One Universe, Many Potentials: A Relational Reframing of the Multiverse

One Universe, Many Potentials: A Relational Reframing of the Multiverse

In popular physics, the idea of a multiverse often arises as a way to explain quantum superposition, cosmic fine-tuning, or the apparent arbitrariness of physical constants. In these accounts, variant outcomes of quantum events, or divergent cosmic histories, are reified into parallel universes. These universes are treated as equally real, each unfolding its own instantiation of physics, regardless of whether they are ever observed or meaningfully related.

The relational model offers a radically different interpretation. It begins with the premise that space and time are not observer-independent containers in which events happen. Rather, space and time are relations between instances. They emerge from the unfolding of processes and the construal of those processes by meaning makers. From this view, potential is not the same as actuality. What is potential is what could be instantiated under particular relational conditions; what is actual is what has been instantiated through observation or interaction.

So when we speak of variant quantum possibilities or alternative cosmic configurations, we are not compelled to posit countless actualised universes. Instead, we understand these as variant potentials—real within the system of meaning potential, but not instantiated until and unless a meaning-making process actualises them.

To imagine a multiverse, in this sense, is to mistake the richness of potential for a proliferation of actual worlds. It is to treat meaning potential as though it had already been enacted, bypassing the conditions of instantiation. But potential cannot be separated from the processes that make it actual. What appears as a branching of worlds is better understood, in relational terms, as the branching of possibilities—within a single, evolving, and meaning-saturated universe.

The allure of the multiverse reflects something profound: a sense that reality is richer than what is immediately instantiated. But the relational model honours that richness without fragmenting reality into disconnected universes. It sees the cosmos as one unfolding totality, structured not by an inventory of things, but by the potential for meaning—awaiting the presence of an observer, a construal, a process.

Closing Reflection:

The multiverse becomes, in this light, a kind of mirror—not of reality, but of our imaginative reach. It reminds us that not all that is possible must be actual, and not all that is actual must be repeated elsewhere. There is one universe. It is enough. It is vast with potential, rich in relation, and always becoming.