Fine tuning, a new approach

[Oncedeceived]

They are failures because, just as you did with the universe, I identified a target in which to assign appearance of fine tuning. I could have picked me, and then you would have been a failure. Just because THEY also would have been highly improbable, does not make them a success. I agree that there are MANY targets I could have chosen. The point is, the target I chose has only happened one time.

At any rate, it is clear that I am unable to adequately describe how you are misapplying my analogy.

I guess it is clear that I am unable to adequately describe how you are misapplying your analogy.

 

[[serious]]

The point was establishing scientific documentation of fine tuning. It was very important to the argument to establish a firm foundation for the argument.

Taking only snippets that (you think) agree with you and ignoring the larger context that refutes your point would be, at best, intellectual dishonesty. At worst, it would be outright deception.

 

[[serious]]

Perhaps, but I wouldn't know that since that didn't make sense to me to compare it.

Well, you could start by answering the question I posed and see where it leads you. Here it is again:

Why is a universe without life similar to ours a failure?

 

[[serious]]

I felt it was a good starting point because it was a early documentation of the fine tuning problem.

Again, you felt something you hadn't read was a good starting point? Perhaps you yourself could start there then. There are some good points in there that you've missed, for example, the fine tuning argument's bias toward our form of life while failing to account for other possible forms of life.

 

[[serious]]

They were used to show the precision necessary and the extreme improbability of them being that precise to allow for intelligent life to exist.

Order of magnitude =/= precision.

What is more precise, 1 g, .001 kg, or 1000 mg? How about .000000000000000000000001 Yg?

The answer is they are identical measurements with identical precision as written. That's the problem with your argument. The 1x10-24 Yg is no more precise than 1000 mg. It's the significant figures that would be indicative of tuning, and many of the figures you are saying are tuned are only known to an order of magnitude (per your own sources)

 

[pgp_protector]

Order of magnitude =/= precision.

What is more precise, 1 g, .001 kg, or 1000 mg? How about .000000000000000000000001 Yg?

The answer is they are identical measurements with identical precision as written. That's the problem with your argument. The 1x10-24 Yg is no more precise than 1000 mg. It's the significant figures that would be indicative of tuning, and many of the figures you are saying are tuned are only known to an order of magnitude (per your own sources)

Wouldn't the 1000 mg be the most precise ?
The others might vary by 1%,10% up to 50% depending on rounding, but the 1000 mg can't vary by more than 0.1%

 

[[serious]]

I gave you a link to a video:

I gave you a reference which I didn't have an online link for: The Life of the Cosmos by Lee Smolin where Smolin has calculated the probability of stars forming randomly (=1 in 10^229) as being the probability of life.

From the Book: going further we should ask just how probable is it that a universe created by randomly choosing the parameters will contain stars. Given what we have already said, it is simple to estimate this probability. For those readers who are interested, the arithmetic is in the notes. The answer, in round numbers, comes to about one chance in 10229 . To illustrate how truly ridiculous this number is, we might note that the part of the universe we can see from earth contains about 1022 stars which together contain about 1080 protons and neutrons. These numbers are gigantic, but they are infinitesimal compared to 10229 . In my opinion, a probability this tiny is not something we can let go unexplained. Luck will certainly not do here; we need some rational explanation of how something this unlikely turned out to be the case.

And I gave you the link from Luke Barnes: http://arxiv.org/pdf/1112.4647.pdf

I gave you at least a half dozen or so quotes from Scientists that claim the universe is unlikely to have the precise parameters we see by chance.

That shows a lack of understanding of basic math. One part in x is an expression of precision, but he's conflating that with order of magnitude.

Here's an example. Let's say I have 1.0g of salt. I know how much salt I have to 2 orders of magnitude, or to 1 part in 100. Now, That's also .0010 Kg. Does that mean I now know the amount of salt to 1 part in 1000? No, of course not, just like writing it in Yg wouldn't make it known to 1 in 10^24. It's known to 1 in 100 no matter what the order of magnitude is.

 

[[serious]]

Wouldn't the 1000 mg be the most precise ?
The others might vary by 1%,10% up to 50% depending on rounding, but the 1000 mg can't vary by more than 0.1%

You are forgetting your rules of sig figs. There is nothing to indicate the zeros are significant there. Now, if I had written 1000. mg, then you would be right. But as written, only the 1 in each figure is significant.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Taking only snippets that (you think) agree with you and ignoring the larger context that refutes your point would be, at best, intellectual dishonesty. At worst, it would be outright deception.

That is ridiculous. I was giving evidence the evidence is the fine tuning which I was establishing. The conclusions in these papers are just that conclusions and ones that I explicitly pointed out.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Order of magnitude =/= precision.

What is more precise, 1 g, .001 kg, or 1000 mg? How about .000000000000000000000001 Yg?

The answer is they are identical measurements with identical precision as written. That's the problem with your argument. The 1x10-24 Yg is no more precise than 1000 mg. It's the significant figures that would be indicative of tuning, and many of the figures you are saying are tuned are only known to an order of magnitude (per your own sources)

I am giving the examples that physicists themselves claim to be extremely precise and fine tuned.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Again, you felt something you hadn't read was a good starting point? Perhaps you yourself could start there then. There are some good points in there that you've missed, for example, the fine tuning argument's bias toward our form of life while failing to account for other possible forms of life.

That is simply false. That paper was written before the technology we have today to simulate universes and what that means for life.

 

[Oncedeceived]

Well, you could start by answering the question I posed and see where it leads you. Here it is again:

Why is a universe without life similar to ours a failure?

The simulations show that life at all would be prohibited.

 

[46AND2]

I guess it is clear that I am unable to adequately describe how you are misapplying your analogy.

lol. Well, yes. Strawmanning someone's argument tends to have that effect.

 

[[serious]]

The simulations show that life at all would be prohibited.

So the paper you didn't read is a great starter for someone, but we also shouldn't pay any attention to it because unspecified simulations disprove what you assume is in the paper, which you didn't read.

How about this, read the paper you cited, then we can discuss it's merits (which are apparently in a quantum state of "a great introduction" and "totally not adequate in any point I don't agree with")

 

[KCfromNC]

I gave you a link to a video:

And I responded to it. A video is not a peer-reviewed paper describing a consensus number and how it was obtained.

I gave you a reference which I didn't have an online link for: The Life of the Cosmos by Lee Smolin where Smolin has calculated the probability of stars forming randomly (=1 in 10^229) as being the probability of life.

Is this your claim for a consensus number? If so, that's kinda strange since the other reference you posted here gives a vastly different number. It is almost as if this is an open question.

But since you're committed to one or the other being the scientific consensus, can you find 5 other peer-reviewed sources agreeing on either number?

And I gave you the link from Luke Barnes: http://arxiv.org/pdf/1112.4647.pdf

http://arxiv.org/pdf/1112.4647.pdf

I believe this was the paper from which you failed to find any relevant probability calculations .

I gave you at least a half dozen or so quotes from Scientists that claim the universe is unlikely to have the precise parameters we see by chance.

So? What peer-reviewed research concludes the parameters came about through sheer chance?[/QUOTE]

 

[KCfromNC]

I am giving the examples that physicists themselves claim to be extremely precise and fine tuned.

Could be. No one is doubting that universal constants are constant here in this universe. Nor is anyone doubting that if things were different they would be different.

 

[KCfromNC]

That is simply false. That paper was written before the technology we have today to simulate universes and what that means for life.

Which specific simulations were discussed in the paper that you never read as things which the authors would like to do but was unable due to limits of technology available to them? Please be specific.

 

[KCfromNC]

The simulations show that life at all would be prohibited.

So?

 

[Oncedeceived]

lol. Well, yes. Strawmanning someone's argument tends to have that effect.

Its not a straw man, it is an incorrect analogy.

 

[Oncedeceived]

So the paper you didn't read is a great starter for someone, but we also shouldn't pay any attention to it because unspecified simulations disprove what you assume is in the paper, which you didn't read.

How about this, read the paper you cited, then we can discuss it's merits (which are apparently in a quantum state of "a great introduction" and "totally not adequate in any point I don't agree with")

Yes, the paper I didn't read is a great starter for someone unfamiliar with fine tuning. I didn't say you shouldn't "pay attention to it". I said the conclusions are based on what was known then and it is dated by new technology we have today. That happens in science.