Talk:Fine-tuned universe/Archive 4

A reference
Here's a cosmology book that might be considered credible, which says:


 * "Why is the universe so favorable in numerous ways to the existence of life? Throughout history, mythology and theology have urged the idea of a universe designed for the benefit of life. In the twentieth century an increasing number of contributions from science have made persuasive the case for cosmic design at a fundamental level.  The design of the universe is fixed by the physical constants and the laws of physics.  In a universe containing luminous stars and chemical elements essential for organic life, the physical constants are necessarily precisely adjusted (or finely tuned). Slight deviations from the observed values result in a starless and lifeless universe." p.522 (you may need an account to see the page)

I don't think he's pitching an "intelligent design" argument here when he refers to "cosmic design at a fundamental level", though some would probably read it that way. To me, it simply means we don't yet understand the fundamentals of physical law, and my impression is that that's how most scientists see it, too.

Do we have scientific refs that dispute this idea of "fine tuning" or my interpretation of it? Dicklyon 17:24, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Here's a credible astrophysicist with a somewhat different take on it, but not really disagreeing that the constants are finely tuned for the universe as we know it:


 * "The precise values of physical constants measured today are not necessarily the only combination of values that could conceivably lead, ..., to intelligent life" p.10

And he references Hubert Reeves's 1991 "complexity principle" as a less chauvinistic alternative to "anthropic principle". This the kind of thing we need to follow up.

Searching in the above book for "physical constants" allows access to pages 8 and 9, which say


 * "The issue is this: If the numerical values of certain physical constants (for example, the velocity of light, an electron's charge and mass, the gravitational constant, etc.) differed even slightly from their observed values, then the long sequence of events that produced galaxies, stars, planets, and life might have been impossible. The cosmos would likely be starless and lifeless, a proposition very much at odds with the once seen around us."

For your consideration. Dicklyon 17:42, 16 October 2006 (UTC)


 * If the nature of the universe is defined by the values of N physical constants, then any theoretically possible universe may be represented by a point in N-dimensional space - a plot on a graph, if you will. Now, it's all very well to say that varying one or more of those constants just slightly will result in a starless/lifeless/uninteresting/whatever universe, but all that means is that the points we can easily extrapolate our knowledge of physics to describe look pretty bleak - it says nothing about regions of this N-dimensional space which are nowhere near the point representing the universe we observe. Now, this is all hopelessly OR (unless someone who's more familiar with the literature can find a reference to a similar argument) but I felt it needed to be said - not least because it seems to knock a hole in the basic concept of the FTU. SheffieldSteel 03:59, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Premise: WTF?
Can someone help with this?

Victor Stenger characterizes the fine-tuned universe concept as capable of being interpreted as a "claim of evidence for divine cosmic plan": "As the argument goes, the chance that any initially random set of constants would correspond to the set of values that we find in our universe is very small and the universe is exceedingly unlikely to be the result of mindless chance. Rather, an intelligent, purposeful, Creator must have arranged the constants to support life."[2]. Stenger in that paper is critical of the claims and provides his own explanations highlighting the flaws in claims of the fine-tuning advocates and concludes that "The universe is not fine-tuned for humanity. Humanity is fine-tuned to the universe." [3].

He's critical of what claims? His own claims from the previous sentence? I am confused :-( SheffieldSteel 04:27, 28 February 2007 (UTC)


 * my interpretation of that is that it is possible that a different (perhaps only slightly different) universe with different fundamental constants (not extremely different) that would result in a different kind of matter, a different mix or availability of elements, etc., that a somewhat different form of life and "humanity" (whatever intelligent life that may eventually evolve) would evolve that would be adapted to the different material universe. i think that he's really just making clear what is the cause and effect.  it's a pretty wierd philosophy that the universal constants took on the values they have so that we can be around to talk about them.  i think that reverses cause and effect. r b-j 19:33, 28 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks. I think I made sense of the bit that what bugging me (the bold text above). SheffieldSteel 01:11, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Source of "2%"
This article gives "2%" as the "margin of error" for the strong nuclear force, withone any citation. In fact, in the section "Known physical constants and possible examples of fine tuning" two sources are cited, both of which disagree with the 2%. This needs citation or a change to the other numbers (9% and 50%). JMD (talk) 02:40, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Okay, so I was bold
I found a stray paragraph on Cosmological Natural Selection towards the end of section 5 (which I renamed because it just seemed so wrong) which I re-united with the main CNS discussion. I hope that someone with a stronger background in cosmology can check it. I'd hate to think I ruined the main points of the theory. SheffieldSteel 01:04, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

Fine tuning unnecessarily overstated?
It's stated several times in this article that the idea of fine tuning requires that all physical constants are so fine tuned that "any small change" would be disastrous. Surely even strong advocates of fine tuning do not go this far? First, it seems obvious that sufficiently small changes would have no significant effect (e.g. if the strong force is fine-tuned to 2% as claimed, presumable a change as small as 0.2% would be safe). Second, the arguments for fine tuning do not touch most of the list of 26 fundamental constants offered by physicists, such as the mass of the top quark or entries in the various quark and neutrino mixing matrices. I don't think these points should be controversial, but post here if they are; otherwise in a day or two I will go through the article (including the lead) and replace "all constants" with "some constants" and "any small change" by "relatively small change". PaddyLeahy 13:35, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * dunno how controversial, but i can tell you that John Baez came through here, as well as a few articles such as Physical constant, Dimensionless physical constant, and Planck units less than a year ago (i think), made some adjustments to some of the articles and left them, i thought, satisfied (i asked him). about the arguments for fine tuning and the list of 26, i didn't think that a claim was made about what tolerance for change for each of the 26 and i don't even know that there has been any published work that spelled out for such-and-such constant, that some specific percent change would change things so that, say, atoms and matter could not form in the way they do.  but i don't imagine that things would be the same if say, some parameter of the Maki-Nakagawa-Sakata matrix or some other esoteric constant changed.  in other words, i think "all" might be more accurate than "some", but the uncertainty of the values of these constants are not known to me, nor the theory of really what they do, if they were different what would change, and how different would they have to be.  i can't believe that radically changing any of the 26 would go unnoticed. r b-j 14:12, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hmm, but this article has changed a bit since JB was active roughly last September. You are right of course that big enough changes would have an effect, e.g. if top was as light as up or down, but that's not exactly "fine" tuning. And given the Weakless Universe proposal it is hard to argue that the neutrino sector is fine tuned. Since you invoke Baez, I'll ask for his comment on this. PaddyLeahy 15:01, 23 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi!


 * I certainly don't recall reading this "fine-tuned universe" article, much less being satisfied with it. The whole idea of a "fine-tuned universe" seems so vague to me, and the whole morass of far-out potential conclusions so speculative --- the universe  could  have been designed by aliens, or  could have been designed by intelligent beings (what's the big difference, exactly?) --- that I  don't really know where I'd begin trying to start improving this article.


 * Anyway: certainly some constants could be wiggled quite a bit without any serious effect, at least as far as I know. The final returns aren't in yet, but does anyone really claim that changing the tau lepton mass by 2%, or even 20%, would make a bloody shred of difference to life as we know it?  How would that happen, exactly?  I've never heard of the tau lepton having any effect on any physics that really matters to us.  It's way too heavy to have shown up after the first hundred picoseconds after the Big Bang, give or take a few orders of magnitude... and I've never heard anyone suggest it played a make-or-break role in the grand scheme of things before that time, either.


 * I could pick other examples, but this one seems like the most outrageous.


 * So, if somebody is claiming all the fundamental constants of nature are fine-tuned, they either know something I don't, or they're just making stuff up. John Baez 21:58, 25 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I would appreciate it if some practicing physicists would review this. Whether they are called "Weasel words" or not, these qualifications are more accurate than saying that "any" small change in "any" of the constants would make for a completely different Universe as PaddyLeahy and John Baez have pointed out.  Some of those coupling constants are esoteric enough that there is no universal agreement amoung physicists what changing them would mean.  If you don't like the so-called "weasel words", then find some other way to make the article accurate.  If some physicist is claiming that changing any of the 26 fundamental constants any little bit will result in a radically different universe, that unqualified claim needs to be attributed to be factual.  Otherwise it's pseudoscience. 71.254.7.200 03:05, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
 * 71... Doesn't look like anyone (but me) are listening to you. Or to the two physicists you've cited.  Nothing new.  Welcome to Wikipedia, the encyclopedia that clings forever to cherished inaccuracies just like George W. Bush. 207.190.198.130 18:02, 29 October 2007 (UTC)
 * George W. Bush is a cherished inaccuracy? Anyway, I've rephrased the points in question, and added a citation that uses similar phrasing, if only for the life claim. What is the meaning of liff? ... dave souza, talk 09:52, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
 * No, GWB (and his cheerleaders) cling to cherished inaccuracies. As do many Wikipedia articles because the concerns of experts in the field have no more juice here than those of non-experts that have a personal investment in the POV of an article.  Experts come here to fix things up, the interested non-experts return to remove such reform, then the experts get tired of dealing with such self-confident ignorance, stop wasting their time here, and go away. 207.190.198.130 17:38, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Also, Dave souza, some (weasel word inserted for accuracy) of the changes you made (as well as what was cited) conflates the notion of a Fine-tuned universe (which is a subject of physics) with the religious spin of it done by Creationists and ID advocates. That is not just rephrasing, but is content changing and, if you read what PaddyLeahy is saying, not what principally what the root topic of FTU is about.  It is about first a physical observation made (that is answered to some degree by the Anthropic Principle).  Then as a consequence, people with a religious agenda have appealed to the FTU to justify their religious POV regarding origins.  That is a related topic that deserves some mention in the article, but it isn't, at all, central nor even necessary to the topic. 207.190.198.130 17:54, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
 * FTU lends itself to the religious right and creationist beliefs, as do the anthropic principles. Really, FTU is a bit of a strawman in that it makes presuppositions based on our own subjective experience.  &#0149;Jim 62 sch&#0149;  20:37, 31 October 2007 (UTC)
 * FTU and AP are physical concepts (that are debated among physicists) that makes an observation about the nature of these constants and about the initial turbulance or nonhomogeniety of the universe (and AP is an explanation). It does not itself have anything to do with religion.  It is physicists saying things like "If the strong nuclear interaction was much different [how much is debated] matter would not condense in the form we know following the big bang."  What the Religious Right or Creationists have to say about it (or to try to use it to support their agenda) is a different topic.  FTU and AP are about astrophysics and cosmology.  It is certainly the case that the religious right (or other religious types, like Catholics) and creationists try to use this concept of cosmology to support their religious cosmology (I think the survival of the Big Bang has emboldened them, perhaps), but like the Big Bang, we do not use either religious tracts or other published scholarship or anti-religious scholarship as a cite for what physicists say about the it (the Big Bang).  Perhaps, as a side note, the neutral article might cite that some religious traditions like the Big Bang or FTU or whatever, because it seems to be congruent to their tradition.  But it would be dumb to put some approving quote of the pope in the lead of Big Bang.  Instead, we would put something that Brian Greene or Stephen Hawking or similar have said about it.  The talk_origins cite should be about what people on different sides of the evolution debate say about FTU (which creates controversy outside of physical cosmology), not about what the FTU concept is fundamentally about.
 * What I am suggesting is that the article should be as neutral and dispassionate about FTU as is Big Bang, and associate the Creationist claims about it in a section similar to Big_Bang. Like Big Bang, it should be primarily about the physics, including the physics debate (about whether or not the universe is fine-tuned at all).  But FTU and AP is not ID and the Creationists did not come up with the idea, even if they might like to refer to it (and likely they misrepresent or do not understand it, in my opinion). 207.190.198.130 01:24, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

Cosmic Expansion and the Cosmological Constant
Cosmology is not my strong suite. However, I did read the relevant sections in "Is there Scientific Evidence for the Existence of God", and "Evidence of fine tuning" and as far as I can tell both of their arguments are for fine-tuning of the cosmological constant to make the universe of constant size (no ongoing expansion) and NOT the fine tuning of the cosmological constant "not to enter a runaway expansion phase early enough to prevent the formations of stars and galaxies." PaddyLeahy, can you (or anyone else) show me where/how the argument they refer to does in fact refer to fine tuning of the cosmological constant such that cosmic expansion is prevented from happening "too early" instead of not happening at all? I'm not meaning to be belligerant, but when I read the relevant sections I genuinely got the impression that the fine-tuning they argued for entailed a universe that is not currently expanding. Romanpoet 02:47, 24 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm happy to explain: First of all, no-one (since Edwin Hubble) is suggesting that the universe has constant size or is not expanding. Both of these articles refer to an argument originally by Steven Weinberg (1987) although the numbers have changed a bit (the two articles actually minimise the amount of fine tuning). Standard cosmological structure formation describes how gravitationally-bound structures can form in an expanding universe from small fluctuations in density via gravitational amplification. This requires that the overall expansion of the universe is decelerating during the period when the fluctuations grow from small (~ 1 part in 105) to large (order unity). (If there is acceleration, the fluctuations don't grow). For structures with sizes of order galaxies, that period is roughly the first billion years of cosmic history. Once bound structures "fall out" from the overall expansion, the overall expansion can accelerate (due to the CC, presumably); all this does is make bound structures recede from each other faster, without affecting what happens inside them. As it happens, it looks like the CC started causing acceleration when the universe was about 7 billion years old, so fine-tuning is satisfied. PaddyLeahy 03:29, 24 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Thanks PaddyLeahy. I can roll with that. Romanpoet 22:21, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Facts tags
I'm troubled by the factual accuracy of Implications of fine tuning section. It is missing references, and I'm disputing the Hoyle reference (for the time being, until I'm convinced it isn't quote mining). What bothers me is that there is an implication that there is actually some science involved with this so-called Fine-Tuned universe. There really isn't, which means NPOV will be violated, but otherwise, as a subsection of the article, it needs to be more balanced. Orangemarlin 01:52, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
 * "What bothers me is that there is an implication that there is actually some science involved with this so-called Fine-Tuned universe. There really isn't,..."   your own words dispel any presumption that you even intend to be unbiased.  you want your belief system canonized in Wikipedia articles. you might note that physicists like John Baez were here (let's see you accuse Baez as a creationist as you have me - that would be good for lot's o' laffs).  he didn't seem to think it was science free.  Paddy's work on it only strengthened it on expert level.  you like the fact that Wikipedia requires no credentials.  is that so non-experts like you can remove expert contributions and replace it with what your worldview is?  do you require this article to be so biased as what your want for the ID article?  for goodness sakes, take some physics.  take some math.  don't just come to these articles and replace content you don't like with your preconceived notions.  holy crap. r b-j 06:29, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Orange's impulse is a good one. Comparing Hoyle, Davies, or Rees to creationists is highly inappropriate as these astrophysicists were all making physical arguments and not spiritual arguments. I have rearranged the lists to make the distinction more clear. --ScienceApologist 12:29, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Orange does not seem to get the drift of the physics and thinks that anyone who thinks differently than him regarding origins is a Creationist. the evidence for that is both at the ID talk page and the fact that he was so predisposed to remove factual information and replace it with just what he thinks is true, his uninformed opinion.  (this 747 quote of Hoyle i heard and knew of 2 decades ago.  in fact, Dawkins refers to it and tries to turn it around on Hoyle and/or the theists and claims that the existance of God is the "ultimate 747", as in an astronomically improbable outcome.  Orange would do well to read even the apologetics of his worldview, he at least might be prevented from making this kind of mistake of assertion from ignorance.)  so, SA, i don't see at all, what you do regarding Orange's impulse.  it's neither questioning (intellectually curious), nor open (intellectually honest), nor informed.  it's a lot like Fearless Leader's impulses, except possibly opposite on the political spectrum.  what's so good about that? r b-j 06:25, 30 April 2007 (UTC)


 * While it is dangerous to inappropriately marginalize it is equally dangerous to inappropriately associate. Hoyle, for example, was extremely atheistic and did not appreciate the 747-analogy being used as attempts to prove "God did it" (in much the same way that Dawkins criticizes this use). If we're going to use Hoyle, we should probably lump him with other non-theistic expalanations (that is, naturalistic explanations). I saw Orange's desire to separate ID and creationism from scientists who were making no theistic or even deistic claims as a good one. --ScienceApologist 13:14, 1 May 2007 (UTC)


 * Actually I tend to ignore rbj, given his history of uncivil remarks toward me and others. Otherwise, my point with that one section is that it tries to make scientists prove the case of some order.  The line has got to be drawn at the point where someone infers that Hoyle and others actually believed a supreme being.  The section reads like original research rather than a condensation of peer-reviewed articles.  I read much of Hoyle had written, and I remain unconvinced he was anything other than pro-Evolution.  He saw some order in the universe, but not everywhere;  he was concerned about the statistical probability of forming of life, though I am not.  With a nearly infinite number of planets in the universe, even tiny probabilities become almost certain possibilities somewhere (which supports my thought that life is exceedingly rare if not unique to Earth).  In addition, the only reason I came to this article is that Hoyle was misquoted and misreferenced in a number of Creationist articles--when I read this article, my concern was that Hoyle was a supporter of this so called fine tuned universe, when in fact there is no evidence that he was.  The section however, aside from a debate on Hoyle, is poorly written and draws inappropriate conclusions.  Orangemarlin 14:31, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * By the way, other editors are not allowed to remove tags, without good reason, of other editors without discussion. RBJ's reasoning, basically to rip my knowledge of math and physics, which I generally studied not under the influence of mind-altering substances, is weak at best.  I was going to replace the tag, but ScienceApologist's rework is a huge improvement.  I need to throw on some citation tags, because it needs more cites.  Orangemarlin 14:37, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hoyle in his later years went a little bit off the deep end and began advocating for panspermia due to interpretations of certain features in the spectrum of interstellar dust. Some of his writings are critical of primordial soup hypotheses and at times have been quotemined by creationists to indicate that he didn't believe life could have arisen on Earth by chance. In fact, Hoyle believed that life was brought to Earth from outer space by meteorites and comets and that life is ubiquitous throughout the universe. This idea has been relegated to the fringe of science and is probably what most creationist-supporters get their rocks off about. -ScienceApologist 15:10, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Maybe Hoyle saw his own mortality, and you know, got a bit concerned in his later years. My problem with all of this began with the 747/tornado/junkyard urban myth.  There isn't an iota of proof he said it, and the reference oft cited (an article in Nature) doesn't exist.  Creationists are deceptive.  You'd think that good Christians wouldn't have to deceive so much.  Orangemarlin 15:27, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

On the contrary, according to the very roots of Protestantism laid down by Martin Luther, attacking reason and rationality (along with Jews) and lying were championed as important cornerstones of faith, and necessary to spread the "true" belief.--Filll 15:30, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * People, could I just point out here that, although the notion of a fine-tuned universe certainly is invoked by creationists, it is formally separate from evolution. Read the page... evolution is barely mentioned. In fact, the notion that the physics of the universe is "fine-tuned" for life from the big bang on strongly implies that life developed purely via natural processes. It's true that the fine-tuning idea is a comfort to many believing scientists who accept evolution but are looking in Galileo's "Book of Nature" for evidence of God. But as the article describes there are many other approaches, including rejecting the idea that there is any fine-tuning at all. The latter is definitely a minority position, though. I have briefly checked the Creationist references used in this article and they are presented sanely and at least qualitatively agree with the scientific consensus. It would take quite a lot of time to replace them with references to peer-reviewed papers but it could be done; if someone is enthusiastic and numerate it would be a worthwhile exercise as there is a tendency for the "tightness" of the fine-tuning to increase with each re-telling. PaddyLeahy 16:57, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Paddy, I appreciate your viewpoint here (and especially your high level of civility, which can be noticeably absent in some of these discussions). But to be honest, I found this article as part of the Creationist categories.  If you can remove it from Creationism, then I probably will not care, because this sounds like a cosmological discussion which has no interest to me.  But as long as a Creationist can use these discussions to justify a design element to the universe (including Evolution), then we need to get this right.  As for the peer-reviewed references, the ones in the section entitled, Known physical constants and possible examples of fine tuning, are not peer-reviewed, and are synthesis of quote-mining.  That troubles me.  And to get a total neutral point of view, each of the points in that section should have the alternative science that might explain it.  I do like the God of the gaps article as good bit of balance, so I could live with it, as long as there are some better references.  Orangemarlin 17:41, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Orange, my concern here is two things:
 * 1. you don't seem to be a physicist and you don't seem to really understand what the physics are. why a bunch of physicists, without pointing to a notion of God, observe that there are a bunch of parameters (maybe about 26, that's John Baez's latest count) that are intrinsic to the properties of the universe and all that lies within it.  maybe, according to Dimensionless physical constant, there are more that will be measured as more new interactions are discovered.  the fact that all 26 of these numbers need to be in certain ranges (some parameters, anthropically, need tighter constraints than others) is an observation that naturally leads to remark by curious-minded scientists (those are the only kind worth their salt) and a question: "how can it be that all these constants came out just right?" (the Goldilocks thing).  there's no invoking of God or anything in that, and this precedes conceptually and pedagogically evolution.  it's asking, simply, how remarkable is it that these physical conditions come out to be so that evolution of complex life is even possible?  that's the science of it.  no Discover Institute, no nasty Creationists, nothing like that.
 * 2. the other concern is you come here with this same agenda that you have regarding ID. you are rabidly anti-ID.  that's okay, i'm opposed to it, as the DI like to push it, but i'm not foaming at the mouth.  your clear non-neutral POV regarding ID has caused you to naively spill over to this (and, i s'pose Anthropic principle is next) to just whack at anything that smells of ID.  you mistook this legitimate topic of inquire in physics and cosmology (and i mean the astrophysical kind of cosmology, not the cosmology of philosophers and theologians) for some kind of ID propaganda and you went on the attack, essentially ignorant of what is the science.  so, again, rather than just trying to dump your anti-ID worldview here, take some physics and mathematics classes so you might eventually have the foggiest idea what you're talking about. r b-j 06:25, 30 April 2007 (UTC)

Yah, my edukamation was stoopid. I was learnt nuthing. You is so much intelligenter than me. i nede to do it again. Orangemarlin 19:17, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

This article
Having skimmed through this article, I see that it has some good material in it, but it is also fairly poorly organized and contains a number of grammatical mistakes and spelling mistakes. It also might contain some factual errors. It needs some rewriting and copy editing at a minimum. I think that at first glance a "fine tuned universe" suggests that a God was involved, but on closer examination, there are other reasons and lines of argument that can be marshalled to explain this evidence. So sorry, as interesting as fine tuning is, it does not appear to conclusively "prove" or at least support the existence or nonexistence of a supreme being, in my opinion.--Filll 15:21, 28 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Check the citations placed at the top of the section, Known physical constants and possible examples of fine tuning. They all refer to non-peer-reviewed ramblings of Creationists.  Give me a break.  Orangemarlin 15:30, 28 April 2007 (UTC)
 * The entire field of fine tuning is a respectable one in physics, and it should be possible to find real honest-to-goodness scientific references for most of this. However, if one is a creationist, the real scientific references might be distasteful for many reasons.--Filll 17:19, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Someone should add a table for clarity
Suggestion: It would be helpful to illustrate the topic if there was a table illustrating physical constants and possible examples of fine tuning. The second to last external link, Evidence For Design In The Universe from Limits for the Universe by Hugh Ross, Ph.D. in Astronomy, is an example of the format I have in mind. I am not suggesting we use Hugh Ross’ table content but his format. This is a format issue not a content issue.--CSvBibra 21:36, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Paul Davies and Fred Hoyle
The current description of these two as advocating "physical reasons" for fine tuning is probably a worse distortion of their views that the earlier "non-religious providence or creation". For Davies, see the last chapter of his The Goldilocks Enigma where he lists various attitudes to fine tuning (list is currently reproduced at anthropic principle... I may move this to here). Davies says that he favours options E and F on his scheme, which give Life or Mind (significant capitals) a fundamental role in creating the universe. He admits that many people see such options as a wimpy stand-in for religion. Hoyle is much more complicated, partly because he didn't regard consistency as a great virtue. But comparing his early statement of his position at the end of The Nature of the Universe (1951) with his essay "God's Universe" in Ten Faces of the Universe (1977), his career retrospective review in Annual Reviews of Astronomy & Astrophysics (1982) (link posted at User Talk:Orangemarlin, see quote from another version of this article prominently quoted at Fred Hoyle), and his last statement at the end of Home is Where the Wind Blows (1994), there is some coherence. He is very anti-religious, which may explain why he is often described as an atheist. But he is equally damning of materialism. He twice quotes with approval James Jeans dictum "God is a mathematician", which was not meant ironically. In 1977 he writes "if God is the Universe", which makes him a pantheist along with Spinoza. In 1982 he talks about a superintellect monkeying with the laws of physics as the only possible explanation for fine tuning (despite the fact that Hoyle gave a standard anthropic explanation in 1965). In 1994 he talks about "my God" who is not all-powerful and has a sense of humor... again driven by fine tuning (God is now upgraded from mathematician to physicist). Not exactly naturalistic. Nor are Davies and Hoyle unique in trying to find a middle way between religion and complete materialism... many scientists have a mystical streak (I could mention John Archibald Wheeler... or Arthur C. Clarke). So, I plan to have yet another hack at this part of the article... PaddyLeahy 04:00, 3 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I can see where you are going with this, but these non-personal gods are religious only in a very vaguely deistic and sometimes even a-deistic sense. It's true that they are not naturalist completely because they embrace speculations regarding science that are very much not naturalistic. I think one thing you are overlooking with Hoyle is his belief that ubiquitous life was the uber-intelligence's work at self-replication (thus panspermia). This thing that anthropically tuned the universe for Hoyle was not a "God" in the mean-sense. Panentheism isn't quite right because Hoyle seemed to revel in the lack of creative origin. --ScienceApologist 11:41, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Merger proposal
I came across the article Known physical constants and possible examples of fine tuning through WikiProject intelligent design‎'s assessment page. It's a fairly new article, but a bit of a mess. It already had an informal message at the top saying "Should this entry be merged with fine tuned universe?", so I thought it would be better to turn it into a formal merger proposal. Make of it what you will. HrafnTalkStalk 15:59, 20 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I too encountered this article after giving a lecuture to my class at MIT on Theoretical Astronomy. I find it both repugnant and reprehensible that Wikipedia has not already merged this article. Shame on you! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.10.163.201 (talk) 22:23, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It would be interesting know more about your Theoretical Astronomy course at MIT. Which one is it?  Your IP of 76.10.163.201 seems to cross an international boundary:

OrgName:   TekSavvy Solutions, Inc.  OrgID:      TEKSAV Address:   330 Richmond St., Suite 205 City:      Chatham StateProv: ON PostalCode: N7M-1P7 Country:   CA


 * Anyway, I, as an anonymous editor, fully support the merger. It should have been part of this article all of the time.  There may well be physicists/cosmologists that dispute some or all of the "possible examples of fine tuning", but that's fine.  We include such and attribute it and Wikipedia's NPOV is served.  Even though there is a relationship between FTU, AP, and ID, and some inter-article reference, none of the three are identical topics and they should be not treated as if they are about the same thing or "supported" by the same interests.  Fine-tuned universe and Anthropic principle really are about physics just as the Big bang is (perhaps with some philosophical implications which can be disputed, but the physics itself can also be disputed) and the articles should portray the topics as physics.  Intelligent design is more of a social issue about what is science and what is not and what shall be taught in the public schools.  It may be that supporters of ID point to some concepts from FTU and AP or BB, but just because they do that, it does not make these topics less legitimate for scientific inquiry.  I am afraid that there are ID-haters whom have conflated the issues a bit (which might be one reason the "possible examples" topic was spun off as a separate article).  It should all be the same, it should be sourced and attributed.  Stuff that is well accepted physics should be portrayed as such and stuff that is one physicist's musings or speculations should also be portrayed as such (and attributed). 207.190.198.130 (talk) 23:44, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Merged. HrafnTalkStalk 02:22, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Known physical constants and possible examples of fine tuning
Given that this article only had a a list of references, not in-text citations, I have decided to move it here on the merge, rather than to the article mainspace, to allow regular editors to evaluate its contents & provide inline citations, before its inclusion. HrafnTalkStalk 02:21, 29 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Okay, Hrafn, can you distinguish between this "merger" and methodical removal of material? You didn't merge this material, it seems as though you are intending to remove it.  Then we have a unsupported statement (that used to link to something) and that will have to be removed, then you have an article that has no content that is representative of what "supporters" (if one has to separate this into groups) of the notion that the Universe reflects, lacking a better explanation, some evidence of fine-tuning.  Then it becomes an article that presents FTU as unsupported, when it really does have supporters who are physicists.
 * So can we actually just merge the material you said you were merging? 72.92.135.233 04:47, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Given that the 'References' section contains many references that are far to vague (e.g. "Bradley", "Collins") to allow verification, any attempt to move this material, as it currently stands, into article mainspace would result in its immediate challenge & removal under WP:V. If anybody (e.g. its original author, Barbara Shack) want it included, then they're welcome to provide proper citations for it. HrafnTalkStalk 06:35, 13 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Dunno that the original author is Barbara Shack. It seems that her agenda is to refute the notion of fine-tuning at every opportunity.  While I agree that the references are vague, I have seen similar language in other WP articles like Fundamental physical constants and have read enough from various authors like Smolin or Barrow that most of it seems legit to me.  I am not sure if I agree with 72.92.135.233 or not, but I think I can see the reasonableness in what he/she meant.  Perhaps you should have announced you were deleting material that you think is dubious rather than say you were merging it.  That might have been more forthright. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 18:45, 13 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Barbara Shack is the original author, as can be seen here. If you think that the contents of that article can be referenced to "various authors like Smolin or Barrow" (neither of whom is mentioned in the uselessly-vague 'references' section), then you are welcome to provide citations and reinclude. I clearly announced that I was moving the material here, rather than directly into the article. To be blunt, my message to everybody is: if you want this material, then cite it, uncited it is not suitable for inclusion (either at this article or its original article) per WP:V. Alternatively, if you think that I'm being precious about this, then move it into the article mainspace yourselves as-is, and be prepared to answer any WP:V challenges to it. HrafnTalkStalk 04:56, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Certain physical facts, including the values of the fundamental physical constants, have been argued to point to a universe fine tuned to favor the emergence of life on earth.

Relative strength of fundamental forces
The strong nuclear force holds together the particles in the nucleus of an atom. If the strong nuclear force were 2% (9% according to Bradley, 50% according to Collins) weaker, multi-proton nuclei would not hold together, and hydrogen would be the only stable element in the universe. If the strong force were 1% stronger, hydrogen would rapidly fuse into helium-2; it is also argued that elements heavier than iron would be rare, since they result from fusion during the explosion of supernovae. Collins disputes this on the grounds that the helium-2 would rapidly decay into deuterium which could then fuse into helium-4, but has claimed that this increase would drastically decrease the amount of oxygen (relative to carbon) in the Universe (and that a decrease would have the reverse effect).

The weak nuclear force affects the behavior of leptons (e.g. neutrinos, electrons, and muons), which do not participate in strong nuclear reactions. Bradley has argued that if the weak force were slightly larger, neutrons would decay more readily, and therefore would be less available, and little or no helium would have been produced from the Big Bang. Without the necessary helium, heavy elements such as carbon could not be made by the nuclear furnaces inside stars. Conversely, he and Collins argue, if the weak force were slightly smaller, the Big Bang would have burned most or all of the hydrogen into helium, which would make hydrogen-containing molecules rare, and shorten the lifespan of stars, since they would be fusing helium instead of hydrogen.

Electromagnetism. The intensity of the force binding electrons to protons in atoms depends on the electromagnetic coupling constant. The characteristics of the orbits of electrons about atoms determines to what degree atoms will bond together to form molecules. If the electromagnetic coupling constant were different, atoms and molecules would be significantly different.

Gravity. In order for life as we know it to form, the gravitational attraction between two elementary charged particles must be many orders of magnitude weaker than the electrostatic attraction between them. Weyl (1919) was puzzled that the electromagnetic force is 1039 stronger than the gravitational force between two electrons. (Frank Wilczek states that it is the small mass of elementary particles that puzzles, not the weakness of gravity.) The relation of gravity to electromagnetism as it currently exists is thus: the numbers of electrons must equal the numbers of protons to better than one part in 1038, since gravity is 1039 times weaker than electromagnetism. Otherwise, electromagnetism will dominate gravity, and stars, galaxies and planets cannot form. Collins cites arguments (for example, by Martin Rees) that if gravity were a billion times stronger than it is, no planet could support a significant ecosystem. much less a civilization. Given "...the total range of strengths of the forces in nature (which span a range of 1040 as we saw above), this still amounts to a one-sided fine-tuning of one part in 1031".

Masses of fundamental particles
The ratio of electron to proton mass also determines the characteristics of the orbits of electrons about nuclei. A proton is approximately 1836 times as massive as an electron. If this mass ratio were different, atoms and molecules would be significantly different. According to Bradley, Stephen Hawking has argued that the neutron mass minus the proton mass must be roughly twice the mass of the electron, in order to ensure the approximate stability of both particles. Collins attributes a similar argument to Barrow and Tipler (1986), although he disputes its relevance to the formation of life on the grounds that pairs of neutrons could decay into deuterons.

If the ratio of neutrons and proton mass were slightly different, deuterium would not exist, and the relative abundance of hydrogen and helium would be different.

Large scale properties of the universe
Only hydrogen, deuterium, helium, and lithium were formed during the Big Bang. All heavier elements, especially the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and phosphorus essential to life on earth, were formed and dispersed billions of years later in supernovae. Supernovae are the source of nearly all of the matter from which rocky planets are made. Supernovae are relatively rare events; in the Milky Way, only a handful have been recorded over the past 1000 years. Hence a universe must be capable of lasting for many billions of years in order for life to emerge in it.

Bradley and Collins report arguments that the cosmological constant must be fine-tuned to within one part in 1050 for the Universe not to undergo an early runaway expansion phase that would preclude the formations of stars and galaxies.

The universe contains about one billion photons for every baryon. This makes the universe extremely entropic, i.e. a very efficient radiator and a very poor engine. The entropy of the universe affects the condensation of massive systems. If the entropy level for the universe were slightly larger, no galaxies would form (and hence no stars). If the entropy were slightly smaller, the galactic systems that formed would effectively trap radiation and prevent any fragmentation of the systems into stars. In either case, the universe would be devoid of stars and star systems.

POV slant.
Hrafn, we have two equally fantastic and equally unprovable explanations about the beginning of things. Probably most religious traditions would say that their God is transcendent, and therefore is in principle unmeasurable, but it is a POV to say they would all say that. There are some goofy sects, like Scientology, that believes they have some measuring device that detects a supernatural property. I think we both agree on the veracity of that, but the point is, it clearly reflects a POV that the supernatural is, by definition, transcendent. Maybe some people believe that their deity appears and some electric field fluctuates, I don't know. All I'm saying is that to, always qualify every position of one side with the last word from the other side that imply's that "in principle" that opposing side does something better than the first when there is no evidence of it, and both positions are about big things that we (as a species, not just us WP editors) know nothing hard (that we can detect or measure) about, is POV. It's POV. Just let both sides (naturalistic vs. religious) speculate what they speculate, allow for a response from the other side, and then let it be. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 23:50, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
 * ScienceApologist, I think that your edit is correct: Such a supernatural entity is, however, very different than the supernatural entities posited by religious groups who describe deities which act outside the confines of nature. I do think it is unnecessary regarding the content of that section.  I dunno which group, let's say Pantheists or similar, might very well believe in a deity or deities of sorts that does not act outside the confines of nature.  Certainly, say Jewish, Christian, or Muslim believers, that believe in the literal accuracy of their scripture, believe in a deity that has acted outside of the confines of nature.  But there are also those that adhere, in some sense, to one of these Abrahamic faiths (or some other, I don't know, Hindus) that do not accept the literal inerrancy (I think that's the word they use) of their bible (they might look at it more mythologically with deeper lessons in it, I don't know).  Having to drill into the differences of these religious traditions should not be needed here.
 * Certainly there are those who think it is more reasonable to believe that a diety created or set up or fine tuned the universe than if the universe did so all by itself. The POV of these people should not control the article (get the last word on everything the naturalists or "materialists" would say on any point), but neither should the other side always have the last word to evaluate or qualify what the theistic evolutionists (or similar line of thinking) like Polkinghorne or similar would say about it.  I do not understand the need for the naturalist or materialist (whatever they call it) POV to always be represented as the preferred POV.  Should this article be so colored of a particular POV (it's one thing to say that natural science and the Discovery Institute have such differing views about the origin of things that they cannot be compatible, it's another to say that natural science and scientists who are also believers of some religion have views that are incompatible) as the Intelligent design article?  This one should be cleaner of POV than the ID article which consistently invites criticism over an extended period of time.
 * Or does someone say that the same POV that permeates the ID article also permeate this article? 207.190.198.130 (talk) 01:35, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Scientology is in a special case, as it is a pseudoscience that later became a religion. As such, it would tend to have properties of both. To the extent that it makes pseudoscientific claims (e.g. about the detectability of 'thetans') it should not be given WP:UNDUE weight. There is a wide body of literature to the effect that supernatural entities are in principle beyond the realms of scientific analysis. Can you point to any similar body of literature arguing that parallel worlds, should they exist, would similarly be in principle beyond analysis. HrafnTalkStalk 03:49, 13 January 2008 (UTC)
 * "Parallel worlds", "Parallel universes", and such are not the observable universe nor in it (if they exist at all), there is no physics literature that says they are, and if they are not in the observable universe, they are in principle, unobservable and no more science than if there is a "science of God" or similar. The objection stands, the article is portraying the quasi-religious claims of things that human beings will never detect as potential science, when there is no reason to grant it such scientific legitimacy. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 02:27, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually there are all kinds of proposals for observational tests of parallel universes, and all kinds of theories that are not that much beyond the current M-brane theory in physics. There are even astrophysical observations of cold spots and other inhomogeneities in the background radiation that some have hypothesized are evidence of parallel universes. And if you are dealing in a topic that is scientific, according to the rules of WP:NPOV the mainstream scientific view is the dominant one. And if that is materialistic or naturalistic, well that is too bad. If you want different rules for your articles, there are hundreds of other wikis which do not have NPOV. You are welcome to go there.--Filll (talk) 02:43, 25 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Is there a single experiment that verifies or falsifies brane theory? Is there even one that is proposed?  Or conceived?  Not from what I read (Smolin, etc.).  You, Filll, attack ID as mere hypothesis and not scientific (and you are correct to do so).  But you don't apply the same standard of "scientificness" to these hypotheses.  This article is slanted because it portrays one POV as unscientific (and it is unscientific, religious cosmology is not science) yet it portrays another, equally fantastic, equally unverifiable, equally unfalsifiable POV as, "in principle", scientific.  And it shows it as the preferred POV, always granting it the last word in its evaluation of the other POV.  That is not NPOV. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 18:46, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

I am not wild about M-Brane theory. But at least it does not rely on magic. However, there are substantial theoretical reasons why it is favored, but I personally think one needs more than clever mathematics to bolster this theory. Science is what scientists define it to be, and scientists define naturalism and materialism or whatever you call it to be a defining characteristic of science, and have done so for many centuries now. We go with what reliable sources and the mainstream state here, and if you do not like that, there are other venues for you to vent in. However, we have rules on Wikipedia and you can either choose to follow those rules, or go somewhere else. And by the way you clearly do not understand what science is or NPOV. So not much in this rambling rabid post to take seriously. Sorry.--Filll (talk) 19:53, 25 January 2008 (UTC)

Not Impressed
Firstly apologies for the tone of this comment but I feel there are serious flaws in this article that need to be addressed. As a neutral observer who has just waded through Martin Rees 'Just Six Numbers' and Paul Davies 'The Goldilocks Enigma' I have to say this is a very poor article indeed for what is a potentially fascinating subject. The POV is very much slanted towards a naturalistic interpretation, it should be more balanced. Very few examples of fine tuning are actually given, which in an article about fine tuning is a bizarre oversight. Lots of quotes from Stenger are included which in the context of the overall fine tuning discussion are complete non sequesters and the results of his woefully simplistic 'Monkey God' program are swallowed uncritically. Despite being a respectable scientific topic, it has also been lumped in with the pseudo-science of intelligent design when in fact it is more closely related to theistic evolution. I would go so far as to suggest deleting this entire article and starting again taking the neutral/agnostic stance of Rees and Davies as a starting point. Not to go on a rant about this, but I feel very passionately about wikipedia as a project and I think it can be much better than this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.205.116.242 (talk) 11:32, 13 February 2008 (UTC)
 * Everything that 217 has said, I agree with. What is happening to this article is similar to what has happened to the Intelligent design article, but not as bad and somewhat later in time. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 18:56, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

One suggestion I have, having looked over it again is that we include all Stenger's stuff under an 'alternative biochemistry' section in the naturalistic explanations section. As Stenger himself says in his paper:

''I do not dispute that life as we know it would not exist if any one of several of the constants of physics were just slightly different. Additionally, I cannot prove that some other form of life is feasible with a different set of constants. But anyone who insists that our form of life is the only one conceivable is making a claim based on no evidence and no theory.''

The way the whole things reads at the moment, it sounds like there is no fine tuning whatsoever. Actually the mainstream scientific view is that the universe appears to be "fine-tuned" for our particular carbon based system of life. That can be established in the beginning of the article. Stenger's point, which is a good contribution, is that we are suffering from a failure of imagination in suggesting that life cannot be produced based on another substance. This would fit in nicely with the existing alternative biochemistry article as it has some interesting discussion on whether other elements such as silicon are suitable. His alternate universe model is based on the premise that other forms of life can appear from other elements and this should be made clear. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.205.116.242 (talk • contribs)


 * Ok here is a novel idea. Why not do a careful literature survey and write a new version of this article in a sandbox, then invite others to take a look at it? I notice this article only has 17 footnotes, including cited references. It should have at least 100 or more. I also have looked at Rees' book in the library; it is an awful piece of poorly written trash. The history of these ideas go back decades, but this article does not explore the history of these ideas very much. Instead of just complaining, why not help out here? Writing these articles is a lot of work, and if you are interested, you can help.--Filll (talk) 16:55, 14 February 2008 (UTC)


 * FTU is such a silly topic: it couldn't possibly be that the reverse of FTU is true. (No I am not implying design.)  But, then I despise any anthropic principle.  In any case, what Filll said.  &#0149;Jim 62 sch&#0149; dissera! 00:46, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

Anthropic principle
I've removed again the POV in the section Counter arguments to naturalistic explanations. Note that in the section Counter argument to religious views, there aren't the counter-counter arguments, yet, when the corresponding section (countering naturalistic explanations) was put in, immediately counter-counter arguments went in there always leaving the last word to the naturalists. Hrafn will revert it no doubt (in his effort to do to FTU what they did to ID), but the edit was made again for the record. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 23:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, I'm reverting it -- the argument you present in the Edit Summary "The AP does not speak to the "lucky" issue without multiple universes, which was assumed as fact as a premise" is fallacious. Multiple universes are not necessary. In any universe (whether a solitary universe or one of many, either in parallel or serially) where there exists sentient life to argue "how lucky" we are that the universe supports life there is a 100% chance that this universe will in fact support life -- if it didn't then there'd be nobody to argue. HrafnTalkStalk 04:39, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * You say that it's fallacious, but just because you say that it is, does not mean it is so. It is only your opinion which can be compared to someone who flips an honest coin 50 times and it comes up heads each time, and then says, we'll since the fact is that the coin came up 50 heads in a row, and we human observers have observed that event, a posteriori, that must mean that there is no reason to consider it remarkable or "lucky".  Now with multiple universes (and a large or infinite number of them), that fact and the AP can be combined to make a coherent explanation for why it's not remarkable, because any particular universe (with any particular set of parameters) is bound to happen if there are an infinite number and some variation with them.  But if there is only one universe, the AP says nothing as to why those parameters come out as they do.  As John Baez has pointed out "nobody knows why" they take the values that they do.
 * The original application of the AP is about the Dicke coincidences which was about the question "why is the universe about 1010 years old instead of 1013 or 107 years old?" And the AP (combined with some other astrophysics regarding main sequence stars, super novae, and cooking up elements heavier than iron) was a good answer because it would only be during the period of time that was not too early (not enough elemental diversity) and not too late (nearly all the stars have burned out), but "just right" - the "Goldilocks" condition.  But, at some time the universe was 107 years old and some day in the future, it's hopeful  that the universe will be 1013 years old (and in those other periods, it's less likely that there were or will be observers around to ask why the universe is as old).  So the universe was (or will be) able to have all of these different "trial ages" and the ages that have conditions to support life are just as certain to occur as ages when life is less likely.  In that way, the AP suffices.
 * But unless reality is able to "test out" all sorts of permutations of fundamental constants (to see which ones support the existance of observers and which ones do not) and only this particular permutation is the only permutation that exists, and if this permutation or something very close to what is necessary, just so that matter can form, then the question remains, "how is it that this necessary permutation of values of fundamental constants occurred that enabled us to be around to notice?" The (far) more likely alternative is one where we would not be around to notice, and only with a reality that allows for all of these different trials can the AP be used to explain it.  To use the AP to explain away the "lucky" does require multiple universes (and a lot of them).  This has been discussed in books of John Barrow (The Constants of Nature), Martin Rees, Paul Davies, John Polkinghorne and others.  Some of them even explicitly debated this at a conference.
 * When you say "Multiple universes are not necessary", that is only your opinion (and that of people who share your world view), but it is not the only viable opinion. For you to insist that it is the Wikipedia position is polemic and dishonest.  So when you have an argument with someone who disagrees with you, all you have to do is point to the Wikipedia article to support your POV.  How convenient. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 23:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)


 * P(Life|People around to argue about how improbable it is that life came into existence)=1 (i.e. 100%) This is an statistical fact, an unavoidable consequence of the laws of conditional probability, quite independent of the number of universes. HrafnTalkStalk 04:18, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * What a weak and stupid argument. The probability of having rolled snake eyes after you rolled the dice and see that it's the value that came up is two, that probability is 1.  Does that mean, with an honest pair of dice that the probability of rolling snake eyes is 1?  If I draw an ace of spades from a deck of cards and say, after the fact, that the probability of me having just drawn an Ace of Spades is 1, does that say anything?  But if "winning the game" required you to roll snake eyes or draw the Ace of Spades and such was rolled or drawn, you are saying that after the fact you would not have any sense of being lucky?  BTW, in my course of work and my training, I probably know a helluva lot more than you do about probability, random variables, and stochastic processes, even if you might be a physicist.
 * The point remains is that you are still insisting that your interpretation and evaluation of someone else's argument remain in the article. I'm only saying that, in the section entitled Counter arguments to naturalistic explanations that those counter arguments are not immediately discounted by counter-counter arguments (from the other side).  No where in  the section Counter argument to religious views is this done, nor would you allow it (nor should you).
 * You're just a polemic (or is the word "polemicist"?) that insists that the Wikipedia POV be your POV. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 17:51, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Your analogy is a false one in that in the AP case there would only be an observer if the dice rolled 'snake eyes'. Thus a universe cannot be observed that does not support life, therefore the probability of it supporting life must, by definition, be unity (as something that can never be observed must have a probability of zero). Given that it has only been speculated that a hypothetical universe with different physical laws from our own might have come into existence instead of our current one, and we have no way of knowing whether, and under what circumstances, it might have supported life, any further statistical speculation is meaningless. All that we know is that this universe supports life (sample size equal to one), and that if it didn't then we wouldn't be here to argue why (posterior distribution equal to one). Statistically that means that we know very little. And who said I was a physicist? HrafnTalkStalk 18:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I dunno. I didn't.  I said "even if you might be a physicist".  There are two qualifications in that which you seem to conveniently ignore.  If you're not a physicist, that speaks even more to your non-mastery of the subject and casts even more suspicion on your objectivity when insisting on your un-cited POV being injected into the article. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 21:15, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, the point made in the disputed paragraph is directly analogous to the argument attributed to Robert Dicke in Anthropic principle --though the latter words it far more elegantly. HrafnTalkStalk 18:20, 16 April 2008 (UTC)


 * No, it is not. That is untrue, and like the "who said I was a physicist?", you set up a strawman to knock down claiming it was the point that I made you are knocking down.  I said that the Dicke coincidences .. was about the question "why is the universe about 1010 years old instead of 1013 or 107 years old?"  I exagerated the factor of 10 deviation to one of 1000, because it stated the question more starkly (and is safer, forensically).  Dicke's position actually makes a stronger claim (it says more, and might be considered "less safe") than the point I was making.  Here's what your citation says:


 * Robert Dicke noted that the age of the universe as seen by living observers is not random, but is constrained by biological factors that require it to be roughly a "golden age". Ten times younger, and there would not have been time for sufficient interstellar levels of carbon to build up by nucleosynthesis; but ten times older, and the golden age of main sequence stars and stable planetary systems would have already come to an end. This explained away a rough coincidence between large dimensionless numbers constructed from the constants of physics and the age of the universe, which had inspired Dirac's varying-G theory.


 * This is about Dicke's observation (leading to the first formulation of the AP).


 * Later, Dicke reasoned that the density of matter in the universe must be almost exactly the critical density needed to stop the universe from recollapsing (the "Dicke coincidences" argument, see article on Robert Dicke). It seems he was wrong...


 * Hmmmmm...


 * However, if the cosmological constant was more than about 10 times the observed value, the universe would suffer catastrophic inflation, preventing the formation of stars, and, presumably, life.


 * The observed values of the dimensionless parameters (such as the fine-structure constant) that govern the four forces of nature are finely balanced. A slight increase in the strong nuclear force would bind the dineutron and the diproton and all the hydrogen in the early universe would have been converted to helium. There would be no water or the long-lived stable stars that are essential for the development of life. Similar relationships are evident in each of the four force strengths. If they are modified sufficiently the universe's structure and capacity for life is greatly affected. A list of cosmological, chemical and physical "anthropic coincidences" is given by Hugh Ross .


 * ''One of the best known examples of anthropic reasoning used in the prediction of cosmological phenomena was by Fred Hoyle. He calculated and then reasoned that there must be an excited state at an energy of 7.6 million electron volts in the nucleus of carbon-12 since he, Fred Hoyle, a life form based upon carbon molecules, existed, then the resonance must also exist to create the carbon.


 * This is not about Dicke or the observations he made that eventually led to the first expression of the AP.


 * From Dicke's article (emphasis mine):


 * Dirac had noted that the Gravitational constant, G is very roughly equal to the inverse age of the universe (in certain 'natural' units), and had concluded that G must vary to maintain this equality. Dicke realized that Dirac's relation could be a selection effect: fundamental physical laws connect G to the lifetime of what are called main sequence stars, such as our Sun, and these stars, according to Dicke, are necessary for the existence of life. At any other epoch, when the equality did not hold, there would be no intelligent life around to notice the discrepancy. This was the first modern application of what is now called the weak anthropic principle.


 * This is about the age of the universe and why it is, for us human beings, about as old as it is. Dirac made the connection of G to the age of the universe, not Dicke.  But Dicke did make a connection of the age of the universe to the fact that biological life forms that have the ability to ponder about the age of the universe were doing such pondering.


 * That supports completely what I was trying to tell you from the start and you keep twisting it. The AP, by itself, speaks to the reason why the universe is around 10 billion years old rather than 100 million or a trillion years old.  It makes perfect sense.  There is no "lucky" because the period of time we live in now has every right to exist, every likelihood to exist, as nearly any other epoch before either the big crunch (which probably won't happen) or the heat death of the universe (and I don't think that the latter will stop time).  So the AP says simply that of course it's about 10 billion years old because if it was much different, we wouldn't be here to ask such a question.  Fine.
 * But that says nothing (and neither does Dicke, at least successfully) about why these dimensionless universal parameters (not the fact that they are that value, we see that they are that value because we measured them) are what they are. My point with the dice and the deck of cards still stands unanswered by you, unless there are (or "were", or "will be", but each universe will have their own "time" so those words should be used metaphorically) many, many other universes (anthropic landscape) that have served as other statistical trials.  In that case, the fact that at least one of those universes happened to stumble upon just the right values of these parameters, and only in such universes will there ever be beings around to ask "why".  That is "directly analogous to the argument attributed to Robert Dicke in Anthropic principle".
 * But if there is only one universe, you don't have that, and you have no support to say that the AP wipes the question as to why this one universe is "lucky" enough to get the parameters just right. You injected into the article what you think is true, what you would like for to be true, but what is simply unsupported from external sources.  And you put it in a place that deliberately colors the article as discounting the position of one side of the debate and that is contrary to Wikipedia policy.  It is not consensus and it never was. 207.190.198.130 (talk) 21:15, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Otherwise, all that we can say with certainty about the universe is that it's age, parameters, etc are close to 'ideal' for our form of life -- which is hardly surprising given that it is our form of life doing the observing. At this point the argument devolves into an argument from ignorance (we don't know of life that favours different universe setups -- hardly surprising given that they're therefore unlikely to be observed in our universe, so implicitly assume that they're impossible).
 * 1) Can you demonstrate that different "dimensionless universal parameters" are possible?
 * 2) Can you demonstrate that different parameters render any form of life, at any point in the universe's history, to be impossible?

And could you please stop personalising this. I did not write the original wording (and in fact consider it to have been rather poorly worded). I merely restored it when deleted as being sourced and relevant. HrafnTalkStalk 05:58, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

Other section headers
Now, the section headers are Naturalistic Possibilities and Religious Opinions. I suggest the following new sections and subsections. There is no reason to split one supernatural explanation (undetectable aliens from another dimension who create our universe in 'their basement') from another (an unnamed designer designed the universe) into 'naturalistic' and 'religious'. So a splitting into 'came into existence without intelligence' and 'with intelligence' is better.

6. Materialistic Possibilities

6.1 Multiverse

6.1.1 Cosmological natural selection

6.1.2 Ekpyrotic universe

6.1.3 Bubble universe theory

7. Design

7.1. Intelligent design, also including Gonzales' work, which is missing

7.2. Alien design

8. Religious possibilities


 * "Intelligent design" is a "religious possibility". ID is Creationism (specifically Neo-Creationism), and its religious roots and underpinnings are well documented. Further, if we have already separated out "alien design", then that clearly only leaves supernatural design as an alternative. I therefore don't see any purpose in the restructuring, whose only purpose would seem to be to obfuscate ID's religious nature. HrafnTalkStalk 06:20, 20 April 2008 (UTC)


 * how does an 'alien design' fit into 'naturalistic possibility' and 'intelligent design' not? What do we (or the 'sources' of this article) know about those aliens? How do we know if they are 'natural' or not? How do we define 'natural'? So a more logical differentiation would be 'unwilled' or 'undesigned', i.e. materialistic on one hand and 'designed' on the other. Don't let other issues blind editors here. This article stands by itself and should be consistent. Northfox (talk) 14:05, 20 April 2008 (UTC)


 * Get a clue Northfox. Are you seriously suggesting that Klingons (for example) would be considered to be supernatural? Or that a golf club can't be both "materialistic" and "designed"? Your "differentiation" lacks both logic and consistency. ID is religion, and has no hope of escaping from that category. HrafnTalkStalk 14:18, 20 April 2008 (UTC)


 * How one would describe an alien species that created our universe (and thus all observable nature) and is by definition out side of this universe? Natural? I have no source for that right now, but I read somewhere that a realiable source said that if those aliens would interact with us they would look quite supernatural to us. And they would be supernatural in the real sense of the word.
 * I stand by my proposal to rename and reorder the section.
 * Of course a golf club is both materialistic and designed, but the material in the golf club did not assemble itself by natural means. Someone designed it and did work to make it.
 * Thus I asked 'what is 'natural'?'
 * Before we do serious a classification here, we should look into the sources and find out how they classify their hypotheses. Please only serious responses here. Ridiculing and straw man burning doesn't help to improve the article.Northfox (talk) 02:22, 21 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I would describe them as "extremely powerful/technologically advanced" aliens. Any scenario that allows for multiple universes, by its very nature allows for the possibility of things "outside our universe" without them having to be supernatural. Likewise if their universe is able to interact with ours (to create it), it is perfectly conceivable that we would (at least theoretically) be able to interact with, and thus observe, theirs. Regardless, this whole line of reasoning is complete WP:OR, on top of its questionable logic, and thus no basis for restructuring the article. HrafnTalkStalk 04:14, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

Problematic paragraph in section 3
I would like to say that I think the Wikipedia user who added the material I'm complaining about is not at fault, as I think that person is simply conveying the true nature of what goes on in science, and the way ideas are expressed there. That is a valuable contribution. There does seem to me to be a lack of clarity in scientific circles about these issues. If I'm wrong, can someone please straighten me out?

In section 3, "Meaning of "universe", the first paragraph states:

"Both popular and professional research articles in cosmology often use the term "universe" to refer to the observable universe. The reason for this usage is that only observable phenomena are scientifically relevant. Since unobservable phenomena have no perceptible effects, physicists argue that they "causally do not exist". Since unobservable parts of the universe cannot be measured, hypotheses about them are not testable, and thus inappropriate for a scientific theory."

It contains a number of problematic statements:

1. "... only observable phenomena are scientifically relevant." The "Big Bang" is not an observable phenomenon, yet surely it is scientifically relevant. Many phenomena in nature are not observable, but are only known by their effects. No one has ever seen a subatomic particle, they are known only by their effects. (In fact, no one has ever directly observed ANYTHING, as we depend upon our sensory apparatus to detect what exists and happens in the physical universe, and upon the brain to then construct a symbolic representation of each thing. Such detection and symbolic representation is a complex, indirect process, with many steps between a human being's physical interaction with a physical phenomenon and our eventual awareness of it. In the same vein, no one has ever "seen" a physical object, other than a photon, as vision depends upon the detection of light reflected off of physical objects, the process amounting to what is basically a natural laboratory experiment. When we use the sense of touch, we do not feel objects themselves, but we only interact with their electric fields. All human perception is in fact the interpretation of the effects of phenomena which cannot be observed. Which brings up the next problematical statement:

2."Since unobservable phenomena have no perceptible effects, physicists argue that they "causally do not exist". " There are in fact no "observable" phenomena - the only way we know ANY phenomenon is by its effects: upon the nervous system, upon artificial measuring instruments, upon the behavior of other things in the universe. What is the meaning of the quoted sentence? Its obvious meaning seems to imply that physicists are arguing a point that is clearly wrong. If it is meant to have a different meaning than the obvious one, it needs to be changed. Does it mean "phenomena which do not affect the physical universe do not, in a scientific sense, causally exist"? That is perhaps a sensible idea, but it is different from the idea being expressed, and it does not support the argument of the first paragraph of Section 3, that unobservable aspects of the universe are not the "universe" proper in a scientific sense, and therefore are outside the realm of scientific inquiry. In contrast to the false, original phrase: "unobservable phenomena have no perceptible effects", a required rewording, such as "only phenomena with perceptible effects are either detectable, testable, or mathematically predictable, and therefore scientifically relevant", then the understood - but unstated - thesis of the first paragraph of Section 3, namely, that the proposed existence of the "fine-tuner" of a "Fine-tuned Universe" is outside the realm of scientific inquiry, seems to collapse, since the existence of a "Fine-tuned Universe" (i.e. a universe with physical laws within the narrow range which allow the physical structure of the universe, as we know it, to exist, and by extension, which allow life, as we know it, to exist) is indeed a detectable effect, so from a scientific point of view, its cause, whatever or whomever that cause might be, must therefore "causally exist", and therefore must be a legitimate field of scientific inquiry. The impossibility, however, in the present day, of human scientists setting up physical "experimental universes" to investigate and differentiate the causes of a "fine-tuned" versus an "out-of-tune" universe would seem to limit how much scientific progress can be made along this avenue of inquiry, at least in the experimental realm, but many areas of physics currently suffer from the limitation imposed by the fact that theory has outpaced the ability to perform experiments. That issue, however, is different and separate from the one being addressed in the paragraph. Natushabi (talk) 15:03, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

A distinction needs to be made between an intentionally "Fine-tuned Universe" and one that is fine-tuned without intention - it's at least a 3 part question:

1. What is "fine-tuning"?

2. Is the universe fine-tuned? (This part has subparts, such as the current 'Meaning of "universe".)

3. Did someone fine-tune it?

Natushabi (talk) 15:27, 1 June 2008 (UTC)

Why is it assumed that universes with different physical properties are/were possible?
In everything from theistic fine-tuned universe arguments, to the naturalistic possibilities of multi-, alien-directed, and buble verses listed on this article, it is assumed that it is possible that there either is, was, or could have been universes with different physical properties. Surely there should be a counter argument somewhere pointing out this asumption? If it were not possible for the physical constants to be anything else than what they are, then claiming fine tuning would be like claiming fine tuning for one plus one equaling two. If there is such an argument that anyone knows of and can refrence, couldya whack it up on the article please? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.240.162.169 (talk) 12:58, 27 June 2008 (UTC)


 * The physical constants referred to here are precisely those constants that science has discovered to exist, but do not know why they are the value that they are. When science finds evidence that explains a constant, than it is no longer one of these constants being referred to. So, people who believe in a God of the Gaps, claim the cause is God. It is merely an extension of when no one knew what caused lightening, people claimed lightning was caused by the gods. Same thing. Different century. WAS 4.250 (talk) 10:10, 4 August 2008 (UTC)