What lies beyond the edges of the observable universe? Is it possible that our universe is just one of many in a much larger multiverse?
Movies can’t get enough of exploring these questions. From Oscar winners like Everything Everywhere All at Once to superhero blockbusters like Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, science fiction stories are full of creative interactions between alternate realities. And depending on which cosmologist you ask, the concept of a multiverse is more than pure fantasy or a handy storytelling device.
Humanity’s ideas about alternate realities are ancient and varied—in 1848 Edgar Allan Poe even wrote a prose poem in which he fancied the existence of “a limitless succession of Universes.” But the multiverse concept really took off when modern scientific theories attempting to explain the properties of our universe predicted the existence of other universes where events take place outside our reality.
“Our understanding of reality is not complete, by far,” says Stanford University physicist Andrei Linde. “Reality exists independently of us.”
If they exist, those universes are separated from ours, unreachable and undetectable by any direct measurement (at least so far). And that makes some experts question whether the search for a multiverse can ever be truly scientific.
Will scientists ever know whether our universe is the only one? We break down the different theories about a possible multiverse—including other universes with their own laws of physics—and whether many versions of you could exist out there.
What is a multiverse?
The multiverse is a term that scientists use to describe the idea that beyond the observable universe, other universes may exist as well. Multiverses are predicted by several scientific theories that describe different possible scenarios—from regions of space in different planes than our universe, to separate bubble universes that are constantly springing into existence. READ MORE...
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