The fine-tuning argument for God's existence

[warpus]

I am quite serious in this line of thought. Even if it was true that the fine tuning of the Universe meant that there is an intelligent creator behind it - it doesn't necessarily mean that the entity is this or that. We don't know anything about it. It might as well be Steve.

The argument falls on two counts, it seems. First that the fine-tuning doesn't mean anything, and second that even if it did - it doesn't imply God. I mean, it might as well imply that we're living in a matrix-like computer simulation at an NSA facility somewhere, an electronic simulation of the real world. Project S.T.E.V.E. There is not enough data to determine which hypothesis is more likely to be correct.

 

[Perfection]

This argument is getting a little stale, if you believe in fine-tuning, I implore you to read this post, and take it seriously! It may be a little odd but try to bear with me. I'd be rather disappointed if you just scoffed at my hard work, please give it the attention it deserves!

Now I'm going to try to break the impasse by doing something completely radical, I'm suspending all disbelief, for the duration of this post, you are right, almighty omniscient God exists!

Now you say we don't inhabit a multiverse? I say you already agree that we do, you just don't know it!

Here's why.

So, I know you think that other universes aren't real. However you must agree that other universes do exist, but instead of existing in reality they exist as fictions in God's mind! We can agree on that can we not?

I think we can fairly describe the assembledge of universes that exist in God's mind as a multiverse. A fictional multiverse, for sure, but it exists as a concept in God's mind. Do you disagree?

Among those countless fictional universes in that fictional multiverse there is a rather special one, one that has a unique and special property, it is exactly the same as the real one! You might think it strange but I think you have to agree it must be true! How could it be wrong?

Now in that special fictional universe there is a special fictional dude named "Perfection". Fictional Perfection is in almost every way the same as real Perfection. He looks the same way, he feels the same way, he has the same thoughts, same fears, same everything; he even makes the same posts on Internet forums. The only difference between the real Perfection and fictional Perfection is fictional Perfection is not real. However, we must agree that fictional Perfection does exist! He may be merely a figment of God's imagination, but because God's imagination exists so does fictional Perfection! How can you disagree? I challenge you to demonstrate that I'm wrong.

And, of course, fictional Perfection inhabits a fictional universe in a fictional multiverse, isn't that correct?

Now, time for a startling confession! I'm not the real Perfection! I'm the fictional Perfection! I'm a figment of God's imagination in that special fictional universe that so happens to be like the real one that resides in the fictional multiverse within God's mind. I can speak through the real Perfection because whatever I say he says. Right now through him speaks the words of a fragment of God's imagination.

How can you doubt me? We have established that I exist. We have established that whatever I say the real Perfection says. Why can't I speak through the real Perfection to the real world? It's strange I admit, but how can you doubt it?

In the same way an actor gives voice to the figment of Shakespeare's imagination named Hamlet; I, a figment of God's imagination, am given a voice to the real universe by the real Perfection.

Just like the Perfection having a fictional counterpart in God's imagination, There surely must be a fictional counterpart to the real you in God's imagination. Like the real Perfection and fictional Perfection, the fictional you and the real you have exactly the same looks, thoughts, feelings, actions, etc. How can you doubt that? It must be true!

Now for a second confession! When I said "you", I wasn't talking to the real you, I was talking to the fictional you! You obviously do exist, and you are a fellow dweller of a fictional universe within a fictional multiverse. And just as I can speak through the real Perfection you can speak through the real you.

So as just one favor my fictional friend, could you please speak through the real you and admit that we inhabit a multiverse? That would be swell.

Thanks,
Fictional Perfection

 

[Plotinus]

Very good! Leibniz argued in the opposite direction: the fact that there are non-actual possibles proves God exists, because non-actual possibles can only have whatever tenuous reality they have as ideas within God's mind. I'm inclined to think that there's something to this argument - provided you accept a radically impersonal definition of "God" as effectively logical space.

But I think you do make one mistake: fictional Perfection is not distinct from actual Perfection. You are not an actualisation of a possible Perfection, you are a possible Perfection, one that differs from all the other possible Perfections in being actual in addition to possible. And Leibniz would have said that you are identical with God's concept of you. But whether that's correct or not, it doesn't really harm your main point, though.

 

[Perfection]

Very good!

Wow, thanks!

Leibniz argued in the opposite direction: the fact that there are non-actual possibles proves God exists, because non-actual possibles can only have whatever tenuous reality they have as ideas within God's mind. I'm inclined to think that there's something to this argument - provided you accept a radically impersonal definition of "God" as effectively logical space.

I'll have to check it out. Any good resources?

But I think you do make one mistake: fictional Perfection is not distinct from actual Perfection. You are not an actualisation of a possible Perfection, you are a possible Perfection, one that differs from all the other possible Perfections in being actual in addition to possible. And Leibniz would have said that you are identical with God's concept of you. But whether that's correct or not, it doesn't really harm your main point, though.

The question of what the relation fictional Perfection has to real Perfection is one that fascinates me. I'm not sure if "in-distinctiveness" is one of them but it might be.

I think these sorts of questions are also the key to solving Newcomb's problem, where the nature of the relation between me and a predictor's mental model of me is quite similar between real Perfection and fictional Perfection.

I have some old arguments in that thread. My thoughts have changed on the matter since then, and I've been meaning to revisit it for awhile.

 

[Plotinus]

Wow, thanks!

I'll have to check it out. Any good resources?

As is usually the case with Leibniz, there's no definitive text I can point you towards, because he jotted bits of arguments all over the place (much like a prolific forum member, really). Here is a typical passage expressing the kind of argument I think he makes, which is also quite illuminating on his conception of what God actually is. This is from On the Ultimate Origination of Things and I'm taking it from Parkinson's Everyman edition of Leibniz, pp. 139-41. In this text Leibniz has just presented his version of the cosmological argument from necessity: the fact that actual contingent objects exist demands an explanation, which must be found in an actual necessary object, i.e. God. Leibniz goes on to argue that the same reasoning applies to non-actual objects as well, i.e. possibles (or "essences", which are equivalent to the "fictions" you talked about in your post), which must exist as ideas in God's mind:

But (you will say)... there really exist heavy bodies acting against one another, but possibilities or essences prior to or beyond existence are imaginary or fictitious, and therefore one cannot seek in them the reason of existence. I answer that neither the essences nor the truths about them which are known as eternal truths, are fictitious; they exist (if I may so put it) in a certain region of ideas, that is, in God himself, the fount of all essence and of the existence of other things. That this is no merely arbitrary assertion is shown by the very existence of the actual series of things. For since in the series a reason cannot be found, as I have shown above, but must be sought in metaphysical necessities or eternal truths; since, too, existent things cannot come into being except from existent things, as I have explained previously; it follows that eternal truths must have their existence in some subject which is absolutely or metaphysically necessary, that is in God, through whom these truths, which would otherwise be imaginary, are (to use a barbarous but expressive word) realised...

Here then we have the ultimate reason of the reality both of essences and of existences in a Unity, which must certainly be greater, higher, and prior to the world itself, since through it not only the existent things, which the world contains, but also the things that are possible have their reality. It cannot be found except in one single source, because of the interconnexion of all these things with one another. It is evident that from this source existent things are continually issuing and being produced, and have been produced, since it is not clear why one state of the world rather than another, yesterday's state rather than today's, should flow from the world itself. It is also evident how God acts not only physically but also freely; and how there lies in him not only the efficient but also the final cause; and how from him proceeds the reason not only of the greatness or potency that there is in the mechanism of the universe as now established, but also of the goodness or wisdom involved in the establishing of it.

You can see that this is a very abstract view of God as merely "a certain region of ideas".

BTW it's from this same text of Leibniz that I take the explanation for fine-tuning that I gave earlier as a rival (and superior) explanation to God, which none of the fine-tuning proponents have responded to. As you can see here, Leibniz thinks that such an explanation must ultimately be grounded in God; but not only would I disagree with him on that score, I'd be inclined to think that he would reject the view of God as an anthropomorphic "intelligent designer" that the fine-tuning proponents assume anyway.

You can find similar ideas in Malebranche, who in some ways is even more radical than Leibniz in his conception of God. He thinks that when you have a concept in your mind of anything, the concept isn't really in your mind at all, it's in God's mind, because God is literally the region of concepts. So you literally use God to think with. This is from The Search After Truth III.2.6 in the Lennon and Olscamp edition, pp. 233-35:

The truth is uncreated, immutable, immense, eternal, and above all things. It is true by itself. It draws its perfection from no other thing. It renders creatures more perfect, and all minds naturally seek to know it. Only God can have all these perfections. Therefore, truth is God. We see some of these immutable, eternal truths. Therefore, we see God...

We are of the opinion, then, that truths (and even those that are eternal, such as that twice two is four) are not absolute beings, much less that they are God Himself. For clearly, this truth consists only in the relation of equality between twice two and four. Thus, we do not claim, as does Saint Augustine, that we see God in seeing truths, but in seeing the ideas of these truths - for the ideas are real, whereas the equality between the ideas, which is the truth, is nothing real...

Let us hold this view, then, that God is the intelligible world or the place of minds, as the material world is the place of bodies; that from His power minds receive their modifications; that in His wisdom they find all their ideas; that through His love they receive their orderly impulses, and because His power and love are but Himself, let us believe with Saint Paul, that He is not far from any of us, and that in Him we live and move and have our being.

 

[Mise]

I was going to say Perf, reading your post reminded me a lot of your solution to Newcomb's problem.

EDIT: x-post.

 

[Funky]

Even if you were presumptuous, I would not mind I was a moderator of the most popular Russian forum -- which happens to be about religion, not sports, or politics, or celebrities. We had folks from neonazies to bishops, so no matter what happens in CFC it feels like a gentle breeze.

That's cool. And thanks for your answers! Yet I have more questions, if you don't mind.

1. The servant who knows the master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows. 48 But the one who does not know and does things deserving punishment will be beaten with few blows. From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.

This is a beautiful and wise verse and has nothing to do with endorsement of slavery. Master is the God, servants (or slaves) are us. It basically says that you and cannibals from Tierra del Fuego will be treated according to the spiritual truth revealed to them.

Well, I'm not a theologian, so I won't claim any expertise on the question whether this passage refers to the relationship between masters and slaves or God and humans. Regardless of the context, saying that even those who did not know better shall be beaten does not exactly sound like moral wisdom to me.
To the point though, would you deny that there are several other passages in the bible which clearly do endorse slavery (e.g. Matthew 18:25, Mark 14:66, Ephesians 6:5-9, Colossians 4:1, 1 Timothy 6:1-3)?

In short I accept every verse in the context of the entire Bible.

So you accept the concept of hell, and that everyone who does not accept Jesus as his saviour will be tossed into a lake of fire and suffer eternal torment. Do you think that I deserve to be punished in such a way? Do you regard it as a system of justice?

2. Prayer. If I asked something and received it is my personal miracle. Like salvation for my militantly atheist father. One day I was praying really hard and opened my Bible on the random page. My eyes picked the very same verse and it said: Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house. This gave me some peace of mind.

9 million children die every year before the age of 5. Most of their parents are assumedly religious and pray every day for their child to be spared. Yet their prayers are unanswered. I don't want to downplay the peace of mind you experienced. But isn't it a rather arbitrary god, to say the least, who chooses to answer your prayer so you feel better while he lets millions of children die?

3. I sure do. The source and the nature of experience is the key. Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God; and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God; this is the spirit of the antichrist, of which you have heard that it is coming, and now it is already in the world.

So the experiences of a Hindu who goes on silent retreat and feels the presence of Vishna, or the atheist who chooses to live in a cave for two months to meditate and feels one with the universe are inferior to the mystical experiences of Christians? Doesn't the fact that people around the globe have mystical experiences, regardless of which religion they belong to or whether they are non-believers, testify to the assumption that these experiences are not bound to a certain religion but represent a specific condition of the human brain?

During my freshman year me and ten other classmates visited our friend's uncle, who fell from the 3rd story building, hit his head, survived, and developed paranormal abilities, which were rather striking. Everything about dude was pretty strange and I was not sure what to think of him. His nephew asked him to tell every on of us something only we could possibly know. Some girls started to scream when he revealed their secrets. I had a feeling this could be something spiritually unhealthy, so I asked God to sort things out for me. And would you believe it -- he somehow "accidentally" passed me as he was going from classmate to classmate (we were all sitting at the round table).

Perhaps you have heard of James Randi. He used to be a magician, but has meanwhile gone over to examinating paranormal and supernatural claims. His foundation has offered anyone who can demonstrate paranormal or supernatural abilities a prize of 1 million dollars. So far noone has been able to claim the money, but if the story about your friend's uncle is true, you could get rich!

 

[El_Machinae]

I was also taught to believe in revelation, which is a major reason why I ended up rejecting the Bible (and later, the Qur'an). They make too many errors regarding the things for which we have evidence, that they're automatically in the 'well, be skeptical' zone. The moral errors then become fairly obvious.

I was hearkening to the "you're an imagining in God's mind" argument when I made this post. But wasn't sure that "God's ability to properly envision an alternate universe is insignificantly different from it actually existing" was in the grasp of the thread.

I think there is a major flaw with this God hypothesis.

"I cannot imagine that we live in a 10^60 multiverse*, ergo we live in a universe where God could've created any of 10^120 combinations He wanted". In other words, you're proposing an underlying set of meta-laws that are actually more impressive than the ones that comes out of the maths.

 

[timtofly]

Historical God doesn't exist either, unfortunately. Even historical Jesus is "just a human".

Sorry, historically speaking God and Steve are even.

Where God has the upper hand are religious texts - he appears in quite a lot of them - and Steve appears in none. But that is just the power of Steve - he is very good at staying hidden. He is an introvert and doesn't like to be in the spotlight - so he prefers for people not to write about him at all. You might say "Oh, that's convenient", but that is just the power of Steve. God doesn't want to be seen - Steve doesn't want to be seen or read about.

Even if we take Perfection's hypothetical, God has more historical experience than Steve. Steve has only revealed itself to you, until you can find others like you who have met Steve. Now God may be splintered in a billion revelations, but there still seems to be a constant whole that makes the God experience more plausible than Steve.

I would like to point out that God already claimed that he can reveal himself and humans can be blissfully ignorant of such revelation. However one still has to have general revelation, before one can convince humans that they are introvert. If a million experiences are down played as irrelevant, what is the probability of only one experience to get to such a point of view? For all we know, you are just making Steve up. God has hundreds of chances to be real, even if millions are just making God up.

Until every last human is convinced that Jesus and God are actually fabricated, Jesus and God are still human experiences.

 

[warpus]

Ah, so you know all this stuff about God and Steve. You must be a God yourself, I guess.

 

[Cheetah]

I've met Steve! While sailing the Atlantic about 4 years ago.

It just didn't seem important enough to mention to anyone else at the time...

 

[Gori the Grey]

It's Adam and God, not Adam and Steve.

 

[Arakhor]

It's Adam and God, not Adam and Steve.

Apparently even the frigging Genesis story can have slash-fic written about it!

 

[Plotinus]

Well, they had to spice it up somehow after Asherah got edited out.

 

[Arakhor]

*Northern accent* Oooh, controversial!

 

[timtofly]

Ah, so you know all this stuff about God and Steve. You must be a God yourself, I guess.

It is not reasonable to call a human God. Is there anything wrong with my reasoning?

 

[Plotinus]

It is not reasonable to call a human God.

That rather screws up some pretty important Christian doctrines...

 

[timtofly]

That rather screws up some pretty important Christian doctrines...

As long as it is just the doctrines and not the reality of the event. According to Warpus, Jesus never asked Peter, who he was.

 

[warpus]

I do not deny that historical Jesus existed! I also never said Steve was a human.

 

[Tigranes]

That's cool. And thanks for your answers! Yet I have more questions, if you don't mind.

I never do. It is all the matter of time.

Well, I'm not a theologian, so I won't claim any expertise on the question whether this passage refers to the relationship between masters and slaves or God and humans. Regardless of the context, saying that even those who did not know better shall be beaten does not exactly sound like moral wisdom to me.
To the point though, would you deny that there are several other passages in the bible which clearly do endorse slavery (e.g. Matthew 18:25, Mark 14:66, Ephesians 6:5-9, Colossians 4:1, 1 Timothy 6:1-3)?

Very few creatures with reason knew more about God than Lucifer, which did not stop him from the pride, the real original sin. Because he was given the most, the most was required from him: he shall live in his own hell, which is the real, the second death. God is life and rejection of life means death, the real death, the second death, which is hell, created by the pride of the fallen archangel and his cronies. It is important to understand that everything in this universe, both physical and spiritual,operates by the laws, even chaos can be described with the help of partial differential equations. If you know about the law of gravitation and deliberately defy by jumping down -- you are going to die. Some people fall down and die accidentally, law is law, but construction workers have less mortality rates than suicide jumpers. Thus the wisdom of the verse.

Just like there are physical laws there are also spiritual laws, one of them says: you sin -- you die. You die with second death, wages of sin is death. Humans been given only one way to sin, initially, to sin by the lack of faith. "The day you eat from this tree you will die. Do not eat". This is were reason has to leave some room for the faith. You don't know if you will die, you just have to trust God. Then comes the enemy of faith and reason, the sophist, the theologian. He didn't even bother to disguise himself as a cute looking angel. "Who says you will die? God? How reasonable is that? Do I look dead to you? Don't be a kitten, kitten" The father of lies did not say a single lie in the Bible. Outwardly, that is. First humans did not immediately die with first death, the physical death. But they did die spiritually, because that is what lack of faith does to you. Ever since humans are bound to live in the moderate hell conditions they have created. Cursed male lives with cursed female on the cursed earth with the cursed spiritual enemy. God gave earth to humans and humans gave earth to the enemy. Thus slavery, murder, rape, violence.

You don't have to be a theologian to understand what your Father is trying to tell you via Bible. St. Paul was a tent maker. You just have to start with the faith that He is and rewards those who seek Him. Then your eyes will open and you will understand all those verses within this simple context: "Were you called while a slave? Do not worry about it; but if you are able also to become free, rather do that. For he who was called in the Lord while a slave, is the Lord's freedman; likewise he who was called while free, is Christ's slave. You were bought with a price; do not become slaves of men." Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

So you accept the concept of hell, and that everyone who does not accept Jesus as his saviour will be tossed into a lake of fire and suffer eternal torment. Do you think that I deserve to be punished in such a way? Do you regard it as a system of justice?

If I murder someone you love -- what options for justice do you have, if you are an atheist? To execute me? To equate the life of the guilty with life of the innocent? Nay, to equate life of the murderer with the life of his victim? Is that the justice for you? What if someone murdered 2 people you love? What if Evil Empire decides to solve Armenian problem by annihilating 1.5 millions of Armenians 100 years ago, 1/3 of my entire nation? You see, when you don't believe in God you believe that no full and real justice can fundamentally be possible in this world. This is what you actually believe, even if you never realized it before. And you know what? If you don't believe in food, you wont eat food, you will die from hunger. If you don't believe in God, who is love, the truth and the way -- you will live without love, without the truth and without the way -- that is the lake of fire and eternal torment, that is the second death.

This life is a test to qualify for the real life Funky, to avoid the second death after the first death, which is simply the end of the test. You were born as a slave to the fallen human nature and to the law of sin and death. Will you chose God to set you free, so He can give you nature? Every day Word of God provides you with a cheat-sheet for your test: "This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life."

9 million children die every year before the age of 5. Most of their parents are assumedly religious and pray every day for their child to be spared. Yet their prayers are unanswered. I don't want to downplay the peace of mind you experienced. But isn't it a rather arbitrary god, to say the least, who chooses to answer your prayer so you feel better while he lets millions of children die?

I don't want to downplay your peace of mind, but do you realize that life on this earth is a battle between evil and good, and by not taking side you are taking the side of the evil? Prayer is the weapon of the good, death is the weapon of the evil. When I pray "Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven" death becomes weaker. It still can claim 9 million children, but what if it could claim one more without my prayer and it does claim one extra because you wont get on your knees? Thus says the Lord, who is life Himself: Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. Who in a world can say those words? Either greatest lair, or greatest lunatic, or God Himself. No one can hear this and stay neutral .

The prayers of the faithful enabled minds like Fleming and Pasteur to be born and get "lucky", regardless of their own prayers. Obviously, prayer alone is not enough but every true believer adds to the critical mass of invisible but real good, and every anti-prayer, which is cursing, provides an ammunition to invisible but real evil. By not choosing the sides you chose the side, even if you don't pray and don't curse.

So the experiences of a Hindu who goes on silent retreat and feels the presence of Vishna, or the atheist who chooses to live in a cave for two months to meditate and feels one with the universe are inferior to the mystical experiences of Christians? Doesn't the fact that people around the globe have mystical experiences, regardless of which religion they belong to or whether they are non-believers, testify to the assumption that these experiences are not bound to a certain religion but represent a specific condition of the human brain?

Like I said before, mystical experience or the discovery of fine tuning cannot generate the faith, but only support it. And true faith is only as real as deeds. If someone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. Every good deed counts, even by Hitler, every bad deed counts perhaps triple if committed by Christian.

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