I watched a very cool show on the Discovery Science channel regarding String Theory and Parallel Universes. Back in the 80s and 90s String Theory emerged as a way to explain how the universe was created. It was revolutionary until it started to break down into 5 different theories. At this time people were ready to dismiss this when the theory of 11 dimensions surfaced. String Theory is based on 10 dimensions and when the 11th gained support all 5 theories came back together. This new theory became the M Theory and brought the idea of parallel universes back from the crazies. The idea here is that within the 11th dimension, membranes exist that ripple and when membranes collide explosions occur. This has been used to explain the cingularity of the Big Bang, how did it happen. If you accept the M Theory as an explaination of the Big Bang it leads to the possibility of other universes existing all within little bubbles floating around between the membranes. There are also multiple membranes floating around, all different shapes and colliding with one another.

If this is true then within the 11th dimension exist multiple universes and the idea of a parallel universe. There may be multiple parallel universes compared to ours, you may or may not exist in that one, Bush may not be president, and Elvis is still alive.

My question is if a collison between these membranes which are all the strings of matter tied together explains the big bang, how did these membranes come to exist? The show didn't go into this but I found a few websites that explains these theories.

http://superstringtheory.com/index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-theory_(simplified)