Sorry for the absence of posts lately, I have just gone through a move and I've had a lot on my plate lately. So I thought I'd do another post on a typical argument against atheism which is that of the anthropic principle. The principle is rooted in the fact that if one of the physical constant (viz. gravitational constant, the electric constant etc.) were modified even slightly the universe would not be able to facilitate life. From there though, it is argued that because of this the universe was designed specifically to facilitate human life (hence the Greek prefix anthro, meaning man). Nobel Laurette Steven Weinberg explicates it as: "the world is the way it is, at least in part, because otherwise there would be no one to ask why it is the way it is".
The problem with this argument is that exact leap where you go from "out of a number of possible universes this universe is one of the only ones that can facilitate life" to "this universe was made in order to facilitate life". It does not follow that because this universe is able to facilitate life that it was designed to do so.
I'll admit that there is something amazing about the fine-tuning of the universe and about human life. We know that for life to be possible the constants must be aligned exactly as they are, think that if the one of the fundamental forces were altered by the smallest percentile then the structure of the cosmos as we know it would be radically different such that life would not be possible. Such an amazement does make one question "Why; why is the universe as it is? Why is there something rather than nothing?" but it is incredibly audacious to assert oneself as the purpose of the universe.
I'll end with a quote from Diane Benscoter: "Easy answers to complex questions are very appealing when you are emotionally vulnerable".
[A note on semantics: it has been convincingly argued that the use of the word 'principle' in the 'anthropic principle' is a misnomer. Any scientific principle must be falsifiable, the anthropic principle is not, it is an interpretation of the fine-tuning of the universe. This means that it cannot be treated scientifically, nor can it be determined to be objectively false or true. I do not think that this is a reason to discard it altogether from examination, but it is to be examined as an interpretation and not a matter-of-fact.]
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Not bad, except for the last part, since you can falsify the anthropic principle simply by finding life outside of the habitable zone or by producing a cosmological structure principle that explains why we are just a consequence of otherwise highly pointed physics.
ReplyDeleteThe assumption that the observation can't be falsified is only true in conjunction with its weak multiverse usage as a selection effect, which is, at best, an unproven and unobservable speculation. It's the multiverse that can't be falsified.
Anthropic selection isn't a physics principle and the multiverse could be justified by a final theory or a complete theory of quantum gravity that requires it.
But I wouldn't hold my breath.
String theorists like Weinberg do nothing to help anybody understand the AP, since they automatically assume that the multiverse really does exist, so they don't bother to have a clue what it means to the observed universe.