I recently learned what it really means when people say space is constantly expanding. At first I thought it just meant more matter is getting created on the outer areas of the universe or something. But it’s moreso space in the spacial sense is expanding between everything, like a balloon being inflated. This opened up a realm of stuff I hadn’t thought about, with my brain struggling to comprehend how there is finite ‘space’ in that sense. Like how does existence itself have a limit to size? For distance as a concept to exist, the space between atoms has to be finite, and doesn’t break down infinitely. But my brain can’t comprehend this, similar to how it can’t comprehend there being nothing before the big bang. It obviously can’t be infinite because there’d be no existsnce as we know it, but how can it be finite and exist at all?
I guess the question is, how is there a limit to the space between atoms?
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I’m a little unclear on what exactly you’re asking, but to start with something fundamental:
>For distance as a concept to exist, the space between atoms has to be finite
This is not quite accurate. You can define distance without reference to the space between atoms. Indeed, a meter is formally defined as the length of the path travelled by light in a vacuum in 1/299792458 second. The speed of light in a vacuum is constant and does not increase along with the expansion of the universe.
As to the “limit” on the space between atoms, there really isn’t one. Atoms can be squeezed together, but it does take energy to do so because you need to overcome the electromagnetic repulsion between similarly charged particles. You can also pull atoms apart, but if they’re too far apart they can’t interact to make molecules because they’re out of range of the electromagnetic force.
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