Cosmologic philosophy: fine tuning, no fine tuner (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, January 18, 2017, 00:05 (2867 days ago) @ David Turell

The philosopher's reasoning is opposite that of John Leslie, who concluded fine tuning requires a God and/or a multiverse:

http://nautil.us/blog/the-cosmos-fine_tuning-does-not-imply-a-fine_tuner

"This new fine-tuning design argument claims the imprimatur of physics, and is presented in quantitatively precise terms: among the set of all possible universes, the percentage that could sustain life is so small that the human mind cannot imagine it. By all rights, our universe shouldn’t have existed. What wonder that our universe has given birth to life, especially intelligent life. It seems the only explanation for this wildly improbable outcome is the supposition that there is a Designer.
But could it really be that physics points to God’s existence?

"Let me put my cards on the table. I believe that our universe is the creation of an omnipotent being.

***

" There’s a deep problem lurking in the background of the fine-tuning argument, which rests on two factual claims. One is that a life-conducive universe exists. And the second is that this kind of universe is improbable.* It’s the second fact that is responsible for the resurrection of the design argument, and fine-tuning advocates are so focused on using it as a premise that they’ve failed to see that it needs explanation. That is, why is it the case that it’s unlikely for an arbitrary universe to be conducive to life? It’s not plausible to write it off as a brute necessity, because it’s not obvious that this had to be the case, nor could it have been discovered by pure reason alone. The reason to believe the second fact is because it is a prediction of our best physical theory.

"But even if we do find the much-needed explanation, it will be disastrous for the fine-tuning argument, because it would disconfirm God’s existence. After all, a benevolent God would want to create the physical laws so that life-conducive universes would be overwhelmingly likely. (Comment: A poor argument from religious belief. He may not be benevolent, and He may continuously guide the process until He has his desired result. His argument sounds like Deism: God stated the process and then let it continue on its own.)

"I myself don’t think that the extreme improbability of the existence of life disproves the existence of God. But that’s because I don’t think we understand God well enough to make firm predictions one way or the other about what kind of universe God would create. The problem I’ve raised is only an issue for theists who think that they do understand God to a sufficient degree.

"One could go too far with this sort of skepticism. Surely the so-called fine-tuning evidence is proof of something. But the fact that our current cosmological theory can’t explain it tells us that we have more work to do. When our best science predicts a lifeless universe, and this fails to obtain, what should we do? We could say, “a miracle has occurred!” But that would be intellectually lazy. We need a theory that will make accurate predictions and integrate with other successful physical theories. The fine-tuning argument falls short because it assumes that our current cosmological theory is correct, as long as we invoke a non-scientific principle, God. I advocate a more radical and scientific reading of the fine-tuning data. It’s not a brute fact or a true premise in a theological argument. Rather it’s evidence that we need a new and revolutionary cosmological theory."

Comment: He is twisting his own religiosity into an untenable position. We need a different physics theory of cosmology to make the existence of God more reasonable. Fine tuning is enough reason.