The strongest limit on the number of possible universes is the human ability to distinguish between different universes. Posted on 10/18/2009 4:06:14 AM PDT by LibWhacker
The strongest limit on the number of possible universes is the human ability to distinguish between different universes.
(PhysOrg.com) -- Over the past few decades, the idea that our universe could be one of many alternate universes within a giant multiverse has grown from a sci-fi fantasy into a legitimate theoretical possibility. Several theories of physics and astronomy have hypothesized the existence of a multiverse made of many parallel universes. One obvious question that arises, then, is exactly how many of these parallel universes might there be.
In a new study, Stanford physicists Andrei Linde and Vitaly Vanchurin have calculated the number of all possible universes, coming up with an answer of 10^10^16. If that number sounds large, the scientists explain that it would have been even more humongous, except that we observers are limited in our ability to distinguish more universes; otherwise, there could be as many as 10^10^10^7 universes.
To work these numbers out, Linde and Vanchurin looked back to the time shortly after the Big Bang, which they view as a quantum process that generated lots of quantum fluctuations. Then during the period of inflation, the universe grew rapidly and these quantum fluctuations were "frozen" into classical perturbations in distinct regions. Today, each of these regions could be a different universe, having its own distinct laws of low energy physics.
By analyzing the mechanism (called "slow roll inflation") that initially generated the quantum fluctuations, the scientists could estimate the number of resulting universes at 10^10^10^7 (a number which is dependent on the model they used). However, this number is limited by other factors, specifically by the limits of the human brain. Since the total amount of information that one individual can absorb in a lifetime is about 10^16 bits, which is equivalent to 10^10^16 configurations, this means that a human brain couldn't distinguish more than 10^10^16 universes.
Requiring that the human brain must be able to count the number of parallel universes may seem inappropriate, if not arrogant, but Linde and Vanchurin explain that dealing with the quantum world is different than our everyday lives in which quantum effects can be safely ignored. A crucial part of their calculation here is an investigation of quantum effects on supergalactic scales. In this kind of scenario, the state of the multiverse and observations made by an observer are correlated (similar to the Schrodinger cat experiment, where the outcome can be determined only after it is registered by a classical observer).
"When we analyze the probability of the existence of a universe of a given type, we should be talking about a consistent pair: the universe and an observer who makes the rest of the universe 'alive' and the wave function of the rest of the universe time-dependent," the scientists write.
As the scientists explain, the calculation of the number of universes is an important step toward an even larger goal: to find the probability of living in a universe with a particular set of properties. What are the chances that we live in a world in which the laws of physics are these laws that we currently observe? Answering this question requires finding probabilities that depend on knowing about other universes, among many other challenges.
There has been arguments that with the universe exactly tuned to allow for the existence of life that is evidence of a creator But if you have some uncomprehensible large number of multiverses then the one we live is just happens to have the correct random drawing for life.
Random? I strongly suspect not. Yet, one of possibly >billions if M-Theory is correct. Tough it’s never testable but that in it’s lower limits it reduces to general relativity and Newtonian mechaninics in such a natural and unfettered way as render it at least mathematically beautiful.
...And gives God a lot to keep of....
There was no such experiment (peta would freak out over that one). Schrodinger's paradox was meant to show the limitations of the then emerging Copenhagen interpretation and that our understanding of QM is wrong - or at least incomplete. People have been misusing the paradox ever since.
How could we, in this universe, ever “see” or “detect” another universe, let alone many others? Unless we can so detect one , then this whole thing will always be a theory. Am I not correct?
OK fine but the burning question of the day is how many perpindicular universes there are.
Isaiah 55:8: For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.
I don’t know how they calculate this. 10^10^16 is one hell of a big number.
“... travel faster than the speed of a cream pie.”
Would be nice.
Exactly the same as TNOATCFOAHOAP!
The Number Of Angels That Can Fit On The Head Of A Pin. Or HPA for short.
Marvelous how *far* such *science* has progressed.
Another example of how the metric system destroys real science.
Simple....ACORN is going to use part of that 2.6 billion dollars it's getting in the stimulus pkg to develop the appropriate counting procedures.....
Probably the same one they'll be using in the 2010 census...(One more reason we can be sure that the so-called de-funding a couple of weeks ago was just the usual B.S. by those who rule us.)
Prof: "I am sorry, Mr. Drill, but I do not sink even ten to ze tenth to ze sixteenth universes iss gonna be enough to hold zat one."
Lol :D
When Jesus rose from the dead and left the stone tomb, He left our spacetime realm and went to another close by (about the length of a man's arm away in fact, as attested by the witness of Belshazzar found in Daniel chapter five, OT). When He appear in the locked upper room, He came from a close-by realm to be with His Disciples.
It’s amazing, the lengths some will go to, to escape the increasingly clear nature of the one universe we’re in.
At least some have been honest about that nature, like Edwin Hubble, Fred Hoyle and, currently, Lawrence Krauss. Avoidance of it is another matter, a “horror” to even contemplate, let alone acknowledge, according to Hubble.
Chances are 100% for me.
Most days.
I totally agree with President Palin’s decision today to ship off the last of the liberals to the detention colonies in Iran and Iraq. What? Oh, I’m sorry, guess I got shoved into the wrong Universe for a while.Ah... a perfect universe. Unfortunately, we're not in that one.
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