I really don’t know why I remember
this conversation, but I do. I had just
started my freshman year of college and was talking to one of my classmates on
a break. He seemed like a hippie- type,
so for him to say that our universe could be one of an infinite number of
universes wasn’t surprising to me. What is
surprising to me is how the idea of a multi-verse is now part of mainstream
science. Just about every recently made
program I watch regarding the universe preaches the possibility of the
multi-verse as if it is true. Even Nova made a video on the multi-verse. Let’s
be clear; it is only an idea. It’s not a
scientific theory. A theory has evidence
supporting it. It’s not a scientific hypothesis. A hypothesis is testable. The multi-verse has neither supporting
evidence nor is it testable, so why is it discussed (preached) in science?
The idea of the multi-verse has been around in science for decades, but it wasn’t taken seriously. Scientists try to avoid theories that have no evidence and cannot be falsified. Many claim to reject the existence of God for this reason, but now scientists actively discuss an idea that has no evidence and cannot be falsified. Why has this changed? The reason for the change is because the universe appears to have been fine-tuned to allow for life. What does this mean? The laws of physics have several constants contained in their equations that, should they vary in the slightest amount, our universe would not have been life permitting, if it had formed at all.
The most extreme example of fine
tuning is the Cosmological Constant which has been tuned to 1:10120
(120 decimal places). If this had been a
slightly smaller value, the universe would collapse on itself to form a giant
black hole. If this value had been
slightly bigger, the universe would have flown apart so fast that atoms would
not have formed. Just for a scale
reference, we’ve had 1017 seconds since time began and it’s
estimated the all of the particles in the observable universe total around 1080.
I’ve included more examples below of finely tuned constants.
What is the best explanation for this?
As Leonard Susskind says in this video,
“nobody thinks that’s accidental….that is not a reasonable idea that something
is tuned to 120 decimal places just by accident”. The more discoveries scientists make, the
more it becomes clear that a designer is required to set these constants into the extremely narrow range. If one were following the evidence, then a
designer is the simplest explanation.
Yet many atheist scientists don’t allow for the option of a
designer. Sandra Faber explains how they
get around the evidence:
“Faber declared that there were only two
possible explanations for fine-tuning. “One is that there is a God and that God
made it that way,” she said. But for Faber, an atheist, divine intervention is
not the answer. “The only other approach that makes any sense is to argue that there
really is an infinite, or a very big, ensemble of universes out there and we
are in one,” she said.”
This Discover Magazine article
discusses if there is an alternative to a creator, since the ‘fine-tuning
problem’ indicates intelligence.
“Call it a fluke, a mystery, a miracle. Or
call it the biggest problem in physics. Short
of invoking a benevolent creator, many physicists see only one possible
explanation: Our universe may be but one of perhaps infinitely many
universes in an inconceivably vast multiverse.”
“Advocates argue that, like it or not, the multiverse may well be the only viable
nonreligious explanation for what is often called the “fine-tuning
problem”—the baffling observation that the laws of the universe seem
custom-tailored to favor the emergence of life.”
“if there is no multiverse, where does that
leave physicists? “If there is only one universe,” Carr says, “you might have
to have a fine-tuner. If you don’t want
God, you’d better have a multiverse.””
The probability that all of these
constants and early universe conditions could be randomly set so precisely and
accurately is so low that it is beyond comprehension. Atheists often claim that there is no evidence
for a designer, yet when they discover such evidence, they postulate an idea
that has no evidence; an infinite number of universes. The multi-verse is a faith-based claim, not a
scientific hypothesis. Good science does
not come up with theories based on the need to avoid God.
The fine-tuning of our universe was either caused by a
designer or there are an infinite number of universes; one has evidence and the
other has to be taken on blind faith. As
Bernard Carr said in the Discover Magazine article, “If you don’t want God,
you’d better have a multiverse.” Christians
are free to follow the evidence where it leads; atheists must hold on to blind faith.
Examples of fine tuning:
Cosmological Constant – 1:10120
– This is the energy of empty space (dark energy) that is causing the universe
to expand. If it were too high the
universe flies apart so fast that atoms cannot form, too low and the universe
collapses into a black hole.
Critical Density – 1:1015 –
This is the density of the universe required so that it would neither expand nor
contract (the density without the Cosmological Constant). It’s value determines the shape of the
universe; open, closed or flat. If it
were too high the universe flies apart, too low and the universe collapses into
a black hole.
Universe Density – 1:1062 –
The density of the universe is tune to 10-62 of the critical density
required for a flat universe. This has
become known as the Flatness Problem. Life requires an almost flat universe.
The Weak Force – 1:10100 –
The weak force is what allows radioactive decay. If it were too strong, only heavy elements
(like iron) could form; too weak and only light elements (like hydrogen) could
form.
Electromagnetic Force to Gravity –
1:1040 – If this ratio varied by 10-40, stars would only
form either small red dwarfs or giant blue stars, neither of which can sustain
life.
The Amplitude of Primordial
Fluctuations (Q) – 1:105 – Q is a measure of the mix of atoms, dark
energy, and radiation at the various points in space after the Big Bang (the
distribution of the ‘stuff’). The
results are ‘ripples’ throughout space.
If the amplitude of these ripples were larger than 10-5, the
resulting chaos would prevent star formation; smaller than 10-6 and the
universe would collapse into black holes.
Hoyle Resonance – 1:105 – The
Hoyle Resonance is a property of carbon-12 that allows both carbon and
oxygen to be produced from stars. A
change in this state by 10-5 would result in either no carbon
production or no oxygen production. The
Hoyle Resonance allows for both to be produced.
The mass of hydrogen converted into
energy in stars – 0.007% - This is the percent of a hydrogen atom’s mass that
is converted into energy from the nuclear reactions of stars. If that percent were 0.006%, the universe
would be full of hydrogen and nothing else.
If that percent were 0.008%, there would be no hydrogen which results in
no stars like our sun or water.
Entropy – 1:1010123 – This is the low entropy value Roger Penrose
estimates our universe had at the Big Bang. Entropy is the amount of order in the universe
and never decreases over time. You could literally take a zero from this number
and put it on every particle in the observable universe with many zeroes left
over.
I wrote a response to this, it either is waiting comment moderation or it got eaten. If it's the first please feel free to delete this comment, if it's the second let me know and I'll try to recreate it.
ReplyDeleteI didn't get it. I don't have moderation turned on or any limits on who can post. Please repost.
DeleteBummer, I think my browser was the culprit.
ReplyDeleteThere are two responses to fine tuning that seem pretty reasonable to me, I'm curious what your take on them would be.
1) It needs to be shown somehow that it would be possible for the constants to be different. Perhaps it just has to be this way for reasons that are beyond our understanding. Perhaps one day we will understand the cosmological constant better and we can give a reason that it couldn't have been different.
For a (pretty silly) analogy, imagine if someone had said it is lucky our planet is a sphere instead of perhaps a cube. If they understood how gravity worked, they would realize that it isn't just luck that our planet isn't a cube, but that shape would be impossible for a planet sized thing.
2) If the universe was different, perhaps it couldn't support life like us, but maybe it could support life in a much different form.
For instance, your "Electromagnetic Force to Gravity" example. It says that it would only allow red dwarfs and giant blue stars and they can't support life. But perhaps they could support a different kind of life, even if we couldn't survive there.
I'm no physicist, so perhaps there are good answers to these objections, but it is the most common answer I see.
One more thing. In regards to the multiverse, I love the multiverse, mostly because it comes up in some really fun ways in scifi. Also because it is really fun to think about. However, I agree with you that banking on it seems silly. If someone can show that it mathematically makes sense, that's awesome, and I love hearing about it. It's fun. But everything I do know about it says that people who assert it as a certainty are greatly overstepping. It's neat, it's possible, but if it's your only solution to something I think you're on pretty shaky ground. Again, I'm no physicist and I'd love to be wrong on this point, but I would need to see some pretty striking evidence for it.
You bring up some good points.
ReplyDelete“1) It needs to be shown somehow that it would be possible for the constants to be different.”
The three possible explanations for the fine-tuning are physical necessity, chance, or design. This is saying that the fine-tuning is due to physical necessity….only a life-permitting universe exactly like ours is possible. There are very few supporters of this view (I know of none) and would kill string theory (which I’m ok with), but that doesn’t make it false. The biggest problem I see with necessity is that many of the finely tuned constants are not related to one another in any way. Another issue is that not all of the fine-tuned parameters are constants; some are early universe conditions like the low entropy and how the primordial energy distributed after the Big Bang. There are a lot of independent factors making it difficult to require that none of them could be different.
“2) If the universe was different, perhaps it couldn't support life like us, but maybe it could support life in a much different form.”
I think this could be said for some of the fine-tuning and the example you gave was a good one. Blue giants don’t last long enough to sustain life (a few million years). A red dwarf star is colder, dimmer, and probably couldn’t support higher forms of life, but does that mean it cannot support any life? Who knows? The most extreme examples of fine-tuning prevent any viable universe from forming, prevent atoms from forming, or prohibit chemical/nuclear reactions from happening. Kinda hard for life to get around that.
I don't think I meant that they couldn't be different, more that they could perhaps be a local equilibrium point. Like, perhaps they could have been very different, but having them just be a little bit different couldn't really happen. If you have a sheet with a bunch of divots in it, there are a bunch of places a marble could settle on it, but once they settle it's not really possible that it could have settled just a little tiny bit over to the side. (again, I'm no physicist, I have no idea if this analogy makes sense, but in the abstract it seems to work for me)
DeleteRE: blue giants. Ahh, they only has a few million years, that makes sense I suppose
Hey Zealot, you are aware that the multiverse was developed independently of the "fine tuning" argument and comes from inflationary theory, right? So we'd be talking about a multiverse even without apologists making the fine tuning argument.
ReplyDeleteAnd also, the multiverse is in principle verifiable. Gravitational waves from other universes can be measured by highly sensitive instruments and either NASA or the European Space Agency is launching a satellite to do that this year.
And doesn't the FTA make it appear as if god himself must conform to the laws of physics and can only create a life-bearing universe just one way? If god can do anything, he should be able to create such a universe an infinite number of different ways, and even create ones that contained life but weren't fine tuned for it.
Yes, the idea has been around for a while, but was not taken seriously until the fine-tuning of the universe was discovered. If it weren’t for the fine-tuning the multi-verse would be a fun sci-fi topic, but not much more.
DeleteInteresting on measuring the gravitational waves. I wonder how they would know that the gravitational waves were from a different universe vs something else (if they find them)?
The FTA does not say that there is only one way to have a universe that can support life. What is says is our universe is fine-tuned with extreme precision to support life.
It's funny how anything that seems to challenge god you want scientific verified proof for, but you'll believe the Bible on nothing more than it says so. The multiverse is in principle verifiable so you were wrong on that part. The way to tell another universe from gravitational waves is that some multiverse theories predict them in a certain way, and so if they are found and observation matches theory, that will give us good evidence that the multiverse is very likely real.
DeleteIf there are many other ways that a universe can support life, how then can you say ours is fine tuned?
@TheThinker – “It's funny how anything that seems to challenge god you want scientific verified proof for”
DeleteI want scientific proof for scientific questions. God cannot be proven or disproven scientifically, but the evidence can point towards or away from a creator. The multi-verse is an escape hatch for atheists, but does not pose a challenge to God (future post coming on this), so I’m free to follow the evidence.
“you'll believe the Bible on nothing more than it says so”
False and not related to the current topic.
“The way to tell another universe from gravitational waves is that some multiverse theories predict them in a certain way”
If there is evidence of gravitational waves from other universes, that throws out the concept of our universe being an isolated system, which many of our fundamental laws of physics are based on and have been repeatedly verified. A discovery like that would be most interesting.
“If there are many other ways that a universe can support life, how then can you say ours is fine tuned?”
We don’t know what other universes would look like with different laws of physics. No one can speculate on this. We do know that for human life to form in our universe, it needed to be tuned precisely the way it is.
We all would like to have scientific proof for scientific questions so we are on the same page there. There are some Christians who say we should expect a mulitverse if god exists, so Christians are all over the map on everything. It can be modified to fit almost anything and it seems to me that some Christians at least want to make it unfalsifiable. The multiverse is often used to answer the physical constants, but we'd be talking about it even in a world full of atheists because current theories in cosmology and quantum physics imply it.
DeleteI only mentioned the bible as a comparison. But you seem to be very serious about your Christianity. I've been looking for someone serious about Christianity who is educated to debate with for a while, and I look forward to discussing and debating various topics related to religion and atheism in the future.
Feel free to check out my blog and challenge me on anything I've written about.
@Thinker - “Christians are all over the map on everything.”
DeleteYes, we are.
“Feel free to check out my blog and challenge me on anything I've written about.”
Sounds like fun! :)
""If there are many other ways that a universe can support life, how then can you say ours is fine tuned?”
DeleteWe don’t know what other universes would look like with different laws of physics. No one can speculate on this. We do know that for human life to form in our universe, it needed to be tuned precisely the way it is."
Isn't that exactly the point though? If the universe could be other ways which supports different types of life, then whichever way it happened to be would produce some life, and those creatures would assume the universe is fine tuned for them. Perhaps if the constants had been different and we couldn't exist, there would be some other creatures talking about how the universe was fine tuned for them.
@Hausdorff - The FTA is not an exclusive claim on how it’s impossible for any other universe to support life. This is a common misconception. It simply says that the constants and early conditions in OUR universe fall within an extremely narrow range to allow life to form in OUR universe. What’s the best explanation for how our existence requires a precision as extreme as 1/10^120? Is that luck or a creator saying, “Here I AM!”?
DeleteWould you honestly expect us to find a universe that wasn't able to support life as we know it? If god wanted to say "Here I AM!" he could have created a universe less than 10,000 years old where there was no sign of evolution at all, or he could have made the earth the literal center of the universe as was commonly believed for thousands of years. That would scream "Here I AM!" not a universe with a haphazard evolutionary process that included no less than 5 mass extinctions and millions of years of conscious suffering before we even get to human beings.
Delete"The FTA is not an exclusive claim on how it’s impossible for any other universe to support life"
DeleteBut isn't such a claim key to the power of the FTA? If alternate universes would have produced alternate life, then they would just think that the universe was fine tuned for them instead. The claim that our universe is special and the only one that can support life is the only thing that gives FTA oomph. The simple fact that the odds are against this particular universe isn't terribly relevant without that part.
Use the odds of my being born as an example. A quick google search says that each ejaculation produces about 250 million sperm. So the odds that the right sperm made it to the egg to make me is 1 in 250,000,000. Does that mean that God must have fine tuned things to get me to be born since the odds are so low? If that sperm, and only that sperm would produce a person then there might be an argument to be made there. However, we can reasonably assume that any one of those sperm would have done the job and there would just be a different person instead of me. Without the assumption that the other sperm wouldn't produce a viable embryo the low odds I quotes really don't have any power.
Same thing goes with the universes. If alternate universes would just produce different life forms, then the odds in the fine-tuning calculations don't appear nearly as impressive.
@Hausdorff – No one knows what another universe would look like with completely different laws of physics (gravity, relativity, thermodynamics, etc) and to speculate this would be an argument from ignorance. What we do know is that with the laws of physics that our universe has, there are many constants and early universe conditions that are extremely precise that should they very in the slightest we would not have a life-permitting universe. The FTA is only for a universe with our laws of physics.
Delete“If that sperm, and only that sperm would produce a person then there might be an argument to be made there.”
This is the FTA. Crude example, but let’s say superman shoots 10^120 sperm. All of the sperm are fully functional, but only one carries the genetic material that will lead to a baby. There’s a 10^-100 chance that a single sperm will make it out of the condom, a 10^-40 chance it will get past the spermicide, a 10^-15 chance it will get past the diaphragm, and a 10^-62 chance that it can get through the fallopian tube that was tied (plus many other perils along the way, but they are only in the 10^-3 – 10^-6 range). The odds are extremely low that any sperm will make it to the egg, let alone the one and only sperm than can produce a baby.
"only one carries the genetic material that will lead to a baby"
Delete" the one and only sperm than can produce a baby"
These are two very different things. Sure, only one will produce a baby, but every sperm there has the potential to make a baby, you said yourself that "All of the sperm are fully functional". If a different sperm had made it to the end, then you would just get a different baby.
I’m not going to use metaphors with any resemblance to the real world anymore. Every time I do, some obscure, irrelevant, detail gets in the way of the point.….I meant only one of the 10^120 has the genetic material capable of producing a life even though any of the sperm were physically capable of making it to the egg without the ability to produce life. Only 1 of the 10^120 can produce life! I was trying to avoid issues like maybe all the other ones are defective or how do they swim without genes or maybe they don’t have tails or some other irrelevant detail related to real life but not related to the point of the metaphor. The odds of any sperm making it to the egg are next to zero, but the odds of the one and only sperm that can produce a life are even lower.
DeleteWhen the fine-tuning of the universe has a precision that requires close to zero variance (0.000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 for just one of the parameters), ya gotta ask if there wasn’t something helping things along.
"I meant only one of the 10^120 has the genetic material capable of producing a life"
DeleteVery well, so your analogy says that there is exactly 1 sperm in the whole 10^120 that is capable of creating life. Call this case A.
The thing is, the reason I went to the example about the sperm is it seems like a reasonable assumption that each and every sperm has the genetic material to create a life, it's just that only one of them makes it. Call this case B.
In case A, the fact that the one and only sperm that is able to produce life just happens to be the one that makes it to the end is incredible, some kind of fine tuning does seem to be going on here. In case B, it's not so spectacular, because a different sperm would just produce a different life.
So the question is, when we are talking about our universe and the fine tuning of the constants, is it analogous to case A or B? If those changes in the constants cannot produce any life (even a different kind of life), then it is amazing (case A). If those changes in constants would prohibit us from existing, but would permit some different life (case B), then it is not that big of a deal. We happened to win this lottery, but if we didn't some other life forms would have instead.
To my mind, fine tuning has to demonstrate that we are in case A, but you don't seem to be doing that because you said that we can't speculate on those other universes (doing so would be an argument from ignorance). You seem to have said we can't tell whether we're in case A or B. But this seems to take away a lot of the teeth of the FTA.
Please let me know if I'm misunderstanding what you are saying. Given my busy schedule lately and my annoying lag in responding to you, I wouldn't be surprised at all if I've misread some stuff.
“Please let me know if I'm misunderstanding what you are saying. Given my busy schedule lately and my annoying lag in responding to you, I wouldn't be surprised at all if I've misread some stuff.”
DeleteSure! It’s in both of our best interests to understand what the other is saying. Many times I find atheists try to disprove a god that I don’t believe in. An atheist that is trying to understand the real meaning of the argument is rare, but makes for great dialogue! :0 I applaud your effort and have greatly enjoyed our discussions.
I think you are equating the fine-tuning constants with the laws of physics, which is easy to do since the constants are derived from the equations describing the laws. The laws of physics include things like gravity, thermodynamics, electromagnetism, quantum mechanics, etc. These laws describe the ‘behavior’ of our universe. No one can speculate what a hypothetical universe would/could look like without gravity. We only know what our universe would look like without gravity….there wouldn’t be a universe. Within the equations for gravity, thermodynamics, electromagnetism, quantum mechanics, etc emerge the constants that are independent from one another, yet have to be extremely precise for life to be possible.
Another analogy would be to have 30 boxes of different sizes containing marbles. For simplicity’s sake, let’s assume 20 of them have 100 marbles with 1 red marble and the rest are white, 5 of them have 1000 marbles with only 1 red marble, 1 of the boxes has 100,000 marbles with only 1 red marble, another has 10^40 marbles with only 1 red marble, another has 10^62 marbles with only 1 red marble, another has 10^100 marbles with only 1 red marble, and another has 10^120 marbles with only 1 red marble. Each box represents a different constant found within the laws of physics and each marble represents a possible value for that constant. For us to have a life-permitting universe, a red marble would have to be selected from all 30 boxes with no white marbles selected. Some universes can form if a white marble is selected, but not allow for life to form (giant black hole, no stars, or no atoms). With our universe, every marble selected is red. It’s very much case A.
That’s just to get a life-permitting universe. That doesn’t include anything else needed for life to form such as a life-permitting planet, abiogenesis, DNA formation, evolution, etc. The layers of improbability keep going.
What if there were 10^500 opportunities for picking a series of marbles? Then it becomes much more likely that the red marbles would be picked in one particular set. And second of all, we don't know how wide the ranges are of the values. They could be really wide or relatively narrow.
DeleteNow obviously this is the multiverse, which you have a problem with. Many physicists like Dr. Vilenkin say that if the cosmological constant was 0 then it would mean that the universe would have a much better long term out look for life, and it would be harder to make the case for the multiverse. So if a god did design only 1 universe, he could have done a better job and he could have made it much harder for physicists to theorize about a multiverse.
Life permitting planets are everywhere. New estimates show about 9 billion earth like planets in our galaxy alone. And given that we are made of the most common elements in the universe, life is inevitable. And an all-loving, morally perfect god is incompatible with the millions of years of conscious suffering required by evolution that would have existed for no logically necessary reason. So that rules out an omni-god right there. The only possible god is a deistic god.
@Thinker – “What if there were 10^500 opportunities for picking a series of marbles?”
DeleteThat’s the Inverse Gambler’s fallacy.
If you’ll note in the OP, I made the statement “The laws of physics have several constants contained in their equations that, should they vary in the slightest amount…..” I’d say a range of 0-10^-120 is a pretty narrow range. If there is a creator and he wants his creation to be able to find evidence for him if they choose to look, a non-zero cosmological constant causes the expansion of the universe to accelerate leaving little doubt that there was a beginning. Also, an argument for bad design is not an argument against design, so you’re not helping your case by expressing an opinion on the design.
The multiverse is not the inverse gambler's fallacy. We have good reason to think it is true. There is no scientific theory explaining the universe now that does not contain the likelihood of other universes.
DeleteYour statement does not address my point. A cosmological constant of 0 would be better for life in the universe, and it would make it harder to make the case for the multiverse. Why would a god who wants us to know "his creation to be able to find evidence for him" leave open the multiverse for us so that we can attribute the constants to chance? Makes no sense. Also, if a god wanted us to have clear evidence for him, he could have simply made a universe less than 10,000 years old, or he could have made the earth the center of the universe and made all the stars and planets revolve around us. There are many things a deity could do to falsify atheism.
And finally, I'm not merely arguing from bad design. I'm saying god is logically incompatible with evolution. If you disagree, then you have to explain to me how a "perfect" being would intentionally use a process that guaranteed conscious suffering for millions of years for no logically necessary reason. Any god who would choose to create humans through a haphazard process that required millions of years of conscious suffering for no logically necessary reason, is to say god is either totally incompetent at creation, totally indifferent to the suffering that he chose to engineer for no reason, or is totally cruel and evil for taking pleasure in this process. If you grant a creator, you have to grant that. There's no logical way out of it.
“The multiverse is not the inverse gambler's fallacy.”
DeleteWhen using the multi-verse to dismiss the fine-tuning problems, it is indeed!
“We have good reason to think it is true.”
No, we have an idea that has been neither proven nor disproven. Just because the math does not prohibit it does not mean the multi-verse exists. Failure to disprove something is not the same as evidence for something.
“A cosmological constant of 0 would be better for life in the universe”
I’ve also heard the opposite. In what way would a zero cosmological constant make it better for life? And in what timeframe? Now or a trillion years from now? Does that mean the allowable range would be less than 10^-120? It still does nothing to explain the extremely narrow range the cosmological constant must fall within….red herring.
“Why would a god who wants us to know "his creation to be able to find evidence for him" leave open the multiverse for us so that we can attribute the constants to chance?”
Everyone is free to reject God. He will not force anyone to serve him. Atheists are free to appeal to an infinite number of universes to escape a creator, but doing so only moves the unanswered questions back a level. The multi-verse, if it exists, cannot legitimately be used to dismiss the evidence for a creator.
“if a god wanted us to have clear evidence for him, he could have simply made a universe less than 10,000 years old, or he could have made the earth the center of the universe and made all the stars and planets revolve around us.”
So, there were no atheists before we knew the age of the Earth or that the Earth wasn’t the center of the universe? Yet another logical fallacy.
“I'm saying god is logically incompatible with evolution.”
The morality of God is quite off topic (red herring) and I’m not interested in debating that now. There’s a website devoted to this topic. www.biologos.org Have at it!
The multiverse began independent of any fine tuning issues. We simply come to it any time we try and figure out the origin of our universe.
Delete"Failure to disprove something is not the same as evidence for something."
Isn't that better applied to your god?
A non-zero cosmological constant means the universe will likely die in a "big rip" at some time in the future either billions or trillions of years or more. It also means that galaxies will find it more difficult to form than a CC of zero or one that is slightly negative. Don Page, the Evangelical physicist even writes in a paper
"the fact that the observed cosmological constant is positive may
be taken to be a very preliminary inconclusive hint of evidence against a biophilic
optimal fine tuning of it to maximize the fraction of baryons that develop into living
organisms, since to maximize that fraction, the simplest (but highly uncertain)
assumption would be that the fraction of baryons condensing into galaxies would
need to be maximized, and for that the cosmological constant would instead need
to be slightly negative."
That means that larger cosmological constants are problematic but smaller ones are not. And I find it interesting that a god would create the universe in such a way to make atheism plausible by creating a universe where you can have the possibility of a multiverse. You almost make it seem as if god is deliberately giving atheists leeway.
The multiverse itself is not used to disprove god, I don't know where you get that. It can be used to address the fine tuning argument but it is by no means a single-knock down argument against god. So you're attacking a straw man right there.
"So, there were no atheists before we knew the age of the Earth or that the Earth wasn’t the center of the universe? Yet another logical fallacy."
No, I'm saying the modern scientific revolution could have proved Genesis to be true, in which case Christianity would have been vindicated and it would be impossible to rationally deny it. If god exists he could have done that. But according to you, it seems god deliberately created a universe that looks natural to allow atheists to reject him.
And I'm aware of Biologos. I think their mission to get more theists into accepting evolution is a good one and I'm a big fan of Ken Miller and Francis Collins. But no one there addresses the issues I bring up to my knowledge.
“A non-zero cosmological constant means the universe will likely die in a "big rip"”
DeleteI do not find something that may happen a few trillion years in the future to be a compelling knock against God. Btw….how do you imbed a link or format in the comments? Is it the same as Reddit?
“You almost make it seem as if god is deliberately giving atheists leeway.”
Yes, it’s called freedom. “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” Jer 29:13
“But according to you, it seems god deliberately created a universe that looks natural to allow atheists to reject him.”
I don’t think the origin of the universe, the fine-tuning of the universe, the mathematical nature of the universe, or the origin of life look natural. They indicate a transcendent intelligence. You choose to believe otherwise.
“And I'm aware of Biologos….But no one there addresses the issues I bring up to my knowledge.”
384 results on suffering….you obviously did not look. http://biologos.org/search?s=suffering
"I do not find something that may happen a few trillion years in the future to be a compelling knock against God."
DeleteAnd I do not find the 3.5 billion years of haphazard evolution, during which there were millions and millions of species that evolved only to be snuffed out and pushed into evolutionary dead ends, and during which time there was at least 5 mass extinctions in which some 70-95 percent of all the living species on earth at that time went extinct to be compatible with an omni-god. I'm being asked by theists to believe that this was all part of a divine creator's plan who was sitting back and perhaps taking pleasure in watching millions of species (whose evolution he allegedly guided) get wiped out one after the other, and then starting all over again, and then wiped them out again and repeated this process over and over, until finally getting around to evolving human beings – which I'm told was the whole purpose of this cruel and clumsy process.
It is unbelievable.
Now, to embed a link you must use the html tag. Link NAME where URL is the actual URL of the link, and Link NAME is the name you want displayed.
"384 results on suffering….you obviously did not look. http://biologos.org/search?s=suffering"
Well, let me correct myself. I am aware that there have been attempts to address this issue, but what I meant was that none make any serious logical sense. The explanations BioLogos gives are:
1. Creation Corrupted by an Angelic Fall
I've actually debated this once with a theist. It's utterly preposterous that an angel fell "before" god created the universe (which means before god 'created' time) and so god decided then to create a world with millions of years of suffering. Even BioLogos admits this is an inadequate explanation.
2. The Fall Impacts All Time—Past and Future
That human sin retroactively created suffering millions of years in the past is another bankrupt attempt to reconcile geology and evolution with god. Why is it even necessary for there to have been suffering millions of years before humans had even evolved? It serves no purpose. Those beings were unaware of it and couldn't stand to gain anything from it. And this makes god look even worse than his portrayal in the OT makes him out to be.
3 Natural “Evil” as God’s Good Purpose
"Those beings designed to die promote the good of the whole by fulfilling their part in God’s plan for governing the universe." And for what logically necessary reason did god have to do this? None is given.
4. Creation Given Freedom as an Act of Divine Love
"The suffering and death embedded in creation provide the opportunity for new creative possibilities, and so are redeemed."
But as C.S. Lewis put it, "So far as we know beasts are incapable either of sin or virtue: therefore they can neither deserve pain nor be improved by it."
5. Creation as an Environment for Human “Soul-Making”
"Robert Wennberg has pursued this line of thinking by stating that the presence of animal pain and suffering contributes to the creation of an environment in which human free decision-making and “soul-making” can best occur....He then argues that an environment in which God’s power and glory were overwhelmingly present, and all threat of pain and suffering eliminated, would not give adequate “space” for the exercise of fully free choices."
If the purpose is soul making, and only humans have souls, why the billions of years of life before humans evolved that served no logically necessary purpose?
Now I could write a whole post on this and I probably am in the future, but as you can see there are huge holes in any attempt to reconcile this problem with a perfectly loving deity.
I liked your post, here are a few of my comments on the matter.
ReplyDeleteA multiverse isn't necessarily the only other option. We could also have a universe that is in a constant state of expansion and contraction. If the critical numbers are not correct, than the universe collapses and starts over again. It's possible that this is simply the millionth attempt at a universe and everything just happened to fall into place. It is also a possibility, as mentioned before, that a universe could be created without all of the constants being correct and still leading to life, so a creator is not necessary in either of these scenarios.
Second, to assume that the multiverse is a crutch being used by science to avoid using a creator is not giving scientists enough credit. As you mention, God cannot be proved or disproved, so a scientist naturally MUST toss out that conclusion. Even a theistic scientist, by the very definition of his field, must reject any hypothesis that cannot be verified. The multiverse is still being used because it CAN be verified. They are working on it now, though results are forthcoming as has been mentioned above.
Third, you straw man the multiverse argument from the get go in your post by mentioning how it came to you from your hippie friend, which is close to saying it's a crackhead idea. You continue this line of reasoning saying that the idea 'wasn't taken seriously' and was nothing more than science fiction many years ago. This ignores the point, however, that a lot of science fiction has BECOME science. A good idea will always be a good idea, but sometimes it is not testable. Sometimes you can't test an idea because it is physically impossible to do so (observe a particle of light without observing a particle of light to see how it behaves) and other times its simply technologically impossible to do so. String theory works great on paper, but it's hard to scientifically verify RIGHT NOW. Plasma rockets were a great idea in 1970 but we've only just acquired the technology to feasibly test large scale models of it. So discounting an ideas validity because of it's age (and especially because of it's source) is a logical fallacy I think you are aware of and above.
After all this, however, there are a lot of advances in science that certainly do help to point to a creator, and this is a very good one. And as you showed there a many scientists saying that it is either this or the multiverse, but I think we must be aware that it is either a multiverse or a CREATOR, not a GOD. Just because we find a creator, or first mover, or primary cause, does not mean it is the Judeo-Christian Yahweh.
@Miguel G – Thanks for stopping by!
Delete“We could also have a universe that is in a constant state of expansion and contraction.”
I do not know of an expansion/contraction model that has been able to get around a finite beginning because of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Entropy continues to increase with each bounce. If you know of one, can you give me a link so I can look into it?
“to assume that the multiverse is a crutch being used by science to avoid using a creator is not giving scientists enough credit”
What I object to is using the ‘multi-verse of the gaps’ to dismiss evidence for a creator when the multi-verse solves no such problem. The fine-tuning issue does not go away with an infinite number of universes (future post), so the problems it is supposed to solve just get moved back a level.
“A good idea will always be a good idea, but sometimes it is not testable.”
Sure, so let’s take the multi-verse seriously when it is testable instead of hand-waving away theistic implications. I’m interested in if these gravitational waves will be seen, but I’m skeptical, not because I’m presupposing theism (since the multi-verse doesn’t do much harm to the possibility of God), but because many of our theories and laws of physics are based on the universe being an isolated system. Having evidence of outside interference would mean that some of the theories and verified predictions from those theories we’ve observed in our universe could be wrong. Not having evidence of outside interference neither proves nor falsifies the possibility of the multi-verse.
“Just because we find a creator, or first mover, or primary cause, does not mean it is the Judeo-Christian Yahweh.”
Agreed. The next question would be has this creator revealed itself to its creation?