I would challenge the notion that there is any need for a fine-tuning argument because no one has proved that a fine-tuning problem exists in the first place. The problem is supposedly that if the constants of the universe were any different, then life couldn't exist, but I review arguments that we simply cannot know whether life would be possible if we changed the physical constants of the universe. It is impossible to predict what kinds of phenomena might emerge in alternate universes, just as it is impossible to predict chemistry from physics in our universe. So I think we should just stop talking about the FTA until we know that the problem it purports to solve is real. https://open.substack.com/pub/eclecticinquiries/p/the-fine-tuning-argument-cant-get?r=4952v2&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
What you’re saying could be true and the fine tuning argument still works. Even if we cant get a prediction of chemistry from changing physical constants, all the fine tuning proponent needs to think is that the way in which the physical constants exist are almost necessary for life - so most changes made wouldn’t work.
We just can't know whether the physical constants that exist are necessary for life or almost necessary for it. It may be that radically different types of life would result from radically different universes. We have no way of knowing which physical constants support life and which ones don't.
This response seems very odd to me. So you’re committed to saying that we cant know whether or not life could arise if something like the cosmological constant as we know it were to be changed?
You are missing an important point, you seem to be thinking of life as "life as we know it", perhaps we can rule out life as we know it by changing fundamental elements of the universe, but what is at stake is "life as we don't know it" it is very hard to rule out "life as we don't know it" because we don't know it. Even in this universe there may be some very strange forms of life that we just don't know about yet they might thrive if we changed the fine structure constant and so on.
Not just me but a couple of physicists whom I quote in my article! I researched the matter and found no evidence of consensus on this question among physicists.
“as I have high antecedent confidence that it is metaphysically impossible that anyone in my physical state has the same mental states as me.”
Typo? Did you mean “DOES NOT HAVE the same mental state as me”? On a Dennetian view of consciousness it seems to me that someone in the same physical state as me would indeed have the same mental state. Indeed, it seems to be that this is equivalent to the claim that p-zombies are impossible.
My question for the non-theist who thinks (antecedently) that the constants are necessary (in the relevant way) is: Why think such a thing? The constants that feature in the fine-tuning argument seem independent, unlike the constants that feature in the Flo-tuning argument. What could justify virtual certainty that they aren’t independent, despite appearances?
One reason to deny that the constants are necessary is that universes in which the strengths of various physical forces are slightly different are easy to imagine. The same isn’t true of worlds in which phi doesn’t equal 1. (These are inconsistent worlds, since they’re worlds in which the velocity of electromagnetic waves both is and isn’t equal to c.)
These aren’t objections to anything you said, obviously. They’re just reasons to doubt that someone who’s informed and thinking clearly meets the condition under which the necessary-constants objection succeeds.
We don't say the constants are necessary because we believe it. We only bring it up as an objection because the constants being necessary has about the same explanatory power as God. So it's meant to highlight the fact that the theistic solution is as arbitrary as the solution of the atheist.
My comment above was addressed only to non-theists who believe antecedently — that is, independently of the fine-tuning argument — that the constants are necessary. The reason I focused on these non-theists is because, according to the argument of the post (which I endorse), they are the only ones who should take the necessary-constants objection seriously.
There may be no non-theists like this. But in that case, no non-theist should take the necessary-constants objection seriously, for the reasons given in the post.
In an alternate universe, with different universal constants, boron-based life forms are having a debate over the existence of a higher power. They point to the fact that life as they know it could not exist if not for the finely tuned parameters of the universe they find themselves in.
Hah, I made my prior probability of the laws of the universe being necessary 60% at the beginning.
I can’t help thinking the fine-tuning people have an incredibly weird initial view. Whatever the reason the constants are what they are, surely it’s not that they were sampled from some finite set of possible numbers. But if it’s not that, how does the fine tuning argument work at all?
It seems like the constants we have must emerge necessarily from the nature of the universe.
And as to the question: what are the odds that the universe would be such as to be apt for the existence of complex life: well, 1. We’ve only observed 1 universe and it is apt for complex life. We have no meaningful other sample set.
Necessary parameters in the 'φ = 1' sense is impossible---so it seems, anyways. If there are no free parameters, and one could describe the universe in a mathematical Universe Model (which is probably possible given enough knowledge on a physicalist account), then every equation in the Universe Model is endogenous to every other equation. Without any initial values, none of the equations have a determined solution. Take the simple model, 'x = y'. It is completely non-descriptive of anything unless x = a for some exogenous constant a. Therefore, if all parameters are necessary (i.e. "endogenous"), then the Universe Model describes nothing. Contradiction.
That doesn't conclusively demonstrate the truth or the falsity of the fine-tuning argument, of course, but it seems to knock against one of its escape routes. Where are the philosophers of math in the room?
I don't think we have the ability to tell what the implications of changing the constants are and we don't have an idea of what life as we don't know it is like specifically what physical constituents it requires, so I don't find the assumptions underlying the Fine Tuning Argument particularly persuasive. If for virtually every other value of the constant, life as we do not know it would exist then it can't be a good argument, because every intelligent being not alive as we know it would be able to run the same argument, someone had to win the lottery no matter how many entrants are in it.
Also, quite possibly constants that seem independent of each other may turn out to be dependent in some more accurate theory of things or the right reformulation of our current theory.
Also, also I'm tempted by the theory of actualism that the actual universe is the only logically possible one as the only way to have enough necessity to bring about anything (whatever is can not not be, baby!). In which case the constants are necessary and probably not in the dependent on God way.
But what if we ignore all that. I say we should infer from the fact that almost all of the universe is free of life (as best as we can tell perhaps the vast vacuum of space teams with life as we do not know it) that the universe is fine tuned for the absence of life, but life is just too good at uh err finding a way and so we have our nuggets of life.
So why would the universe be fine tuned for the absence of life one explanation is that God exists and is malevolent, but this raises the problem of Good if God were omnipotent and omni-malovent how could there be any good? Perhaps some limited sort of limited God. The other option is a limited God who is good but antinatalist. He tried his hardest to make sure everyone would never be born, but his powers were limited and so we were condemned to the horror of existence.
I’m a necessitarian and think that through that lens you can see that this kind of response may not be necessary for the bare necessity of constants claim. Everything that happens is necessary in this view, yet not everything has the epistemic status of what people usually think are metaphysical necessities; so it seems that your take should be aimed at people not just claiming the necessity of the constants, but claiming to have a certain epistemic justification in the belief that the fact holds in any state of affairs.
I agree, none of what I said should be read in a way that implies that, what I said was that through that lens its easier to see problems with your take. I think necessitarianism makes clear that i) belief in something being m-necessary and ii) belief of that being the kind of thing one can be certain obtains across states of affairs are two different things. That's how they account for the difference between every true proposition, which is metaphysically necessary to them and statements such as 1+1=2. With that in the background, one can see that the strict metaphysical necessity claim *without the epistemic status claim* is properly handled by the epistemic possibility response. This is relevant because you say things such as "...the constants are metaphysically necessary as the atheist alleges, just as it is metaphysically necessary 1+1=2", but the metaphysical necessity invoked atheists often does not involve the claim of parity in epistemic status with 1+1=2. Famously, Oppy thinks the necessity follows from his causal powers account of modality.
The laws of nature seem hardly certain to be as necessary as things like the law of non-contradiction. As such I think you’re mixing up something being necessary in the sense of required by the laws of nature and something being necessary in the sense that God could not make it otherwise. At least appears to be the case, given your arguments about the speed of light. After all, it seems perfectly possible, that things other than the speed of light like the speed of sound or animal locomotion could be slower compare to the speed of light so that from our human perspective, the speed of light might appear greater. Why are you so confident that the laws of nature could not have been such that everything else was slower compared to the speed of light such that effectively for all practical purposes, the speed of light was far greater than it is. At any rate, it hardly appears as if we have any proof that God could not have made it so that special relativity was false if he was so inclined. Similarly about the laws of electromagnetism.
I also am not really sure why you think we could ever have good evidence as to whether something is necessary in the sense of being necessary independent of what God wants. It seems like it would be very hard to distinguish between the gravitational constant being what it is, because God necessarily wished that way, and the gravitational constant being its actual value because it is necessarily that independent of God‘s wishes. For that matter honestly, I’m not sure how you would ever find out whether something other than the laws of logic or mathematics was necessary since it’s hardly inconceivable to imagine different laws of nature, and there is no way to directly perceive the necessity of a fact.
I would challenge the notion that there is any need for a fine-tuning argument because no one has proved that a fine-tuning problem exists in the first place. The problem is supposedly that if the constants of the universe were any different, then life couldn't exist, but I review arguments that we simply cannot know whether life would be possible if we changed the physical constants of the universe. It is impossible to predict what kinds of phenomena might emerge in alternate universes, just as it is impossible to predict chemistry from physics in our universe. So I think we should just stop talking about the FTA until we know that the problem it purports to solve is real. https://open.substack.com/pub/eclecticinquiries/p/the-fine-tuning-argument-cant-get?r=4952v2&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
What you’re saying could be true and the fine tuning argument still works. Even if we cant get a prediction of chemistry from changing physical constants, all the fine tuning proponent needs to think is that the way in which the physical constants exist are almost necessary for life - so most changes made wouldn’t work.
We just can't know whether the physical constants that exist are necessary for life or almost necessary for it. It may be that radically different types of life would result from radically different universes. We have no way of knowing which physical constants support life and which ones don't.
This response seems very odd to me. So you’re committed to saying that we cant know whether or not life could arise if something like the cosmological constant as we know it were to be changed?
You are missing an important point, you seem to be thinking of life as "life as we know it", perhaps we can rule out life as we know it by changing fundamental elements of the universe, but what is at stake is "life as we don't know it" it is very hard to rule out "life as we don't know it" because we don't know it. Even in this universe there may be some very strange forms of life that we just don't know about yet they might thrive if we changed the fine structure constant and so on.
Not just me but a couple of physicists whom I quote in my article! I researched the matter and found no evidence of consensus on this question among physicists.
Ill make sure to check out your article when I get some time today
Cool, I hope you'll tell me what you think!
“as I have high antecedent confidence that it is metaphysically impossible that anyone in my physical state has the same mental states as me.”
Typo? Did you mean “DOES NOT HAVE the same mental state as me”? On a Dennetian view of consciousness it seems to me that someone in the same physical state as me would indeed have the same mental state. Indeed, it seems to be that this is equivalent to the claim that p-zombies are impossible.
Typo yes thank you!!
This is an excellent, excellent post. Well done!
My question for the non-theist who thinks (antecedently) that the constants are necessary (in the relevant way) is: Why think such a thing? The constants that feature in the fine-tuning argument seem independent, unlike the constants that feature in the Flo-tuning argument. What could justify virtual certainty that they aren’t independent, despite appearances?
One reason to deny that the constants are necessary is that universes in which the strengths of various physical forces are slightly different are easy to imagine. The same isn’t true of worlds in which phi doesn’t equal 1. (These are inconsistent worlds, since they’re worlds in which the velocity of electromagnetic waves both is and isn’t equal to c.)
These aren’t objections to anything you said, obviously. They’re just reasons to doubt that someone who’s informed and thinking clearly meets the condition under which the necessary-constants objection succeeds.
We don't say the constants are necessary because we believe it. We only bring it up as an objection because the constants being necessary has about the same explanatory power as God. So it's meant to highlight the fact that the theistic solution is as arbitrary as the solution of the atheist.
My comment above was addressed only to non-theists who believe antecedently — that is, independently of the fine-tuning argument — that the constants are necessary. The reason I focused on these non-theists is because, according to the argument of the post (which I endorse), they are the only ones who should take the necessary-constants objection seriously.
There may be no non-theists like this. But in that case, no non-theist should take the necessary-constants objection seriously, for the reasons given in the post.
In an alternate universe, with different universal constants, boron-based life forms are having a debate over the existence of a higher power. They point to the fact that life as they know it could not exist if not for the finely tuned parameters of the universe they find themselves in.
Hah, I made my prior probability of the laws of the universe being necessary 60% at the beginning.
I can’t help thinking the fine-tuning people have an incredibly weird initial view. Whatever the reason the constants are what they are, surely it’s not that they were sampled from some finite set of possible numbers. But if it’s not that, how does the fine tuning argument work at all?
It seems like the constants we have must emerge necessarily from the nature of the universe.
And as to the question: what are the odds that the universe would be such as to be apt for the existence of complex life: well, 1. We’ve only observed 1 universe and it is apt for complex life. We have no meaningful other sample set.
Necessary parameters in the 'φ = 1' sense is impossible---so it seems, anyways. If there are no free parameters, and one could describe the universe in a mathematical Universe Model (which is probably possible given enough knowledge on a physicalist account), then every equation in the Universe Model is endogenous to every other equation. Without any initial values, none of the equations have a determined solution. Take the simple model, 'x = y'. It is completely non-descriptive of anything unless x = a for some exogenous constant a. Therefore, if all parameters are necessary (i.e. "endogenous"), then the Universe Model describes nothing. Contradiction.
That doesn't conclusively demonstrate the truth or the falsity of the fine-tuning argument, of course, but it seems to knock against one of its escape routes. Where are the philosophers of math in the room?
I don't think we have the ability to tell what the implications of changing the constants are and we don't have an idea of what life as we don't know it is like specifically what physical constituents it requires, so I don't find the assumptions underlying the Fine Tuning Argument particularly persuasive. If for virtually every other value of the constant, life as we do not know it would exist then it can't be a good argument, because every intelligent being not alive as we know it would be able to run the same argument, someone had to win the lottery no matter how many entrants are in it.
Also, quite possibly constants that seem independent of each other may turn out to be dependent in some more accurate theory of things or the right reformulation of our current theory.
Also, also I'm tempted by the theory of actualism that the actual universe is the only logically possible one as the only way to have enough necessity to bring about anything (whatever is can not not be, baby!). In which case the constants are necessary and probably not in the dependent on God way.
But what if we ignore all that. I say we should infer from the fact that almost all of the universe is free of life (as best as we can tell perhaps the vast vacuum of space teams with life as we do not know it) that the universe is fine tuned for the absence of life, but life is just too good at uh err finding a way and so we have our nuggets of life.
So why would the universe be fine tuned for the absence of life one explanation is that God exists and is malevolent, but this raises the problem of Good if God were omnipotent and omni-malovent how could there be any good? Perhaps some limited sort of limited God. The other option is a limited God who is good but antinatalist. He tried his hardest to make sure everyone would never be born, but his powers were limited and so we were condemned to the horror of existence.
I’m a necessitarian and think that through that lens you can see that this kind of response may not be necessary for the bare necessity of constants claim. Everything that happens is necessary in this view, yet not everything has the epistemic status of what people usually think are metaphysical necessities; so it seems that your take should be aimed at people not just claiming the necessity of the constants, but claiming to have a certain epistemic justification in the belief that the fact holds in any state of affairs.
I don’t think necessitarianism is dialectically relevant to the success of the atheist’s objection here
I agree, none of what I said should be read in a way that implies that, what I said was that through that lens its easier to see problems with your take. I think necessitarianism makes clear that i) belief in something being m-necessary and ii) belief of that being the kind of thing one can be certain obtains across states of affairs are two different things. That's how they account for the difference between every true proposition, which is metaphysically necessary to them and statements such as 1+1=2. With that in the background, one can see that the strict metaphysical necessity claim *without the epistemic status claim* is properly handled by the epistemic possibility response. This is relevant because you say things such as "...the constants are metaphysically necessary as the atheist alleges, just as it is metaphysically necessary 1+1=2", but the metaphysical necessity invoked atheists often does not involve the claim of parity in epistemic status with 1+1=2. Famously, Oppy thinks the necessity follows from his causal powers account of modality.
The laws of nature seem hardly certain to be as necessary as things like the law of non-contradiction. As such I think you’re mixing up something being necessary in the sense of required by the laws of nature and something being necessary in the sense that God could not make it otherwise. At least appears to be the case, given your arguments about the speed of light. After all, it seems perfectly possible, that things other than the speed of light like the speed of sound or animal locomotion could be slower compare to the speed of light so that from our human perspective, the speed of light might appear greater. Why are you so confident that the laws of nature could not have been such that everything else was slower compared to the speed of light such that effectively for all practical purposes, the speed of light was far greater than it is. At any rate, it hardly appears as if we have any proof that God could not have made it so that special relativity was false if he was so inclined. Similarly about the laws of electromagnetism.
I also am not really sure why you think we could ever have good evidence as to whether something is necessary in the sense of being necessary independent of what God wants. It seems like it would be very hard to distinguish between the gravitational constant being what it is, because God necessarily wished that way, and the gravitational constant being its actual value because it is necessarily that independent of God‘s wishes. For that matter honestly, I’m not sure how you would ever find out whether something other than the laws of logic or mathematics was necessary since it’s hardly inconceivable to imagine different laws of nature, and there is no way to directly perceive the necessity of a fact.