The Fine-Tuning Argument is dead

[Jim Nasium]

Actually the correct statement would be the chances of me being alive after the shots were fired are 1, because I am. The chances of all 100 bullets missing is another question entirely. Maybe they all hit exactly what they were aiming at, it just wasn't me.

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Hi

Where are you getting this reasoning from?

There is no form of probablity that allows you to claim the chances of a firing squad intending to kill you and misses are 1.

 

There is a form of Bias that allows this though and it is being used throughout the thread. You cannot reason correctly with pathological bias and all it does is make your argument appear even weaker.

 

There is a reason why virtually all cosmologists and theoretical physists claim there is fine tuning and denying it requires very strong and properly formed arguments. Everyone is quite free to say "its just so" regarding their beliefs but to act as if those who clearly see the fine tuning are somehow making errors in logic...well its up to you to show that ---all I have read here is just street reasoning with nothing to back it up.

 

I actually dont think this will help because of the bias that is causing its denial but I'll try anyway.

 

If you could hold in your hand a ball of energy that was "similar" to the one that caused our universe and threw it, and could witness in time lapsed form its evolution--would you not be surprised to see particles that just so happened to have charges--all pairing up using some magic glue--allowing chemical reactions, then nuclear synthesis, stars with just the right features allowing them to produce elements..then explode to form planets, biospheres, the formation of a computer code that eventually contained the precise spatial location of the 4 chamber heart with its electrical and pressure system?

 

Can anyone claim that is 1 to 1 probablity?

What the fine tuned constants show is that it is almost infinitely more probable to observe nothing astonishing. Like a bunch of dust doing nothing--certainly not magical lego's that can build complex structures.

 

You have to understand that the atheists who flooded the fields of origins expected to find the parameters were quite wide to a stable universe. A random ball of energy with no purpose should not create stars, let alone the conciousness to understand them. So if they do...the path to that unbelievable phenomenon must be *Wide. The world appears designed--everyone on earth agrees with that. They sought to show it only "appeared" designed. But when you find out the math is more designed looking than the universes very appearence-- you must answer that.

 

A purposless clump must produce a random outcome. So if it doesnt appear random--then the parameters must be exceedingly *Wide so there are many paths to a designed appearence. That is exactly the opposite of what was found. The underlying struture of the universe is more desgined looking that even what we see.

 

Now, it has been shown that certain bias or certain personality types, autistic, aspergers--and some others cannot see purpose in things. So if you're not seeing what everyone else sees very clearly it must be bias or some other personality trait--but its not truth. The fine tuning is there. Its clear and inescapable.

Edited August 7, 2013 by Jim Nasium

[Moontanman]

Gymnasium, if you survive the firing squad, the chance you survived is 100%...

Edited August 7, 2013 by Moontanman

[Greg H.]

 

Actually the correct statement would be the chances of me being alive after the shots were fired are 1, because I am. The chances of all 100 bullets missing is another question entirely. Maybe they all hit exactly what they were aiming at, it just wasn't me.

----------------

 

 

 

Hi

Where are you getting this reasoning from?

There is no form of probablity that allows you to claim the chances of a firing squad intending to kill you and misses are 1.

I never claimed they intended to kill me. Read the following two statements very carefully, because they are not the same.

 

1. What is the probability that I am alive after the firing failed to kill me?

2. What is the probability of the firing squad failing to kill me?

 

If they fire, and I am still alive afterwards, the probability of me being alive after the shots were fired is 1. That statement makes no efforts to compute the probability of them all missing. It doesn't even say anything about missing. Maybe they hit me but I survived anyway.

 

The point is, discussing the probability of a discrete event that occurred in the past is nonsense. It's like trying to multiply by infinity - it's useless to discuss. The probability that you were born is 100% because you were born. The probability that you logged into this forum and typed a post is 100% (otherwise I would have nothing to respond to).

 

Probability is really only useful in describing future events. What is the probability that the sun won't be there tomorrow? Well, it's pretty low, but there is an infinitesimally small chance that it could just explode while I'm asleep tonight.

 

Now, if you wanted to discuss the probability of another universe forming exactly like this one - that's actually a useful question. It's impossible to answer since we have

1. No concrete idea (or mathematical model of) how this universe formed, and
2. No other universes to compare it to even if we did.

So it would be impossible to even begin to calculate the probability involved - we simply do not have the required information to even be able to formulate a WAG.

Wild Ass Guess

.

There is a reason why virtually all cosmologists and theoretical physists claim there is fine tuning

 

^{[citation needed]}

[pears]

Surely we assign probabilities to unknowns? What is the point of assigning a probability to a known past event? Isn't that meaningless?

 

Isn't the fine tuning argument is about asking what are the odds that the universe is the way it is, that the fundamental constants beyond some boundary where they are known, could have become what they are? Unless by assigning 100% to the odds of us being here you mean it was inevitable, that there was no possible other way the universe could ever have been other that it is, which is quite a claim.

[Greg H.]

Surely we assign probabilities to unknowns? What is the point of assigning a probability to a known past event? Isn't that meaningless?

 

Isn't the fine tuning argument is about asking what are the odds that the universe is the way it is, that the fundamental constants beyond some boundary where they are known, could have become what they are? Unless by assigning 100% to the odds of us being here you mean it was inevitable, that there was no possible other way the universe could ever have been other that it is, which is quite a claim.

 

That was sort of my point. The idea of assigning fine tuning to prove the existence of our universe is sort of silly because, frankly, we don't have anywhere near enough information to make that kind of claim, much less assign a probability that another universe would form under the exact same conditions. Our universe exists - that's really all we can say at this point. We don't know enough about how universes form to even begin to assign a probability to the chance of another universe forming at all, much less one just like ours.

[Moontanman]

Well yes it did happen, now we have to ask why. Why out of increditable odds did a life substaining universe form by chance?

 

Or could it be that there is a fine-tuner.

 

 

I've already pointed this out many times, but since people keep bringing it up I will say this again.

 

There is currently no experimental evidence in support of the M-verse "hypothesis". While there is some support in physics for string theory and inflationary cosmology, they are currently provisional and highly speculative. However I actually believe the multiverse exists, but is insufficient in accounting for the fine-tuning of the laws of nature. (see links)

 

http://sententias.org/2013/01/19/do-multiverse-scenarios-solve-the-problem-of-fine-tuning/

 

http://arxiv.org/pdf/0801.0246.pdf

 

Also about the never ending cycle of universes (cyclic universe).

 

The new Planck data render many cyclic models, including the ekpyrotic universe, a lot less likely. A lack of non-Gaussianities in the CMB spectrum rules out the conversion mechanism required by most cyclic models.

Crispy Bacon, can you show me any positive evidence for a fine tuner? Because as i said, it happened, doesn't matter if the chances of it happening are one in a quadrillion billion it happened we are here, outrageous odds are meaningless in that context.

 

It's like telling the person with a winning lotto ticket they can't have won because the odds were so bad....

[imatfaal]

Crispy Bacon, can you show me any positive evidence for a fine tuner? Because as i said, it happened, doesn't matter if the chances of it happening are one in a quadrillion billion it happened we are here, outrageous odds are meaningless in that context.

 

It's like telling the person with a winning lotto ticket they can't have won because the odds were so bad....

 

 

Moon - I am not arguing for fine tuning in any way but your argument raised a thought in my head - if someone one the jackpot ten weeks running I would check the odds and then say shenanigans without much fear of contradiction. I am willing to believe that most lotteries are run fairly as it is the easiest way for the organizers to avoid prison a/o civil suits, the odds of winning are long but if I meet a lottery winner then to claim they cannot have won because it is 14 million to one would be a ludicrous statement; however, if I met someone who had won every week since christmas the stupendous odds (for something that had already happened) against this happening would convince me that there was a hidden mover (his brother who works building the machines etc)

[Moontanman]

 

 

Moon - I am not arguing for fine tuning in any way but your argument raised a thought in my head - if someone one the jackpot ten weeks running I would check the odds and then say shenanigans without much fear of contradiction. I am willing to believe that most lotteries are run fairly as it is the easiest way for the organizers to avoid prison a/o civil suits, the odds of winning are long but if I meet a lottery winner then to claim they cannot have won because it is 14 million to one would be a ludicrous statement; however, if I met someone who had won every week since christmas the stupendous odds (for something that had already happened) against this happening would convince me that there was a hidden mover (his brother who works building the machines etc)

 

 

That sort of thing is suggestive and would seem to discount the supernatural not by virtue of being miraculous but by virtue that almost all humans would hold information that miraculous with suspicion in every aspect of life but the supernatural...