New Miscellany: fine-tuning, climate, theodicy (General)

by David Turell , Saturday, March 01, 2025, 20:28 (4 days ago) @ dhw

Fine tuning

DAVID: It is a stepwise issue. First the universe must be constructed in a special way to allow life to appear. The universe it totally fine-tuned for life in that sense. Now, secondly, you wish to add climate friendly to life. I 'can't disagree.

dhw: I would guess that when you were a schoolboy, you were top of the class at science and bottom of the class at English Language. In all creative processes, you create the basis first, and last of all comes the fine-tuning or finishing touches. In no sense is the universe totally fine-tuned for life. How do we know? Because so far only one part of the universe is known to harbour life! I do not “wish to add” anything. Our climate is part of the fine-tuning that makes life possible on Earth.

You were last in science it seems. The construction of the universe allows the Earth to harbor life. If the universe were only very slightly different the Earth could not have life.' The difference is emphasis.

Theoretical origin of life: finding phosphates

QUOTE: "To him, the combination of volcanic activity and soda lakes is “pretty close to a geological solution” to the phosphorus problem. Pasek thinks hydrothermal pools probably played a role, too. “There is room for both,” he says. But with any proposal about how life began billions of years ago, Preiner advises humility. “There’s uncertainty here that we just have to live with.'”

DAVID: this finding drives us to the conclusion that hydrothermal vents in the ocean floor would have provided phosphorous for the origin of life. Only oceans provided a continuous environment for any life forms that might appear.

dhw: This is one of many articles you have published recently that emphasize the complexity of the “fine tuning” that leads to life. How very wise of Preiner: the finishing touches are a complete mystery, but you can be quite sure that they are not present throughout the entire universe.

Yes only Earthbound

Theodicy

dhw: Precisely. The evil is real, and that is why we discuss the problem. Proportionality explains nothing.

DAVID: It does for believers.

dhw: Only believers in God have the problem of reconciling his presumed goodness, omnipotence and omniscience with the evil for which, as first cause, he is responsible. Proportionality may be a comfort to you as you stick you head in the sand, but it does not explain anything.

Not to you.

Climate change

Timing a probable glacial period

QUOTES: Earth's obliquity is currently in the process of declining towards a minimum, which it will reach in 11,000 years or so; according to the team's calculations, the next ice age will kick off before then[/b]. (David’s bold):

"'According to the latest IPCC reports, humans have already started to alter the course of climate away from its natural trajectory by the emission of greenhouse gases..."

"'This means that the decisions we make now will have consequences into the far future.”

DAVID: Another article with this viewpoint:
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2470262-we-now-know-how-much-emissions-have-delaye...

QUOTE: "This is in line with earlier modelling that suggests rising CO2 levels due to anthropogenic emissions will prevent the onset of the next glacial period for tens to hundreds of thousands of years,” says Andrey Ganopolski…

DAVID: we need global warming it seems.

dhw: Delaying the next glacial period won’t be much use to humanity if it has already been frizzled up by global warming. No, this is not panic. If temperatures continue to rise, the planet will be uninhabitable long before the next ice age is due, and the period in between will create hell on Earth. We shan’t be there to see it, but “decisions we take now will have consequences into the far future.”

'
You have bought the so-called "accurate" predictive models hook line and sinker.