That’s not the extreme. As noted above, the claim refers to quantum positioning. The molecule level is way too high. I think all the stories about decision making are mere analogies for understanding.
Technically again, no matter how large the number of events, the universes generated are finite. Very large, true, but finite. An infinite number is only possible if the universe is endless.
People treat multiverses as if they all imply infinite numbers of universes. That’s absolutely not the case. They might be under certain circumstances, but they don’t have to be. They’re two separate issues.
It’s definitely in the realm of philosophical cosmology, and a current category in ontology.
Either the idea of multiverses hasn’t, or cannot, be ruled out by science, then it is up for grabs as a possibility—also on the matter if whether or not our universe is infinite, as well.
Ultimately, an infinite universe is similar to Zeno’s Paradox, in that it seems we find ourselves in a moment of time that seems should take an infinitely long time to get here. So how can this be possible?
Even accepting the Big Bang, there’s nothing that emphatically rules out the idea that our universe was a rebound from another universe before us, or that we are indeed spawned from an infinite stretch of universes before this one.
Even Wittgenstein joked about this seeming paradox, of finding ourselves at a specific point in an infinite series, as if it was like someone coming across a man finishing counting, “…9, 5, 1, 4, 1, 3—Done!”
“Done with what?”
“Done counting pi backwards—starting with eternity. I finally reached the end!”
And speaking of pi, I just finished a piece of pumpkin. I need a nap; an infinitely long one.
Even if time extends to infinity in both directions, the time elapsed between two points in time nevertheless is always finite. Picture the infinite number line: any difference between two numbers is still finite – there are finitely many numbers between any two numbers. (Strictly speaking, this relies on the ordinality, the ordering, of the number line (let’s consider the naturals for simplicity): I could re-order it such that there are, in fact, infinite intervals, simply by putting one number ‘after’ all others, i.e. creating the set {1,2,3,4,…,n,…,5}, where ‘n’ stands for any natural number (except 5). Then, there are infinitely many numbers between four and five, even though both sets have equally many members. Such differences between sets exist in the ‘real world’: the rational numbers and natural numbers, while equivalent in their cardinality (i.e. there are equally many of each), are inequivalent in their ordinality. So basically, it could be the case that there are infinite intervals in a universe with backwards-infinite time; but this is by no means necessary.)
Furthermore, a finite universe does not really get you out of the problem: assume that time is continuous, but there exists no ‘first moment’. Then, the time elapsed up to a given moment can be modeled by the half-open interval (0,1]. There is no smallest element in this interval, since 0 is not a member: but then, for any moment in time, there exists an earlier moment, and you’re stuck with the same problem (if it indeed was one, which, as I just argued, it is not).
Whether a finite or infinite universe is argued, they’re both rife with their own set of formidable paradoxes.
Yet, here we are, humans on the Internet, somewhere on a rocky sphere, third from the sun, in the Milkyway, in the Local Group of galaxies, part of the Virgo Cluster, within a universe filled with hundreds of billions more (that is, the observable amount, anyway), seemingly spawned from a singularity some measly 13.7 billion years ago.
Even if time itself began with the BB, and renders time meaningless “before” that event, did anything exist? If it were absolute Nothingness, that concept may as well be rendered meaningless since something does exists—Nothingness would have no time-like quality.
My problem with the infinite, constantly created, multiple universe “theory” is that no mechanism is ever proposed for why the current universe (or the one we conscious beings travel on) is the current universe. If I flip a coin and it lands on heads in one universe and tails in another, why is it that I can observe only one of those universes?
You still have the same problem of a preferential frame and have not really simplified anything. There still is no difference between saying that I became an astronaut in another universe and asking what if I became an astronaut. In other words, the other universes are still hypothetical don’t explain why we are in this one.
You do observe both universes. Or rather, each universe has its own BigT in it, and the BigT in the heads universe observes heads, and the BigT in the tails universe observes tails, and each one of them asks why they’re the one to have observed that particular outcome.
If TV is giving you the questions, it can also give you answers, at least to the many worlds issue, you just have to look to the more speculative content (aka fiction).
The multiple worlds idea I’ve composited from multiple stories/series is that time is more like an infinite sea than some ever branching a river. You aren’t creating universes when you make a decision, they’re already there. All you’re doing is choosing which possibilities and events become part of your universe.
I know this is totally unscientific babbling, but hopefully it’ll at least get us back to the original questions/issues.
