...Would agree the 'whole 'verse' encompassing every adjacent 'universe' in the 'multiverse' is likely infinitely old. Thus when they say this universe is ~13.4 billion years old I think they're referringmore to the age since the big bang moreso than 'everything everywhere.' ...
My objection to the idea of multiple "adjacent universes" goes beyond simple semantics. I believe the adjacent tiers within a multi-tiered structure would be more properly characterized as 'aspects of the whole' than as autonomous 'wholes' in their own rights, particularly if their exterior relationships to one another have any bearing on the interior workings of the tiers. In my view, what's dependent on something outside of itself can't rightfully be viewed as either 'autonomous' or 'universal' in nature.
...The universe then is everything we can actually measure. But because we can't see further in it than it is old (not more than about 13 billion ly, last 400k ly being 'fogged' despite the diameter being much larger because of the big bang event) thus, while the universe is 80 Gly across, we can only see 13Gly of it instead of all 80. In 67 billion more years we'll see all 80 like. But even then that isn't all there is. ...
Well, I suggest that whatever lies beyond the "80 like" is part and parcel to the whole, whether we can "actually measure it" from humanity's perspective or not.
It sounds to me like you're defining 'the universe' from your perspective inside an opaque bubble, simultaneously excluding the possibility that things or states of existence outside of it are "actually measur[able]" while affirming nonetheless that such things/states may actually exist "adjacent[ly]" in relation to your bubble ...*and may even have
measurable effects upon it.
*
pushing the perceived need for ideas like 'dark flow', ETC...
...A mind-blowing phenomenae being observed is that all the galaxies and matter in regions of the universe are being 'pulled' towards the 'border' as if something outside the bubble of the universe is attracting it there. Another universe as it were. ...
What you're describing there is an expansionist-only interpretation of the observed phenomenon.
It could be that the
apparently increasing 'spaces' between groups of cosmological material are better explained by a different model/paradigm than the ones with which 'mainstream science' has lumbered its theorists in recent centuries.
But what if the apparent expansion of space were just that -- an
apparition?
Think of two stationary but rapidly deflating balloons in a box. Would the 'space' between them be 'expanding' as they deflate; or would disparate objects be decreasing in size in the constant space marked out by the interior dimensions of the box? Imagine further from the perspective of a microbe on the exterior surface of one of the balloons. The other balloon may appear to be moving away (and red-shifting in the process), despite the stationary aspects of the deflation for both balloons. Remove that stationary aspect and the occurrence of blue-shifting could be accounted for as well, so long as the speed of the directional motion exceeded the rapidity of the deflation.
As crazy and counter-intuitive as it may seem to the indoctrinated, there's nothing but
the orthodoxy standing in the way of such an interpretation of the observable evidence.
"Dark flow", meet
Occam's Razor.
...I actually postulated in school that the universe might be like galaxies. Just one of many or an infinite amount. Seems like whatever scale you look at, there's always something smaller or bigger. So why should the universe be the max scale? Why not put the universe in a box and around it put other universes?...
The better question might be, "
WHY put 'the universe' in a box, when doing so not only places limits on its
universality but forces an infinitely superfluous use of the term; ...ESPECIALLY when the
simpler notion of a single universe with many aspects does neither of those things?!
Think the reason is science likes hard and fast limits as with Planck Length and Planck Temperature. At some point, they like things to be reduced to a minimum, or at least a useful minimum.
As far as I'm concerned, ascribing a
singular totality to THE totality of existence that is 'the universe' is less a matter of pragmatism than logic. Even if there are an infinite many objects, aspects, and states of affairs that comprise the totality of existence, the all-inclusive connotation would remain logically consistent with the overarching singular nature of 'the whole', not too dissimilar to the infinite many iterations available to the singular 'closed system' that is
Koch's Snowflake.
All of that said, I think you and I may have similar views as to the nature of the universe, although we'd probably use different terms to describe them.
