In “’Multiverse’ theory suggested by microwave background” (BBC News , 3 August 2011), Jason Palmer tells us, “The idea that other universes – as well as our own – lie within “bubbles” of space and time has received a boost”:
However, Dr Peiris stressed that the four regions were “not at a high statistical significance” – that more data would be needed to be assured of the existence of the “multiverse”.
“Finding just four patches is not necessarily going to give you a good probability on the full sky,” she explained to BBC News. “That’s not statistically strong enough to either rule it out or to say that there is a collision.”
Dr Peiris said that data from the Planck telescope – a next-generation space telescope designed to study the CMB with far greater sensitivity – would put the idea on a firmer footing, or refute it. However, the data from Planck cannot be discussed publicly before January 2013.
Intriguingly, we are told, “Data from the Planck telescope should resolve the question once and for all.”
Hey, Jason, tell us another one. If Planck doesn’t find the multiverse, the cosmologists will just have to make one up, right? Too much is at stake. Only in a multiverse could everything they want be true, and all at the same time.