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Wish granted: the same electron is added to all atoms in the universe.
This one single electron is created in a quantum state described by a wave function that is uniformly distributed over every atom in the universe. This wave function collapses nearly instantaneously to a single position, and the end result is that one random atom in the entire universe gains one electron.
Nothing of interest happens.
Considering how intentionally malecious the side effects of typical genie-wishes tend to be, the extra electron probably comes to rest in the wishers hypophysis and causes a free radical that leads to a rare sort of cancer that prevents the wisher from falling asleep ever again, so he dies in madness scratching out his own eyes.
0r something similar along that line.
The real question isn’t if the universe ends…
It’s if the genie magic expands outward from the source at the speed of light, or if it’s instantaneous everywhere, which would allow information to be transmitted faster than the speed of light, allowing for violations of causality, and destroying our fundamental understanding of the universe before we all died.
Not if the universe is inside the genie.
It’s genies all the way down.
It’s really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really fun to think about taking a speed of light ride.
You wouldn’t have any time to appreciate it.
No. It’s inside you. For listening to the genie.
The genie didn’t do anything. It was you the whole time!
just choose an electron somewhere random in the universe, and declare said electron to be the legal property of every atom in the universe. problem solved
I think in this way, one universe was obliterated and ours was created at the big bang.
“There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.” - Douglas Adams
So basically the simulation argument where the guys running the simulation are watching us.
Potentially. Douglas Adam’s imagined a lot of weird shit, and was also good at combining words in ways that drove imagination in the readers even if he didn’t have any specific thing in mind when written.
His words here could be taken to mean “God” didn’t want to be known/understood, like the Tower of Babel.
Unrelated to the previous, the Elder Scrolls mythos contains a sort of transcendence concept called CHIM, which involves coming to fully understand reality and the person’s relationship to it. Since that reality is, according to at least some, a dream, that means accepting that you are just a part of a dream. Managing to fundamentally internalize that without winking out of existence is apparently extraordinarily difficult. All that to say, perhaps a similar mechanic could drive the “dream” to reset itself, or start anew.
Turns out, there’s a rule against exterminating all life in the universe with a wish, but the genie doesn’t know what an electron is or what adding one to every atom will do, so you’ve found yourself a loophole.
I’m a physicist, not a genie, and I have no fucking clue what adding an electron to every atom would do. I can’t even begin to fathom the question.
Whatever it is that happens, it would be pretty violent.
“What If” had a slightly different, more localized but more concentrated premise it covered once:
Electron MoonQuote:
“This is, by far, the most destructive What-If scenario to date.”
I asked ChatGPT what would happen. Here you go:
If every atom in the universe suddenly gained one extra electron, the result would be instant, universe-ending chaos — in less than a nanosecond. Here’s why:
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1. Universal Negative Charge Imbalance
Right now, matter is electrically neutral — the positive charges in nuclei balance the negative charges of electrons. Adding one electron to every atom makes every single atom negatively charged. The universe instantly becomes dominated by repulsive electrostatic forces.
Coulomb’s law tells us electric forces are ~10³⁶ times stronger than gravity. That means: • Atoms would violently repel each other. • Molecules couldn’t hold together. • Planets, stars, and galaxies — all held together by gravity — would be ripped apart by overwhelming electrostatic repulsion.
Within moments, all normal matter disintegrates into a plasma of electrons and nuclei being hurled away from each other.
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2. Collapse of Atomic and Molecular Structure
Each atom now has one more electron than its nucleus can bind: • The extra electron would either occupy a weakly bound outer orbital or be completely unbound. • Chemical bonds depend on balanced electron sharing — those would fail instantly. • Solids, liquids, and gases all cease to exist in recognizable form.
Essentially, chemistry ends. There’s no more “matter” in the familiar sense — just a roiling cloud of charged particles.
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3. Energy Release on an Unimaginable Scale
The addition of an electron to every atom requires — or releases — colossal energy, depending on the element and context: • Ionization energies and electron affinities differ between atoms. • You’re effectively forcing a global-scale electron capture reaction.
But the real kicker is that the sudden Coulomb repulsion between everything would dwarf any nuclear explosion imaginable. The entire universe’s matter would “explode” outward — far beyond the speed of galactic escape velocities — powered by the electrostatic potential energy now released.
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4. No Stable Matter, No Light, No Universe
With matter annihilated into a universal electron-ion plasma: • Photons would scatter off free charges (via Thomson scattering). • The universe would become completely opaque. • Eventually, as it expands and cools, you might end up with diffuse clouds of charged particles, but never stable atoms again.
You’d basically reset the universe to something like an ultra-energetic pre-recombination plasma — except with the wrong charge balance and no chance of re-neutralizing.
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In short:
Adding one extra electron to every atom would: • Destroy all atomic and molecular structure. • Overwhelm gravity entirely. • Convert the universe into a high-energy, negatively charged plasma. • Likely erase all physical structures — stars, planets, life, everything — in an instant.
It’s not a slow catastrophe; it’s an immediate, total one.
