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Fine Tuning argument / The best argument for the existence of God
- Thread starter leroy
- Start date
leroy
Well-Known Member
Conditions? What conditions? What are you talking about?.............I´ll ask you directly what do I have to do in order for you to support your assertions and accusations?
Including
1 My claims have been refuted
2 I am taking the article out of context
3 I was corrected and not willing to accept my mistakes
And even more important
4 Answer if you still disagree with the claim that Bolzman Brains are statistically more likely than normal observers like us (assuming we came to be by chance)………if you still disagree explain why
What do you want me to do in order for you to actually answer my requests?
Don’t do it for my benefit, do it for the benefit of people that will read this thread in the future and might be interested in you supporting your claims/observations/accusations etc.
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
There is no need to do it for the benefit of others. Anyone that has been following this thread would agree.
But here is a free one that refutes your claims. You have as yet to demonstrate that Bolzman<sic> Brains are even possible. You need more than mere handwaving to do that. You did not even understand your Wiki source that pointed out that scientists do not take the concept seriously, though it can be used to test ideas. Until you address the issue of Boltzmann Brains properly you have lost.
Prediction, upcoming attempt to shift the burden of proof.
And when needed I do support my claims. So far your failed arguments have not really required that.
leroy
Well-Known Member
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Oh my, that may be a violation of the TOS.
leroy
Well-Known Member
And I provided 4 sources supporting that claim, not only that BB are possible but more likely to occur than “normal observers” …… so whats wrong with the sources? Or what is wrong with my interpretation of the sources?
Yes that is the point of the BB paradox………. Any hypothesis that results in the conclusion that we are BB should be rejected on the basis of reduction ad absurdum.
My point is that some* multiverse models that attempt to explain the FT problem lead to the conclusion that we are probably BB , which is why we most reject (or atleast modify) those models.
Asking you to explain and justify your specific points of disagreement is not “shifting the burnen proof”
You claimed that my claims have been refuted, you claimed that I don’t admit my mistakes, you claimed that I took the article out of context………………….why wouldn’t you support any of this claims?
Why are this claims in your list of “claims that I dont have to support”
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Oh my, the same old failed arguments and false claims again.
leroy
Well-Known Member
And ,let me guess, you will not support claim, you will not explain why the arguments fail……………you will simply make the assertion without any justification
Out of curiosity: why do you keep bringing up Boltzmann brains? How do you see them as relevant?
leroy
Well-Known Member
The 10^120 is not a result of direct measurement but rather it is inferred by the equations….
I don’t claim to understand the deep physics of the cosmological constant nor the “10 120” number, but this is not creationists stuff, this is well documented and granted within the scientific community.
Steven Weinberg , for example
leroy
Well-Known Member
The BB paradox destroys any chance explanation for the FT of the universe……..(this includes many multiverse hypothesis) ……..
I brign Bolzman Braisn every time someone asks me (challenges me) to explain why chance fails as an explanatioin
the original argument
Bolzman brains are used to support part of premise 2 (the part in red)
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
I have endlessly. It is not my problem anymore. By the way, this thread justifies me. I need no more than that.
leroy
Well-Known Member
Yea sure
Subduction Zone
Veteran Member
Everyone else will point out the same. Perhaps it is time to rethink your strategy.
joelr
Well-Known Member
No physicist I have ever listened to thinks there is any actual evidence for fine-tuning.
The same authors:
Finely tuned models sacrifice explanatory depth
http://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/18526/7/FTED_20.pdf
We thus provide an account that relates two `theoretical virtues' of
models used broadly in physical settings| namely, a lack of fine-tuning and explanatory depth|and
argue that finely tuned models sacrifice explanatory depth
This is what the model predicts?
That is ridiculous. Mathematics has predicted actual physical things. We also see nature following mathematical laws. The point is there is an order that nature follows and mathematics describes it. There is no God in any way.
Except classical systems. The rules of quantum mechanics do not apply to macroscopic systems in the way they apply at the quantum realm.
So you agree with me that the universe does not look fine tuned for life?
Wrong. You can track the probability of a system being in some classical state not which state it will be in. Taking the early universe and saying you know all the elements will form and then life will form is an even larger version of wrong.
That is also ridiculous. We know life is possible because we see life. We know universes are possible because we live in one. Just because our current understanding is incomplete you cannot rule out the obvious.
No it is not? Hugh Everetts Relativistic State has mathematics that is very convincing as a solution to the wave-function collapse problem to a number of physicists. It has ZERO to do with finding an explanation to replace God?
Then we have the evidence of nature continually showing us to be larger and larger. earth, galaxy, multiple galaxies, universe, larger universe. an infinite universe is a possibility with local big bangs which is one of the multiverse theories.
Thinking that there is more to nature then the observable universe is far from ridiculous.
It's not like God? We already see nature. We already see a universe that went from a simplistic state, a unified energy, to a vast universe. We see a type of evolution. So it isn't far fetched to have a hypothesis that universes evolve from simpler states. God has the least explanatory power.
Paul Davies is a bit of a deist as stated in The Mind Of God and God and the New Physics.
Again, many physicists do not consider it nonsense. The many-worlds physicists strongly support the multiverse.
Just because a multiverse is untestable doesn't make it as bad as a God hypothesis. We already know a universe is real, this makes it far more likely than it being a God-creation.
At the roundtable of the World Science Fair with Turok, Kip Thorne, Penrose, Sean Caroll and some others (there were several different sessions) the multiverse was taken seriously by some. There are hypothetical ways to test for it depending on what we find with the super-collider.
leroy
Well-Known Member
The issue is that even if there are many worlds, I dont see why would that be a problem for design hypothesis.
I would even make an argument that seems extravagant but it relies on fairly un controversial premises.
1 if there is a potentially infinite number of universes, there would also be potentially infinite number of planets with inteligent life.
2 a fraction of this inteligent life would be much more intelligent / advanced than us (lets call the "super inteligent life)" SIL
3 some super inteligent life (SIL) will have the techology of creating simulations where conscious creatures are created inside the simulation
4 a single society of SILs can create millions of simulations
5 therefore the mayority of concious creatures are part of a simulation
6 therefore most conscious creatures live in universes that where design
7 therefore it is more likely that our universe is designed
As a theist I would reject #3 because I would argue that consciousness and self awareness is more than just "chemical reactions" (you need a soul)
But if you are an atheist and accept "many worlds" I dont see how can you scape from the conclusion that probably we live in a simulated (design) universe.
The main point is that "many worlds" + "naturalism" wont safe you from the conclusion that our universe is designed
joelr
Well-Known Member
Simulation theory is a bit different. But we don't know which multiverse is even the correct version if at all. If the laws of physics can vary (A. Linde a cosmologist has a model about this) then life could be rare. But it doesn't solve any fundamental questions because some life has to form from a naturalistic method before simulations are created.
We don't know the limits of what intelligence can do, how rare is intelligent life and if the universe is a simulation then there may be ways to test for that. It's not a theory in cosmology at all. Simulation theory doesn't involve Gods or souls either.
You don't need many-worlds or naturalism to save you from the conclusion that the universe was designed. There is no evidence it was designed. The competing theories in cosmology that have some levels of evidence are inflation, types of multiverse or different patches of an infinite or much larger universe.
Cosmologists now know the universe started as a "ball of light" or super compressed energy which was likely unified. Some change in state caused the spacetime to begin expanding. The laws of nature happened. The total attractive plus repulsive energy adds to zero according to Alan Guth Cosmologist so these events could be common and each bang could produce random splitting of forces and laws. There is no evidence that this was designed to be this way. Do you study cosmology at all?
Listen to what cosmologists have to say?
The "soul" thing is not even part of simulation theory, that's just unproven speculation based on ideas.
None of these concepts can get you anywhere near theism. If the universe is designed does that mean myths become real?
leroy
Well-Known Member
My point is that if you adopt multiverses and accept that my premises are probably true then you have to conclude that you live in a simulation (which ironically would be a form of inteligent design)
So ether
1 reject the multiverse aproach
2 reject one of the premises (and explain why would you reject it)
3 accept the conclusion that you live in a simulation
What do you mean “listened to”? Do you just plug your ears at conferences and symposia? Do you get someone else to read through e.g., APS journals in order to make sure you skip papers devoted to solutions and/or implications of known fine-tuning problems (or new fine-tuning problems)?
More likely (given what you’ve written) you are listening to a small number of physicists in a highly selective manner and misunderstanding some of the fundamentals. For example, guys like Susskind, Carroll, Weinberg, Greene, Tegmark, etc., who are popular or at least have written popular books I’ve been asked about or told about sometimes deny that there exists a fine-tuning problem or that the universe is fine-tuned not because they deny that there is evidence for fine-tuning but rather because they believe that they have an approach to it which solves the problem(s) and is satisfactory or even the correct one! But by this definition, theologians like WL Craig don’t believe in fine-tuning problems because they have a solution: God did it.
A central difference is that physicists and cosmologists are also interested in often related problems other than fine-tuning and our evidence for different types of fine-tuning. We are concerned, for example, with naturalness and the hierarchy problem(s), as well as a certain amount of aesthetics and metaphysical issues.
Carroll has written in a widely-used textbook on the fact that the universe appears fine-tuned and has more recently written a rather simple, chapter-length document on his personal take on where the issues of fine-tuning lie. Susskind has said and written numerous times of his belief that the universe clearly appears finely-tuned, as has Weinberg: "Indeed anthropically inclined physicists like Susskind and Weinberg are attracted to the multiverse precisely because it seems to dispense with God as the explanation of cosmic design" (from Carr’s editors introduction to Universe or Multiverse?, cited in a previous post). Other physicists, especially those who you’d only know from journal articles or papers on arXiv someone sent you a link to or from this or that conference, likewise deny that there is any actual fine-tuning because the evidence can be explained according to some method or approach they advocate (many of these approaches are in direct conflict).
You can find all sorts of papers written over the years in many different journals which do in fact argue that there exists no fine-tuning problem, but not because there is no evidence. Rather, the claims made in these research journals are that X or Y method, approach, etc., solves this or that fine-tuning problem (or class of fine-tuning problems).
You either didn’t read the article, or have completely failed to understand the issues involved. The authors are not arguing that there is no evidence for fine-tuning. They aren’t even claiming to have solved any fine-tuning problems. Rather, they are noting that it is a problem, and specifically that such fine-tunings demand explanations. This is, incidentally, absolutely in agreement with naïve fine-tuning arguments made by theologians. The difference is that, as elsewhere in the physics literature, the argument(s) made concern the nature of the problems of fine-tunings in physics (at a rather unusually broad level), as opposed to an immediate leap to “therefore god” or “therefore multiverse”.
Absolutely wrong:
“In order to avoid additional fine-tuned constants of Nature, it is reasonable to assume that the Big Bang started from a totally neutral state where the sum of all additive charge-like quantum numbers was zero, hence from equal amounts of matter and antimatter. A matter–antimatter symmetric universe would, however, have rapidly annihilated to an empty light bubble, while we live today in a matter-dominated Universe. Related to the density of relic photons, the number of matter particles amounts only to about one in several billions. The matter content of our Universe hence originates from a tiny but decisive disbalance characterized by a small number. In a closed universe, a significantly larger matter density (more than one matter particle per one million relic photons) would have caused a rapid recollapse of the Universe without any chance for structure formation and life.”
Naumann, T. (2017). Do we live in the best of all possible worlds? The fine-tuning of the constants of nature. Universe, 3(3), 60.
The model doesn’t predict asymmetry or symmetry, but rather more general principles combined with a lack of any theoretical justification for asymmetry leave the matter-antimatter asymmetry as a problem. It is an outstanding problem in so-called Beyond Standard Model (BSM) physics.
No, we use mathematics to predict. Incidentally, one of the most important mathematical structures and tools used in modern physics was developed using theological assumptions (namely, that a most perfect deity would organize the laws of the physical universe to reflect these extremes, which led Maupertuis and then Euler and Lagrange to formulate the variational calculus and action principles which underlie essentially the entire structure of modern fundamental physics and beyond). Newton’s laws as well as that of Galileo were likewise theologically motivated, and so was their view of mathematics and its relation to the physical and metaphysical world.
My point is not that mathematics isn’t a fundamental tool, or that God provides a useful tool or principle or anything like these in the past ~300 years. Rather, it was that simply because mathematics has been successful doesn’t justify the leap from “some mathematical structures are successfully used across physics and other sciences” to “we can infer from these successes something even remotely resembling scientific evidence for other universes.” Other universe aren’t justified by the mathematics in any case. They are posited to explain away the appearance of something like design or fine-tunings. The real issue for the extreme extrapolations based on mathematical structures is that we know such systems are inherently limited and have no way to constrain the possible sets of universes to allow such that for example we can exclude from the multiverse infinitely many gods like Zeus or universes in which Hogwarts and Vampires exist. The mathematical universe hypothesis is limited only by the structures we can dream up, and these aren’t even limited to those that can be rigorously defined.
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We don’t. For example, almost all the laws of physics you might refer to posit that all virtually all measurable quantities and physical properties take values in a continuum, are located within a space with the same cardinality, or both. Moreover, these mathematical structures are generalizations of the familiar real line (in terms of e.g., number of dimensions, topological properties, relationship to a base space, providing or requiring additional structure, etc.).
You may think that it is simply trivial and obvious that we can observe all kinds of instances of physical systems following mathematical laws that clearly involve R, R2, R3, R4 (equipped with a different metric), etc. Motion of a body along a line, for example, involves following physical laws along a kind of physical R^1 embedded in higher-dimensional space.
But in fact we can never even in principle ever observe such laws. This is because what we observe and measure are finite values. So even if we could imagine an idealized situation where we measured with infinite accuracy, we would be restricted to the countably infinite set of rational numbers. Now, between any two rational numbers are infinitely many more rational numbers. No matter how infinitesimally you may wish to consider some length, volume, time, etc., away from some “point”, you will find infinitely many rational numbers between the deviation and the original point.
Yet the physical laws which require continuity also require the probability of any measurable quantity we could ever hope to observe or record or in any way ever measure, even ideally, to be 0. That is, no matter what property or in what space we situate some physical system obeying some physical laws, the mathematical laws require the actual physical observations and empirical tests to always be inaccurate and never confirmed (even ideally).
Put most simply, all measurable quantities form a negligible set that mathematics says we can completely ignore without any difference.
Which don’t exist. They are approximations that fail in a number of ways, from violating special relativity to positing the existence of physical properties, entities, and dynamics that don’t exist.
Wrong. Utterly and completely wrong. The above is a statement that is so radical in nature if true it would demolish modern physics entirely. Even radical physicists who deny the validity of QM do not somehow posit that we should regain classicality. Classical physics is simply wrong as a model of reality; it is a set of useful approximations that breaks down in a variety of ways at every level.
Find a QM textbook (undergrads and beginning grads in related fields are still using Shankar and Griffiths, but there are better sources if you want recommendations). Look up the parts about basic postulates. Compare these with classical laws. You will find that what you said above fails to remotely accurately describe the evolution of classical or quantum states and perhaps even understand what I said about the deterministic evolution of QM before measurement (this relates to your mention of Everett below).
Then find just about any book on physics that addresses nonlinearities and realize that the problem described above would exist in classical physics in an even worse way.
We know a universe is possible because it is defined to be that which exists. We don’t know anything about multiverses other than that taken literally such a thing can’t exist because the universe is all that does so by definition. Taken more generally, it is an extrapolation from about the least generalizable observation imaginable to the most fantastic.
Your logic is no better than “I know I was born once, therefore I know I can be born infinitely many times.”
Hugh Everett’s dissertation under Wheeler and his subsequent paper were later rediscovered by the real founders of the many-worlds interpretation. The problem with the above is that 1) you're utterly wrong about the mathematics part (the whole point behind Everett’s approach and those who followed along similar lines is to drop the non-unitary evolution and reject the Born rule) and 2) this is not a cosmological model but an interpretation of QM in which we get rid of half of the mathematics governing quantum systems. So the only thing you’ve told me above is that you haven’t read Everett or any of the mathematics involved, as it is identical to that within standard non-relativistic quantum mechanics. The difference is that (contrary to what you said above about probability in classical vs. quantum states) in Everett’s approach, half of the mathematics is rejected. What remains is the standard type of state evolution familiar to college students taking their first semester of quantum physics.
What is ridiculous is to posit that because our own universe appears to be so special, and we have no theoretical explanation for this, therefore we are justified in asserting that there exists vast numbers of universes for which our only evidence is that our universe seems unnaturally fine-tuned and otherwise special. Theists assert that God’s design explains why our universe appears special. Physicists like Susskind and Weinberg explain the same appearance of design by positing universes that we can’t describe, understand, test, or even reasonably constrain in any well-defined manner other than that they must allow the finely-tuned parameters and similar features to be in our universe by chance in the sense that they must not exist a vast majority of universe posited to “explain” the improbability of our universe.
Wrong. Some do. Most do not or are ambivalent. Like me, they are more interested in quantum foundations than cosmology and their work seldom touches upon multiverse cosmologies if ever. Many are not even concerned with the standard model of particle physics.
In fairness to theists, it so happens that "the God hypothesis" gave us the origins of modern physics in a way that is still influential in our thinking, albeit only implicitly or accidently. It was a belief that certain cosmological problems required no explanation but that nonetheless there was a Reason and Rationality underlying the universe that historically enabled the emergence of physics and the sciences more generally. We don't need God as an explanation anymore in the sciences or even as inspiration. The exception, apparently, is in certain areas of cosmology where one would have found (centuries ago) appeals to a designer but today instead we find non-rigorous mathematical mishmash that may hopefully avoid what was taken for granted by the founders of physics. It is no better an explanation than God or "turtles all the way down."
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