.
I’m not sure what you’re getting at with this point. No-one has disputed that time is bounded.
I agree it could be interpreted a number of ways, but the interpretation where nothing is described as a discrete thing, and that we’re making the positive statement that that thing exists, seems to me the most disingenuous.
It reminds me of a “proof of God”-style word game.
Yeah, thinking about these things too hard does tend to make me go a bit cross-eyed. 
From now on, I’m going to imagine that outside space and time there is nothing but delicious, creamy potato salad as far as the eye can see.
Ahhh. That’s better.
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With the time is bounded thing I realize it was about the “north of the north pole” thing. I take that part back.
But I maintain that I’ve heard many times “There was no before the big bang” without anyone previously having used the word “before”.
Yeah, I think it was Stephen Hawking I first heard say that.
Agreed, but I still don’t think it’s me playing the word game. I think it’s in the question.
Edit: I read RickJay’s original statement again and I had misunderstood what he was saying.
More specifically, the word game is in the rejection of the concept of nothing as described by physicists by claiming it’s “not really nothing”.
The Lawrence Krauss ‘nothing’ has received a lot flack from this angle and that’s what I think is disingenuous.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
Except it’s more than “theorized” - space-time is a coherent concept of a four-dimensional object.
Could you clarify? Do you mean 4 dimension total, 3 spatial and 1 temporal? In that case, does that imply that in a certain sense that all of time exists simultaneously with the three spatial dimensions? Or are you talking about a 4th spatial dimension along with the current 3 spatial dimensions and time? The former situation would at least be consistent with what I understand, even if it is very hard to picture. As far as I am aware, however, there is no evidence for the latter situation, that a 4th spatial dimension actually exists. Is there any evidence for a 4th spatial dimension, or are you just talking about time acquiring characteristics of the 3 spatial dimensions when we are dealing with extreme situations like those that existed at the big bang?
Before the Big Bang, there was Loading… on some dude’s console. And now, the roast is almost done and his friends are coming over soon.
This is a common misconception (due to it’s unfortunate name), but the Big Bang was not an explosion. It was an expansion.
And it didn’t expand into anything, either.
The location (actually a spherical locus) one quadrillion lightyears away could easily exist. We don’t know how big the universe is, but it’s virtually certain it’s much bigger than the observable universe. It could be thousands, millions, billions… times larger than that. Perhaps even infinite.
I went with quadrillions because my understanding is that the expansion is occurring faster than the speed of light. I don’t know exactly how much faster, but I assume it isn’t a million times faster. But let’s say that maybe at some point the expansion of the universe was a million times faster than the speed of light. What about a spherical locus 1 x 10^1000 light years away?
Regarding infinite possible size, is that something that is considered a possibility by astronomers? I thought the big bang theory disproved an infinite universe. Do some scientists think that an infinite universe is still possible even in a big bang type scenario?
Cite?
No, I mean four dimensions of spacetime. From the Wikipedia article on the subject:
I feel the same way. We have brains designed by natural selection to help us survive in Africa and we use them to understand math, physics and chemistry well enough to invent technologies that actually work. No other species does that.
But who knows if there are layers of reality beyond ours that we can’t comprehend with our biological brains. Maybe one day we will invent machines that can understand these things.