(October 24, 2016 at 7:17 am)Gawdzilla Sama Wrote: We exist to serve cats.

This!

Atheists cannot account for apparent cosmological fine-tuning except by appealing to necessity (brute fact) or chance (multiverse). If necessary then the obvious question arises. Why must the physical universe be as it is and no other way? If by chance, then an infinite regress ensues. Why is the multiverse fine-tuned to generate physical universes that are fine-tuned?

(October 24, 2016 at 10:32 am)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: Atheists cannot account for apparent cosmological fine-tuning except by appealing to necessity (brute fact) or chance (multiverse). If necessary then the obvious question arises. Why must the physical universe be as it is and no other way? If by chance, then an infinite regress ensues. Why is the multiverse fine-tuned to generate physical universes that are fine-tuned?

The common multiverse argument isn't that it is fine-tuned, but that among an infinite number of universes within the multiverse, there are bound to be universes with certain ranges of values that permit for human life just by "chance".

(October 24, 2016 at 10:32 am)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: Atheists cannot account for apparent cosmological fine-tuning except by appealing to necessity (brute fact) or chance (multiverse). If necessary then the obvious question arises. Why must the physical universe be as it is and no other way? If by chance, then an infinite regress ensues. Why is the multiverse fine-tuned to generate physical universes that are fine-tuned?

And this is where honest agnosticism concerning such questions earns its keep. Better that than taking a particular alleged god (a god of revelation and miracles, no less), written of in an old book that you happen to revere by cultural and historical accident, and shoe-horning it into a philosophical argument and then pretending that a bait and switch hasn't happened. Argue for deism all you want, Chad, if it makes you happy. But we all know that's not where you really come down. And Aquinas can't save the poor quality of the 'Biblical evidence' on which the Christian house of cards rests.

(October 24, 2016 at 10:32 am)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: Atheists cannot account for apparent cosmological fine-tuning except by appealing to necessity (brute fact) or chance (multiverse). If necessary then the obvious question arises. Why must the physical universe be as it is and no other way? If by chance, then an infinite regress ensues. Why is the multiverse fine-tuned to generate physical universes that are fine-tuned?

I have read about it, there are apparently some arguments against the fine-tuned argument, one of them is top-down cosmology which I do not understand (because my english is lacking in some areas, maybe it might help you), anyway, let's say we don't know.

How does god help? You are presenting god of the gaps at the moment. If we have no answer for it, god isn't the answer either, until you prove god, that is the problem. God isn't the answer to everything we can't answer. There might be some things that we won't be able to answer, and god will never be the solution for that, you'll have to deal with the possibility that we are imperfect and our knowledge might be forever incomplete.

The origin of the universe is a very complex question, and we don't know everything about the universe, for all we know, there might be a branch of physics that we haven't discovered that could potentially answer this question. My point is here, it might be ok to present god when we know everything or everything we need to know to solve this problem yet we can't. There's also the possibility, that everything just is, without a reason. If you ask questions far enough, my guess is, you'll eventually come to the point where the answer is 'it just is'.

A problem with this question that I've noticed a very lot since I've gotten into 'this', is that, before asking this question we, without realizing it, presume that life itself is something special, that we are more than a collection of atoms, therefore we must come from an intelligent being. The universe isn't fine-tuned for us, we adapted to the circumstances in the universe, we literally speaking, are the universe. If you're going to present a soul, something special, something extraordinary that only we humans have, It'd be good coupled with evidence. My stance at the moment is that our imperfect human brains are overthinking the situation.

You've got the multiverse theory wrong. It isn't fine-tuned to generate universes capable of life as we know it, it's that among the infinite amount of universes, there are an amount that can provide life as we know it, that simple. In that case, no universe that supports life is fine-tuned, it's just that they are one of the universes that have the right tunings among infinite others that don't have the right tunings.

You can believe that god did everything, but you'll probably never convince someone that requires evidence.

(October 24, 2016 at 10:32 am)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: Atheists cannot account for apparent cosmological fine-tuning except by appealing to necessity (brute fact) or chance (multiverse). If necessary then the obvious question arises. Why must the physical universe be as it is and no other way? If by chance, then an infinite regress ensues. Why is the multiverse fine-tuned to generate physical universes that are fine-tuned?

Still conflating atheism and naturalism I see.

An atheist who believes in magic jelly can account for it all just fine. Magic jelly did it.

Let's not forget that, through special pleading, magic jelly is the solution to the problem of infinite regress.

It's not quite as snappy as goddidit, but at least people know what jelly is so it's easier to imagine.

(October 24, 2016 at 10:39 am)Irrational Wrote:

(October 24, 2016 at 10:32 am)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: Atheists cannot account for apparent cosmological fine-tuning except by appealing to necessity (brute fact) or chance (multiverse). If necessary then the obvious question arises. Why must the physical universe be as it is and no other way? If by chance, then an infinite regress ensues. Why is the multiverse fine-tuned to generate physical universes that are fine-tuned?

The common multiverse argument isn't that it is fine-tuned, but that among an infinite number of universes within the multiverse, there are bound to be universes with certain ranges of values that permit for human life just by "chance".

That is not exactly what I meant. If we live in a Multiverse then it is sufficiently fine-tuned to produce at least one physical universe in which life is possibly. This is like saying that if our universe is fine tuned the it produced at least one planet capable of supporting life.

(October 24, 2016 at 12:24 pm)Neo-Scholastic Wrote:

(October 24, 2016 at 10:39 am)Irrational Wrote: The common multiverse argument isn't that it is fine-tuned, but that among an infinite number of universes within the multiverse, there are bound to be universes with certain ranges of values that permit for human life just by "chance".

That is not exactly what I meant. If we live in a Multiverse then it is sufficiently fine-tuned to produce at least one physical universe in which life is possibly. This is like saying that if our universe is fine tuned the it produced at least one planet capable of supporting life.

No, it isn't/wouldn't be fine-tuned, lol. I do not understand your reasoning, imagine a monkey typing on a keyboard, give it infinite time and there's a possibility that it will write a whole game, think GTA V, or one of the big, complex games. It wasn't fine-tuned to write the game, though, it was just clicking the buttons randomly. That is similiar to the multiverse theory, if I am not wrong. We might need our physicist to confirm this. However, iirc I've heard that it's not 100% that the monkey will write a game, even given infinite time, you can look it up if you're interested.