The anthropic principle and a finely-tuned universe

SubjectSean

Can I just ask is my understanding of the "atrractors" in chaos theory correct. Do they pre-exist so to speak embedded in the fabric of the universe? Are they responsible for spirals, coastlines and convergent evolution? How did these attractors get there?

robindch

SubjectSean wrote:

they have a quark factory do they?

Well, like much of space, the volume occupied by your parents does generate quarks through pair-production and by them floating about in the generally gooey quantum foam that we all splash about in.

You may need to tell them this.

Zillah

PDN wrote: »

I can't see how this is a problem for anyone either, but it obviously is for Dawkins (at least as presented by Zillah). He argues that if God designed the universe then God must Himself require a designer, a fallacious argument IMHO.

:rolleyes:

I realise you have a lot of posts directed at you here, but if you're going to keep attributing something to me the least you could do is actually read my posts.

SubjectSean

robindch wrote: »

Well, like much of space, the volume occupied by your parents does generate quarks through pair-production and by them floating about in the generally gooey quantum foam that we all splash about in.

You may need to tell them this.

Thankyou but I would rather not burden them with something so spooky. It may lead them to surmise there is something supernatural going on.

robindch

SubjectSean wrote:

It may lead them to surmise there is something supernatural going on.

I present Hilliard's Corollary to Clarke's Third Law:

robindch wrote:

Any sufficiently advanced physics, chemistry or biology is indistinguishable from magic. Doubly so if you're religious.

SubjectSean

robindch wrote: »

I present Hilliard's Corollary to Clarke's Third Law:

I think it my case the appearance of 'magic' is leading me to be a little freaked out. I don't know if this counts as a religion. The first Church of Freakedness. It's not until I got to the advanced science that I started to get this way. I was hardly freaked out at all before and I laughed hard at Jebus and all the other man made religions along with him. But now with science in my heart I see that everything is highly ordered out of chaos and broadly inevitable even down to the memes. Looks like design IMHO and it never did before.

[EDIT] TBH with you it begins to look like something approximating an evolving holodeck <You in the back there, stop sniggering!> I feel like poor Jules out of pulp fiction

JULES
What's an act of God?

VINCENT
I guess it's when God makes the
impossible possible. And I'm sorry
Jules, but I don't think what
happened this morning qualifies.

JULES
Don't you see, Vince, that ****
don't matter. You're judging this
thing the wrong way. It's not
about what. It could be God
stopped the bullets, he changed
Coke into Pepsi, he found my
****in' car keys. You don't judge
**** like this based on merit.
Whether or not what we experienced
was an according-to-Hoyle miracle
is insignificant. What is
significant is I felt God's touch,
God got involved.

Schuhart

SubjectSean wrote: »

JULES
What's an act of God?

VINCENT
I guess it's when God makes the
impossible possible.

I think of Pulp Fiction as an entirely appropriate source of spiritual enlightenment, although I do admit to a tremendous sense of disappointment when I found that Jules' trademark biblical quotation is manufactured.

However, doesn't his quote above underline that point that its things behaving in a way that defy explanation that suggest a god, rather than stuff acting in a way that is explicable. In that specific instance (if memory serves) it was the fact that the holes in the wall behind him suggested that bullets had passed through his body without harming him. 'Design' would require him to be dead, making for a much shorter film.

tbh, I think the 'design' issue is one where proponents hope that playing with language will do the job for them. Indeed, if there is design it does require a designer. But is calling the ability of things to be understood 'design' seems to be a leap of faith.

Zombrex

PDN wrote: »

I think it reasonable for someone to say, "This universe looks ordered, therefore, in my opinion, I think it more probable than not that there was a designer." That is a faith statement supported by evidence, but not by conclusive proof - which supports theism or deism.

Not really following this thread ... why does an ordered universe suggest a designer?

Are you saying that order is unlikely or less likely to occur in a non-designed universe?

I'm not quite sure how anyone can say that since we don't have a non-ordered universe (or any other universe) to compare ours to.

For all we know the way this universe is is the only way that a natural universe can form.

It could in fact be extremely unlikely that a non-ordered universe would ever form from what ever our universe formed from.

The classic example is the water filling a puddle. It is very very unlikely (impossible as far as we know) that rain water will not fill a puddle to the edges of the puddle.

Would someone look at the order of the puddle, the way the water fits exactly the dimensions of the puddle, and say that this, while not proving a designer, strongly suggests that someone designed the water to fit the puddle?

SubjectSean

Wicknight wrote: »

Not really following this thread ... why does an ordered universe suggest a designer?

The alternative is that an ordered universe does not suggest a designer. Because of things like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attractor (apologies for source)

Wicknight wrote: »

Are you saying that order is unlikely or less likely to occur in a non-designed universe?

Less IMO but this is basically a gut feeling.

Wicknight wrote: »

I'm not quite sure how anyone can say that since we don't have a non-ordered universe (or any other universe) to compare ours to.

I said in an earlier post that this is the only argument I can see against what I was saying and what PDN was defending. However it is very easy for me to imagine alternative universes and it is not beyond science to hypothosise different universes. Due to variabilities in the big bang or other factors a different universe could have arisen and I have little doubt of this.

Wicknight wrote: »

For all we know the way this universe is is the only way that a natural universe can form.

It could in fact be extremely unlikely that a non-ordered universe would ever form from what ever our universe formed from..

This is speculation no different than that I am engaging in. You can't have it both ways. What you are presenting here is just your gut feeling and it is a position that I find unlikely only because of my gut feeling.

Wicknight wrote: »

The classic example is the water filling a puddle. It is very very unlikely (impossible as far as we know) that rain water will not fill a puddle to the edges of the puddle.

Would someone look at the order of the puddle, the way the water fits exactly the dimensions of the puddle, and say that this, while not proving a designer, strongly suggests that someone designed the water to fit the puddle?

Somebody told me this example the other day and presented it from the point of view of a conscious puddle as it evaporated However I have difficulty comparing the puddles existence with that of sentient consciousness. There is a vast difference in the level of complexity. Even if I spill my coffee it makes a puddle. Such a level of order is mostly unremarkable. However if after some period of time the coffee began to ask questions about who had spilled it then I would be somewhat astounded. I would think what an extraordinary accident, there has to be something supernatural involved.

Zombrex

SubjectSean wrote: »

The alternative is that an ordered universe does not suggest a designer.

No, the alternative is that it doesn't suggest anything, either way.

SubjectSean wrote: »

Because of things like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attractor (apologies for source)

Neither of those suggest a designer either.

SubjectSean wrote: »

Less IMO but this is basically a gut feeling.

Ok. Humans certainly tend to view the world as acted up by an agent that they relate to in human terms, hence the invention of religion in the first place, but that is a trait of the way our brains view the world, rather than an actual reflection of it.

We used to think that gods lived in storm clouds for the same reason.

SubjectSean wrote: »

This is speculation no different than that I am engaging in. You can't have it both ways.

Yes, but I'm not speculating. I'm saying no conclusions can be drawn, where as you appear to be saying that the order of the universe suggests a designer. I'm saying that such an assertion, even a speculative one, is wholly unsupported.

SubjectSean wrote: »

What you are presenting here is just your gut feeling

Well no offense Sean but gut feelings are largely irrelevant and not to be trusted.

SubjectSean wrote: »

However I have difficulty comparing the puddles existence with that of sentient consciousness.

Well you shouldn't.

It is the human need to view ourselves as some how special that makes us pounder about how amazing it is that we exist. We then look around for something equally amazing (to us) to explain why we exist, because the idea that we are actually simply a bunch of rather complex yet completely natural chemical reactions doesn't sit with our own sense of self-importance (your "gut feeling" as it were).

SubjectSean wrote: »

There is a vast difference in the level of complexity. Even if I spill my coffee it makes a puddle. Such a level of order is mostly unremarkable.

Unremarkable to whom?

We only think we are remarkable because we like to view ourselves as special. No doubt there are far more complex systems of life in this universe or another universe who would view our small bodies as no more amazing than puddles of coffee.

it is all relative.

SubjectSean wrote: »

However if after some period of time the coffee began to ask questions about who had spilled it then I would be somewhat astounded. I would think what an extraordinary accident, there has to be something supernatural involved.

Well if by "some period of time" you mean a few billion years, you really shouldn't.

Life as we understand it on Earth is certainly rare in the explored universe (we have so far only found it on Earth), but by no means exceptional.

Given certain conditions that are not wholly unlikely with in our galaxy let alone the universe, it is in fact inevitable that complex life would develop. As inevitable as a pool of water filling a hole.