The design argument

This video very good among all lectures I've heard on the fine tuning - anthropic principle of the entire universe for the existence of life.

Dr. Hugh Ross - Journey Toward Creation - Origin of the Universe .

If you cannot watch the whole thing, I suggest you start in the middle and watch through to the end. The most interesting things are towards the end and grow more and more incredible.

He takes the clock of the expanding universe back and back and discusses down to trillionth of a second from the "creation event."

He speaks of unwrapping 10 or 11 dimensions present trillionths of a second near the creation event.

He outlines equations which demonstrate even the amount of stars existing in the universe is tuned for the formation of life.

He discusses almost 200 features of fine tuning for life and what some have had to call "the entity" that must be responsible for this fine tuning.

YouTube

Originally posted by JS357
http://www.iep.utm.edu/design/#H3

Extended quote from source cited above:

quote:

...one might be tempted to argue that there is one context in which scientists employ the design inference without already having sufficient reason to think the right sort of intelligent agency exists. As is well-known, researchers monitor radio transmissions for patterns ...[text shortened]... ntifically legitimate uses, they cannot stand alone as arguments for God's existence.

unquote

Of course if you believe in a God (capital "G"😉 then you're going to believe that it does something (it would be rather pointless to believe in an eternally sedentary God) and therefore you're going to believe it created and fashioned the universe. That to me is rather beside the point.

The point is that given the way the universe is is it logical to believe that it is that way because of random chance (I am specifically referring to the type of physical rules mentioned in my prior post)? If one believes that the answer to that question is "yes" then they must explain why the existence of physical rules within very narrow confines that make this universe the way it is is probable. If one believes the answer is "no", then the argument becomes what made these physical laws the way they are.

Originally posted by no1marauder
From wiki:

Martin Rees formulates the fine-tuning of the Universe in terms of the following six dimensionless physical constants.[12][13]

N, the ratio of the strengths of electromagnetism to that of gravity for charged subatomic particles, is approximately 1036. According to Rees, if it were significantly smaller, only a small and short-lived unive ...[text shortened]... cally consistent with these observed facts although you can always rely on a "lottery" argument.

N, the ratio of the strengths of electromagnetism to that of gravity for charged subatomic particles, is approximately 1036.

That should be 10^36, it depends on scale, at very short distance scales we expect gravity to be a similar strength to the electro-weak force. The critical density is tuned to 1 if supersymmetry is a symmetry of nature. There are three basic problems with these fine tuning arguments:

1) They are not necessarily indicative of fine tuning, but of our lack of knowledge of the correct underlying physics.

2) If there are an infinite number of physical disjoint parallel universes then it's not that surprising that we came about and live in one. Even if the typical observer in any given universe is a Bolzmann brain there is no reason to think that we are typical observers in any universe other than this one.

3) They are never talked about in physics departments. The only time physicists discuss this stuff is when they are trying to sell popular physics books. This is a strong reason for thinking it's bunk.

If a theory requires ultra-fine tuning to predict the universe we see then as a rule it is normally indicative of a problem with the theory. It's a variation of Occam's razor. These fine tuning arguments for a creator turn that on it's head and say the theory requires fine tuning so there is something wrong with the universe.

Originally posted by DeepThought

N, the ratio of the strengths of electromagnetism to that of gravity for charged subatomic particles, is approximately 1036.

That should be 10^36, it depends on scale, at very short distance scales we expect gravity to be a similar strength to the electro-weak force. The critical density is tuned to 1 if supersymmetry is a symmetry of natu ...[text shortened]... it's head and say the theory requires fine tuning so there is something wrong with the universe.

When I copied from the wiki article, it did not accurately transcribe the 10 to the 36th power number.

I don't understand 1. What are the supposed "correct underlying physics"? I postulated what I called "Metarules" as an explanation i.e. some universal rules that require the forces to be within narrow ranges of the ones seen in our universe. However, that explanation should be supported by some type of evidence or logical reasoning.

I already stated that a large number of universes could be an explanation. But again what is the evidence to support their existence?

I don't care about 3. What gets talked about in Physics Departments is logically irrelevant.

Originally posted by no1marauder
Of course if you believe in a God (capital "G"😉 then you're going to believe that it does something (it would be rather pointless to believe in an eternally sedentary God) and therefore you're going to believe it created and fashioned the universe. That to me is rather beside the point.

The point is that given the way the universe is is it logical to ...[text shortened]... es the answer is "no", then the argument becomes what made these physical laws the way they are.

The point was that design arguments in law and science (examples given in the complete article) depend on antecedent reasons to believe there is an agent capable of and motivated to do the act. Identifying this weakness in the design argument is hardly beside the point.

Your demand for an explanation of the values of universal constants, can apply no matter what they are. No set of constants is uniquely in need of explanation.

Originally posted by no1marauder
When I copied from the wiki article, it did not accurately transcribe the 10 to the 36th power number.

I don't understand 1. What are the supposed "correct underlying physics"? I postulated what I called "Metarules" as an explanation i.e. some universal rules that require the forces to be within narrow ranges of the ones seen in our universe. However ...[text shortened]...

I don't care about 3. What gets talked about in Physics Departments is logically irrelevant.

Why do you require antecedent reasons to posit metarules but not to posit ID?

Originally posted by JS357
The point was that design arguments in law and science (examples given in the complete article) depend on antecedent reasons to believe there is an agent capable of and motivated to do the act. Identifying this weakness in the design argument is hardly beside the point.

Your demand for an explanation of the values of universal constants, can apply no matter what they are. No set of constants is uniquely in need of explanation.

I don't think so. They rely only on the possibility of such an agent as an explanation which is consistent with logical thinking and scientific reasoning. Dismissing such a possibility out of hand for ideological reasons seems far more of a "weakness" to me.

Originally posted by JS357
Why do you require antecedent reasons to posit metarules but not to posit ID?

I have no idea what that means. What makes you think asking for evidence supporting the existence of either is requiring "antecedent reasons"? That is a baffling assertion to me.

Originally posted by no1marauder
Of course we can't know what the exact probability of the physical laws that exist in the universe arising by chance are. But the fact that even minute differences in them would lead to a far different universe is quite interesting at the least.

Interesting yes. But what more can one say?

Throwing up your arms and saying "Well who knows?" doesn't seem to be very intellectually satisfying;
But it may be intellectually honest.

one doesn't have to claim absolute knowledge but not "drawing any conclusions" seems a rather vapid response to such facts.
You misread my post. I was saying that if you have a whole universe of objects for which you have no idea whether they were designed or not, including the universe itself, you shouldn't be drawing conclusions about design based on a few objects you noticed on Earth for which you know the design history of. You might as well say: all man made objects contain atoms, therefore all objects that contain atoms are man made.
Creationists are claiming some man made objects appear designed, all life forms appear designed, the universe appears designed. They know the man made objects are designed, then the conclude that life and the universe must be too.

Originally posted by no1marauder
When I copied from the wiki article, it did not accurately transcribe the 10 to the 36th power number.

I don't understand 1. What are the supposed "correct underlying physics"? I postulated what I called "Metarules" as an explanation i.e. some universal rules that require the forces to be within narrow ranges of the ones seen in our universe. However ...[text shortened]...

I don't care about 3. What gets talked about in Physics Departments is logically irrelevant.

Copy and paste onto this site tends to clobber some formatting. I'd realised what happened with the power. Incidentally if you want something in parentheses then it's better to put a full stop before the close bracket ("qwerty".) to prevent smilely faces like this: ("qwerty"😉

Metarules as I read them would apply to all possible universes, it's beyond the scope of physics as it's impossible to do an experiment. There's no a priori reason to think that the laws of physics we are used to apply in parallel universes at all, never mind ones where the basic parameters have different values.

By underlying physics I meant things like String Theory which seek to provide a Theory of Everything (at least as far as physics is concerned). One criterion for them is that the world as we know it should come about in a fairly natural way. So I find that fine tuning arguments like this are misdirected - the problem lies with our understanding of physics, not with the universe.

The third point is important. One needs to be in a philosophy department to be discussing this kind of thing. The typical seminar in a physics department talks about technical issues concerning some theory or other. This means that the ideas they are coming out with in popular books haven't been properly tested.

The basic fallacy is the one I described in my closing paragraph. The reason we have apparently fortuitous coincidences in physical parameters is that we don't understand the physics properly yet. It does not mean that the universe must have some sort of prior cause.

Originally posted by no1marauder
I have no idea what that means. What makes you think asking for evidence supporting the existence of either is requiring "antecedent reasons"? That is a baffling assertion to me.

It's covered very well in the source I cited and I refer you to it.

Originally posted by no1marauder
I find this line of argument quite persuasive .....

When I was first learning programming, I played around with Conways game of life. When you first look at it, you might wonder why he came up with those particular rules. You might also be tempted to think those rules are special. After all, they give rise to some remarkably interesting patterns that would not occur with different rules. Also, almost all researchers appear to have stuck with those particular rules.
I tried playing around with the rules a bit, and soon discovered there were plenty of other variations that had interesting results, in fact I found some sets of rules that I thought were even more interesting than Conways version.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conway's_Game_of_Life

So next time someone says: these are the laws of physics necessary for life, ask yourself what other interesting universes are possible that you haven't even thought of. Maybe we are some boring backwater in the larger scheme of things.

Originally posted by twhitehead
Interesting yes. But what more can one say?

[b]Throwing up your arms and saying "Well who knows?" doesn't seem to be very intellectually satisfying;
But it may be intellectually honest.

one doesn't have to claim absolute knowledge but not "drawing any conclusions" seems a rather vapid response to such facts.
You misread my post. I was ...[text shortened]... now the man made objects are designed, then the conclude that life and the universe must be too.[/b]

I wasn't making a Paley's Watch argument.

Originally posted by DeepThought
Copy and paste onto this site tends to clobber some formatting. I'd realised what happened with the power. Incidentally if you want something in parentheses then it's better to put a full stop before the close bracket ("qwerty".) to prevent smilely faces like this: ("qwerty"😉

Metarules as I read them would apply to all possible universes, it's beyon ...[text shortened]... he physics properly yet. It does not mean that the universe must have some sort of prior cause.

DT: The reason we have apparently fortuitous coincidences in physical parameters is that we don't understand the physics properly yet

That's a similar argument to one Einstein used to use against Quantum Mechanics. It turned out that the physics properly understood didn't support the idea that there was more there there.

Intellectual snobbery never really impresses me. If Physics Departments aren't discussing such ultimate questions, then I find such lack of imagination in those departments troubling.

Originally posted by no1marauder
I don't think so. They rely only on the possibility of such an agent as an explanation which is consistent with logical thinking and scientific reasoning. Dismissing such a possibility out of hand for ideological reasons seems far more of a "weakness" to me.

The reason-able possibility of a motivated capable agent, then, is enough. For example in the cite I made, intelligent ET life sending prime numbers into space is deemed reasonably possible because we are doing it. The guy fixing the ballot lists is deemed reasonably possible because it has happened elsewhere and the motivation and moment exist. So there has to be some criteria for possibility, no? What are the reasonable criteria for an ID-er being deemed possible?