| The universe appears to be fairly flat, but according to:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shape_of_the_universe ...if the universe was like a "3-torus", it could be both flat and finite: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-torus If you ever played the classic game "asteroids", you might remember how everything wrapped around at the edges of the screen. A 3-torus would be like that, only in 3D. On the other hand, one could imagine the universe as a 3-sphere, which I believe would mean it would be both locally curved and finite in volume. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3-sphere There are also other possibilities, like something analogous to a Klein bottle with an extra dimension. There are a bunch of possibilities for "flat and finite" as well as "positively curved and finite" that I can't begin to visualize. There is even supposedly such a (hypothetical) thing as a negatively curved, (commonly described as saddle shaped) yet finite universe. But regardless, the current belief about the real universe is that it is at least very close to flat, but not known to be finite or infinite. |