Robert Krulwich

It has to do with more than one universe.

You know this, we've talked about it before, that there is a vogue now for the idea that instead of one universe encompassing everything, there might be more than one.

Now, in this view of things, there could be not just one universe or three or 19.

There could be 10,000.

There could be trillions.

There could be an infinite number.

And here's the crucial thing.

Each and every one of these universes can be different from its neighboring.

Some of them might have atoms, some of them might not have atoms.

You could have a universe with lots of stars, some with no stars, some could be made of Munster cheese.

I don't know.

The fundamental properties of each universe could be very different.

That's exactly right.

And that's the key to Alan Lightman's argument.

Well, then, going back to the beginning of our conversation, if a physicist's job is to explore everything, that is the universe, now the universe has just been demoted to a sub-universe, then...

When you get your diploma from a great university, the president of the university says, my friends, we are gathered here to meet the people who have earned the credentials to describe the sub-universe.

A little bit of what we could know.

It's like you've been demoted.

You thought that you were going to get to learn about everything, your words, and now it turns out that everything is sub.

Johannes Kepler was an astronomer and a kind of mapper of the solar system.