Is The Universe Fine Tuned for Human Life?

[We_Are_VENOM]

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to We_Are_VENOM in post #1]

More than a hundred different parameters for the universe must have values falling within narrowly defined ranges for physical life of any conceivable kind to exist." (see above article for list of parameters).

I only have time for a quick reply now, but the primary argument against this sort of thing is that life (at least the only life we know about now) was very late to the party ... by billions of years relative to the origin of the (or this) universe. So it is far more likely that life arose within a preexisting environment that became suitable for it, rather than the environment being tailored (or designed) specifically so that life could develop.

We only know of life on one planet ... Earth. It is an entirely negligible component of the entire universe (or even our own galaxy). If life, and especially human life, were the target of such a grand design as vast as the universe, why isn't it more common? If the universe were designed with us humans in mind, it seems awfully strange (not to mention a gigantic waste of space and matter) that we are (so far) completely unsuccessful at finding even a hint of evidence that life, especially intelligent life, may exist outside of Earth. A big part of that is the vast distances involved and our relative short time being able to even look and listen, but if life were the target of this grand design why is it not ubiquitous?

Earth formed about 4.6 billion years ago, long after all of the physical constants were established and the formation of millions or billions of galaxies and planets (as we now know ... the first exoplanet was only confirmed via observation in 1992 ... a measly 30 years ago). Which of the hundred or more "fine tuned" parameters are tailored for life, vs. those that determine everything else in the universe that is independent of life existing? If life never materialized, would any of these "fine tuned" parameters have different values ... even slightly? If so, which ones?

[brunumb]

2. Necessity: This option is a no-go..because the constants and parameters could have been any values..in other words, it wasn't necessary for the parameters to have those specific values at the onset of the big bang.

Assumes facts not in evidence. Please demonstrate that the constants and parameters could have been any values. So far, that is an unsupported assumption. The same goes for fine-tuning itself. We don't even know that any sort of tuning was involved since we don't have any deep knowledge of the actual process involved in the formation of the universe.

[We_Are_VENOM]

2. Necessity: This option is a no-go..because the constants and parameters could have been any values..in other words, it wasn't necessary for the parameters to have those specific values at the onset of the big bang.

Assumes facts not in evidence. Please demonstrate that the constants and parameters could have been any values. So far, that is an unsupported assumption.

Your post lacks substance, as usual.

Just the same ole atheistic "You have no evidence" 2-5 sentence quip.

Smh.

Anyways, the entire universe is contingent, it had a beginning..it didnt have to be here.

If the universe is contingent, then the laws which govern it also must also be contingent.

Life did not have to be here...and if life did not have to be here, then life isn't metaphysically necessary..which is the main/only point of option #2.

And btw, I am certainly not going to debate the finitude of the universe, not with you.

Why not? Because history has shown that you are either unwilling or incapable of having an in depth conversation about these subjects.

I may have such discussions with someone else, and I predict you will peek your head in the discussion for an occasional typical 4 sentence paragraph.

That is all you've done thus far during my tenure on this forum, and I don't expect anything different.

The same goes for fine-tuning itself. We don't even know that any sort of tuning was involved since we don't have any deep knowledge of the actual process involved in the formation of the universe.

I already addressed this (predicted it) in the latter part of the OP.

[brunumb]

[Replying to We_Are_VENOM in post #4]

In other words you are unable to support your assumption and have simply fallen back on the usual flippant dismissal. What? No emojis? Hubris!

Please demonstrate that the constants and parameters could have been any values. Unless you can your argument fails, regardless of your opinion of my style.

[We_Are_VENOM]

[Replying to We_Are_VENOM in post #4]

In other words you are unable to support your assumption and have simply fallen back on the usual flippant dismissal. What? No emojis? Hubris!

Please demonstrate that the constants and parameters could have been any values. Unless you can your argument fails, regardless of your opinion of my style.

What is that..3 sentences (not including one worded questions)?

Yup, looks about right...just as I predicted.

And I addressed your question...but you are too busy giving your typical automated "Your argument is unsupported" assertion to have noticed.

[We_Are_VENOM]

I only have time for a quick reply now, but the primary argument against this sort of thing is that life (at least the only life we know about now) was very late to the party ... by billions of years relative to the origin of the (or this) universe.

Irrelevant.

If a guy is building a car and the entire car is built, but he didn't drop the engine until a year after the car was built...does this prove that therefore, the car wasn't built?

No.

Non sequitur.

Cmon now, Doc. You can do better than that.

So it is far more likely that life arose within a preexisting environment that became suitable for it, rather than the environment being tailored (or designed) specifically so that life could develop.

Then that would be random chance, and the 10^10^123 probability makes it practically impossible.

And we know that isn't how entropy works...because if what you are suggesting is true, then that would mean that things became blindly (and mindlessly) ordered to the 10^10^123 degree, from a chaotic and disordered process...and we know from entropy that things tends to become disordered over time, certainly not ordered, and ESPECIALLY not to that degree.

So again, not happening.

We only know of life on one planet ... Earth.

And?

It is an entirely negligible component of the entire universe (or even our own galaxy). If life, and especially human life, were the target of such a grand design as vast as the universe, why isn't it more common?

The designer decides whether or not he wants his design to be common, or uncommon.

That isn't something the design decides.

If the universe were designed with us humans in mind, it seems awfully strange (not to mention a gigantic waste of space and matter) that we are (so far) completely unsuccessful at finding even a hint of evidence that life, especially intelligent life, may exist outside of Earth.

Strange = subjective.

Ok, I find it not so strange...so how is your opinion any more valid than mines?

It isn't.

A big part of that is the vast distances involved and our relative short time being able to even look and listen, but if life were the target of this grand design why is it not ubiquitous?

Syllogism test...

1. Life isn't as ubiquitous as I believe it should be.

2. Therefore, the universe/life was not designed.

Non sequitur. Fallacious reasoning.

Test; FAILED.

Earth formed about 4.6 billion years ago, long after all of the physical constants were established and the formation of millions or billions of galaxies and planets (as we now know ... the first exoplanet was only confirmed via observation in 1992 ... a measly 30 years ago).

And?

Which of the hundred or more "fine tuned" parameters are tailored for life, vs. those that determine everything else in the universe that is independent of life existing?

All of the fine tuned parameters are tailored for life...you saw implications of the parameters if they were tweaked to the tiniest degree, didn't you?

If life never materialized, would any of these "fine tuned" parameters have different values ... even slightly? If so, which ones?

Again, did you see the implications (the results) if the parameters were tweaked to the tiniest degree? The implications would be the results of the parameters, had they had different values.

[Inquirer]

This is an area I've really never spent much time investigating, so I'm glad you brought this up. I recently learned of the late John Barrow, a fascinating physicist who could easily have been a celebrity scientist but it seems he was not drawn to that world, hence relatively unknown to the layman.

Here's a short talk he gave to an interviewer about the nature of our world with respect to complexity:

I bought one his books last year, I've only read the first couple of chapters but found his treatment of physics refreshing. Anyway here's a talk all about the constants of Physics and their relevance to cosmology, a genuinely interesting talk:

[DrNoGods]

[Replying to We_Are_VENOM in post #7]

If a guy is building a car and the entire car is built, but he didn't drop the engine until a year after the car was built...does this prove that therefore, the car wasn't built?

No, but if he starts the car a year later and spills his coffee on the fabric seats, the resulting stain would have no dependence on when the car was built, or how it was built. It is an event that happened long after the building of the car. Earth formed some 9 billion years after Penrose's Big Bang, and the "car" was already built. So how life proceeded on Earth at that point has no dependence on whether the Big Bang was 9 billion years earlier, or 1 billion, or 50 billion, or how it happened. The physical constants and natural laws were already in place and long established by the time Earth formed, and life developed within those constraints. There is no reason to believe that those constants and laws materialized as they did purely so that life forms on Earth could develop billions of years later. Life developed on Earth because the conditions just happened to be right for it.

DNG: So it is far more likely that life arose within a preexisting environment that became suitable for it, rather than the environment being tailored (or designed) specifically so that life could develop.

WAV: Then that would be random chance, and the 10^10^123 probability makes it practically impossible.

There isn't a 1 in 10^10^123 chance that Earth formed ... there is a 1 in 1 chance because it does exist. Therefore, an environment suitable for life did arise no matter what probability you give to that happening. This is the crux of my argument against using any Big Bang initial condition fine tuning arguments, because whatever the probabality of Earth forming as it did ... it happened. Now the question is, given the conditions on early Earth, what is the probability that life formed from nonlife (ie. abiogenesis). No need to invoke fine tuning arguments of any kind. What if life had not developed on Earth at all? That would not change the history of the universe prior to Earth's formation, or the conditions on Earth prior to life appearing.

The designer decides whether or not he wants his design to be common, or uncommon.

Without any evidence for a designer, that is a very weak argument.

Strange = subjective.

OK ... replace strange with horribly inefficient and wasteful of all that creating effort.

Syllogism test...

1. Life isn't as ubiquitous as I believe it should be.

2. Therefore, the universe/life was not designed.

Non sequitur. Fallacious reasoning.

Test; FAILED.

I did not make a conclusion that the universe was not designed, but that it is awfully inefficient to create a universe where the one planet we know containing life represents a fraction of the total that is in the same category of 1 in a gigantic number as your Penrose initial condition percision number. Not that big, but ridicuously large. Would a creator god being be that inefficient? It wasn't until the 1920s that we even discovered that the universe was not just the Milky way galaxy (Hubble showed that the fuzzy things in people's telescopes seen since the 1700s were actually entire galaxies ... no one knew this before and it was a measly 98 years ago). This changed our knowledge of how big the universe actually was, and made our (Earth) position in it even more irrelevant.

All of the fine tuned parameters are tailored for life...you saw implications of the parameters if they were tweaked to the tiniest degree, didn't you?

Again ... life developed because the conditions happened to be right for it. Planets and stars and everything else in the universe developed for the same reason (conditions allowed it). Fusion in the center of stars, chemistry, etc. all proceed because the physical constants and laws developed as they did. Life on Earth is an entirely negligible component of the universe and its matter, processes, etc. If life never developed anywhere in the universe it would have no bearing on the physical constants being what they are. You've got it backwards ... life developed because the conditions happened to be right ... those conditions did not arise with any consideration of whether life would materialize, or not.

[Inquirer]

[Replying to We_Are_VENOM in post #7]

If a guy is building a car and the entire car is built, but he didn't drop the engine until a year after the car was built...does this prove that therefore, the car wasn't built?

No, but if he starts the car a year later and spills his coffee on the fabric seats, the resulting stain would have no dependence on when the car was built, or how it was built. It is an event that happened long after the building of the car. Earth formed some 9 billion years after Penrose's Big Bang, and the "car" was already built. So how life proceeded on Earth at that point has no dependence on whether the Big Bang was 9 billion years earlier, or 1 billion, or 50 billion, or how it happened. The physical constants and natural laws were already in place and long established by the time Earth formed, and life developed within those constraints. There is no reason to believe that those constants and laws materialized as they did purely so that life forms on Earth could develop billions of years later. Life developed on Earth because the conditions just happened to be right for it.

DNG: So it is far more likely that life arose within a preexisting environment that became suitable for it, rather than the environment being tailored (or designed) specifically so that life could develop.

WAV: Then that would be random chance, and the 10^10^123 probability makes it practically impossible.

There isn't a 1 in 10^10^123 chance that Earth formed ... there is a 1 in 1 chance because it does exist. Therefore, an environment suitable for life did arise no matter what probability you give to that happening. This is the crux of my argument against using any Big Bang initial condition fine tuning arguments, because whatever the probabality of Earth forming as it did ... it happened. Now the question is, given the conditions on early Earth, what is the probability that life formed from nonlife (ie. abiogenesis). No need to invoke fine tuning arguments of any kind. What if life had not developed on Earth at all? That would not change the history of the universe prior to Earth's formation, or the conditions on Earth prior to life appearing.

The designer decides whether or not he wants his design to be common, or uncommon.

Without any evidence for a designer, that is a very weak argument.

Strange = subjective.

OK ... replace strange with horribly inefficient and wasteful of all that creating effort.

Syllogism test...

1. Life isn't as ubiquitous as I believe it should be.

2. Therefore, the universe/life was not designed.

Non sequitur. Fallacious reasoning.

Test; FAILED.

I did not make a conclusion that the universe was not designed, but that it is awfully inefficient to create a universe where the one planet we know containing life represents a fraction of the total that is in the same category of 1 in a gigantic number as your Penrose initial condition percision number. Not that big, but ridicuously large. Would a creator god being be that inefficient? It wasn't until the 1920s that we even discovered that the universe was not just the Milky way galaxy (Hubble showed that the fuzzy things in people's telescopes seen since the 1700s were actually entire galaxies ... no one knew this before and it was a measly 98 years ago). This changed our knowledge of how big the universe actually was, and made our (Earth) position in it even more irrelevant.

All of the fine tuned parameters are tailored for life...you saw implications of the parameters if they were tweaked to the tiniest degree, didn't you?

Again ... life developed because the conditions happened to be right for it. Planets and stars and everything else in the universe developed for the same reason (conditions allowed it). Fusion in the center of stars, chemistry, etc. all proceed because the physical constants and laws developed as they did. Life on Earth is an entirely negligible component of the universe and its matter, processes, etc. If life never developed anywhere in the universe it would have no bearing on the physical constants being what they are. You've got it backwards ... life developed because the conditions happened to be right ... those conditions did not arise with any consideration of whether life would materialize, or not.

Ha "conditions happened to be right" that is funny!

I suppose that answers my question posed in the OP of this thread.

All of these observed behaviors are nothing to do with ingenuity, creativity, hard work, perseverance, pain, toil or any of that, why of course, all of these are nothing more than conditions happening to be right!