Heller M, Woodin W.H. (eds.) Infinity. New research frontiers (CUP, 2011)(ISBN 1107003873)(O)(327s)_MAml_

228 infinities in cosmologythe world is but a “mind of God” implemented in the work of creation (or rather thatthe mathematical structure of the world is our approximation to the “mind of God”). Ifso, then every mathematical model, which has a reference to the real world, also has atheological significance in that it gives us a hint of what a certain aspect of the “mind ofGod” could look like. In this approach, no “infinite properties” of a given world modelhave more major theological significance than its other properties, except that, fromthe psychological point of view, they can, more than the other ones, orient or elevateour thinking to the horizon of transcendence.As mentioned previously, one of the motives to create the multiverse idea was toneutralize its philosophical significance: if there exists an infinite number of universesin which all possible initial conditions (and other parameters characterizing a givenworld) are somewhere realized, then no intelligent design is necessary, and God, asthe Great Designer, seems superfluous. Indeed, such a reasoning makes the idea ofdesign irrelevant as far as cosmological considerations are concerned, but it does noteliminate from theological (or philosophical) considerations the need of the ultimateunderstanding of reality. In the case of the multiverse, the metaphysical question “Whydoes there exist something rather than nothing?” seems to be even more relevant (or atleast more appealing) than in the case of a single world. If the Christian idea of creationcontains the answer to this question in the case of a single universe, it does the samein the case of the multiverse. To put this simply: for God it is equally easy to createan infinite number of universes as it is to create a single universe. And even if this is alittle more difficult, God could not be interested in anything less than infinity.AcknowledgmentsI express my gratitude to Anthony Aguirre for his careful reading of the manuscriptand penetrating remarks.ReferencesBosshardt, B. 1976. On the b-boundary of the closed Friedmann model. Communications in MathematicalPhysics 46: 263–68.Carr, B. (ed). 2007. Universe or Multiverse? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Dadaczyński, J. 2002. Mathematics in the Eyes of the Philosopher. Kraków: OBI; Tarnów: Bibls(in Polish).Descartes, R. 1641. Meditations on First Philosophy. Translated by J. Veitch. Third Meditation, n.24. http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/descartes/meditations/meditations.html.Earman, J. 1995. Bangs, Crunches, Whimpers, and Shrieks. New York: Oxford University Press.Ellis, G. 2007. Multiverses, description, uniqueness and testing. In Universe or Multiverse? B. Carr(ed.), pp. 387–409. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Geroch, R. 1978. General Relativity from A to B. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Geroch, R., and Horowitz, G. T. 1979. Global structure of spacetime. In General Relativity: AnEinstein Centenary Survey, S. W. Hawking and W. Israel (ed.), pp. 212–93. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.Hadot, P. 1987. Exercices spirituals et philosophie antique. Paris: Études Augustinnienes.