Fine Tuning Principle: Devastating Disproof and Scientific Refutation of Atheism.

[The Valkyrie]

More important than that is that the design argument cannot show that God was the designer, so even if we were designed, that just leaves a puzzling mystery.

I don't know about you, but if one of the candidates for universe creation was outwitted by a Talking Snake™ (Genesis 3), I wouldn't call that particular god back for a second interview.

I would.

I'd want to know if it could be outwitted by a talking sock puppet...

[The Architect Of Fate]

I did not say you were depressed, FM. I was pointing to a general trend among the non-religious: "Of the 178 most methodologically rigorous studies, 119 (67%) find inverse relationships between R/S and depression" https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3426191/ Man was never meant to live without God. True, your Sunday mornings may be occupied in going to Church etc, but then you receive so many blessings for fulfilling your obligations to Him in that way, from receiving Him in Holy Communion,

And this is how much this guy is interested in the conversation about fine-tuning, which is nill. He just jumps to another topic.

When it comes to happiness and religion, the happiest countris in the world are also the least religious countries in the world, like Denmark, Switzerland, Austria, Iceland, Finland, Sweden, Canada.

While the least-happy nations on earth are highly religious societies with virtually no atheists: Congo, Zimbabwe, Burundi, Afghanistan

Also even if this were true it's easy to be happy when you are ignorant and high on religious fantasies. Make believe is so much easier to deal with 

[LinuxGal]

Physicist Paul Davies teaches: "There is now broad agreement among physicists and cosmologists that the Universe is in several respects ‘fine-tuned' for life” (Cosmic Jackpot, Why our Universe is just right for life), while even Steven Hawking admits: "The remarkable fact is that the values of these numbers seem to have been very finely adjusted to make possible the development of life."

You can only adjust constants if they aren't constant.  That would make them variables.  And one thing we know about these "variables" is they don't.

[LinuxGal]

It strikes me that beyond all the evidential reasons to believe in God and the Gospel, this is a practical one: atheism leads to nihilism and hopelessness, in the long run at least, because of what it predicts will ultimately happen. But Christianity to confidence, peace and happiness, because of what it predicts will ultimately happen. We will see how things come to pass, but Christianity gives us something to look forward to.

[Bucky Ball]

It strikes me that beyond all the evidential reasons to believe in God and the Gospel, this is a practical one: atheism leads to nihilism and hopelessness, in the long run at least, because of what it predicts will ultimately happen. But Christianity to confidence, peace and happiness, because of what it predicts will ultimately happen. We will see how things come to pass, but Christianity gives us something to look forward to.

He needs the sucker to make himself go to the dentist. It's really very childish.

[Randy The Atheist]

This entire universe is incredibly hostile to life and will zap us into oblivion the moment we leave this little blue ball. It was definitely not designed for life. Life didn't even exist for the first 10 billion years of the universe's existence. It only appeared on Earth beginning around 3.5 billion years ago. And this is where the "impossible odds" falls apart. You see, in an inordinate amount of time like a BILLION years, anything that can happen - WILL happen.

Simply google "Spontaneous Formation Of RNA On Volcanic Glass" to get an example of this.

[Bucky Ball]

This universe was not "created for" life as we know it. Intelligent Design is false.

Life of a black hole :
"It's not exactly fast. A good size black hole — say, a few times more massive than the sun — will take about 10^100 years to eventually evaporate through this process, known as Hawking Radiation."

What is 10 to the power of 100?
googol
A googol is 10 to the 100th power, which is 1 followed by 100 zeros. While this is an unimaginably large number, there's still an infinite quantity of larger numbers. One such number is googolplex, which is 10 to the power of a googol, or 1 followed by a googol of zeros.

Hydrothermal vents, (in which some life exists).
"The cold seawater is heated by hot magma and reemerges to form the vents. Seawater in hydrothermal vents may reach temperatures of over 700° Fahrenheit . Hot seawater in hydrothermal vents does not boil because of the extreme pressure at the depths where the vents are formed."
https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/vent...e%20formed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremophile

[polymath257]

Let’s formulate the Fine Tuning Argument in logical steps:
1.      The Life-Permitting Possible Configurations of the Universe are vanishingly small compared to the Life-Precluding ones (as amply admitted/documented by the above Scientists/Researchers).

This assumes that we understand the real laws of physics well enough to say this. We don't. In particular, the constants that you are talking about are parameters in our current theories. We do not know whether or if those constants *could* be different values. We don't know whether or not there is some process that forces those constants to be the values they have. We don't know that those constants are the same even inside of our universe but outside of the observable universe. If there is a multiverse, we don't know whether those constants are different in different 'universes'.

Next, even allowing for the constants to vary, the universe we are in is incredibly hostile to life. The vast majority of the universe would kill all life as we know it instantly. Instead, the constants seem to be 'tuned' to give complexity. They allow for complex nuclei to form, complex feedback loops, the formation of multiple generations of stars, etc. Life, as far as we can determine, is a consequence of that complexity, but there is NO reason to think life was a 'goal'.

In fact, the *only* place in this universe where we *know* life exists is one small planet orbiting one dwarf star in one galaxy among hundreds of billions. Now, life *might* be common, we don't know, but at this point the only life we know of is on this one planet. That hardly makes the constants 'tuned' to form life.

I would also point out that if there is a multiverse, it is possible that *all* combinations of the constants appear in some universe. If that is the case, they our universe is simply one that has life (because of the complexity) while the vast majority of others do not.

Finally, life arose in this universe and so is adapted to this universe. If the constants were different in a way that still allows complexity, it is reasonable to think that life would eventually evolve there, but be quite different than the life we see here on Earth.

2.      Thus, on Chance alone, it’s reasonable to say no life at all should ever have existed.

This assumes that we know the distribution function for those constants. And, if they can vary, or how they vary over time and location. The claimed unlikeliness is the case *only* if we assume a uniform distribution based on the specific constants we use for our theories. Even if we keep the same theories, but use other natural constants, the distribution would change.

3.      Therefore, granted the existence of life, Design is a vastly superior explanation to chance, for the fact of why life exists at all in the first place. Chance just isn’t very good at creating life, it turns out, unfortunately for Atheists, because the life-permitting range is mind-bogglingly narrow.

So, you are assuming the constants are fixed once and for all (we don't know that). You assume that there is no mechanism for them to change naturally (we don't know that). You assume that because a universe that is incredibly hostile to life is produced, that life is the goal of that universe (which seems incredibly unlikely). You assume that if something unlikely happens, it is better to assume it was designed (which is very far from being the case even within the universe).


In summary, yes, if some of the constants were even slightly different, no stars would form, no atomic nuclei would form, etc. But we don't know whether those constants *could* be different, how or what would make them change, or even whether the values they now have are simply equilibrium values. Second, life in this universe seems to be rare, possibly even vanishingly so. To think the universe was designed for life seems to be quite a stretch given this fact. Also, an unlikely event does not imply design.

You fail on every point.[/quote]

[Bucky Ball]

Let’s formulate the Fine Tuning Argument in logical steps:
1.      The Life-Permitting Possible Configurations of the Universe are vanishingly small compared to the Life-Precluding ones (as amply admitted/documented by the above Scientists/Researchers).

This assumes that we understand the real laws of physics well enough to say this. We don't. In particular, the constants that you are talking about are parameters in our current theories. We do not know whether or if those constants *could* be different values. We don't know whether or not there is some process that forces those constants to be the values they have. We don't know that those constants are the same even inside of our universe but outside of the observable universe. If there is a multiverse, we don't know whether those constants are different in different 'universes'.

Next, even allowing for the constants to vary, the universe we are in is incredibly hostile to life. The vast majority of the universe would kill all life as we know it instantly. Instead, the constants seem to be 'tuned' to give complexity. They allow for complex nuclei to form, complex feedback loops, the formation of multiple generations of stars, etc. Life, as far as we can determine, is a consequence of that complexity, but there is NO reason to think life was a 'goal'.

In fact, the *only* place in this universe where we *know* life exists is one small planet orbiting one dwarf star in one galaxy among hundreds of billions. Now, life *might* be common, we don't know, but at this point the only life we know of is on this one planet. That hardly makes the constants 'tuned' to form life.

I would also point out that if there is a multiverse, it is possible that *all* combinations of the constants appear in some universe. If that is the case, they our universe is simply one that has life (because of the complexity) while the vast majority of others do not.

Finally, life arose in this universe and so is adapted to this universe. If the constants were different in a way that still allows complexity, it is reasonable to think that life would eventually evolve there, but be quite different than the life we see here on Earth.

2.      Thus, on Chance alone, it’s reasonable to say no life at all should ever have existed.

This assumes that we know the distribution function for those constants. And, if they can vary, or how they vary over time and location. The claimed unlikeliness is the case *only* if we assume a uniform distribution based on the specific constants we use for our theories. Even if we keep the same theories, but use other natural constants, the distribution would change.

3.      Therefore, granted the existence of life, Design is a vastly superior explanation to chance, for the fact of why life exists at all in the first place. Chance just isn’t very good at creating life, it turns out, unfortunately for Atheists, because the life-permitting range is mind-bogglingly narrow.

So, you are assuming the constants are fixed once and for all (we don't know that). You assume that there is no mechanism for them to change naturally (we don't know that). You assume that because a universe that is incredibly hostile to life is produced, that life is the goal of that universe (which seems incredibly unlikely). You assume that if something unlikely happens, it is better to assume it was designed (which is very far from being the case even within the universe).


In summary, yes, if some of the constants were even slightly different, no stars would form, no atomic nuclei would form, etc. But we don't know whether those constants *could* be different, how or what would make them change, or even whether the values they now have are simply equilibrium values. Second, life in this universe seems to be rare, possibly even vanishingly so. To think the universe was designed for life seems to be quite a stretch given this fact. Also, an unlikely event does not imply design.

You fail on every point.

I can toss 32 pair of dice on my desk right now, and the resulting pattern has the probability of 1/googolplex. 
It's not designed.

[LinuxGal]

1.      The Life-Permitting Possible Configurations of the Universe are vanishingly small compared to the Life-Precluding ones (as amply admitted/documented by the above Scientists/Researchers).

Oh, they documented it, even.  That must mean they have epistemic access to counterfactual universes with different configurations and observed them as being lifeless.  I'd love to see their write-up on the archive.