from the article:
"Proponents of the multiverse theory argue that it's the next logical step in the inflation story.
Detractors argue that it is not physics, but metaphysics -- that it is not science because it cannot be tested." Bingo!
We have a winner!
We cannot blame people for becoming confused about differences between scientific "fact" versus "law" versus "theory" versus "hypothesis" versus "S.W.A.G."*, when those are not clearly pointed out by most popular science reporters.
But ALL this multiverse-inflation bed-time story is at best SWAG, hoping desperately to become a respected, testable hypothesis.
Of course, there's no problem with that -- everyone loves a good bed-time story, but let us not confuse ourselves into thinking there's something more to it.
There's not. Yet.
*SWAG = scientific wild *ssed guess
The beauty in M-Theory is that reduces, naturally, to general relativity in the mathematical limit of everyday experience.
No other theoretical framework has ever wedded GR to the quantum realm so well. It is this that drives whole careers into M-Theory.
As more refinement is teased from the results so far at CERN’s big ring particle collider, particularly the almost certainty in having observed the Higgs boson, we’ll obtain more and more information about matter and energy’s sub-structure.
As there is no ‘ad hoc’ objection to the physics yet therein, it seems to me that at least some physicists and mathematicians should look into it.
Yes, even at the risk of their careers.