Editing Multiverse (section)

== Occam's razor ==
Proponents and critics disagree about how to apply [[Occam's razor]]. Critics argue that to postulate an almost infinite number of unobservable universes, just to explain our own universe, is contrary to Occam's razor.<ref>{{cite book |last=Trinh |first=Xuan Thuan |title=Science & the Search for Meaning: Perspectives from International Scientists |date=2006 |publisher=[[Templeton Foundation]] |isbn=978-1-59947-102-0 |editor=Staune |editor-first=Jean |location=West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania |page=186}}</ref> However, proponents argue that in terms of [[Kolmogorov complexity]] the proposed multiverse is simpler than a single idiosyncratic universe.<ref name="TegmarkPUstaple"/>

For example, multiverse proponent [[Max Tegmark]] argues: {{quotation|text=[A]n entire [[Statistical ensemble (mathematical physics)|ensemble]] is often much simpler than one of its members. This principle can be stated more formally using the notion of [[algorithmic information]] content. The algorithmic information content in a number is, roughly speaking, the length of the shortest computer program that will produce that number as output. For example, consider the [[Set (mathematics)|set]] of all [[integer]]s. Which is simpler, the whole set or just one number? Naively, you might think that a single number is simpler, but the entire set can be generated by quite a trivial computer program, whereas a single number can be hugely long. Therefore, the whole set is actually simpler... (Similarly), the higher-level multiverses are simpler. Going from our universe to the Level I multiverse eliminates the need to specify [[initial condition]]s, upgrading to Level II eliminates the need to specify [[physical constants]], and the Level IV multiverse eliminates the need to specify anything at all... A common feature of all four multiverse levels is that the simplest and arguably most elegant theory involves parallel universes by default. To deny the existence of those universes, one needs to complicate the theory by adding experimentally unsupported processes and ad hoc postulates: [[finite space]], [[Wavefunction collapse|wave function collapse]] and ontological asymmetry. Our judgment therefore comes down to which we find more wasteful and inelegant: many worlds or many words. Perhaps we will gradually get used to the weird ways of our cosmos and find its strangeness to be part of its charm.<ref name="TegmarkPUstaple"/><ref>{{cite journal | date = May 2003 | title = Parallel universes. Not just a staple of science fiction, other universes are a direct implication of cosmological observations | url = https://cds.cern.ch/record/604580| journal = Scientific American | volume = 288 | issue = 5| pages = 40–51 | doi=10.1038/scientificamerican0503-40 | pmid=12701329|arxiv = astro-ph/0302131 |bibcode = 2003SciAm.288e..40T | last1 = Tegmark | first1 = M. }}</ref>|author=Max Tegmark}}