The Weak Anthropic Principle.
- Thread starter Mouthwash
- Start date
The Weak Anthropic Principle is more or less true by definition. You might even call it a tautology... who exactly is claiming it's false?
I've never met a physicist who rejects the weak anthropic principle, and I've met some pretty clever physicists.
strijder20
Wallowing in irony
It's not only untestable, it's just unprovable - and true.
Of course there can only be observers in a universe where there can be observers.
History_Buff
Deity
- Joined
- Aug 12, 2001
- Messages
- 6,529
[Citation Needed]
That isn't my impression either. Physicists usually reject the strong anthropic principle in my experience. The weak version is basically the standard answer for why universal constants happen to be to allow life to exist I've heard from any physicist who concerns himself with that question, ever. And it's a pretty sound answer in my opinion.
Hey, I just noticed RFC has been updated! I don't play it because of the rampant Anti-Semitism among the people there (someone suggested an UHV for Israel as controlling the entire Middle East), but congratulations.
I just heard from someone that most physicists reject the Weak Anthropic Principle and I wanted to see if it was true.
MrCynical
Deity
It's the strong anthropic principal that's usually rejected. That claims that the universe and its laws of physics are somehow forced to create sentient life. This is basically egocentrism on a grand scale - the universe revolves around the creation of sentient life, and hence us. There's no evidence for it.
The weak anthropic principle basically says that a universe can only be observed if the laws of physics permit the formation of sentient observers. i.e. any observer will always find themselves in a universe that permits the existence of life. Since fundamentally all this says is that observers can only exist in universes where it is possible for an observer to exist, it is tautologically true. It doesn't actually tell you a lot, it's just highlighting the obvious logical flaw in the argument that we should be surprised the universe appears well suited to our existence.
The weak anthropic principle basically says that a universe can only be observed if the laws of physics permit the formation of sentient observers. i.e. any observer will always find themselves in a universe that permits the existence of life. Since fundamentally all this says is that observers can only exist in universes where it is possible for an observer to exist, it is tautologically true. It doesn't actually tell you a lot, it's just highlighting the obvious logical flaw in the argument that we should be surprised the universe appears well suited to our existence.
strijder20
Wallowing in irony
Mouthwash said:
Rampant semitism? How long have you been on that subforum?
By the way, I don't see how suggesting for them to control the entire Middle East is anti-semitic. Some of the goals are extrapolations of the achievements in real life, and the Israelis seem to be eager to 'recreate' the old Israel (from the BC years) and already conquered some lands which fall in that region, IIRC. While it's indeed unlikely that their government is interested in conquering the entire Middle East, America isn't that eager to occupy Middle East countries for oil IRL either (Yes, I realise the irony of what I'm saying) nor were the Koreans sinking ships just for the sake of sinking ships.
Mise
isle of lucy
The weak anthropic principle just describes a selection bias. There's nothing controversial about it. EDIT: I see others have said it better already... I'll let myself out.
Thanks, it's not RFC but only my humble mod of it though
I'm not sure what exactly you're referring to with the Israel thing, but we haven't talked about something like that for months.I'm curious what this person objects to in the weak anthropic principle. Other than being an adherent of the strong anthropic principle, I can't imagine any, since as already said, it's more of an argument against a certain type of reasoning than a claim about the universe. But it'd be interesting if you could ask him and relay his arguments.
If my neighbor leaves his house empty so that a terrorist can come in and use his house to launch rockets at me, then the neighbor is a collaborator. He has acted aggressively against me indirectly and has shown that he does not care about my life or property. I should kill the terrorist and occupy the house. But should I give it back to the former neighbor? Absolutely not. His indirect aggression delegitimized his ownership of the house, and if I let him have the house he will invite the terrorists again, who will keep launching rockets at me. I need to protect myself from future acts of aggression, whether direct or indirect.
This sums up the Israeli position on the 'occupied' territories. Note that the Arab villages that were not abandoned were not touched; those Arabs were allowed to remain in Israel, and today they are Israeli citizens.
Obviously religious Jews want to see an Israel on the Holy Land, but most of them aren't willing to displace Arabs to accomplish that any more than we want to tear down the Dome of the Rock to build a new Jewish Temple. You're thinking of ultra-Orthodox right-wingers who make wonderful propaganda for the Arabs when they spit on Palestinians.
And I distinctly remember one guy on that subforum declaring himself an "anti-Zionist." Another person said the Israel should have its UHV be controlling the entire Middle East (when they were considering putting Israel in RFC). He was not joking. When you start saying that Israel's expansion is a Zionist plot to control all Arab lands then I'd say that's anti-Semitic at the very least.
I may try RFC again, though, but right now I'm more involved in C2C. It isn't like most of the people there are Israelophobics; some of them didn't even have a problem with Israel. What irked me is that no one bothered to call the Jew-haters out.
He didn't seem to have arguments... I was debating some guy who used the "universe designed for us" argument to prove that we were living in a computer simulation.
Here, in the comments section, not the actual debate. I just used what you guys said about the WAP because I had no knowledge if there even was an argument against it. It does make perfect sense.
Tschibo
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2006
- Messages
- 64
It appears to be more of a postulate? A "similarity is not correlation" kind of thing?
A balloon requires a universe to fly in but the scale makes it hard to compare.
Or different, a human is awesome, but not perfect in any sense. We dominate a certain habitat on earth, not everything. The mitochondrium, a energy generating bacteria we have in our cells, is far more important for life.
How can we be the logical conclusion of physical constants, at least more than anything else?
A balloon requires a universe to fly in but the scale makes it hard to compare.
Or different, a human is awesome, but not perfect in any sense. We dominate a certain habitat on earth, not everything. The mitochondrium, a energy generating bacteria we have in our cells, is far more important for life.
How can we be the logical conclusion of physical constants, at least more than anything else?
strijder20
Wallowing in irony
Oh, but I think the Israelis are remaining remarkably stoic under the aggression of their neighbours. And yes, a military expansion goal might not be fitting after all, if I compare it to, say, Germany's goal (which has to conquer most of Europe and England), because that's about the past, while this is an actual issue and 'conquer by 2020' implies that today's Israel is a country which actively tries to conquer it's neighbours.
Similar threads
