The fine-tuning argument for God's existence

[Borachio]

So. What is belief? Is it just holding something to be true?

And is religious belief just holding something to be true without any reason (i.e. firm evidence or good sound logic) for it?

I have tried to do this (I've tried a lot of things - being quite adventurous). But then I find myself confronted with a dilemma: I seem to be lying to myself for some reason. Or if not directly lying, fooling myself into trying to believe something with no good reason for doing so (by definition - assuming my definition above is sound).

Can a house divided against itself stand? I've heard that it can't.


Blah de blah, de blah, blah, blah, blah. Something about trust. After >2,000 years of this stuff, I'm beginning to lose any trust I might have had to begin with.

 

[warpus]

I wouldn't completely agree with that. Saying "You can't prove God's existence because it's about faith", which is the closest thing I see here to a theological objection, isn't a debunking, it's just a (fairly arbitrary) moving of the goalposts.

I was referencing the original argument not holding up theologically - the "fine tuning argument for God" one. It didn't seem to have many theological legs to stand up on, but that was just my impression based on a couple posted links and on some of the stuff you wrote (I think).

 

[Plotinus]

So. What is belief? Is it just holding something to be true?

Yes. At least, that's the traditional definition that analytic philosophers go by, and it's the one that makes the most sense to me.

And is religious belief just holding something to be true without any reason (i.e. firm evidence or good sound logic) for it?

No. Religious belief is holding something to be true in the sphere of religion, e.g. that God exists or that there is life after death. Like any other belief, it might be held on rational grounds or it might not; and it might be true or it might not. Those considerations don't alter its status as a belief.

Religious faith is something else, which either includes religious belief among other elements, or is qualitatively entirely different. Different philosophers of religion have argued for different views on this.

The situation is also muddied by the fact that at the vernacular level "belief" is sometimes used to mean a belief which is uncertain (as in "I don't believe, I know"), it's sometimes used to mean a belief specifically in the field of religion, and it's sometimes used to mean a non-cognitive attitude of faith (as in "I believe in you"). Philosophers, at least, use the term merely to mean the psychological state of holding something (anything) to be true, so it includes the first two of these but not the third.

I was referencing the original argument not holding up theologically - the "fine tuning argument for God" one. It didn't seem to have many theological legs to stand up on, but that was just my impression based on a couple posted links and on some of the stuff you wrote (I think).

Ah, I was giving philosophical objections rather than theological ones. As I said above, I don't think there are good theological objections to it, at any rate not decisive ones, but obviously that's not much of a recommendation given that as far as I can see it fails fairly decisively on other grounds.

 

[Tigranes]

So. What is belief? Is it just holding something to be true?

And is religious belief just holding something to be true without any reason (i.e. firm evidence or good sound logic) for it?

....

Blah de blah, de blah, blah, blah, blah. Something about trust. After >2,000 years of this stuff, I'm beginning to lose any trust I might have had to begin with.

Is it just me or your thoughts are loosing your landmark fluidity and coherence? I fail to connect the need for so many blahs with your previous line

Me and you are reasonable people (to the degree). Your reasoning supports your belief, my reasoning supports my faith. No serious religion/belief can exist in disconnect with reason. I can argue it round, you can argue it flat. For me personally atheism is more reasonable than IPU and less reasonable than Hinduism. And yet we both can agree in something, like in supporting UN Special Rapporteur.

The UN Special Rapporteur is an independent expert appointed by the UN to monitor, investigate, and report on the right to freedom of religion or belief. It is the highest UN position devoted solely to defending the human right to freedom of religion or belief. The post is currently held by Professor Heiner Bielefeldt, a German philosopher.

Atheism/agnostism/-ism are all the religious believes. There is always "some reason" behind a certain belief. We can talk about more reasonable or less reasonable believes. Fine tuning is a remarkable fact. People like you can try to explain it away, "debunk" it, and then people like me can debunk the debunking. But one thing is clear -- the very fact that atheists need to go to such lengths as to invent the idea of Multiverse to dismiss the Design -- strips them from ability to do what you just did: to claim that religious belief is just holding something to be true without any reason.

 

[timtofly]

I was referencing the original argument not holding up theologically - the "fine tuning argument for God" one. It didn't seem to have many theological legs to stand up on, but that was just my impression based on a couple posted links and on some of the stuff you wrote (I think).

Ah, I was giving philosophical objections rather than theological ones. As I said above, I don't think there are good theological objections to it, at any rate not decisive ones, but obviously that's not much of a recommendation given that as far as I can see it fails fairly decisively on other grounds.

A theologian would be a human like a scientist whose theories purport that God was involved some how. Even like a scientist where neither one actually experienced anything observable, Faith has to step in and/or acceptance that what is being discussed can be proven true, in some way or the other. It would seem to me that a skeptic is just one who needs their own experience before accepting any one else's or their logical reasonings need an extra nudge in the right direction.

 

[Borachio]

Is it just me or your thoughts are loosing your landmark fluidity and coherence? I fail to connect the need for so many blahs with your previous line.

Well, that's a first. I've never been accused of being normally fluid and coherent before. I think I'll have to put my head in the airing cupboard till the feeling passes.

Me and you are reasonable people (to the degree). Your reasoning supports your belief, my reasoning supports my faith. No serious religion/belief can exist in disconnect with reason. I can argue it round, you can argue it flat. For me personally atheism is more reasonable than IPU and less reasonable than Hinduism. And yet we both can agree in something, like in supporting UN Special Rapporteur.

Invisible Pink Unicorn?

Atheism/agnostism/-ism are all the religious believes. There is always "some reason" behind a certain belief. We can talk about more reasonable or less reasonable believes. Fine tuning is a remarkable fact. People like you can try to explain it away, "debunk" it, and then people like me can debunk the debunking. But one thing is clear -- the very fact that atheists need to go to such lengths as to invent the idea of Multiverse to dismiss the Design -- strips them from ability to do what you just did: to claim that religious belief is just holding something to be true without any reason.

I agree. The value of the cosmological constant and, even more, vacuum energy are remarkable phenomena. I have no explanation for either of them.

And I find it amusing that cosmologists are having to do mental gymnastics comparable to Young Earth creationists.

My position is rather different. I don't try to defend atheism at all. Nor any kind of metaphysical belief. And the multiverse is a kind of metaphysical belief to my way of thinking.

It really makes no difference to me how we come to be where we are. Because here we are. The question for me is what we do now we are here.

Which isn't to say that it isn't interesting to speculate about the origins of the universe and whether it may, or may not, be "God wot done it". Just that it's a long way down the list of things that are important.

 

[Funky]

Atheism/agnostism/-ism are all the religious believes. There is always "some reason" behind a certain belief. We can talk about more reasonable or less reasonable believes. Fine tuning is a remarkable fact. People like you can try to explain it away, "debunk" it, and then people like me can debunk the debunking. But one thing is clear -- the very fact that atheists need to go to such lengths as to invent the idea of Multiverse to dismiss the Design -- strips them from ability to do what you just did: to claim that religious belief is just holding something to be true without any reason.

I think this is the first time I disagree with you, Tigranes!

First, atheism is, by definition, a lack of religious beliefs. A lack of religious beliefs is not a religious belief!

Second, the so-called "fine-tuning" of the universe is an issue of cosmology. As such, theoretical physicists are far better suited to explain it than theologians, who in most cases lack any kind of training in physics. From what I understand, it is not only a smaller mystery than theologians make it out to be, also the explanations all manage without some supernatural cause.

Third, it wasn't atheists who invented the concept of the multiverse, but physicists. It was neither introduced to dismiss design, nor do physicists choose to believe in it "without any reason". It is a prediction based on proven scientific models. While it may ultimately not be verifiable, it is a plausible assumption based on what we know about the cosmos.

Fourth, when we don't know the answer to a problem, the honest thing to do is say "I don't know". Even if we had no explanation whatsoever for the "fine-tuning", that would not in the slightest suggest a supernatural power or divine being. All it would say is that we don't know the answer (yet). Making up stories about gods, angels and demons as an explanation is neither intellectually honest nor does it serve any purpose in searching for the true answer. In fact, it potentially impedes scientific research by pretending to have an answer and being satisfied with it instead of working on the real answer.

 

[madviking]

Fourth, when we don't know the answer to a problem, the honest thing to do is say "I don't know".

that's a bingo. reminds me of the old saying by russell: "the whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts"

 

[El_Machinae]

But one thing is clear -- the very fact that atheists need to go to such lengths as to invent the idea of Multiverse to dismiss the Design -- strips them from ability to do what you just did: to claim that religious belief is just holding something to be true without any reason.

I don't think that's fair. Science has, time and again, allowed us to discover underlying process when various faiths were insisting upon Design. The fine-tuning argument is not very different from Paley's Eye. But it was people who were devoted to questioning and understanding that went on to 'debunk' Paley's Eye.

Scientists didn't so much invent the idea of the Multiverse as discover it. It's a bit of a quibble, but these theories fall out of the maths. Yeah, there's an aspect we can call 'invention', but this is the same process that 'invented' anti-matter decades before it was discovered, 'invented' the Higgs mechanism before it was discovered, and 'invented' Inflation before direct evidence was even imagined.

 

[Arakhor]

It's also rather foolish to assert that scientists devised the Big Bang theory in a deliberate attempt to dismiss theological beliefs. As hard as it may be to conceive, science and religion are not polar opposites!

 

[Thlayli]

Quick hypothetical question. If God made objective proof of his existence discoverable, or even likely, wouldn't that technically be an obstacle to free will?

Let's consider it for a moment. If God does exist, him shrouding his existence from us is obviously a benefit to free will. Because if you can see God up in the sky or wherever, and you know he's real, you also know that divine punishment and reward is real. As such, the choices that you're making aren't really choices, since your certainty in punishment and reward make the cost-benefit equation fairly tipped on the scales towards doing what God wants.

So let's assume that God prioritizes free will in his creations for whatever reason. If God wanted to create a universe where free choice was a necessity, he would be obligated to hide his existence in a very clever way. For this reason I'm perpetually skeptical of any claims of being able to "prove" or "disprove" God's existence, and I doubt there will ever be any arguments that incontrovertibly do so.

As such, I have taken the opinion that God will never make his existence discoverable; there will always (until the end of time) be legitimate arguments for and against his existence, but overall, a rough balance which allows all humans, regardless of the time and place into which they are born, a roughly equal chance at personally believing or not believing. Obviously when we get into miracles and supernatural occurrences, this breaks down, since obviously not everyone has equality of opportunity in belief or disbelief.

But the universe is a fairly complex simulation, so those sorts of discontinuities are to be expected, no?

 

[Flying Pig]

An obstacle to free will, yes, but nobody thinks God intended us to act entirely without influence. After all, religion would be rather pointless if he did!

 

[Bugfatty300]

Of course belief really isn't a free will choice to begin with. Surely a god would know this simple fact.

So why not show itself? Presumably we'd still have the choice to not worship or have anything to do with said deity. That would actually be free will.

 

[Unicorny]

Much thanks and respect @Plotinus for splitting up this topic into its own thread and for replying back to my arguments in a clear and nonpartisan manner.

The fine-tuning argument in itself does not prove that existence of God - in fact, nothing can prove the existence of God in absolute terms as that notion would violate the purpose of life itself (which I'll get to later). What the fine-tuning argument does is make one ponder and wonder and provide a plausible option of an intelligent sentient entity that had designed the universe as such - so that it would permit the building blocks and environments that life requires.

I agree in the sense that the multiverse - if it does exist - would undermine the fine-tuning argument as it is plausible for a universe such as ours to arise from an infinite set of possible universes. However, no possible astronomical observations can ever exist to "witness" or measure those other universes. So it leads to nowhere.

The multiverse hypothesis is also an indirect answer at best. As even if it exists, it leaves the deep mysteries of nature unexplained and would invoke more questions than it would care to answer.

Which leads us to the question: are these infinitesimally small life-permitting conditions sufficient to create an independent pattern pointing to a Designer?

According to William Dembski's theory for detecting design, one looks for the conjunction of high improbability with an independently given pattern. For example, if you're playing poker and your opponent consistently deals himself the winning hand, you will suspect that he/she' cheating, not simply because of the high improbability of the sequence of cards he gets (any sequence is equally improbable!), but because that highly improbable sequence conforms to the independently given pattern of winning poker hands. As you say, "a royal flush has intrinsic value . . . because the rules of the game define a royal flush as having value before the hand is dealt." That same hand would be worthless were you playing some other game. But given that it is poker that you're playing, that pattern is significant.

As Dembski points out, however, the key factor here is not that the pattern is given in advance ("before the hand is dealt"), but that it is given independently of one's knowledge of the deal. The pattern doesn't need to be given chronologically prior to the deal, so long as it is specified independently of the deal. If we don't require independence, someone looking at the result of the deal can always concoct some game in which the hand dealt is a winner. Such a pattern is "cherry-picked," as they say, to fit the result and therefore is not significant.

Now in the case of intelligent life, the pattern of life-permitting conditions is given independently of and, indeed, long before, cosmologists' discovery of the fine-tuning of the initial conditions of the universe. So the fine-tuning seems to exhibit just that combination of enormous improbability and an independently given pattern that tips us off to design. Thus, in so far as fine-tuning is concerned, it is not the case that "the rules about royal flushes are being made up only after the hand has been dealt.

Now the question that you seem to raise is whether there are not other, independently given patterns which might be used to justify a design inference when applied to the initial conditions of the universe. The problem with this, however, is that these phenomena are not actually observed, and so there is nothing to be explained. What requires explanation is some actually given, independent pattern which is highly improbable. If it exists, Dembski would say that it does warrant a design inference.

Remember that a design inference does not inform us of the purpose for which the observed phenomenon exists. Dembski's design inference demands only an intelligence as an explanation of the phenomenon, but it doesn't presume to tell us the purpose that the intelligent designer had in mind in bringing about that phenomenon. So Dembski's design argument doesn't assert, for example, that the universe was made for the purpose of bringing about human beings. This fact is evident in that the existence of a lowly earthworm also requires an intelligent designer as its ultimate explanation, given its breath-taking improbability and its conformity to an independently given pattern, but we should not infer that the purpose for which the universe exists is therefore earthworms. The idea that the universe was designed for the purpose of man's existence is a theological claim, not a design inference. All the design argument asserts is that human life requires for its explanation an intelligent designer, whatever his purposes may have been, not that the universe was made for man.

Still, one might wonder why we should focus on intelligent life as the pattern with which we're concerned. Why not the pattern required for the existence of, say, crystals? Here I think John Leslie's notion of a tidy explanation may be helpful. For Leslie, "tidy explanation" is a technical term: it is an explanation which, in explaining some phenomenon, reveals that there is something to be explained. Leslie gives a great many charming examples of tidy explanations. For instance, you are shopping in the bazaar, and the silk merchant is displaying for you a drape of silk. His thumb just happens to be covering the moth hole in the cloth. Now of course his thumb has to be somewhere, and any location on the drape is equally improbable; nevertheless—! That he is hoodwinking you provides a tidy explanation of why his thumb happens to be where it is. Or again, Bob, who was born on August 23, 1982, receives a car for his birthday from his wife with the license plate BOB 82382. That this plate number is the result of intelligent design is a tidy explanation of it. In light of the fact that it is Bob's birthday which is being celebrated, one is not being "Bob chauvinistic" in singling out his name and birth date as a significant pattern crying out for explanation. The presence of a tidy explanation of the initial conditions of the universe could similarly justify us in focusing on the conditions requisite for intelligent life as a phenomenon crying out for explanation.

So why not show itself? Presumably we'd still have the choice to not worship or have anything to do with said deity. That would actually be free will.

I see this question often. If God is indeed more than just an imaginary big-daddy-in-the-sky, why does it seem that God is hiding from us? It stands to reason that the inability of anyone to produce a unicorn is a pretty good reason not to believe in unicorns. Why shouldn’t the same standard be applied to God? And if he doesn’t have a physical body, why won’t he at least produce an obvious sign that he is there…like the words “I am God, I am here” written in big flaming letters in the sky?

It all boils down to free will. If God made us unable to deny his existence, we would be unable to carry on our own lives uninfluenced and completely at free will. The notion of free will itself is therefore destroyed.

Would you openly masturbate in-front of an existing God knowing all well that you'll be cast in Hell for eternity and suffer unimaginable torment by being burned alive? I think not. Therefore, the notion of free will breaks down, and is the reason that God will not prove himself until the assigned time.

Secondly, an Uncaused Cause (i.e. God), if exists, must, by definition, exist beyond the limits of the universe in order to have created it. The laws of physics tell us that we cannot make measurements beyond the limits of this universe. Therefore, scientists can conclusively determine that we cannot ever detect God using any of our instruments.

However, God is not restricted to our limitations and could choose to reveal part of Himself to us. God could not reveal His entirety to us without causing major problems in our universe. The sudden appearance of dimensions and matter from outside the universe would destroy anything in the vicinity and maybe even destroy the entire universe. Having said that, God could reveal His nature by communicating with humans and sending prophets, messengers, etc.

If you're interested in learning more, I recommend reading this book. A book for life, a book for the next life, a book for all eternity, unspoken by man, engulfed by humanity but indescribable of any earthly tongue. I cannot let you understand it, but i can invite you to feel it... Link

P.S: I see some have missed me. How amusing.

 

[uppi]

Religious faith is something else, which either includes religious belief among other elements, or is qualitatively entirely different. Different philosophers of religion have argued for different views on this.

The distinction of faith and belief is a somewhat alien concept to me, because there is no such distinction in the German language. What exactly is the difference between those words in the English language? Is there a definition that helps with deciding when to use which word?

Now in the case of intelligent life, the pattern of life-permitting conditions is given independently of and, indeed, long before, cosmologists' discovery of the fine-tuning of the initial conditions of the universe. So the fine-tuning seems to exhibit just that combination of enormous improbability and an independently given pattern that tips us off to design. Thus, in so far as fine-tuning is concerned, it is not the case that "the rules about royal flushes are being made up only after the hand has been dealt.

Essentially, there are two errors in your argument. The first one is the reliance on the fine-tuning of the universe. Whether it is fine-tuned or not, is unknowable, unless we had other universes we could observe. If we only have observations of our universe, there is always the possibility of constraints to the properties of the universe. In the extreme case, our universe might be the only universe possible for some reason. We cannot exclude that by looking at our universe, so any conclusion being drawn from a fine-tuning argument is unknowable as well.

The second error is that you state that life-permitting conditions are independent from the life that observes these conditions. They are not: life will only ever observe conditions that allow it to thrive. There might be an infinite number of tries, maybe even an infinite number of successes, but we can only observe the one where the parameters are exactly right for us.

These two errors can be traced back to the same fundamental error: You are making arguments about probability with a sample size of one. The most rudimentary understanding of statistics reveals that this cannot work. To get back to the poker analogy: If the cards are only dealt once and the dealer gets a royal flush, statistics cannot give me an answer whether he cheated or not - he might just have been lucky this time.

 

[El_Machinae]

Again, Unicorny, you need a theory or a process of 'universe creation' in order to say whether a set of conditions is 'improbable'. The dealer dealing a flush to himself is only really a surprise if you know what type of deck you're playing with.

edit: we don't have a theory of universe creation. We cannot call our universe 'improbable'. We just don't know.

Now, when it comes to Life on Earth, we have a better idea. We don't know much about abiogenesis. But, what we do know is that it seems rare and really (really) improbable. But, in this case, the Anthropic Principle really does apply. The Universe is HUGE. Like, really, really huge. It might even be infinite (we wouldn't be able to tell that. But, we do have good reason to think it's at least a million times bigger than our visible universe.

It's ginormous and old. But, it's a case where we're just playing hand after hand of poker. The fact that someone, today will win a poker game with a flush isn't a real surprise. Though, I'll assure you, that guy is surprised.

 

[Unicorny]

And yet again, are some posters denying the evidence of fine-tuning itself now? That's remarkable. I'll cite a few examples:

N, the ratio of the strength of electromagnetism to the strength of gravity for a pair of protons, is approximately 10^36. If it were smaller, only a small and short-lived universe could exist.

Epsilon (&#949, the strength of the force binding nucleons into nuclei, is 0.007. If it were 0.006, only hydrogen could exist, and complex chemistry would be impossible. If it were 0.008, no hydrogen would exist, as all the hydrogen would have been fused shortly after the big bang.

Omega (&#937, also known as the Density parameter, is the relative importance of gravity and expansion energy in the Universe. It is the ratio of the mass density of the Universe to the "critical density" and is approximately 1. If gravity were too strong compared with dark energy and the initial metric expansion, the Universe would have collapsed before life could have evolved. On the other side, if gravity were too weak, no stars would have formed.

Lambda (&#955 is the cosmological constant. It describes the ratio of the density of dark energy to the critical energy density of the Universe, given certain reasonable assumptions such as positing that dark energy density is a constant. In terms of Planck units, and as a natural dimensionless value, the cosmological constant, λ, is on the order of 10^−122. This is so small that it has no significant effect on cosmic structures that are smaller than a billion light-years across. If the cosmological constant was off by the tiniest amount, stars and other astronomical structures would not be able to form.

That is akin to a dealer dealing a royal flush billions and billions of times in succession - just getting lucky or is it by design (i.e. knowingly cheating in this case). As the video that I had posted earlier attests to, the element of random chance is nonexistent, as the probability of the fine-tuned constants laying in their very small range of the order of 10^60 and 10^120 is beyond rational reason to attribute to luck, especially, in a single universe.

Theoretical physicist John Polkinghorne has stated: Anthropic fine tuning is too remarkable to be dismissed as just a happy accident, and I concur.

"We don't know" is not an answer.

 

[El_Machinae]

Well, it's the answer when you actually cannot know, you know.

Again, you cannot assign probability to an outcome if you don't have a mechanism by which the outcomes occur.

 

[Funky]

"We don't know" is not an answer.

This attitude is the root of pretty much all the superstitious nonsense virulent across the globe. All religions, ufo sightings, miracle healings, psychic powers, conspiracy theories etc. all boil down to the same argument from ignorance. "I don't know, therefore it must be X." I am sorry, presupposing an answer and filling it in our gaps of knowledge is not how we go about finding out what is true. When we don't know the answer to something, the only honest thing to do is say "I don't know". Not knowing is great, because it gives us something to work on, something to learn!
The only time to accept a claim as true is when there has been sufficient verified evidence in its favor. In the case of gods, no evidence has ever stood the test of vigorous scientific examination. Therefore we can safely discard the god hypothesis, until such evidence has been presented.

 

[PhroX]

And yet again, are some posters denying the evidence of fine-tuning itself now? That's remarkable. I'll cite a few examples:

N, the ratio of the strength of electromagnetism to the strength of gravity for a pair of protons, is approximately 10^36. If it were smaller, only a small and short-lived universe could exist.

Epsilon (&#949, the strength of the force binding nucleons into nuclei, is 0.007. If it were 0.006, only hydrogen could exist, and complex chemistry would be impossible. If it were 0.008, no hydrogen would exist, as all the hydrogen would have been fused shortly after the big bang.

Omega (&#937, also known as the Density parameter, is the relative importance of gravity and expansion energy in the Universe. It is the ratio of the mass density of the Universe to the "critical density" and is approximately 1. If gravity were too strong compared with dark energy and the initial metric expansion, the Universe would have collapsed before life could have evolved. On the other side, if gravity were too weak, no stars would have formed.

Lambda (&#955 is the cosmological constant. It describes the ratio of the density of dark energy to the critical energy density of the Universe, given certain reasonable assumptions such as positing that dark energy density is a constant. In terms of Planck units, and as a natural dimensionless value, the cosmological constant, λ, is on the order of 10^−122. This is so small that it has no significant effect on cosmic structures that are smaller than a billion light-years across. If the cosmological constant was off by the tiniest amount, stars and other astronomical structures would not be able to form.

That is akin to a dealer dealing a royal flush billions and billions of times in succession - just getting lucky or is it by design (i.e. knowingly cheating in this case). As the video that I had posted earlier attests to, the element of random chance is nonexistent, as the probability of the fine-tuned constants laying in their very small range of the order of 10^60 and 10^120 is beyond rational reason to attribute to luck, especially, in a single universe.

Theoretical physicist John Polkinghorne has stated: Anthropic fine tuning is too remarkable to be dismissed as just a happy accident, and I concur.

"We don't know" is not an answer.

And yet again, you are completely failing to understand anything thats being said to you.

Making any statements about the likelyhood of these constants holding particular values is impossible because we do not know the range of values they can hold, nor do we know the probablity of them holding specific values in that range.