Multiverse

Universe. Not long ago, people held the conception that the sun revolves the Earth, and that we live on a flat planet, a disc to be precise. The stars were only known as little dots of light spread out on the mosaic called sky. I guess before that time, living on a globe was only a fragment of one's imagination. One could have only imagined a universe where the earth wasn't in the centre, and the stars are huge balls of gas, way much larger than the puny earth. Imagination thrives on ideas. Ideas thrive on imagination. This intermingling of ideas and imagination is what makes them special, and not everybody's ball game.

I had read this somewhere before, but I am not sure who the author is; otherwise I would have given him due credit. To the best of my knowledge, it should be Scott Adams, but I am not sure. Anyway, I am not the type of writer who research their sources and ideas. I am the type who simply write down their ideas. I was reading about this new way to perceive the universe. Before stating that, I will like to ask you if you know how motion pictures work? Well, let me tell you again for the sake of clarity. Motion pictures consist of still images, called frames, arranged sequentially, where each frame differs from the last only by a slight measure. These frames are flashed upon a screen at a very fast rate (24 per second). Due to the human eye's perception of vision (an image seen by the eye creates an impression on our eye that lasts there for 1/10th of a second approximately), we cannot distinguish between the successive images, and confuse that to be a continuous motion picture. You see, the way we perceive the thing is wrong, not the way we know it. Now that I have told you, the next time you see a motion picture you are not going to see separate frames; just a continuous movie.

This brings me to my point. We perceive our life as something continuous - always changing, ever so slightly from the last instant. Could it be that our life too is like the motion picture? I mean, maybe there isn't just one universe, but infinitely many of those (let's call that a multiverse), arranged sequentially and each one differing from the last one ever so slightly. Of course, there are many variables to be considered in an universe - starting from the various living beings to the various inanimate objects and also the behavioural moods of the living beings etc. So for each universe in this multiverse, there will be infinitely many universes at the next instant. And for each of the next, there will be infinitely more later on too. So you see, I propose a system of infinite universes, that is ever growing. Which brings me to my next point.

Assuming this model of a multiverse holds, why do we traverse through these universes in a particular way. I mean while I am sitting at my desk and typing this document, why am I always here? Why can't I keep switching places throughout the process of writing this article. Or for that matter, why are we the way we are, generically speaking. Assuming my notion of the multiverse is valid, is there some force controlling our travel through the universes? Or is it that we are instinctively programmed to function in a certain particular way, that this multiverse has an order, which is difficult to overcome; or for that matter, can it really be overcome?

Could it really be possible for us to traverse through the universes the way we choose to? And what would we call the entity which traverses through these universes? A soul? Is that soul truly separate from this body then, as many people have said over and over again? Do we have a control over the way we live, partially, if not fully. When one of our forefathers said 'You make your own future', did he mean it?