The Fine-tuning Argument for God's Existence

Started by GurrenLagann, July 08, 2013, 04:00:18 PM

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GurrenLagann

So I've been doing some groundwork and "research" for several future "counter-apologetics" videos on my MindForgedManacle YouTube channel and I'm currently thinking about the fine-tuning argument.

Now, I think the more easily rebutted version of the argument is that the universe's constants are fine-tuned specifically for life. I mean, once you point out the incomprehensibly vast amount of the universe (or even just Earth) that is inhospitable to even the most specialized forms of life - as well as the fact of biological evolution (life better fitting itself for the universe) - then that version would seem to collapse.

However, a harder one to tackle (to me) is the version pointing that the universe's constants allow for life to form, despite a hugely absurd likelihood of them falling into that range. Now, you can (of course) posit the multiverse hypothesis, but it is true that such is "multiplying entities beyond necessity", i.e contrary to Occam's Razor, a principle we ourselves often make use of against theists. So what would be the optimal ways to attack this argument, and what pitfalls should I seek to avoid? I've been meaning to check out the physicist Victor Stenger's The Fallacy of Fine-Tuning: How the Universe is Not Designed for Life (not sure I got that subtitle right), but I just haven't gotten to it.

 :-k
Which means that to me the offer of certainty, the offer of complete security, the offer of an impermeable faith that can\'t give way, is the offer of something not worth having.
[...]
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty & wisdom, will come to you that way.
-Christopher Hitchens

GurrenLagann

Oh and if you know of any relevant, good books/articles on the topic (including if Stenger's book is good), be sure to let me know. :)
Which means that to me the offer of certainty, the offer of complete security, the offer of an impermeable faith that can\'t give way, is the offer of something not worth having.
[...]
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty & wisdom, will come to you that way.
-Christopher Hitchens

LikelyToBreak

How do we know the physical constants could be other than they are?  It is just an idea to suppose they could be different.  Which means atheists cannot counter the teleological argument, because God can do anything.

Solitary

8-) Fine tuning is the god-of-gaps argument . Anyone using it must do more than point to a gap in our knowlerdge. He must  prove beyond a reasonable doubt that science can never fill the gap.  If it could be shown by careful, repeated experiments that the Pope can cure illnesses with his prayers and no one else can, science would be hard pressed to provide a plausible explanation.  We can defeat any God-of-the -gaps argument by simply providing a plausable natural explanation consistent with our best existing knowledge to fill the gap.

That argument does not need to be proven. In the case of fine tuning it can. Hooray! Our universe seems to be a part of a super universe called the multiverse suitable for evolving our form of life. Some theist, and even scientist, object to the multiverse hypothesis as being nonscientific, since other universes are unobservable (Here we go again) and nonparsimonious, because it violates Ockam's razor.  However, these objections are not legitimate. Science talks about the unobservable (Keep those letters coming!) all the time, such as "QUARKS" and black holes---please, no jokes! They are components of models that agree with observations.

Many parameters of Earth and the solar system are claimed to be fine-tuned for life. This fails to consider that with trillions of planets in the visible universe and countless number beyond our horizen, a planet with the properties of life is likely to occur many times just by accident. Almost all the literature that advocates fine-tuning, the authors make serious analytical mistakes by varying only one parameter at a time and holding others constant. They fail to account for the fact that change in one parameter can be compensated by a change in another, opening up more parameter space for a viable universe.

Doing a proper analysis shows that there is no evidence that the universe is fine-tuned for us or anything else. Take that Bible Thumpers!  :twisted:  Solitary
There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action.

GurrenLagann

I think you misunderstand a bit Solitary. There is nothing (as far as I'm aware) regarding these parameters that necessitates another parameter compensating for the alteration of another.

And you didn't actually explain why the multiverse hypothesis isn't unparsimonious as an attempted counter to the argument.
Which means that to me the offer of certainty, the offer of complete security, the offer of an impermeable faith that can\'t give way, is the offer of something not worth having.
[...]
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty & wisdom, will come to you that way.
-Christopher Hitchens

Jutter

It only seems finetuned to a selfentitled life-centered mind.
Life is hardly the status quo throughout the universe. To put it intergalacticly mild.
No religion for me thank you very much; I 'm full of shit enough as it is.

Being flabbergasted about existence never made anyone disappear in a poof of flabbergas, so nevermind why we're here. We ARE here.

Voskhod

[blink:mozva9hm]LAW OF STATISTICS[/blink:mozva9hm]

Ahem. Yes. The fact that we live in such an incredibly fine-tuned universe isn't testament to intelligent design or the work of a creator - It is a simple law of statistics. Life REQUIRES these things to be fine tuned to exist, yes, but have you ever pondered the converse? If the universe wasn't fine-tuned to make life possible, there wouldn't BE any life. There wouldn't BE any people around to ponder why the universe was so hostile to life.

In other words: If the universe (And more specifically, Earth) weren't so relatively benign to life, we wouldn't be here, we wouldn't have come into existence in the first place - intelligent life would have never have arisen, and we wouldn't be sitting around here discussing it over the internet now would we?
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"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown." -H.P. Lovecraft
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Solitary

There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action.

Rin Hato

Q: What's the probability of life existing?

A: One.

Q: What's the probability of the conditions for life arising?

A: One.

Q: What's the probability of religious nuts being retarded?

A: One.
Obieru kono te no naka niwa taorareta hana no yuuki.

Rin Hato

Basically, the probability is one because it is a fact.
Obieru kono te no naka niwa taorareta hana no yuuki.

Hijiri Byakuren

Quote from: "Voskhod"In other words: If the universe (And more specifically, Earth) weren't so relatively benign to life, we wouldn't be here, we wouldn't have come into existence in the first place - intelligent life would have never have arisen, and we wouldn't be sitting around here discussing it over the internet now would we?
Life is a physical process just like anything else. If you say the universe is fine-tuned for life, you must say it is fine-tuned for everything, because the same laws of physics that say thermonuclear fusion occurs in the core of a star also say that mixing guanine, adenine, thymine, and cytosine in certain quantities will create deoxyribonucleic acid. The term "fine-tuning" becomes meaningless, because all you've accomplished is to say that a particular set of physical laws will give you a particular set of results. You can't have life without our universe and you can't have our universe without life, because to remove either would require a fundamental change to the laws of physics which would just give you a completely different universe (ostensibly with completely different life which might be tempted to think its universe is fine-tuned as well).
Speak when you have something to say, not when you have to say something.

Sargon The Grape - My Youtube Channel

Voskhod

Quote from: "Hijiri Byakuren"
Quote from: "Voskhod"In other words: If the universe (And more specifically, Earth) weren't so relatively benign to life, we wouldn't be here, we wouldn't have come into existence in the first place - intelligent life would have never have arisen, and we wouldn't be sitting around here discussing it over the internet now would we?
Life is a physical process just like anything else. If you say the universe is fine-tuned for life, you must say it is fine-tuned for everything, because the same laws of physics that say thermonuclear fusion occurs in the core of a star also say that mixing guanine, adenine, thymine, and cytosine in certain quantities will create deoxyribonucleic acid. The term "fine-tuning" becomes meaningless, because all you've accomplished is to say that a particular set of physical laws will give you a particular set of results. You can't have life without our universe and you can't have our universe without life, because to remove either would require a fundamental change to the laws of physics which would just give you a completely different universe (ostensibly with completely different life which might be tempted to think its universe is fine-tuned as well).

Oh, and that too.
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[size=100]
"The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown." -H.P. Lovecraft
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GurrenLagann

Well, that's the Anthropic Principle yes? In a sense it seems to work, but does it? I mean it really amounts to saying "If things were different, they'd be different", which while true seems a bit... unsatisfactory. .-. I'm not saying it's wrong, just that I'm trying to avoid being slammed by someone who's more knowledgeable on this than I.

Thanks for the responses. Keep 'em coming. :)
Which means that to me the offer of certainty, the offer of complete security, the offer of an impermeable faith that can\'t give way, is the offer of something not worth having.
[...]
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty & wisdom, will come to you that way.
-Christopher Hitchens

Plu

It really does. It sounds unsatisfactory because it's incredibly bland, but it's simply how it is. The argument of "it was finetuned for life" is simply complete bull for the reasons listed above. It has to be supportive of life or we wouldn't be here talking about it.

It's effectively failing to understand that events lead up to other events, and thinking that the middle-point of chain of actions can be its start. None of these people who say "earth is perfectly fine-tuned for life" have ever contemplated how their parents would be able to survive long enough on the moon to give birth to them in an enviroment that isn't hospitable to life. Let alone the rest of the chain of life happening there.

Agramon

If the universe is finely tuned for life, why is 99.999999999... etc. % of it uninhabitable?

"I'm going to make this giant fucking universe, just to house one particularly important species on a tiny blue ocean planet. The planet will be full of things that try to kill that species too - I wouldn't want things to get too boring."
"And, tricked by our own early dream
And need of solace, we grew self-deceived,
Our making soon our maker did we deem,
And what we had imagined we believed."
- Thomas Hardy