Thanks for a great site. I am intrigued by your articles on fine-tuning. Theists claim fine-tuning is evidence for a fine tuner, i.e., God. The physicist Victor Stenger and others have tried to rebut this claim. Mr. Stenger acknowledges that if some of the fundamental constants of nature differed even slightly, the structure of the universe would change in such a way that life as we know it would be impossible. Yet he maintains that this fact indicates nothing special about life as we know it, since if the laws of physics were different, different forms of life would evolve to take advantage of them. He also supports the hypothesis that there are probably many universes (an infinite number?) so that even if life required careful fine-tuning of certain physical constants, it is all but guaranteed that at least one universe should possess the the right laws and we should not be surprised to find ourselves living in that universe.

In his article, "The Anthropic Coincidences: A Natural Explanation" at

<a href="http://spot.colorado.edu/~vstenger/Cosmo/anthro_skintel.html" target="_blank">http://spot.colorado.edu/~vstenger/Cosmo/anthro_skintel.html</a>

Mr. Stenger cites the physicist Max Tegmark on the subject of life, or self-aware structures as Mr. Tegmark calls them, arising in possible spaces: "Tegmark," he writes, "examines the types of universes that would occur for different values of key parameters and concludes, as have others, that many combinations will lead to unlivable universes. However, the region of the parameter space where ordered structures can form is not the infinitesimal point only reachable by a skilled artisan, as asserted by proponents of the designer universe."

The region may not be infinitesimal but it is still very small. I do not see how this finding provides an answer to the challenge posed by fine-tuning. If symmetry breaking after the big bang was random and physical constants cannot be derived from first principles, the odds remain overwhelming that the universe should have fallen into a state incompatible with self-aware structures. In any case, the idea that some form of life could have arisen in even a small subset of space marginally different from our own strikes me as speculative. Mr. Stenger cautions against "carbocentrism" and the like. But If life is so elastic, why do we not find evidence for a biosphere on Mercury, or in the dust of interstellar space? All the available scientific evidence seems to suggest that carbocentrism is indeed a valid stance. Mr. Stenger invites users to sample his universe-generating program, but I could find no link to it on his home page.

Multiple universes would answer the fine-tuning riddle. But can theories of multiple universes ever be falsified? Mr. Tegmark maintains that his theory can be falsified, although I must admit I did not quite follow his reasoning on this score, probably because I am not a scientist. I will read this portion of his paper again, but I would be grateful if anyone could clarify just how the Tegmark multiverse is falsifiable. In various articles Mr. Stenger mentions several multiverse schemes, but I do not see how any of them are testable and therefore scientific.

Another line of attack against fine-tuning seems to be that there is really nothing to explain. Mr. Stenger reasons as follows:

"Suppose that a lottery is conducted in which each entrant is assigned a number from one to one million. Each has kicked in a dollar and the winner gets the whole pot of $1 million. The number is selected and you are the lucky winner! Now it is possible that the whole thing was fixed and your mother chose the winning number. But absent any evidence for this, no one has the right to make that accusation. Yet that's what the fine-tuning argument amounts to. Without any evidence, God is accused of fixing the lottery.
Somebody had to win the lottery, and you lucked out. Similarly, if a universe was going to happen, some set of physical constants was going to be selected. The physical constants, randomly selected, could have been the ones we have. And they led to the form of life we have."

There seems to me to be something wrong with this argument although the flaw is difficult to pinpoint. Perhaps it has to do with the idea that the above-mentioned lottery winner would seem "fine-tuned" if he had won the previous six hundred consecutive lottery drawings and now was winning the lottery for the 601st time in a row. Or what if we had a machine that threw out one million dice onto a vast table? Suppose all the dice came up six? Should we shrug our shoulders and say, "Some combination had to come up, and if someone predicted all sixes, that person is the lucky winner!"

If the possibility of alternate life forms existing under different physical laws is too remote to make fine-tuning in our own universe seem unexceptional, and if theories of multiverses can never be falsified, and if probability arguments like the lottery analogy are misapplied (I don't know that they are), it seems to me that fine-tuning remains a riddle in need of an explanation. For unless multiverse theories can be falsified, then they are metaphysical theories and not scientific ones, and I do not see how scientists are consistent in using them to rebut the speculations of theists while at the same time demanding that theists stop concocting pseudoscientific and metaphysical theories to conjure a God for which there is no scientific evidence.

On a slightly different subject, I would be interested in knowing more about what Mr. Tegmark's theory implies with respect to the actual nature of the multiple universes whose existence he postulates. If I understand his theory correctly, every mathematical model that is free from contradiction instantiates a real universe somewhere. How? Do all these universes pop out of their own big bang? Are they always spatiotemporally isolated from our own, or might they interact somehow (suggesting a possible way to detect their existence)? Also, if physical existence is the same as mathematical existence and every possible universe that is free from self-contradictory properties actually exists, couldn't we use this claim to argue for the existence of something like a God or gods in some universe (though not necessarily or evidently in our own), provided such entities exhibit no logically inconsistent properties? Can anyone explain what relation if any the Tegmark multiverse bears to the metaphysical multiverse postulated by the philosopher David Lewis?

Mr. Tegmark writes lucidly of the frog's view and the bird's view of mathematical reality. The bird's view of our world is of a block spacetime seasoned with quantum superpositions. What the frog views as instants in time seem to be, from the bird's perspective, more like locations in space, and the lives of particles and people and everything else are represented by unchanging world lines embedded in static 4d spacetime. All these world lines terminate at the singularity of the big bang, much like, I suppose, lines of longitude and latitude converge at the poles on the surface of a globe. If this mental picture is correct, it seems that we must infer that free will and cause and effect are illusions. For how can anything be said to cause anything else, if world lines are simply "there" in a static 4d manifold? Perhaps we could say that things seem to us to make other things happen for if they did not, reality would be too chaotic to produce self-aware structures and we would not be here to think about such subjects. If this is the answer, it would seem that cause and effect is yet another peculiar anthropic coincidence and that logically ordered time sequences are yet another example of fortuitous fine-tuning. Hope this wasn't too long, and thanks again for a great site.

-DM-

Thank you for your positive feedback regarding the Secular Web, in general, as well as for your feedback regarding "fine tuning" (which represents one example of an <a href="http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/theism/design.html" target="_blank">argument to design</a>) and for your comments regarding Vic Stenger's offsite article <a href="http://spot.colorado.edu/~vstenger/Cosmo/anthro_skintel.html" target="_blank">The Anthropic Coincidences: A Natural Explanation</a>.

I have notified Stenger of your feedback and you might therefore want to check back here from time to time for a possible response from him. You might also want to consider becoming a <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=agree" target="_blank">registered user</a> so that you could participate in the ongoing discussions of this sort of thing in our <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=forum&f=58" target="_blank">Evolution/Creation</a> forum.

--Don--

Vic Stenger

David says&gt;&gt;&gt; The region may not be infinitesimal but it is still very small. I do not see how this finding provides an answer to the challenge posed by fine-tuning. If symmetry breaking after the big bang was random and physical constants cannot be derived from first principles, the odds remain overwhelming that the universe should have fallen into a state incompatible with self-aware structures. In any case, the idea tha some form of life could have arisen in even a small subset of space marginally different from our own strikes me as speculative.

I would like to see David's calculation of "overwhelming" odds and have him compare the number with his calculated odds of any alternatives. He is speculating it is low. I am saying we do not know. He thus has the burden of proof. This is the same old design argument I see over and over again, most recently in the Intelligent Design movement. "I do not see how it could have happened naturally so therefore it had to happen supernaturally." As a physicist, it is a lot easier for me to see how it happened naturally than by some other means for which we have not the slightest idea what the mechanism might be. Simply saying "God did it" is no explanation at all. Why not the Tooth Fairy? What not the material universe itself?

As for talking about multiple universes that cannot be falsified, falsification does not define science. What is wrong with taking the best existing knowledge and extrapolating it into other realms? This at least serves to refute any claims that science cannot provide a possible answer to the fine tuning problem. Of course it does not prove this is the answer, but in providing a counter example it defeats any claim that science requires a creator. We have a strong scentific basis for multiple universes, which are not ruled out by any known principle and indeed strongly suggested by current cosmology. Thus anyone who claims a single universe has the burden of proof.

This is discussed in detail in my upcoming book, _Has Science Found God? The Latest Results in the Search for Purpose in the Universe_, Prometheus Books, October 2002.

-DM-

David responds:

----------- Begin quoted material -----------

&lt;david&gt;
unregistered

posted May 17, 2002 08:08 AM

Thanks to Victor Stenger for responding to my post on fine-tuning. Fine-tuning may be a modern variant of the discredited argument from design, but it is not necessarily discredited by association. Stenger writes: "I would like to see David's calculation of "overwhelming" odds and have him compare the number with his calculated odds of any alternatives. He is speculating it is low. I am saying we do not know. He thus has the burden of proof."

Well, we have good evidentiary grounds for believing that the vast majority of possible universes would be incompatible with orderly structures of any kind. If the universe was a one-time only event, and if the laws of physics arose randomly, I do not see how it is a speculation to say that we are most fortunate to be here. If it is somehow invalid to retrospectively calculate the odds of a one-time only event, then maybe there is no problem. If there is a problem, what would resolve It? Multiple universes would resolve it. Where are they? What predictions do they make? What test can we conduct for their existence? Stenger writes: "We have a strong scientific basis for multiple universes, which are not ruled out by any known principle and indeed strongly suggested by current cosmology. Thus anyone who claims a single universe has the burden of proof."


Well, maybe. I wonder how many scientists would agree with that statement? I have the burden to disprove the existence of many universes, even though there is, strictly speaking, no scientific evidence for their existence? Cosmology may strongly suggest that many universes exist, but there is still no way to verify or falsify them. The actual evidence for their existence is the same as the evidence for God: zero. I will buy Stenger's book for a fuller discussion of this problem! Thanks again.

----------- End quoted material -----------

-DM-

[Note to David: it is not possible to move individual posts from an unregistered user into an already existing thread. If you would like to be involved in an ongoing discussion of this topic, you would need to become a<a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=agree" target="_blank">registered user</a> and do so in one of the open forums, a forum that is meant for ongoing discussion. Replies in feedback are restricted to Secular Web authors and staff. --Don--]

Vic Stenger

Huh? We have one universe and that universe has orderly structures. Thus, based on the evidence, the probability of a universe having orderly structures is unity! I agree that the statistics is poor, with only a single sample, but you have absolutely no basis for your claim.

That is not the speculation. The speculation is your claim that orderly structures are unlikely.

How can you make any statement at all about a universe with totally different properties than ours? You seem to be assuming the only the physics of our universe is possible.

I know I will be repeating myself, but you do not seem to grasp the point. Here's the argument in the form of a dialogue:

Creationist: A universe with random parameters would have had a very low probability of evolving human life.

Naturalist: If our universe is one of vastly many, then the probability of a universe with the parameters for human life appoaches unity.

C: You cannot prove that multiple universes exist.

N: You cannot prove that they do not.

C: Multiple universes violate Occam's razor.

N: That is a misapplication of Occam's razor. Since we have no known principle that demands that only one universe exists, multiple universes is the more parsimonious assumption.

You only have the burden of poof if you insist that there can only be one universe. I am not claiming they exist, just proving them as a possible natural explanation to refure any claim that it is inconceivable that the universe we live in was fine-tuned by any natural process. Well, I can conceive of one.

I do not know your religious views, but you are making, or at least implying, a variation of the same old argument you hear from theists all the time. You can't prove God does not exist, therefore he does.

[Edited formatting only. --Don--]

[ May 19, 2002: Message edited by: Don Morgan ]</p>

-DM-

[Note: This topic was copied here at the request of David who is now a registered user who wishes to continue the discussion. --Don--]

Jobar

My thanks to &lt;David&gt; and to Prof. Stenger for the first really deep post I have seen in the short time I have been moderating this board.

I studied physics at Ga. Tech back in the seventies, and though I have never done more with it than teach at the high school level, I am fascinated by the places where physics meet philosophy and metaphysics- as I wrote back then, "In the world of the large and the world of the small/We approach stunning mysteries/Forming hyperbolic walls."

Are we indeed observing infinite systems, in cosmology and in quantum mechanics? Are there infinitely many 'bubble universes', infinitely many alternate universes spawned with each quantum interaction? I think we cannot actually know- finite systems (we humans) cannot define or completely understand infinite ones (the universe or the multiverse, as may be.) We do know that the universe of observation *seems* to be infinite- it is certainly larger than we can see! I personally am of the opinion- and I think that opinions are all we can really express, here- that the universe is indeed infinite. I base that opinion on the efficacy of the mathematical notion of infinity in explaining physical phenomena.

If we are really part of an infinite system, then it seems that there is some meaning to the word God. And since our consciousness exists, it follows that consciousness is also a part of an infinite system. But since we cannot actually *use* infinity- even in calculus, we only speak of 'approaching infinity'- it seems that these musings on the links between consciousness and infinity are of no practical use (at least so far.)

I agree with Prof. Stenger's observation that we cannot infer God from simple ignorance- but I shall continue to name myself an atheist/pantheist because (IMO!) we *appear* to be parts of an infinity- and all definitions of God, both monotheist and pantheist, stipulate an infinite nature. J.

Not Prince Hamlet

BTW, the following is a post from a friend of mine who teaches Physics at a reputable university:

Tercel

Vic Stenger,
I have a few queries and thoughts regarding your article “The Anthropic Coincidences: A Natural Explanation" and some of the statements you have made in this thread.

Your article contained the statement that:
I am more than a little concerned about the validity of such an analogy.
Using a little probability analysis and a bit of explanation, I will try and explain the problem as I see it:

Here we have, effectively two competing hypothesis: One hypothesis is that you won the lottery because it was fixed in your favour, and the other being that you won the lottery by chance selection. What we are effectively asking is “which hypothesis is the more likely of the two”?
In other words, which of the following two is the greater:

• P(Your winning the lottery occurred by fixing) = P(It would be fixed in your favour, given that it was being fixed) * P(Someone was fixing the lottery)
  (ie P(Y by F) = P(Y|F) * P(F))
• P(Your winning the lottery occurred by chance) = P(Your winning the lottery, given that the result was being selected by chance) * P(The lottery’s result was a chance one)
  (ie P(Y by C) = P(Y|C) * P(C))

Y = the event of your winning the lottery, C = the event of the lottery’s result was selected by chance, F = the event of the lottery’s result being fixed.

In the absence of any suggestion that the lottery should be fixed in your favour as opposed to anyone else’s, it can be seen that P(Y|F) is approximately equal to P(Y|C) (ie P(It would be fixed in your favour, given that it was being fixed) is approximately equal to P(Your winning the lottery, given that the result was being selected by chance)). If we know there was exactly 1 ticket per person, the potential number of distinct candidates in whose favour the lottery can be fixed exactly equals the potential number of distinct candidates in whose favour the lottery can result by chance.
Hence it is up to P(F) and P(C) (ie P(Someone fixed the lottery) and P(The lottery’s result was a chance one)) to play off against each other: The latter clearly being very significantly more likely - lotteries in general are fairly carefully monitered (hopefully) and do not get fixed. Hence P(F) is much less than P(C).
And hence by the multiplication of probabilities by the formula given above we get: P(Y by F) is much less than P(Y by C).

Which is of course the answer we expected.
Nothing amazing there. But this process is, it seems to me, the normal method by which we intuitively evaluate different hypotheses against each other.

But in the case of Fine-Tuning it is far from clear that an analogous result holds. The equivalent two hypotheses are:

• P(The universe was designed for life) = P(The universe would be designed in order to allow life, given that it was being designed) * P(The universe was designed)
  (ie P(L by D) = P(L|D) * P(D))
• P(The universe permits the existence of life by chance) = P(The universe would permit the existence of life, given that it was being controlled by chance) * P(The formation of the universe was controlled by chance)
  (ie P(L by C) = P(L|C) * P(C))

Where L = the event of the universe containing life, D = the event of the universe being designed, C = the event of the universe being the result of chance processes.

To say that the Fine-Tuning argument is analogous to the above lottery example, seems to be to declare that P(L|D) approximately equals P(L|C) (ie P(The universe would be designed in order to allow life, given that it was being designed) approximately equals P(The universe would permit the existence of life, given that it was being controlled by chance)), like P(Y|F) and P(Y|C) were. And hence that it is simply the case that P(D) and P(C) need to be compared.

But is this the case? Are P(L|D) and P(L|C) equal? It seems to me that the whole point of the Fine Tuning argument is that (for one universe at least) they are not equal. The “Fine-Tuning” involved in the Fine-Tuning argument is that P(L|C) has a low value. -A point which you seem quite ready to agree with in your analysis of the argument.
However, does the value of P(L|D) have an equally low value, or is the case of the Fine-Tuning argument different to the lottery example suggested?

Here we come to what I think is the fundamental difference between things happening by chance and things happening by design. To see the difference it is perhaps best to regard any system as having two features: Functionality, and Implementation. A system's Functionality can be regarded as what it does or what use it has and the system's Implementation as what it is. As a computer programmer, I use this sort of break-down regularly. I start by establishing the Functionality of my system - what I want it to do, and then I set about programming it or “implementing” it, whereby I produce an actual system which has the required Functionality. But these ideas can be applied fairly generally, so I'll give some examples to show what I am talking about:
Say I was playing a card game, where each player was dealt a card. All that matters for this game is whether the card dealt is red or black. The functionality of the card I was dealt would be whether it was red or black, the implementation would be which particular card in the pack it was.
Or imagine I was rolling two dice and needed an 8 or more to win, otherwise I would lose. The functionality of the dice roll would be whether I got 8 or more or not, the implementation would be which particular number I got on each individual dice.
Or in computer programming, the Functionality might be to display the message “Hello” to the user, while the program could be Implemented using a number of different programming languages eg Java, C, Pascal etc and might work by displaying a message box or drawing a picture with that message in it, or writing the text to the command line etc.
Or say there was a lottery with only 5 people, each of whom bought 10 tickets. The Functionality would be which of the 5 people won the lottery, while the Implementation would be which of the 50 tickets was the winning ticket.

I think the Functionality vs Implementation distinction helps to highlight the problem in the analogy.
Chance selection works by the process of choosing an Implementation at random from the available Implementations. In dealing cards, I am dealt one of the many possible cards and the Functionality follows from the chosen Implementation. In selecting a lottery ticket, chance selects one of the lottery tickets randomly from the list of tickets.
With a designer however, it is our experience that the reverse is true. If I was "fixing" the card I was going to be dealt, I would consider Functionality first (say I wanted a red card) and the Implementation would be incidental (I wouldn't mind which number it was or whether it was hearts as opposed to diamonds, so long as it was red).
The Designer will find an Implementation that gives the required Functionality once that Functionality is decided upon. -That is exactly what “design” is.
The important point however is that <strong>Chance selects from the list of possible Implementations and the Functionality follows from that selection, while the Designer (or “Fixer”) chooses from the list of Functionalities and the Implementation follows from that selection.</strong>

With regard to the Fine-Tuning argument, it can be seen that Chance would choose an Implementation (the exact values that the symmetry splits were to take) and the Functionality would follow from that, while a Designer would make some design decisions about the Functionality of the universe being designed and select an Implementation which gave that Functionality.
Hence P(L|D) (The probability that a Designer would make a universe allowing intelligent life given that they are making a world) is the probability that the Designer would select the Functionality of their universe being able to sustain life over the Functionality of their universe not being able to sustain life. If we know nothing about this Designer, we surely must conclude that the probability of the Designer making either choice is equal: and hence P(L|D) = 1/2.
Chance on the other hand, chooses one from the large list of possible Implementations, only a few of which have the Functionality of allowing intelligent life: ie P(L|C) is very small.
In the case of the FT Argument, it seems P(L|D) is much greater than P(L|C).

Why the difference to the lottery example, where the two corresponding probabilities were equal?
In the Lottery example, assuming everyone bought only one ticket, the number of different mutually exclusive Functionalities exactly equalled the number of different implementations: There were 1 million possible winners and 1 million possible winning tickets. In the FT Argument there are only 2 mutually exclusive Functionalities (Allows life, or doesn’t) but a huge number of different possible ways the universe could be implemented.

Hence it seems to me that the analogy is a misleading one, which only serves to ignore the very point the FT Argument is making.
Sorry for the length of that explanation. However, I hope I have managed to convey accurately why I do not think the FT Argument can be fairly compared to a lottery. If you think I’ve gone wrong somewhere in my reasoning I would be interested to hear why.

I was intrigued by your mentions of Occam's Razor in conjunction with the multiple universes hypothesis. You say "Since we have no known principle that demands that only one universe exists, multiple universes is the more parsimonious assumption". More parsimonious? All you have done is a large multiplication of entities without any evidence that any of these entities exist. As far as explanatory power goes, before there was one existence that needed explaining and now you have a large number. The only way I can see in which it becomes more parsimonious is if you are prepared to defend the idea that all possible universes exist.
I think Tegmark's idea is problematic. If anything that does not contain a logical contradiction exists, then does God exist too? Some ideas of God are certainly contradictory, but surely the idea of God as an extremely powerful intelligent being is not self-contradictory? In what way does Tegmark's theory exclude the existence of a logically-possible deity while demanding the existence of every other logically possible state of affairs?
If Tegmark's ideas are not to be accepted, I cannot see any reason to believe it is more parsimonious to believe in multiple universes over a single one: All you have done is added unevidenced entities without gaining anything - what is to stop the theists from doing the same?

You point out in your article that speculation on the implications of the Fine Tuning discoveries has been confined to publications by individuals and has not been published in Scientific Journals which continue to maintain a stance of Methodological Naturalism. I am inclined to think this suggestion as being a bit "below the belt", so to speak. Isn’t it proper for Scientific Journals to maintain a stance of Methodological Naturalism no matter how proven or disproven the idea of God is or might ever be? When discussing the religious implications of Scientific findings, publications by individuals is surely the correct place for them to be. Scientific publications should surely only deal with theories which are explanatory and testable, and since speculation on religious implications is neither it would seem to me improper for such to be published in any Scientific Journal. In reading your article, it seemed to me you were suggesting that the reason such publication was lacking in Scientific Journals was in fact because it was not sufficiently well founded or accepted, and simply that the public had been duped into thinking the argument is better than it was. Even if the accusation with regard to the quality of the Fine-Tuning argument was true, I'm not sure I can agree that suggesting that that is the reason they have not been published in Scientific Journals is honest. I may be wrong here (feel free to correct me if so) as I am no Scientist (unless “Computer Scientist” counts ) myself, but that was my understanding of the situation.

Tercel

[ May 31, 2002: Message edited by: Tercel ]</p>