How many universes "branch off" from a "quantum event", and in how many of them is the cat dead vs alive, and what about non-50/50 scenarios, and please answer so that a physics dummy can maybe kind of understand?
(Is it just 1 with the live cat and 1 with the dead one?)
If The Road to Reality (from which the term omniverse, or "omnium", originally sprung) is not "mainstream", then pray tell what is.
This is a technical aspect of the discussion, and is not contradictory. The point should be clear if one considers the possibility of flipping 100 heads in a row on a fair two-sided coin. For all intents and purposes, the probability is 0, but that it may happen is not in the least prevented or negated were we to consider an infinite ("long run") flipping of coins. Pretty straightforward and not contradictory.
Had I devoted the energy to a full-length discussion of the topic, this probably wouldn't be an issue, but (in general) it should be clear that the number of such worlds (or universes) should be uncountably infinite, not countably infinite. That is, the cardinality would be on the order of Aleph-1, at the very least. And I seriously doubt that had any bearing on prase's original point.
I guess you could read on the topic, if you're interested. I've already suggested at least two (namely, Hawking and Penrose). Do I really have to do all the work? I need to eat and making a living.
There is no "tone" here. That is a mind-projection fallacy. If anyone liberated of mammalian instinct can read what I say without imputing emotional overtones thereto, then it should be obvious that my points consist in reasoned discourse without torrents of bluster at all. It's almost as if you people wish to say, "yeah, we can see you holding that 9mm, just waiting to bust a cap, and the foam dripping from your mouth". It's really rather cute.
Your last two sentences are interesting, but I'm currently short on time. Grant me that I will return to respond to them later. Thank you.
First, words and phrases become recognized in mainstream physics when they become widely used in publications, not when one well-known physicist uses them. There are 15 results on Google Scholar for a search of 'omniverse' within physics, and of those results, none has been cited more than three times.
Second, even within The Road to Reality - for which I have the first edition as an ebook - the word 'omni... (read more)