@avalanchethecat said<<I believed it all, until suddenly I didn't. Since then, I have read through the OT (although I did skip the begats) a couple of times, the NT three or four times, and the Gospels a whole bunch of times.>>
I am fully conversant with the 'fine-tuning' argument, in fact I argued your side of it on several occasions. Eventually I was shown that there is no level of scientific argument which has any relevance when weighed against the methodological principle I linked for you.
I am very familiar with the bible. I spent a good portion of my childhood in a very religious h ...[text shortened]... p the begats) a couple of times, the NT three or four times, and the Gospels a whole bunch of times.
Why are you reading stuff you don’t believe? And not once but a “whole bunch of times?”
I don’t buy that at all.
And you believed it all until suddenly you didn’t? No precipitating event that caused you to disbelieve what you previously believed? Give me a break.
@avalanchethecat saidYes facts matter and when we why we exist is due to some highly improbable levels of universal constants, saying something akin to, “So what,” is not looking at it seriously.
I don't think it's true to say I'm introducing a means for ignoring the argument. It is a simple fact that we exist. Do you disagree with that? No, of course not. Therefore you must accept that the universe is such that we may exist. It may appear to be 'fine-tuned', but the fact is that those constants couldn't be any different in any universe we find ourselves existing in.
To call it 'tuning' is to imply that they could be different. They couldn't be.
@kellyjay saidThere is a hidden assumption in the 'fine tuning'' argument. It's that the constants can be tuned at all.
Yes facts matter and when we why we exist is due to some highly improbable levels of universal constants, saying something akin to, “So what,” is not looking at it seriously.
How do you know that they're tunable?
If they are, in fact, tunable, what is the process for tuning them?
@avalanchethecat saidAnd you credit who or what for that?
What makes you think they are highly improbable? As far as we know, they can only be of the value they are.
@bigdogg saidYes, and by design or necessity does it matter? If it necessary and it is the only way it can be, should design be ruled out? I can’t dial in my favorite FM/AM stations without putting the dial where I want it. How does information theory go when we look at all the possibilities verses specific information required?
There is a hidden assumption in the 'fine tuning'' argument. It's that the constants can be tuned at all.
How do you know that they're tunable?
If they are, in fact, tunable, what is the process for tuning them?
@BigDogg
So you are saying these factors HAD to be set to what they are and could not have been otherwise ?
But the coincidence for several is too astronomically improbable left to chance.
Brute fact-ing it doesn't work for some researchers.
Cambridge physicist Brandon Carter as far back as 1973 published a ground breaking paper entitled "Large Number Coincidences and the Anthropic Principle in Cosmology" a a prestigious scientific conference.
Paul Davies a former professor of theoretical physics at University of Adelaide admitted he's been persuaded of purpose behind the universe - saying "Through my scientific work I have come to believe more and more strongly that the physical universe is put together with an ingenuity so astonishing that I cannot accept it merely as a brute fact."
Robin Collins Phd. asks what impression would we have if we found a biosphere on Mars like this.
"I like to use the analogy of astronauts landing on Mars and finding an enclosed biosphere, sort of like the domed structure that was built in Arizona a few years ago. At the control panel they find that all the dials for its environment are set just right for life. The oxygen ratio is perfect; the temperature is seventy degrees; the humidity is fifty percent; there's a system for replenishing the air; there are systems for producing food, generating energy, and disposing of wastes. Each dial has a huge range of possible settings, and you can see if you were to adjust one or more of them just a little bit, the environment would go out of whack and life would be impossible. What conclusion would you draw from that?"
The honest answer is that someone took great care in designing and building such a biosphere. Something else seems to me to be going on with the mind that just dismisses these as brute facts that had to be and could not have not been so.
There is something else going on there in a desperate attitude to avoid the more obvious inference.
Collins - "Over the past thirty years or so, scientists have discovered that just about everything about the basic structure of the universe is balanced on a razor's edge for life to exist. The coincidences are far too fantastic to attribute this to mere chance or to claim that it needs no explanation. The dials are set too precisely to have been a random accident. Somebody, as Fred Hoyle quipped, has been monkeying with the physics."
@bigdogg saidSo why aren’t the “constants” the same for every planet revolving around a star in the universe?
There is a hidden assumption in the 'fine tuning'' argument. It's that the constants can be tuned at all.
How do you know that they're tunable?
If they are, in fact, tunable, what is the process for tuning them?
@avalanchethecat saidLike I said by definition you rule out what you don’t want to acknowledge. Convenient isn’t it somethings so incredibly cosmic and microscopic can be ignored as nothing noteworthy while a fossil, oooo ahhhh.
I don't feel a need to award credit for universal constants.
@kellyjay saidPerhaps I missed it, but I don't see anything in your post that explains how you know [or even suspect] that the constants may be tunable.
Yes, and by design or necessity does it matter? If it necessary and it is the only way it can be, should design be ruled out? I can’t dial in my favorite FM/AM stations without putting the dial where I want it. How does information theory go when we look at all the possibilities verses specific information required?
To use your analogy, we have a stream of voices and you are assuming a radio. I'm asking for proof that the voices are coming from a radio in the first place.
@sonship saidI am not saying the factors HAD to be set to anything - far from it.
@BigDogg
So you are saying these factors HAD to be set to what they are and could not have been otherwise ?
But the coincidence for several is too astronomically improbable left to chance.
Brute fact-ing it doesn't work for some researchers.
Cambridge physicist Brandon Carter as far back as 1973 published a ground breaking paper entitled "Large Number ...[text shortened]... put together with an ingenuity so astonishing that I cannot accept it merely as a brute fact."
I am questioning if they are even settable to begin with.
I also tend to NOT find ex-ante probability arguments convincing.
For example, before a person wins a lottery, his odds could be astronomical, such as 1 in 1 billion, but afterwards, the odds are [obviously] 100%.
@pb1022 saidSo you are not talking about the constants in physics - such as i, e, etc., but rather things like the distance between the earth and sun.
So why aren’t the “constants” the same for every planet revolving around a star in the universe?
Well, there's billions of solar systems. As far as we know, there may be others with distances that are close enough for life. There's also the chance that other kinds of life may be present - life that functions differently from earth-life.
Edit: and even if there is zero other life at all, we are still the lottery winner. Probability is only a measure of information. According to the information we have now, there is a 100% chance that we came into existence.
I am not saying the factors HAD to be set to anything - far from it.
I am questioning if they are even settable to begin with.
These two sentences seem not to make consistent sense to me.
I am not saying the factors HAD to be set to anything - far from it.
You say it is far from it that thirty separate physical or cosmological parameters HAD to be precisely just so in order to produce a life sustaining universe. But that is contrary to what is being discovered. Anyone of some thirty parameters NOT being as they are would definitely interfere with a life sustaining universe. That is what these scientists are saying. So you are contradicting this realization by saying it is FAR FROM the case these calibrations HAD to be so for a life sustaining universe.
Then your second sentence says
I am questioning if they are even settable to begin with.
First you say they did not have to be so set.
Then you question that they could have been set otherwise.
I think you are contradicting yourself.
Take one example - the cosmological constant. It is "set" [or whatever other term you prefer to use] so that the universe will expand as it does and not collapse in on itself. "The fine tuning has conservatively been estimated to be at least one part in a hundred million billion billion billion billion billion. That would be a ten followed by fifty-three zeroes. That is inconceivably precise." - Robin Collins
It is "remarkably well adjusted in our favor" - Steve Weinberg. If larger and positive this constant would be a repulsive force that increases with distance, a force that would prevent matter from clumping together in the early universe. The result would have been no galaxies, no stars, no planets, therefore no people.
If it had been "set" [or any other term you prefer] large and negative the cosmological constant would have acted as an attractive force increasing with distance. Then that would almost immediately reverse the expansion of the universe causing it to recollapse. In either scenario life would not have been permitted.
That this just one of thirty such parameters was set [ or some other word you prefer other than "set" ] is counterintuitively precisely just so. According to Stephen Weinberg this precision "is widely regarded as the single greatest problem facing physics and cosmology today."
Your second sentence sounds like you are questioning that this just one factor (among others) could have turned out to be other than it is. Do you mean human life being allowed for in the universe should surprise no one?
Can you help me reconcile your two statements which appear self contradictory to me.