Infinite universes and moral responsibility.

[Laughing Man]

man took me forever to think up a title fitting the context so bonus points to anyone who can think up a better one.

warning very minor bioshock spoiler!

I'm currently playing bioshock: burial at sea and I'm a couple of lazy hours in and it got me thinking, If there were infinite universes and you had the ability to travel between them and sufficient ability to effect major turning points in history (superman's powers for example) and save a few billion lives what would you do?

I'd do nothing, as the premise you put forward only works in a multi verse theory were different universes split as a result of decisions made by humans. The reality is that you would get split universes from events such as a small gravitational effect on a proto atom or put another way you would be more likely to find more universes with no obvious differences to our own and even more universes in which their was nothing at all.

 

[cleric of the order]

I always liked the idea of infinite parallel universes.
I could see what I'd be like in a million different ways, what ways my being could be stretched within the confines of causality.
See how the worlds change and fall.
See the infinite scope of reality in all it's unmasked forms.
Also if there are infinite universes then likely there are universes that have existed in fiction.
Moral responsibility, well just as long someone doesn't use that ability for evil then I don't see the problem. It isn't your responsibility to right every wrong and mess with fate (having infinite universes based on different determinist choices inevitably means free will if not illusory, is very near it). The only good choice is see is to wander the cosmos attempt to learn everything and with that knowledge assist people.

 

[cleric of the order]

I always liked the idea of infinite parallel universes.
I could see what I'd be like in a million different ways, what ways my being could be stretched within the confines of causality.
See how the worlds change and fall.
See the infinite scope of reality in all it's unmasked forms.
Also if there are infinite universes then likely there are universes that have existed in fiction.
Moral responsibility, well just as long someone doesn't use that ability for evil then I don't see the problem. It isn't your responsibility to right every wrong and mess with fate (having infinite universes based on different determinist choices inevitably means free will if not illusory, is very near it). The only good choice is see is to wander the cosmos attempt to learn everything and with that knowledge assist people.

 

[Spacewolf]

It's satisfactory anyway but unless you can assert it will cancel a worse cataclysm, the most interesting example I can think of is a world without the americans bombing Hiroshima, with the soviets eventually learning how to create a bomb and having a full scale nuclear apocalypse since no one realizes the scale of destruction.

The initial tests of atomic weapons actually made it blatantly obvious their destructive power. We didn't need to bomb Hiroshima or Nagasaki to find out exactly how destructive they are, nor how much latent radiation and fallout they produce. Not using the atomic bombs on Japan would have been a disaster, as they likely wouldn't have surrendered had we not. Millions and Millions more would have died on both sides, it's also possible that Japanese culture could have been wiped out, at least as we know it, in the process. Not only that but the taking of Japan and Japanese held territory through out Asia would have been such a bloody process, and would have taken years.

One further point is that the Japanese people were ready to commit mass suicide if the Americans landed on the shores of Japan. Their propaganda basically said it'd be better to kill yourself then let the dirty barbaric Americans rape and torture you to death.

I don't think that was the point he was making, the point was that while yes all that would have happened a Nuclear war would have then been more likely simply due to the lack of a "Human" component to allow people to take in what it actually meant to pursue nuclear war. (Also the Soviets where already making ready to attack Japan from the east so it would likely have lead to another Germany situation at best providing another hotspot for the cold war.)

 

[Niflhel]

If an infinite amount of universes exists, then surely there's an infinite amount of "I" who've traveled to an infinite amount of universes, changing the outcome of an infinite amount of events. In fact, an infinite amount of "I" have already changed all events that happened within this very universe an infinite number of times (because there's an infinite amount of "I" who possesses the ability to both travel through different universes and time), and looking at the current state of the world I'd like to ask myself: Is that the best you can do?!
If this is the best an infite amount of "I" can accomplish, then surely, me contributing would be pointless.

Here is my new infinite universe theory: There's an infinite amount of them, yet they're all 100% (right down to the atomic level and below) identical. Through the chaos of an infinite amount of time travelers changing all the events, what emerges is a sort of equilibrium state that cannot be changed and thus what we experience is the truly neutral (deterministic?) outcome of events.

Of course, all this hinge on whether or not traveling between universes and through time is an actual posibility in any of the universes. But if you start to impose restrictions on what can and cannot happen, can you truly call it infinite (not in numbers, but in the original sense of infinite outcomes) any more?

Now I'm confused. Don't blame me for going off-topic, it was bound to happen because of the equilibrium state!

fact: This post contains nearly an infinite amount of the word "infinite".

 

[Chessrook44]

Here's the thing about an Infinite number of universes.

Everyone's right. And wrong.

There's an infinite number wherin you DO do exactly what you say, and it works.

An infinite number wherin you do exactly what you say, and it doesn't.

An infinite number where someone else does it.

An infinite number where it's possible but nobody does it.

An infinite number where it's impossible.

An infinite number with degrees of possibility that we cannot even conceive.

Infinite means Infinite, and the moment you put on some sort of limitation you remove the concept of infinity. It's not that it doesn't matter in the grand scheme, it's that it's going to happen anyway as well as not happen anyway, and even with degrees of happening we cannot conceive. Your only choice is which universe you choose to be a part of... the one where you do something, or the one where you don't?

 

[Kathinka]

Well, there are an infinite number of alternate universes out there, so everything essentially becomes meaningless.

So I'd go find the alternate universe where I married Natalie Portmen, murder my alternate self, and start a happy family with two daughters and a son.

And

This guy for universe president. He knows what's up.

 

[Mister K]

To tell the truth, I don't really want to change anything in past and/or paralel realities. I'd rather avoid bad ones and enjoy good ones as some kind of huge amusement park. Why make changes to something that is functioning as it is supposed to?

 

[DEAD34345]

Infinite universes pretty much kills any kind of utilitarian sense of morals, I think. If there are an infinite amount of universes, you cannot affect the total amount of good, or happiness, or "utility" at all. You could cheat and declare your own universe the "real" one, but I can't think of any way that could actually be justified as the "right" thing to do.

Some other kinds of morality would be OK though. If what matters is not the consequences of your actions, but the actions themselves, then the presence of multiple universes wouldn't matter at all.

I don't know what I'd personally do if there were an infinite amount of universes. Seems like I'd just have to give up on my current sense of morality altogether, and look out for my (same universe) family, friends, and anyone else I happened to specifically care about.