Universe [Probably] 250+ Times Bigger Than What Is Observable

[Nephew Twiddleton]

And also, I remember reading somewhere that lightspeed isn't even a constant, as it travels at different speeds, through
different mediums. So what we are using for light years, may actually only be light moments. And  because of the the infinitely ineffable dimensions of the Uni/Multi verse, any system we attempt to quantify Time or Distance with on such a scale is meaningless. And distracting. And far too confusing to try and apply to our little pinpoint of existence. But the Wormhole/Stargate analogy works for Star Trek, Farscape Babylon 5 etc, and I think it's the way to go.
As long as Wesley Crusher isn't involved at all, it should all work out in the end.   

Partially right.  Actual light waves/particles travel through different media at different rates (something like 1/2 speed for glass and 2/3 speed for water, IIRC) but the speed of light in a vacuum is a constant, and that's the one people talk about when they say "speed of light" or "light-years."  The speed of light in a vacuum is also the hard upper limit of speed of anything (rumors, monarchy, gravity, information) in the universe, regardless of medium.

I'm not sure what you mean by "infinitely ineffable dimensions," or by quantifying such things as being meaningless.  The scale means there is 1.3 seconds of lag between any earth-moon communications, and about 8 minutes of such lag between the earth and the sun.  Seems meaningful to me.

Seems like I remember reading somewhere that space may be able to expand faster than light.

Or maybe I didn't.

Funny enough, that's the principle that warp drive theoretically would use. It has yet to be tested, but if the universe isn't < ~28 billion ly in diameter, it might mean just that.

[BadBeast]

Well, light needs space to be light. If there is no space it cannot behave in a way definitive of light. So presumably space always gets there first. So it must expand faster than light. Light's wavelengths must need space to exist in. but space can be dark and devoid of light. So space get's it's flag up first, every time. Whether light then bothers to deign space with it's presence, doesn't affect space much. It's always dark first, in all the Creation Myths too. "Out of the the darkness, came forth -----------*
                                    (*Insert relevant newcomer)

In the beginning was the word, and the word was in the bloody dark, because it had not yet said "Lux Fiat".

[Telarus]

Holyshit, you just proved Pratchett's "Speed of Dark".

[BadBeast]

Holyshit, you just proved Pratchett's "Speed of Dark".

I did?
I mean, I did! It just came to me in a flash of endarkenment.

[Golden Applesauce]

And also, I remember reading somewhere that lightspeed isn't even a constant, as it travels at different speeds, through
different mediums. So what we are using for light years, may actually only be light moments. And  because of the the infinitely ineffable dimensions of the Uni/Multi verse, any system we attempt to quantify Time or Distance with on such a scale is meaningless. And distracting. And far too confusing to try and apply to our little pinpoint of existence. But the Wormhole/Stargate analogy works for Star Trek, Farscape Babylon 5 etc, and I think it's the way to go.
As long as Wesley Crusher isn't involved at all, it should all work out in the end.   

Partially right.  Actual light waves/particles travel through different media at different rates (something like 1/2 speed for glass and 2/3 speed for water, IIRC) but the speed of light in a vacuum is a constant, and that's the one people talk about when they say "speed of light" or "light-years."  The speed of light in a vacuum is also the hard upper limit of speed of anything (rumors, monarchy, gravity, information) in the universe, regardless of medium.

I'm not sure what you mean by "infinitely ineffable dimensions," or by quantifying such things as being meaningless.  The scale means there is 1.3 seconds of lag between any earth-moon communications, and about 8 minutes of such lag between the earth and the sun.  Seems meaningful to me.

Seems like I remember reading somewhere that space may be able to expand faster than light.

Or maybe I didn't.

Space does expand "faster" than the speed of light, sort of.  Space expands proportionally to itself.  So if you have two points that are 5m apart, after some time t they will be 6m apart.  During that same time t, a pair of points that were 500m apart have now become 600m apart.  The apparent velocity of the second pair of points is 100 times that of the first pair.  Taking two points that are sufficiently far apart will yield two points that appear to be traveling away from each other in excess of lightspeed - but that's okay, because nothing is actually moving.  The two places are still exactly where they started, only now there's more space in between them now.

This messed up property of the metric expansion of space is how the universe could be both larger than the observable universe, and how it could be larger than a sphere with radius (age of universe)(lightspeed.)  [Note that the sphere won't have volume 4/3*pi*r^3, due to space being all warped.]

[Golden Applesauce]

Doesn't matter, might matter,  Dark matter, Light Matter, Microcosm &  Macrocosm are fairly exact models of each other on the Atomic / Solar scale, with the planets and moons being the electrons and neutrons, with the Sun shining on as a nucleus. That is a comparison I can get my head round.  BeforeI start losing interest again.

Electrons don't orbit the nucleus.  They do the quantum "I'm somewhere around here, probably?" dance.

[BadBeast]

My knowledge of Astrophysics and Sub atomic particles  comes almost exclusively from listening to Hawkwind,
and reading Comic books. Waddya expect? Stephen Hawking? And don't get me started on the home made "Hardon collider" debacle!