The calculation of probabilities supplies an answer to this question.
The greater the number of worlds, the greater will be the probability
that the forces of nature have given birth to an organisation like
that of the Earth. Now the real number of worlds surpasses all human
calculation, either written or possible to be written. If we could
understand what "infinite" means, we might venture to say that this
number is infinite. I concluded, then, that there is a very high
probability in favour of the existence of many worlds exactly like the
Earth, on the surface of which the same history is accomplished, and
the same succession of historical events takes place; worlds which are
inhabited by identically the same species of vegetables and animals,
and the same humanity, and where men and families like our own, I doubt
not, exist.
In the second place, I asked myself if another world analogous to
the Earth might not also be symmetrical to it; and then I worked out
the geometry of the problem, and the metaphysical theory of images.
I arrived at the conclusion that it was _possible_ for the world in
question to be like the Earth, but in an inverse form. When you look
at yourself in a mirror, you notice that the ring on your right hand
appears to be on the ring-finger of your left hand. This explains the
symbol. If you wink your right eye, your reflection winks the left
eye; when you advance your right arm, your image advances the left
arm. It is not impossible that in the infinity of the stars a world
exists exactly the converse of the terrestrial world. Undoubtedly in an
_infinity_ of worlds the non-existence of a similar world, perhaps of
millions of them, would be the real impossibility. Nature of necessity
repeats herself, reproduces herself, but still under all forms plays
the game of creation. I thought therefore that the world on which I saw
those things was not the Earth, but a globe like the Earth, the history
of which was precisely the opposite of yours.
QUÆRENS. I myself have had the idea also that it might have been as you
say. But was it not easy for you to make sure of it by ascertaining
whether it was the Earth or another star that you had before your eyes,
by examining its astronomical position?
[Sidenote: The solution of the problem.]