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The Multiverse: When One Universe Isn't Enough
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Expected 3 Mar 26The universe was supposed to be all there was - the whole of existence. For centuries the size of the universe and whether or not it is finite, fascinated scientists and philosophers.
But however big the universe may be, there being only one gave astronomers and cosmologists a headache. Existence as we know it is contingent on so many constants in nature which, if altered only slightly, would make life impossible. This seems so unlikely to happen by chance. What if, instead, there is in fact a vast range of different universes, with many variants of the universal contents, making ours just one of many that happens to be viable for life?
In this illuminating exploration, Brian Clegg delves into the endless possibilities of the multiverse. Investigating questions of expanding, parallel and communicating universes, this accessible guide takes the reader into one of the weirdest and most exciting areas of modern physics and cosmology.
But however big the universe may be, there being only one gave astronomers and cosmologists a headache. Existence as we know it is contingent on so many constants in nature which, if altered only slightly, would make life impossible. This seems so unlikely to happen by chance. What if, instead, there is in fact a vast range of different universes, with many variants of the universal contents, making ours just one of many that happens to be viable for life?
In this illuminating exploration, Brian Clegg delves into the endless possibilities of the multiverse. Investigating questions of expanding, parallel and communicating universes, this accessible guide takes the reader into one of the weirdest and most exciting areas of modern physics and cosmology.
- GenresScience
192 pages, Paperback
Expected publication March 3, 2026
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22 people want to read
About the author
Brian Clegg
163 books3,195 followersBrian's latest books, Ten Billion Tomorrows and How Many Moons does the Earth Have are now available to pre-order. He has written a range of other science titles, including the bestselling Inflight Science, The God Effect, Before the Big Bang, A Brief History of Infinity, Build Your Own Time Machine and Dice World.
Along with appearances at the Royal Institution in London he has spoken at venues from Oxford and Cambridge Universities to Cheltenham Festival of Science, has contributed to radio and TV programmes, and is a popular speaker at schools. Brian is also editor of the successful www.popularscience.co.uk book review site and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
Brian has Masters degrees from Cambridge University in Natural Sciences and from Lancaster University in Operational Research, a discipline originally developed during the Second World War to apply the power of mathematics to warfare. It has since been widely applied to problem solving and decision making in business.
Brian has also written regular columns, features and reviews for numerous publications, including Nature, The Guardian, PC Week, Computer Weekly, Personal Computer World, The Observer, Innovative Leader, Professional Manager, BBC History, Good Housekeeping and House Beautiful. His books have been translated into many languages, including German, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Polish, Turkish, Norwegian, Thai and even Indonesian.
Along with appearances at the Royal Institution in London he has spoken at venues from Oxford and Cambridge Universities to Cheltenham Festival of Science, has contributed to radio and TV programmes, and is a popular speaker at schools. Brian is also editor of the successful www.popularscience.co.uk book review site and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.
Brian has Masters degrees from Cambridge University in Natural Sciences and from Lancaster University in Operational Research, a discipline originally developed during the Second World War to apply the power of mathematics to warfare. It has since been widely applied to problem solving and decision making in business.
Brian has also written regular columns, features and reviews for numerous publications, including Nature, The Guardian, PC Week, Computer Weekly, Personal Computer World, The Observer, Innovative Leader, Professional Manager, BBC History, Good Housekeeping and House Beautiful. His books have been translated into many languages, including German, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Japanese, Polish, Turkish, Norwegian, Thai and even Indonesian.
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December 14, 2025There are many different versions of the idea of a multiverse… and most of them are not particularly scientific. They are ‘ascientific’ in the sense that they are not accessible to science to prove or disprove. They are just interesting ideas, like thought experiments.
To some extent, the rise in popularity of ideas about a multiverse is linked to ideas about ‘fine-tuning’ (ie the 1 in 10136 likelihood of this actual universe). The Multiverse has become a standard ‘go-to’ solution, which explains our universe by diluting any otherwise improbable features of the world we experience, by appealing to the enormous range of alternative options which a multiverse presents. Thus, as the author puts it: ‘cosmologists… favour the existence of a multiverse not so much because there was any evidence that they exist, but rather because they didn’t like the implication of a multiverse not existing.’ (Chp.5)
Working through ideas of Eternal Inflation, Bubble Universes, and Many Worlds interpretations of quantum physics all generate interesting ideas, but they don’t present any (scientific) reasons for thinking that they represent reality.
During the course of the book, the author identifies three particularly problematic arguments which are sometimes appealed to, as justifications for belief in a multiverse.
Firstly, it is a well-known fallacy (Inverse gamblers fallacy) to appeal from a present state of a probability outcome, to a supposed necessity of how that state must have come about. Seeing 10 dice all reading a six, tells us nothing about what happened earlier to those dice. Maybe there has been a preceding infinity of dice rolls, maybe there have been no prior rolls at all. Similarly, just because there is a person with a jackpot in a casino, that tells us nothing about how many other people must be present in the casino playing non-jackpot games at the same time.
Secondly, you cant appeal to the anthropic principle as an explanation for prior states. Yes, its true that humans would not see the present state of the universe (if they not in fact here to see it). But that is an epistemological claim about human knowledge, rather than a claim about reality itself. The author imagines a scenario where a sniper watches an observer of a game of cards and will shoot the observer if the cards do not show a winning hand. Thus, the observer would not be there to see the winning hand, unless the hand won. But the presence of the observer tells us nothing about the winning hand itself. It is illogical to reference the observer in an attempt to explain the winning hand.
We also cannot draw conclusions from infinities. Even if there has been an infinity of prior universes, that doesn’t mean that the universe has worked through every possible configuration until it reached the present state. An infinity of prior universes could just have been an infinity of oscillations between two states, A and B. As the author puts it: ‘Arguments from infinity are inevitably flawed because there is always another possibility. You might say there is an infinite set of them. With no mechanism for making a choice between them.’ (Chp.6).
Chapter 9 works through colliding universes of string theory (M-theory) and chapter 10 works through holographic universes… In each case the book explores an interesting set of ideas but it cannot find a (scientific) evidence or reason for actually committing to a belief in a multiverse.
Ultimately, belief in the multiverse may be comforting. It may seem logical to some people, and it may even seem like the obvious solution to accounting for the universe. But if that is so, then (in the absence of evidence for it) there is little to separate it from a creation myth. In fact the multiverse can be thought of as just a new version of a creation myth, which has all the appearance features to seem sufficiently scientific and un-mythic to be acceptable to those of a more discerning scientific palette.
Overall, this is an interesting book to read, as it brings together, sets of issues which are often scattered across different topics and arguments. By focusing on the single issue of the multiverse itself (rather than on some other issue as an excuse for appealing to a multiverse) it enables readers to reflect on the idea of the multiverse itself, without the presence of the factors which would otherwise motivate likes and dislikes of the idea
I would have rated the book 5 stars if possible, but the book is currently classified (incorrectly) as un-published, so ratings are restricted.
To some extent, the rise in popularity of ideas about a multiverse is linked to ideas about ‘fine-tuning’ (ie the 1 in 10136 likelihood of this actual universe). The Multiverse has become a standard ‘go-to’ solution, which explains our universe by diluting any otherwise improbable features of the world we experience, by appealing to the enormous range of alternative options which a multiverse presents. Thus, as the author puts it: ‘cosmologists… favour the existence of a multiverse not so much because there was any evidence that they exist, but rather because they didn’t like the implication of a multiverse not existing.’ (Chp.5)
Working through ideas of Eternal Inflation, Bubble Universes, and Many Worlds interpretations of quantum physics all generate interesting ideas, but they don’t present any (scientific) reasons for thinking that they represent reality.
During the course of the book, the author identifies three particularly problematic arguments which are sometimes appealed to, as justifications for belief in a multiverse.
Firstly, it is a well-known fallacy (Inverse gamblers fallacy) to appeal from a present state of a probability outcome, to a supposed necessity of how that state must have come about. Seeing 10 dice all reading a six, tells us nothing about what happened earlier to those dice. Maybe there has been a preceding infinity of dice rolls, maybe there have been no prior rolls at all. Similarly, just because there is a person with a jackpot in a casino, that tells us nothing about how many other people must be present in the casino playing non-jackpot games at the same time.
Secondly, you cant appeal to the anthropic principle as an explanation for prior states. Yes, its true that humans would not see the present state of the universe (if they not in fact here to see it). But that is an epistemological claim about human knowledge, rather than a claim about reality itself. The author imagines a scenario where a sniper watches an observer of a game of cards and will shoot the observer if the cards do not show a winning hand. Thus, the observer would not be there to see the winning hand, unless the hand won. But the presence of the observer tells us nothing about the winning hand itself. It is illogical to reference the observer in an attempt to explain the winning hand.
We also cannot draw conclusions from infinities. Even if there has been an infinity of prior universes, that doesn’t mean that the universe has worked through every possible configuration until it reached the present state. An infinity of prior universes could just have been an infinity of oscillations between two states, A and B. As the author puts it: ‘Arguments from infinity are inevitably flawed because there is always another possibility. You might say there is an infinite set of them. With no mechanism for making a choice between them.’ (Chp.6).
Chapter 9 works through colliding universes of string theory (M-theory) and chapter 10 works through holographic universes… In each case the book explores an interesting set of ideas but it cannot find a (scientific) evidence or reason for actually committing to a belief in a multiverse.
Ultimately, belief in the multiverse may be comforting. It may seem logical to some people, and it may even seem like the obvious solution to accounting for the universe. But if that is so, then (in the absence of evidence for it) there is little to separate it from a creation myth. In fact the multiverse can be thought of as just a new version of a creation myth, which has all the appearance features to seem sufficiently scientific and un-mythic to be acceptable to those of a more discerning scientific palette.
Overall, this is an interesting book to read, as it brings together, sets of issues which are often scattered across different topics and arguments. By focusing on the single issue of the multiverse itself (rather than on some other issue as an excuse for appealing to a multiverse) it enables readers to reflect on the idea of the multiverse itself, without the presence of the factors which would otherwise motivate likes and dislikes of the idea
I would have rated the book 5 stars if possible, but the book is currently classified (incorrectly) as un-published, so ratings are restricted.
Displaying 1 of 1 review