New Miscellany: more on fine-tuning (General)

by dhw, Sunday, February 23, 2025, 13:40 (11 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: […] 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.

dhw: “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: Don't you read what I say. The composition of this universe is fine-tuned because the 20+ factors that define this universe and create this universe as it is.

Unfortunately for you, I do read what you say, and you say three separate things which, true to form, are self-contradictory.

1) The universe is as it is because of certain factors, and if the universe did not exist as it is, life would not be possible. There is no disagreement. But fine tuning for life must include whatever factors change inanimate matter into living matter!

2)“The entire universe is fine-tuned for life to appear.” Contrast that with: “Life can pop up anywhere with a hospitable climate.” We know for a fact that even large parts of our own galaxy do not have a hospitable climate, and so you are quite rightly limiting the possibility to particular spots in the universe that are “fine-tuned for life to appear”, as opposed to the entire universe. And even if a spot did have a hospitable climate, that still wouldn’t mean life existed there, because a hospitable climate is not the only factor that determines whether inanimate matter becomes animate. We can only say a place is/was fine-tuned for life if we know there is/was life in that place!

3) You have spent years and written books pointing out the uniqueness of our planet, and you insist that your God’s only purpose for creating the universe was to design us and our food. How does this equate with life “popping up” wherever there is a hospitable climate?

See square brackets for my answers to your next statement:

DAVID: We do not know how life decides to appear. [I didn't know life was a conscious decision-maker. I thought you thought it was your God who took the decision to do the fine-tuning.] We do not know how life originates. [Correct] We know this universe is hospitable for life. [So far we only know that one part of it is hospitable for life.] And we know that it is possible for life to appear anywhere within the universe. [That is our assumption: anywhere, but certainly not everywhere.] We search for aliens! [And only if we find them can we say their particular spot in the universe is fine-tuned for life.]

dhw: 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.

DAVID: Nonsense! Origin of life is a separate package which can only appear in a specific fine-tuned universe waiting for it.

Back to 2). You say “the entire universe is fine-tuned for life to appear.” But life can only appear where the climate is "hospitable for life". Are conditions throughout the entire universe hospitable for life? Please answer.

Bird brains

QUOTES: “The genetic tools they use to establish their cellular identity vary from species to species, each exhibiting new and unique cell types.”
“Birds have developed sophisticated neural circuits through their own mechanisms, without following the same path as mammals.”

You explained this as being due to a 3.8-billion-year-old programme of instructions; we both reject Darwin’s random mutations, and I prefer Sheldrake’s theory of cellular intelligence. You then repeated your mantra:

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

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!
And:
DAVID: One simple immune system makes antibodies for every enemy. Take a piece of the invader, add a killer portion to it and an antibody appears.

You have managed to change the subject from bird brains (see above) to the immune system, and you have dodged the fact that your theory also embraces every species, strategy, lifestyle, response to new threats/opportunities etc. I have challenged even this example, since intelligent communication between cells is still essential, and clearly your all-knowing God’s automatic system sometimes breaks down when new threats proceed to kill millions of people – e,g, ‘flu, malaria, AIDS, Covid – which means viruses can outsmart your God instead of outsmarting our cells. But your example is a mere dot in the vast collection of instructions your God apparently implanted in those first cells. If you want simplicity, Shapiro’s theory wins by a vast distance!