A thought about fine-tuning

[Ernest Major]

Simplified, the fine-tuning apologetic argues that the probability that
a universe is capable of supporting us, whether us is drawn broadly as
in life, or narrowly as in Homo sapiens, is sufficiently low that it is
justifiable to conclude that the universe was deliberately constructed
to support us (or that there are great number of universes, in which
case one has recourse to the weak anthropic principle).

This argument falls short, in that the parameter space for universe is
not known, so we lack a means of calculating the requisite probability.

However there is another issue that I don't think I've seen anyone bring
up. Presuming for the same of argument that life is only possible in a
small portion of the parameter space, the probability we should be
looking at is that probability that a universe supports something that
is only possible in a small portion of the parameter space - that it
supports life, or liff, or laff, or laif, or lauf, or loof, or lof, or
luff, or lef, or leef, and so on. If a substantial proportion of
possible universes supports one of these, then we can appeal to weak
anthropic principle to account for us being in one that supports life.

Calculating this probability is an even more challenging problem that
calculating the first.

--
alias Ernest Major

[Glenn]

"List of Fine-Tuning Parameters"

https://intelligentdesign.org/articles/list-of-fine-tuning-parameters/

"“Fine-tuning” refers to various features of the universe that are necessary conditions for the existence of complex life."

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

On 2023-06-01 16:09:45 +0000, Ernest Major said:

> Simplified, the fine-tuning apologetic argues that the probability that
> a universe is capable of supporting us, whether us is drawn broadly as
> in life, or narrowly as in Homo sapiens, is sufficiently low that it is
> justifiable to conclude that the universe was deliberately constructed
> to support us (or that there are great number of universes, in which
> case one has recourse to the weak anthropic principle).

I don't have the expertise to have an informed opinion of fine tuning,
but some people who do, such as the physicist Anthony Aguirre, have
found the fine-tuning argument to have been oversold:

> There is currently no established theory as to why these parameters
> take the particular values we deduce from observations. This has led to
> proposed “anthropic” explanations for the observed value of each
> parameter as the only value capable of generating a universe that can
> host intelligent life. In this paper, I explicitly show that the
> requirement that the universe generates Sun-like stars with planets
> does not fix these parameters, by developing a class of cosmologies
> (based on the classical “cold big-bang” model) in which some or all of
> the cosmological parameters differ by orders of magnitude from the
> values they assume in the standard hot big-bang cosmology, without
> precluding in any obvious way the existence of intelligent life. I also
> give a careful discussion of the structure and context of anthropic
> arguments in cosmology, and point out some implications of the cold
> big-bang model’s existence for anthropic arguments concerning specific
> parameters.

Anthony Aguirre (2001) "Cold big-bang cosmology as a counterexample to
several anthropic arguments" Phys. Rev. D 64, 083508

>
> This argument falls short, in that the parameter space for universe is
> not known, so we lack a means of calculating the requisite probability.
>
> However there is another issue that I don't think I've seen anyone
> bring up. Presuming for the same of argument that life is only possible
> in a small portion of the parameter space, the probability we should be
> looking at is that probability that a universe supports something that
> is only possible in a small portion of the parameter space - that it
> supports life, or liff, or laff, or laif, or lauf, or loof, or lof, or
> luff, or lef, or leef, and so on. If a substantial proportion of
> possible universes supports one of these, then we can appeal to weak
> anthropic principle to account for us being in one that supports life.
>
> Calculating this probability is an even more challenging problem that
> calculating the first.


--

athel cb : Biochemical Evolution, Garland Science, 2016

[Öö Tiib]

It is possible to construct working computing device in Conway's Game
of Life that has only 2 dimensional grid with 3 rules. So the space of
universes where complex life is possible can be way larger then the
fine tuning proponents anticipate. Or can be smaller. We do not know.
We can not make knowledge from ignorance.

[Mark Isaak]

Another problem is that we are not really asking about the probability
that the universe can support life. We are asking about the probability
that the universe can support life, given that there is something in the
universe to ask the question. That skews the equation dramatically.

--
Mark Isaak
"Wisdom begins when you discover the difference between 'That
doesn't make sense' and 'I don't understand.'" - Mary Doria Russell