Clutch

I have asked this question before, and not received an answer. Let me try again.

What justifies the claim that the prior probability of getting an orderly universe is infinitesimal? As I understand it, the calculation of probabilities requires some conception of how things *might* have turned out. And when it is precisely the basic laws and physical properties of the universe that are in question, what constraints govern one's assumptions about how things might have turned out?

Putting things another way, the calculation of probabilities is a matter of asking: Given THIS, what are the odds of THAT? The fine-tuner wants to question the odds of everything that might be given, though. In light of what are these odds to be assessed, then?

Could the mass of a proton have been any real number? Not according to our physical laws. But of course, the universe could have had other laws, right? Schmeneral schmelativity, and bantum bechanics might have governed the universe where electrons have mass M, for some arbitrary real number M. Would that universe be orderly? Well, here's a home truth: nothing in *our* laws will tell us whether it would be.

Without some clear sense of the background possibilities against which the probability of an orderly universe is supposed to be low, fine-tuning is really a species of the Argument From Making Stuff Up.

Iddnit?

Theli

Good question.
I was wondering, if all matter in the universe were to suddenly increase in size 100 times (including the distance between particles) would that really count as a change?
I would think not. So the question about the possible size of matter in the universe is irrelavent. There's probably alot more that follows this line, including mass.

[ June 07, 2002: Message edited by: Theli ]</p>

Clutch

Theli, as I understand it, your scenario would indeed make a real difference. Dozens of 'em.

(For a whole pile of reasons: e.g. that there are more forces than gravity; that the constancy of gravitational force is not preserved by increasing mass and distance by linear relation anyhow, etc...)

Theli

I could see why changing either distance or size would make a difference, but not changing both at the same time.

Jobar

Theli, I suppose you are imagining an increase in such physical constants as speed of light and Planck's constant. This sort of imagining is wholly pointless; it's like saying that each particle has a tiny undetectable fairy who remembers all the properties and steers. It's unfalsifiable, and unprofitable.

Hm. Just like imagining there is a completely undetectable God creating all the properties, and steering every particle...

Proxima Centauri

Why do supporters of the scientific method so often insist that if an idea is unfalsifiable that idea is unscientific. As I understand it such people seem to be saying that if an idea is unfalsifiable that idea has to be false or it has to be treated as false. The statement, 'Unfalsifiable ideas have to be false.'
is clearly nonsense.

I feel the possibility of a multiverse is a reasonable explanation of what seems to be fine-tuning of the universe. Intelligent design is also a possible explanation.

Theists often state that the multiverse hypothisis is inherently unfalsifiable. With present scientific knowlege the multiverse is unfalsifiable. The concept of God is also in my opinion unfalsifiable. Agnostics fron the time of Thomas Huxley onwards have argued that way.

Why don't theist treat the God concept as false?

[ June 08, 2002: Message edited by: B.Shack ]</p>

Clutch

B.Shack, I've seen nobody argue that unfalsifiable=false. The equation is, rather, unfalsifiable=no bloody use. It's a concern about the empirical *content* of a claim in the first instance, and not its truth-value. The idea, roughly, is that if it doesn't rule any result out, then it doesn't rule anything in either.

It's also not supposed to be a merely pro tem worry, as you suggest. An hypothesis can be falsifiable even though we currently do not possess the means of falsifying it -- eg, by not having sufficiently precise measuring techniques, say.

The concern with ID-ology is that it is (from everything its boosters have said) unfalsifiable *in principle*. This is a problem for all species of God-of-the-Gaps explanations; the methodology amounts to locating the intelligent design wherever a law-based explanation is lacking.

[ June 08, 2002: Message edited by: Clutch ]</p>

Synaesthesia

Although philosophers subsequent to Popper have shown that no theory is strictly falsifiable, the general notion of it is still useful. The idea is that no possible set of observations would be inconsistent with the theory in any theoretical framework. As was pointed out, it's not that such theories are necessarily false, but they are necessarily useless and uninformative.

Now although Design has until recently been a viable hypothesis for the formation of the universe, I would not invoke it to explain fine tuning simply because of the very basic flaws in the idea of FT. We don't know how tuned the universe is, we don't know if it is special or simply typical and increasing theoretical evidence suggests that the conditions of our universe have annealed into their present state. That would serve to explain it's overall organization, even if the precise configuration is a priori improbable.

Vic Stenger
This strikes me as a rather dramatic misunderstanding of Occam's razor. If ANYTHING is unparsimonious, it is the multiverse theory. It basically posits entities (albeit of a familiar kind) that have no current means of being observed and no good theoretical grounds to be believed in.

The extremely counterintuitive notion of reality being embodied in some form of probability function is far more parsimonious than a more commonsense conception of an infinite number of universes for every possible wavefunction collapse. For the time being, that consideration alone is compelling.

Since we have observe such a thing as the cosmos, I would not think it as much of a violation of parsimony as postulating a God of infinite complexity (or an infinite number of Gods).

The vast, or rather, infinite degree of theoretically sterile invisibility required by these theories cripples them all as viable alternatives.

[ June 08, 2002: Message edited by: Synaesthesia ]</p>

Tercel

To commit some gross generalisations: The basic aim of science is to be able to advance to obtain better and more accurate conceptions of how the world works.
If an idea is not able to be falsified then it doesn't provide any opportunity for scientific advance. A non-falsifiable theory may well be true: non-falsifiable doesn't equal "false" by any stretch. But a non-falsifiable theory isn't any use to science because we have no way to test it.

I agree that both are potentially possible explanations. And that both are unfalsifiable.

Because unfalsifiable doesn't equal "false". The point of the accusation that the multiverse is unfalsifiable is that the person proposing it has stepped outside the realm of science and is using a solution to the problem that is just as "bad" as the theist's. (Theists are often told that they shouldn't believe in God because he is unfalsifiable and unprovable.)

Proxima Centauri

Yes, I know it has been found that time spent of unfalsifiable theories is usually time wasted. Still there is a problem. The parameters of our universe lie in a narrow range. Outside this narrow range our type of carbon based life would be impossible and no type of life we know of would be possible. Exotic life may be possible but we don't know this. The parameters of our universe require explanation.
Theists say, 'It must be an intelligent designer'. Atheists and agnostics say, 'It could be a multiverse'. Theists and secularists both say 'What the other side says is no good, its unfalsifiable'.
This case is, I feel, an exception the generalization based on Popper . We should look into the possibility that intelligent design or the multiverse could cause the apparent fine-tuning of the universe. If we reject two possible explanations out of hand we might get nowhere in explaining the parameters of the universe. Clutch says, 'The idea, roughly, is that if it doesn't rule any result out, then it doesn't rule anything in either' Both intelligent design and the multiverse rule nothing out. Both intelligent design and the multiverse rule in a universe with parameters within the narrow range which allows our type of life. Both are possible explanations.