I'm currently reading Dinesh D'Souza's new book Life and Death: The Evidence (which I'll be reviewing shortly). But in the meantime, I wanted to share a fun paragraph from P. 84...
The significance of the Anthropic Principle has not been lost on leading atheists who are desperate to avoid the obvious inference to a creator. Richard Dawkins, for example, concedes fine-tuning but argues that “it does not have to mean that the universe was deliberately made in order that we should exist. It need mean only that we are here, and we could not be in a universe that lacked the capacity of producing us.”
This in science is called a selection effect. The difficulty with Dawkins’ argument is exposed by philosopher John Leslie. Leslie asks, suppose a massive terrorist bomb explodes a few feet away from you. Given the extremely low odds, wouldn’t you be amazed to find yourself still alive? How impressed would you be with Dawkins’ contention that there was nothing to warrant surprise; obviously you had to have survived, because if you hadn’t you wouldn’t be here to discuss the subject.
Leslie’s point is that your survival under the circumstances remains highly improbable and in need of explanation. Fine tuning is even less likely than the odds of me buying a lottery ticket in all fifty states and winning every time. How clueless do you have to be to fail to recognize that something very strange is going on here?
2 comments:
"How impressed would you be with Dawkins’ contention that there was nothing to warrant surprise; obviously you had to have survived, because if you hadn’t you wouldn’t be here to discuss the subject."
I agree with Dawkins's view of the anthropic principle (that fine-tuning doesn't necessarily or even probably point to the existence of God) but at the same time I am not impressed with the contention above. Did Dawkins actually say this or is this Leslie's interpretation of what Dawkins would say in response to his analogy?
I'm sure anyone would be amazed to survive a massive bomb, including Dawkins, but to jump from that amazement at the improbability of surviving to attributing the improbable event to God is logically flawed.
This logical fallacy is different from the logical fallacy of the anthropic principle however and that is why I would be surprised if the above response to Leslie's query actually came from Dawkins.
The logical fallacy of the anthropic principle I think comes from a misuse of probability and odds. The universe has many dials. One for gravity, the speed of light, the strong and weak forces, etc. These dials could have been set at any point from 0 to infinity. The fact that one dial is set at 7.345 is in and of iteself a neutral valueless circumstance. There are no "odds" of it being set at any one particular number from the beginning because every setting would be one in a gazillion. The miraculous odds and any value judgements derived from them are only obtained after the fact by showing that any small deviation would bring down the whole house of cards.
Another argument against the anthropic principle comes from the fact that there may be an infinite number of universes- the so-called multiverse theory- so that every single setting of each dial eventually gets tried out and permutated with every single setting of every other dial. Through sheer volume a universe that has the potential for life will emerge and maybe life will emerge in it, but this wouldn't necessarily be God it could just be a grossly inefficient random quality of the multiverse.
Anon: “Did Dawkins actually say this or is this Leslie's interpretation of what Dawkins would say?”
TW: The quote comes from Dawkins himself, and can be found in his book, The Ancestor’s Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution.
Anon: “I'm sure anyone would be amazed to survive a massive bomb, including Dawkins, but to jump from that amazement at the improbability of surviving to attributing the improbable event to God is logically flawed.”
TW: Certainly, but I don’t think Leslie is making that assertion. Rather, he is just showing how dense and clueless Dawkins is. Consider if the bomb scenario happened to you: After the bomb went off, wouldn’t you (or any normal person) want to know HOW you survived? Maybe you were wearing some rare clothes that weren’t flammable. Maybe there was…well, anything! But wouldn’t you WANT to know? Wouldn’t you think it’s IMPORTANT to know? That’s the point Leslie is making.
Anon: “The logical fallacy of the anthropic principle I think comes from a misuse of probability and odds. The universe has many dials. One for gravity, the speed of light, the strong and weak forces, etc. These dials could have been set at any point from 0 to infinity. The fact that one dial is set at 7.345 is in and of iteself a neutral valueless circumstance. There are no ‘odds’ of it being set at any one particular number from the beginning because every setting would be one in a gazillion. The miraculous odds and any value judgements derived from them are only obtained after the fact by showing that any small deviation would bring down the whole house of cards.”
TW: I have to say, while I’m not positive I understand your assertion, I’m pretty sure I do, and I don’t find it very convincing. After all, you say it yourself: Theoretically, those numbers could be anywhere from zero to infinity, and yet the numbers they settled at (7.345 or whatever) are precisely the numbers that made the universe, Earth, and human life possible. I don’t see how the fact that we make those “value judgments” “after the fact” makes those numbers any less miraculous. Thus, the argument for fine-tuning remains very, very powerful.
Anon: “Another argument against the anthropic principle comes from the fact that there may be an infinite number of universes- the so-called multiverse theory.”
TW: Yes, I’m familiar with the multiverse theory, but it seems to me that the multiverse theory was only created to deflect attention away from the scary proposition (from an atheist’s perspective) that God created the Universe. After all, there is zero evidence for a multiverse. On this matter, I always enjoy the wit of Professor Robert C. Keens, who noted…"Originally, atheists prided themselves on being no-nonsense empiricists, who limited their beliefs to what could be seen and measured. Now, we find ourselves in a situation in which the only alternative to belief in God is belief in an infinite number of unobservable parallel universes! You've come along way, baby!"
Thankfully, a lot of physicists are already on record saying that the Anthropic Principle is real and that science must come to terms with it. To quote the physicist Freeman Dyson, "the universe knew we were coming." And that’s pretty amazing.
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