Not satisfied with studying one enormous and complex Universe - you know, the one we live in - some scientists and philosophers are keen to speculate or hypothesize about additional universes, lots of them. Indeed, there have been numerous different ways of concocting such Multiverses. In this post I will describe some of those I have heard or read about.
1. Most Probable Multiverse:
In our Universe (the real one), we can "see" up to about 13.8 billion light-years in any direction. At that distance, we are looking at what was happening 13.8 billion years ago since it has taken that long for the light to reach us from there. Because the Universe is expanding, anything at that distance is receding from us at almost the speed of light, and hence is greatly "red-shifted". Everywhere we look, however, at the largest scale in any direction, the Universe looks more or less the same, adjusting for the age at different distances.
Based on that apparent uniformity, it seems unlikely that space-time and the Universe actually ends at a distance of 13.8 BLY, the edge of the visible Universe from our position in it, which we call our cosmological "horizon". Indeed, for someone living, say a billion LY away from us, they would be able to see ~1 BLY further in that direction than we can, even as they are moving away from us at ~7% the speed of light. Someone 13.8 BLY away would "see" us (as we were 13.8 BLY ago) in our direction and would see 13.8 BLY in the other direction, so that half of their Universe would be beyond the edge of ours. Clearly, in principle, someone much further away might see a Universe totally separated from what we can see. There is no reason to suppose that space, time, galaxies, planets, etc. cease to exist past our horizon, just because we cannot see them.
In some sense these places "outside" are all the "same Universe", but in reality, they would be totally different universes, forever separated from ours. Given that we see no variation in the content of our universe all around us - our Universe being flat, isotropic and uniform seems to be an accurate approximation - it seems reasonable to assume that whatever is beyond our horizon is much the same as in the parts we can see. How far that could go is subject to speculation, of course, but it could be hundreds of billions of LYs in every direction. Give three spatial dimensions, there could well be hundreds or thousands of such universes, arranged like spherical balloons filling a large room.
These "balloons" are what I will call the Probable Multiverse since we have no reason to believe it does not exist beyond the edges of ours. Assuming that is so, we can be certain about some aspects of those universes. They must all have the same physical laws, physical constants, chemical elements, typical stars, galaxies, black holes, planets, and possibly, life (many would say probably, but that is another topic). If this Multiverse extends forever in every direction (which has its own philosophical challenges), then it can be proven, given that our Universe is finite, that somewhere out there is another universe exactly like ours, where your doppelganger is reading this same post written by mine. Indeed, if truly infinite, then there must be an infinity of such identical universes!
2. Inflationary Multiverse:
Cosmic inflation theory says that in the tiny sliver of time (less than 10^-34 seconds) at the start of the Big Bang that produced our Universe, there was an ongoing time-space inflation event, much more rapid than our current expansion, that churned out tiny quantum bubbles, each of which could then expand at an enormous rate (the inflation part) into its own universe, roughly equivalent to Multiverse #1 above. In some theories, this could go on forever, with universes large and small spit out at random, or according to unknown laws and constants. In that way there could supposedly be billions or even an infinite number of universes in existence, "somewhere", although the theory seems a bit vague on their location and arrangement. Given the relativistic effects of space-time and the unknown but hypothesized details of the inflation mechanism, almost anything could happen.
The rationale behind this theory seems to be that our Universe is flat and uniform. What we see 13 BLY in one direction at the largest scale is almost exactly the same in every other direction. The thinking is that since the Big Bang, there has not been enough time for one side of our Universe to be in contact with, affected by, mix with, or even see the other side, so how could they end up the same? The proposed "solution" is that the initial inflation spreads our any variations or anomalies present in that sub-picosecond time scale so quickly and far, that they were smeared out so that all we see is one tiny patch of uniformity spread out more than 14BLY in every direction, as discussed in #1 above.
There are other ways of explaining the uniformity, but they might have mystical or metaphysical connotations, so materialist scientists prefer the inflation theory to account for what we see, and then expand it to eternal inflation. One such metaphysical reason for proposing eternal inflation is to account for the fine tunings seen in our Universe. For any form of life to exist, the laws of physics, their physical constants, and the initial conditions at the Big bang have to be precisely set, or else: the Universe will expand too fast, making atoms impossible, or collapse back on itself after a short time; or only hydrogen will form making stars, planets, chemistry, life impossible; or all matter will collapse into black holes, or ... Indeed, if any of a dozen or more parameters were slightly different, life could not have come into being. Books have been written about this, so I won't go into detail, but the reader may look into Intelligent Design theory for more.
It turns out the chance of getting the full set of finely-tuned parameters needed for life - and there is no reason why it would not be by chance since no one knows why those parameters have those values - is infinitesimally small. To get that set of parameters to come about by chance therefore, requires that an infinite number of universes be spawned, each with a random set of those or similar parameters. We, of course, then find ourselves in the rare universe with the "right" set for life to exist. This is one rationale for materialist belief in eternal inflation.
In this scenario, so the theory goes, during the instant of inflation for each universe, the physical parameters and initial conditions may be highly variable. Then each new universe would come with its own set of physical constants, initial density, expansion rate, and possibilities for subatomic particles, quantum effects, energy, atoms, etc. This randomization would come about by unknown inflation and quantum effects at the moment of creation, somewhere down in Planck time (10^-34 second). Or so goes the speculation and theorizing.
It should be noted that there is zero evidence for inflation apart from the observed uniformity of our Universe, which can be explained in other ways. There is even less evidence for eternal inflation. Moreover, such inflation theories require additional physics, constants and parameters, all of which are poorly defined and would also have to be fine tuned to work as proposed. And finally, there cannot ever be any evidence of the supposed other universes. Thus, this particular form of Multiverse must be considered forever as just a hypothesis.
3. Many-Worlds Multiverse:
In quantum physics, there is a conceptual or interpretive issue regarding how to understand the collapse of the wave functions that represent quantum theory and describe physical reality as discovered in laboratory tests throughout the 20th century. The wave function is a mathematical representation of the superposition of all possible quantum states for the system under consideration, before the outcome of any event involving it. When tested, that is when the event occurs, this superposition collapses into one of those states as part of the observation or measurement. There is a probability associate with each possible outcome. Physics can calculate those probabilities for simple scenarios, but cannot predict which outcome will occur for any particular test or event.
The usual way of understanding this superposition collapse is called the Copenhagen interpretation, wherein the presence of an observer forces the collapse into one state or other. Aside from following the probabilities statistically in multiple such events, there is no accounting for the result of any single collapse, the other possible outcomes simply did not occur in that case. The linked Wikipedia article explains it better than I can, but that is not my purpose here.
Some people do not like the idea that the collapse requires an observer. (There is more to it than that, but I simplify.) So it was posited that when a quantum superposition with two possible outcomes collapses, the Universe splits in two, with each result happening in one of them! Every quantum event in the Universe would then generate a pair of universes, or more if there are multiple possible outcomes. Each time the Universe splits, we end up in whichever Universe saw the result we measure or observe. Perfect copies of ourselves and the entire Universe end up in another universe where the outcome was different.
Most rational people rightly balk at the idea of creating another entire universe every time a choice is made or a wavefunction collapse occurs. Such an explosion of universes would put even eternal inflation (#2 above) to shame! There is, of course, no possibility of observing the supposed many-worlds that split off from the one we remain in, they are gone forever from ourselves. Where they have gone is part of the question. Presumably there is some other dimension along which they instantly shift by some tiny amount to get away from us (see #4 below). Or perhaps it is our Universe that shifts, or both separate along this extra dimension axis? Your guess is as good as mine.
There are other questions too. If there are multiple possible outcomes, and for most quantum interactions there are several, then the probability for the different outcomes may be quite different. What would that mean for the Universe splitting? How does a 10% likely universe compare to a 50% one? Are there more universes where the probability was higher or are those ones just more "real" somehow? I imagine that many-worlders get around this by saying that statistically, there would be more universes split off for the more likely outcomes. But at each split, new universes come into being for every possible outcome, so the question of probability and its meaning stands.
One might ask how the universe split occurs, instantaneously everywhere, or at the speed of light from the quantum event? Also, what happens when two quantum events occur at the same time? How do they coordinate their splittings? And then there is the question of conservation of mass-energy. Each time the Universe splits, one reality with all its space-time, matter and energy, becomes two, both having the same amount of mass and energy as the original presumably. Of course, we do not see the other universes, and conservation applies where we remain, so maybe that is not a problem for many-worlds physicists?
I do not pretend to understand all the theory or consequences of this philosophy, but I can say that I cannot accept it. One Universe is fine for me, even if we do not fully understand quantum mechanics. In any case, since there cannot even in principle, be any evidence supporting this theory, then is should remain a philosophical speculation rather than a truly scientific theory.
4. Extra Dimension Universes
Similar to the Many-Worlds hypothesis, some people speculate that additional spatial dimension actually exist, and that in our Universe we have access to only three of those so cannot see anything along the extra dimensions. Even one extra dimension suffices for the hypothesis that other universes may exist along that dimension. Just as many sheets of two-dimensional paper can be stacked along the third dimension, the idea goes, so many 3D worlds can be stacked along a 4th dimensional axis, at right angles to the three we experience. Restricted as we are to our three dimensions, we cannot detect anything along the fourth axis, even if it is "nearby" in some sense.
There are many sci-fi stories along these lines, always involving people somehow moving between or among these universes along that 4th axis. Some such stories limit themselves to one extra universe, but others suppose a multitude, or even an infinity of "parallel worlds" as they are often referred to. In that case, it is usually supposed that the closer to us along that axis, the more like our world they are, even though the stories usually require many things to be changed. The worlds further along this axis may have somewhat different physical laws and constants as well, or so the thinking goes.
There has even been a suggestion that the heaven spoken of in the Bible as God's domain and where angels live, is simply another world, separated from ours by a small step along some 4th dimension. God, of course, sees everything in both worlds, and angels have the ability to shift between their world and ours, explaining how they appear out of nowhere at times. One could then suppose that hell is a third such world, presumably on the other side of ours as seen from heaven? But then in the Bible, Paul speaks of the 7th heaven, suggesting there may be multiple such worlds, hence a sort of divine Multiverse!
Occasionally you see astrophysics reports that claim to have found some anomaly or discrepancy in the laws of physics; for example in the behaviour of gravity. They posit some sort of "leakage" between parallel universes to explain the discrepancy. But such reports seem to fade when someone comes up with better data or a more comprehensive explanation. In any case, I have not seen much along those lines lately (but see #5 below!). So this Multiverse concept will also have to remain a hypothesis without physical evidence, at least until we die and go to heaven - or the other way!
More realistically, cosmologists talk about an open or closed Universe, where the shape of our Universe is not a perfectly "flat" 3D space, but curves in some 4th dimension. I have also read that the shape of the event horizon on a black hole cannot be described in three dimensions. In relativity theory moreover, our space-time continuum is said to be warped by gravity. Hence there seems to be some justification to the idea of an unseen 4th spatial dimension, but the existence of other worlds spread out along it must remain speculative for now.
5. String Theory Universes
This is one physical theory that I do not claim to understand. From what I have heard however, it postulates the existence of multiple extra dimension, up to eleven in total, I gather. All but our basic three spatial and one temporal dimension are apparently folded up tightly - very tightly - into such small sizes as to be undetectable form our perspective. Somehow those work with new concepts of matter and energy to create the universe we perceive, while supposedly explaining some things that we cannot fully understand about the world scientifically.
Beyond that I cannot really go, except to say that this theory also supposedly "allows" for other universes to exist with different physical laws and properties. Using suitable choices of theoretical parameters, up to 10^500 alternate universes may be conceived, or so I have heard. And - you guessed it - there would be no way to detect those other universes with any conceivable measurements we could make, although some proponents hope for breakthroughs that might allow them to expand one or more dimension, or to detect some subtlety that would hint at their existence.
The down side of this String Theory is (or so I have read), that the number of variables or free parameters in the theory are so large that essentially anything could happen in a String Theory Multiverse. Moreover, how the selected parameters determine the type of universe and even whether any selected parameter set is compatible in itself, are totally unknown. Perhaps if a reader know more than I do about String Theory - that is, anything at all - then you can correct me in the comments. My purpose here is not to get the speculation accurate, but just to report on the types of speculation that occur on this topic. And imagine, other people actually get paid for this sort of work!
6. All Possible Universes
This is a metaphysical idea that comes out of trying to understand what it means that God is infinite, all knowing, all powerful, etc. The idea is that such a God would not limit himself to one world or Universe, but would somehow create all possible universes, that is all conceivable assemblages of consistent and coherent parameters that could define a real universe. As such, there would be universes where unicorns are real, where pigs can fly and mice speak to us in English, along with a whole infinity of even stranger universes, with many dimensions in time and space, different chemistry, Boltzmann brains, densely packed atoms without gravity, or nothing at all. If mere humans can conceive of such places, then surely an infinite God could produce them if they are in fact "possible" in some sense, and an infinitely powerful God could do that as a matter of course.
To me, this stretches the idea of an infinite God too far, and goes beyond any reasonable religious view that I know of. But then who am I to clamp down on others' idle speculations? Perhaps all the imaginative things that people come up with are just ideas leaking into our world from other ones? Nevertheless, I am happy to keep my mind and life in one world, at least until I die.
7. Simulated Worlds
In another post, I reported on and speculated about the possibility that our Universe is a simulation in some higher reality. The idea is that, if this higher reality can simulate our Universe, then why would it limit itself to one only? In principle, it could simulate any number of universes for its own interest or entertainment value, although I suspect they would get enough laughs out of ours. In this way, a simulated Multiverse is perhaps the easiest one to wrap our minds around, given that humans simulate universes; think video games!
Once one opens this possibility, there is no end to the types of universes that might "exist" in the simulation sense. Any particular simulation would have its own set of space-time structure, physical laws, starting conditions, and so on, making each one unique in many possible ways, more than we can imagine. Some universes might look like our video games with weird monsters, magic, wormholes, or what have you. They would not even have to make sense, or be coherent. If you can set parameters any way you want, you can simulate anything, even utter chaos or random noise. Why the simulating entity would want to do that is not for us to say. We can just say that in simulations, anything is possible.
It would not even be necessary to keep the simulations separate. Part of the fun might be to have one universe start to interact with a totally different one. Here too, various sci-fi stories have toyed with that idea, and if mere humans can imagine it, then why wouldn't the simulating entity try it?
Finally, of course, if one entity can simulate an entire Universe, then in principle, a higher entity could simulate that entity and its universe. Indeed, humans do that (or could) in our video games and simulations. There is surely a game out there in which some character in the game world is playing his own video game? In this sense, there is a hierarchy of simulations going on, and in principle, there may be no limit to the levels of simulators being themselves simulated by higher powers, themselves simulated from above, etc. Then it could be turtles all the way up!
8. Other Multiverses?
The mind of man can imagine many things, and as listed above, has imagined many universes in may different ways. There are doubtless other ways to imagine multiple universes, or make up "scientific theories" positing some new way of interpreting reality. Indeed, it is easy to think about combining two or more of the above listed ideas into a hybrid or multi-concept Multiverse. For instance, Multiverses #1, 2 and 3 above are largely independent of each other and could, in principle, coexist at the same time. Of course, there would still be no evidence for any of it, and the universes would quickly out number our ability to tally them up. Indeed, even thinking about where all those multi-multiverses might reside stretches the mind's conceptual abilities, not to mention any sense of plausibility.
Over all, I doubt if there are any other universes aside from those beyond the edges of our cosmic horizon, as presumed in #1 above. There is no evidence in support of any others, so it all seems like idle speculation, but it can still be fun. If trying to imagine other ways that reality might exist, we expand our thinking and perhaps even our understanding of large concepts, then doing so is not without some benefit. In any case, I hope you have enjoyed this romp through the realm of possible Multiverses.