Old 09-13-2006, 01:22 AM   #1
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Default The Anthropic Principle.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

Basically, it says that no matter how unlikely it is for life to spring up, it has to or else there'd be no life around to ask why it happened.

Person 1: But what if we were in a universe where life didn't come to be?
Person 2: Then you wouldn't be around to ask the question.

Truth, or just an excuse to not look deeper into some aspects of cosmology? I'd like to hear what you people think.
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Old 09-13-2006, 01:30 AM   #2
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Default Re: The Anthropic Principle.

It's not really a meaningful idea. It's like saying,

"Why is the pot boiling?"
"Well, if it weren't boiling you wouldn't be asking me that, now, would you?"

It doesn't get at the question. What scientific principles can we use to explain why the pot is boiling, or why life has a chance of existing?
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Old 09-13-2006, 12:15 PM   #3
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Default Re: The Anthropic Principle.

Person 1: But what if we were in a universe where life didn't come to be?
Person 2: Then you wouldn't be around to ask the question.

Seems like a fairly irrelevant statement to me.


The argument that the universe is 'fine tuned' is groundless...since we don't know where any of these things like relative electron mass came from, or why the universe inflated in the first place. They could be derived from a completely chanceless process for all we know.

The entire ID argument plays on human emotion and thought.
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Old 09-13-2006, 04:02 PM   #4
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Default Re: The Anthropic Principle.

It's useful for explaining the improbabilities that we might see around us. For example, the improbability of the universe's inflation, or of a solar system forming like ours, or of a planet having a moon that exerts strong tidal forces, etc.

It's an important idea, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it. It's not useful for explaining why things are the way they are, but it doesn't pretend to be useful for that purpose either.
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Old 09-13-2006, 09:39 PM   #5
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Default Re: The Anthropic Principle.

If a tree falls in the woods, and no one's there to hear it, does it still make a sound?
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Old 09-15-2006, 08:40 PM   #6
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Default Re: The Anthropic Principle.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Cavernio
If a tree falls in the woods, and no one's there to hear it, does it still make a sound?
If a post is made in CT and it has nothing to do with the topic, is it still meaningful?

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