The theory is written in the title: infinite universes.
The Rabbi’s answer: Sometimes I don’t notice the title.
A. It doesn’t matter how many support it. What matters is whether it has decisive evidence. What evidence is there for infinite universes? What empirical test is there for this at all, that would define it as a scientific hypothesis?
B. If we adopt the language of the atheists, then in one of these universes there is surely a Flying Spaghetti Monster. If so, why not simply believe that there is only one universe and one monster that created it? Especially since the creator could be something less bizarre than a Flying Spaghetti Monster.
C. Not clear (but already answered).
D. It should be added that there is no reason there would be atoms there at all. The formation of protons is not something that has to happen in every universe, even if it is very similar to ours. Certainly if the elementary particles there are different, it won’t be atoms. In fact, it is not clear what identical physical substrate one can propose as existing in all these universes, and why such a thing should exist at all, and if it does exist, who is responsible for it.

And to Elikim, who probably doesn’t know the site: the words “The Rabbi’s answer” were said jokingly (and for a certain purpose), and the answer is of course my responsibility alone.

The questioner’s answer (I assume Yishai probably does know the site):
Not true. Everett’s specific theory speaks about the splitting of the universe at every collapse of the wave function into all possible outcomes. The physics is identical in all of them, and gods and suchlike certainly won’t arise there.

Ah, now I understand what this is about. How is this connected to creation at all? After all, nobody claimed that creation is proven from the quantum events that occurred since the Big Bang. As I understand it, this theory does not even purport to talk about the Big Bang, in which everything was created, and it does not explain at all the laws and constants that are finely tuned for the creation of life.
I see on Wikipedia that it says this also solves the anthropic principle problem, but it doesn’t explain how. Is the claim that the constants are the product of quantum events? Is there any proof of that?

I don’t think anyone says that the constants were somehow determined because of the multiple universes. At most one can argue that if so many different universes were created, then almost certainly in one of them life would arise, and therefore there is nothing to be surprised about (a completely idiotic argument, but still I have a feeling that this is the intention).

Honorable Rabbi, it seems to me that I did not emphasize the theory enough, or explain it clearly enough. The theory is that every time there is even some chance of any change in the world at the subatomic level—the entire universe splits (in its wave function), and therefore, since according to physics a theoretical world that would indeed be identical to ours but with a different wave function would be a completely parallel world (with absolutely no ability to pass to it or from it), this theory simply assumes that such a world exists—or more precisely, infinitely many such worlds (infinitely many possible wave functions into which it can collapse)—in order to explain why the atom’s wave function collapses דווקא into the form we see in our world and not into the infinitely many other options, and that is its whole innovation. If so, there is another world in which I am sitting and writing, and everything proceeds according to the wonderful laws of causality, and suddenly the world’s wave function crystallizes in such a way that the air above me undergoes a drastic change in its atoms (completely physically possible, but so rare that we would have to wait more than the lifetime of this universe to see it, according to our experience thus far), and turns into a hippopotamus, which falls on me and crushes me. In another universe my luck is even worse, and my heart dissolves into gas. In infinitely many other universes, infinitely many things, good and bad, strange beyond all imagination, happen. In one universe, for example, life suddenly begins in empty space (and since this is some numerical percentage out of infinity—there are infinitely many such worlds, and infinitely many worlds in which man is the ruler of planet Earth, and infinitely many in which the snails are the rulers, and infinitely many in which a hippopotamus falls on my head). This is why one cannot—or at least it is very reasonable not necessarily—to infer from all sorts of events that appear to contradict the laws of physics (only the physics of our universe!) the existence of metaphysical entities beyond the universe, because with absolute certainty among all these infinite worlds there are infinitely many universes in which the revelation at Mount Sinai occurred, even if we believe every detail of its Torah description literally; and one could even say there are infinitely many in which in the middle of the revelation at Mount Sinai, a hippopotamus suddenly fell onto smoking and burning Mount Sinai (and was immediately roasted to death…).

The screaming question is of course: so what the hell are we doing in all our laboratories and universities and faculties? Studying a world whose laws can radically change at any moment and turn us all into Flying Spaghetti Monsters?? The answer that seemed simple to me (and very postmodern, admittedly, and this despite the fact that I already know of the Rabbi’s well-known “fondness” for this crazy style of thought…)—we believe. We believe and hope. We believe with greater devotion than any religion that the moon does not turn into cheese when we turn around, that we are not all dreaming in Matrix cells, that we are not bananas with vision problems who are convinced that they are human beings (okay, I got carried away… sorry). We do not know, and never will know with certainty, what will happen tomorrow morning and whether all the laws of nature we have discovered are not just an illusion. But that is exactly the point of science—to investigate the world on the basis of axioms, impossible to prove or refute, but without them—we truly are like little children before the world. Therefore we assume, and only assume, everything we know, and also, of course, its continued existence.
Again, sorry, of course, for the length, but it is important to me that the Rabbi understand me fully so that he can answer me to the best of his ability (which I value greatly).

I don’t think a hippopotamus can appear out of thin air even according to quantum theory (for that you don’t specifically need the multiple universes. The multiple-universes explanation is only an interpretation that changes nothing, and merely claims that the possibilities that did not occur occurred in the duplicated universe).

Hello.
These are science-fiction speculations (bad ones) that do not have a shred of evidence and not a shred of logic. Chariots of the Gods by von Däniken, literally. But beyond all that, even if all this were true, it still would not solve the problem.
Suppose there is a random universe-generator, quantum branching, or any other mechanism. Who created it? After all, all these imaginary multiple worlds exist because of properties of quantum theory. In an empty world with no system of laws, nothing would happen. Therefore the question of who created quantum theory, which supposedly creates universes for us out of nothing, remains exactly as it was.
And still, I can’t resist adding that it seems strange to me that this collection of absurd, baseless hallucinations is put forward by men of science in the name of scientific and empirical rationalism, as an alternative to a simple common-sense conclusion: if there is a complex world, then there is probably someone who assembled and created it. That’s all. In what way is the Mad Hatter’s tea party with assumptions plucked from thin air superior to a collection of bizarre creatures and bizarre laws and bizarre universes that nobody has ever seen anything of, for some reason. Ah, you can’t see them, because they are different universes with different laws. If this is not exactly Russell’s celestial teapot style argument (which he accused believers of), I do not know what such a teapot is.
By the same token, I could say that every hippopotamus I have seen is not descended from hippopotamuses but from quantum branchings (which, of course, nobody has ever seen anything of) that had sexual relations with demons, and that is what came out. Are you serious? Is this really a question? The fact that some creature writes pseudo-scientific hallucinations may perhaps have literary value. By the way, as far as I know, no serious scientist relates to this nonsense. It’s good for ideological atheists and science-fiction writers.

Hello Rabbi. Seemingly, regarding a world different from yours, and all the more so a system that includes your world itself within it, you cannot know anything. It may be that there systems can exist without a creator (aside from the possibility that the system is primordial and ageless and without a creator by its very nature).
And regarding how widespread the opinion is—the Rabbi is invited to look at the English Wikipedia article at the beginning and see that it says there that the view is “often considered mainstream in the field,” at the following link—

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Many-worlds_interpretation
In any case, I definitely understand why one would not arrive at this opinion if it were not one of the only 2 scientific options for explaining all of quantum theory (see Schrödinger’s cat and its implications—the experiment leads to only 3 possible explanations: there is an observing God [albeit a neutral one, absent reason to say otherwise]; there are infinite worlds; or we are unable to understand physics in its entirety with the human mind, at least not yet).
And regarding the claim that common sense says complexity indicates a creator even on the scale of the world—I simply cannot believe I found an intelligent person who holds this ancient and strange claim, which everyone has supposedly already turned into a joke and a mockery. Apparently the Rabbi’s basic assumptions are fundamentally different from my own. I would be more than happy to read the Rabbi’s response to these words of mine, but I think I will not be able to continue the discussion without carefully reading all of the Rabbi’s words in his notebooks. I would be very happy to return after I finish reading them (with great interest), and ask the Rabbi new questions in accordance with whatever becomes clear to me after the reading. Thank you very much, Honorable Rabbi!

Indeed. Even in my own world I cannot know anything. Skeptical doubts can be raised about anything. By the same token, you could wonder why assume that the laws of physics also apply on the moon or in other places in the universe. The accepted assumption is that everything is universal until proven otherwise. In particular causality, which is not based on experience at all (as I mentioned), and if we apply it here, why should we not apply it everywhere else?!

How widespread the opinion is changes nothing. Since I am not fed by Wikipedia but by direct acquaintance, among the scientists I know this is esoterica. Moreover, it explains nothing in quantum theory, and certainly not “all” of quantum theory. This is what is called hanging what was taught on what was never taught—explaining one strange phenomenon by means of another absurd hallucination.

Anyone who does not hold this is not intelligent. That is almost a definition in my eyes. So I can say that intelligent people necessarily do hold this. True, there are sometimes intelligent people in certain fields who display foolish thinking in other fields.
By the way, the very resort to all the absurd fantasies you mentioned indicates that people do have those intuitions about cosmic order. Otherwise, why do they seek explanations of the type of multiple universes and other hallucinations? Let them simply say: that’s just how it is, period.

If the multiple-universes model is formulated axiomatically and with mathematical precision (according to Wikipedia), doesn’t that mean it is necessarily true?
And more generally, does whatever is formulated mathematically have to exist in some ideal world, or does it only mean that it is not a logical contradiction?

I did not understand the difference between the two options. Everything that is non-contradictory exists in some ideal (imaginary) world. That is the deontic meaning of possibility.

[[ By “deontic meaning” do you mean the implied meaning? Sorry, my lexicon is still in its infancy 🙂 ]]
Seemingly, one could say that if the many-worlds interpretation is not contradictory, then it is indeed true in one of those worlds and maybe also in our world, and we would not be able to say that it doesn’t have a shred of logic.

I used the wrong term. It is the modal meaning, not the deontic meaning. See Column 301. When speaking about something being necessary or possible, one can translate this into the language of possible worlds. When one claims that it is possible that there is a fairy with three wings, the meaning is that among all the worlds that can be imagined or conceived, there are some in which there is a fairy with three wings. The claim that it is necessary that such a fairy exists translates into saying that in all conceivable worlds there is such a fairy. Note well: not that such a world actually exists. This is a fiction whose purpose is to give semantic meaning to the concepts of necessary or possible. See the above-mentioned column.