Worlds Without End: The Many Lives of the Multiverse

“Multiverse” cosmologies imagine the universe as just one among a vast number of others. While this idea has captivated philosophy, religion, and literature for millennia, it is now being considered as a scientific hypothesis–with different models emerging from cosmology, quantum mechanics, and string theory. Beginning with ancient Atomist and Stoic philosophies, Mary-Jane Rubenstein links contemporary models of the multiverse to their forerunners and explores the reasons for their recent appearance. One model concerns the so-called fine-tuning of the universe, in which Nature’s constants are so delicately calibrated that it seems they have been set just right to allow life to emerge. For some thinkers, these “fine-tunings” are evidence of the existence of God. For others, however, “God” is an insufficient scientific explanation.