Re: BIBLE: Quantum computers & Many Worlds Hypoth. (fwd)

David Campbell (bivalve@email.unc.edu)
Tue, 27 Aug 1996 17:35:50 -0500

10^500 calculations do not need multiple universes worth of atoms if you
can recycle them.
However, the idea of multiple universes certainly raises
interesting theological questions. The problem lies in what "all POSSIBLE
universes" means. Assuming that all of these universes are under God's
rule, there are certainly universes which we can imagine but which He
probably would not allow.
Nevertheless, practically any imaginable moral condition of the
inhabitants of a universe is easily reconciled with Christianity: angels
and demons are perfect or hopelessly unregenerate, respectively, so the
existance of non-supernatural versions of either seems possible. As for a
partially fallen world, like our own, it is perfectly possible that going
to all peoples includes non-humans, and we just happen to live where the
Gospel started (the anthropic principle!). (This is largely a paraphrase
of C. S. Lewis' discussion of the nature of life on other planets, rather
than rapid thought on my part).