RE: Theists: What is the most compelling argument you have heard for Atheism?
March 28, 2017 at 10:56 am
(This post was last modified: March 28, 2017 at 11:18 am by Angrboda.)
(March 28, 2017 at 8:35 am)SteveII Wrote:(March 28, 2017 at 4:52 am)Tazzycorn Wrote: You're mistaking an effect for a cause. The universe isnt the way it is to accomodate the exisetence of humanity (as evidenced by the fact that 99.9% of the universe is hostile to humanity), but we exist because the universe is the way it is.
And the question is, why, against all odds is the universe the way it is?
In what way is it "against all odds" that the universe turned out the way it did? Ignoring the fact that you can't rule out necessity as a possible reason the universe is the way it is, the universe had to turn out "some way" and the way it did turn out is not special in any regard with respect to the universe itself. It's special to you because you're a life form and you have an emotional investment in existing, but as far as universes go, there's nothing unique about this one. You assume a teleological stance with respect to life, but this ignores the fact that life in this universe is opportunistic; it didn't have to be, it conformed itself to what was available. All that the fine tuning argument says is that if things had been different, then things would have been different. Where you get the existence of a god out of that, I don't know.
(March 28, 2017 at 8:35 am)SteveII Wrote: Multiply those very small number by the other probabilities of life permitting ranges given the overall possible ranges of any given constant and you have a number so small that there are so many zeroes in it that there are not enough molecules in the universe to cover the odds.
Using a frequentist view of probability, the odds are given how many times life would occur given a number of trials. Unfortunately for your argument, life conforms to the conditions existing, not the other way around, so you have no way of specifying what a "life permitting range" is. You're simply assuming that it's close to the conditions which currently exist, which is circular. Victor Stenger has done simulations in which the parameters of the universe are adjusted and seeing what kind of universe results, and in over half of the simulations, stable universes resulted. So you're simply tailoring your region to your argument. That's a faulty argument. (I also note that you claim there to be "possible ranges" of the given constants. How you know what a possible range for these constants is constitutes a remarkable fact, as science doesn't even know what suitable ranges for these constants are. Care to share where you got this astounding information from?)
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