New Miscellany: more on fine-tuning (General)

by dhw, Saturday, February 22, 2025, 08:29 (12 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: The discussion has nothing to do with origin of life. […]

dhw: This is the daftest of all your arguments. How can you possibly say that everywhere in the universe is fine-tuned for life if our planet is the only place we know that has produced life?

DAVID: Because the 20+ necessary factors make this universe exist! That is the level of this discussion, not the appearance of life. Your view is absolutely wrong.

“The universe is fine-tuned for life” has nothing to do with the appearance of life in the universe? Are you joking? Once more: How do you know the whole universe is fine-tuned for life if the only life we know of is our own?

DAVID: It is the makeup of this universe that allows life to appear. That is the primary concept you miss.
And:
DAVID: The real history of fine-tuning: Life is here and physicists have worked backward to define the requirements. Amazingly they are precisely fine-tuned!

They have defined the requirements for life, and amazingly the requirements are what is required for life, and this has nothing to do with the origin of life! Yes, life is here, and so all the fine-tuning necessary for life has occurred here. Yes, the universe is as it is, and it has “allowed” life to happen. Otherwise, it could not have happened! But you tell us that “fine tuning for life is everywhere in the universe. Life can then appear in any spot that evolves life hospitality as it did on Earth.” Your theoretical “can” doesn’t mean that it does, and “any spot” will still only be a minuscule fragment of the universe – not the entire universe. Yes, we know some of the material requirements for life, but that does not mean life can “pop up” just because conditions are suitable. How inanimate matter can be “fine-tuned” to become animate remains a mystery. That’s what we mean by the “origin of life”. It is the ultimate piece of fine-tuning, and the only fine-tuned “spot” we know of in the entire universe is Planet Earth. Your next item illustrates your own illogicality:

Biological complexity

QUOTE: We hope that one day we will be able to unlock the secret of how nature produces all the oxygen molecules that surround us and that we breathe every day," says Ablyasova."

DAVID: it took highly sophisticated lab work to do it. How do natural mutations achieve such a complex enzyme? Not by chance.

dhw: So it's all part of the "fine-tuning", and you think the whole universe combines all of these highly sophisticated factors, and life can pop up [= originate] anywhere. Once more: you can only know that a place is fine-tuned for life if it harbours or has harboured life! What other proof can you possibly have?

Bird brains

DAVID: Cells are not intelligent enough to design a new type of organism.

dhw: Yes, I know you prefer your theory of ad hoc divine dabbles or the first cells being provided with 3.8000,000,000 years’ worth of instructions.

DAVID: And you have your brilliant cell committees.

dhw: So your God provided the first cells with programmes for every species, every strategy, every response to every new threat/opportunity, to be passed on through billions of years even into our present and future. I get it. I just don’t believe it.

DAVID: Immunity proves it. One system makes antibodies for everything!

One “system” (the brain) invents rockets, writes symphonies, fights diseases, discusses the mysteries of life. It can do what it does because it has its own autonomous intelligence. Its thoughts are not programmed. The “system” is the mechanism which acts or reacts to create something new. The intelligent cell processes new information, communicates with other cells, and takes decisions in order to make new antibodies in response to new invaders. I propose that this is a more likely “system” than a 3.8-billion-year-old programme for every future situation. No need to repeat the LUCA section, since the same argument applies.