Does the fine tuning of the Universe even exist? Sabine Hossenfelder & Luke Barnes 

Yeah if you just completely ignore Luke Barnes response. It's funny how people that object fine-tuning have to appeal to fringe theories not accepted by mainstream physicists

Yeah, that's the honest response to someone talking nonsense.

lmao

Assumption? We have calculations. What are you talking about?

​@kuyab9122 Read Sheldrake's The Science Delusion/Science Set Free. 😏 Apparently, gravity, the speed of light etc aren't all that constant! Measurements have varied over time..

@@oneoflokis That pseudoscience dude? That's a nope.

@kuyab9122 Sorry, ad hominem attacks are no good! And Rupert Sheldrake is a real scientist (coming put of mainstream science) and always was. Before his formal retirement, he was a Cambridge Professor. Now he is an author and broadcaster (just like your idol Dawkins. 😏) The reason I mentioned him, is that Rupert Sheldrake wrote a book, entitled The Science Delusion (Science Set Free in the USA) which told me several things I didn't previously know. One thing he discovered in his researches among other scientists is that the cosmological constants (which of course can be measured) aren't really constant! There have been fluctuations in the speed of light over decades. Ditto gravity. It's kind of like science's guilty secret (and is only recorded in decades old almanacs.) They have swept it under the carpet now, by defining one constant in terms of the other, or something. Making it so that scientists don't have to objectively measure them any more. Sounds like a right put-up job to me! 😏 (And when I SEE all the RU-vid videos there are about scientific fraud, I'm not at all surprised! 😏 Science appears to be an unethical pursuit, at least to a degree.)

It's all in the section entitled How Constant Are The Constants? In chapter 3 of The God Delusion. You can read it for yourself.

True. This is rejecting symmetry altogether.

Rupert Sheldrake has pointed this out..

In fact, her argument is not convincing at all, and what does Christianity have to do with the fine-tuning problem accepted by the vast majority of cosmologists?

Not true. She said we don't know what's being talked about regarding a bayesian approach absent any observational evidence. Barnes had to throw another method out there knowing that she's correct - there's simply no data on other sets of constants to work with so calculating probability on them is pointless.

@@greg5023 Why is the universe as it is?

Perhaps the simple explanation is that this is the only universe we can observe. So we cannot talk of why this universe is as it is because we have no other universes to compare it with.

@@evangelistkimpatrik It has to be. Or WE wouldn’t be here to ask the question. And if a meteor hadn’t hit the yucutan peninsula 65 mill. years ago, we (homo sapiens) probably wouldn’t have been here.

@@erikhviid3189 Why are we here? As far as experience tells us, everything has a reason. Therefore, our existence here should have a reason.

Circular arguments must be examined carefully and it must be subjectively decided whether they are valid or not. If we live in a closed universe - closed to matter and energy and also closed to ideas (we seem to) - then every argument is ultimately a circular argument. Every argument is either circular or has an underlying argument. That underlying argument must, in turn, have an underlying argument or be circular. Unless there is an infinite regress, all arguments are ultimately founded on a circular argument. If that bothers you, I'm sorry. That's just reality.

Like I said, Paul Davies must be nuts. And he's got a lot of company.

@@Ebergerud Paul Davies practices religion, not science….

@@rubiks6 Ah, the old “infinite regress” red herring….nice touch. Are you also a Priest?

@@yamahajapan5351 - _"... red herring ..."_? How so?

Who calculated that probability of the folding protein and why? What constitutes “on its own”? Why would folding protein be part of a “plan”? Proteins fold, there is likely a very complicated process involved, but it is not magic! It is not planned…

People love big scary numbers when they're trying to convince you to believe their nonsense. And how often are those numbers actually backed up with anything other than "I'm smart, you should believe me!"? Never. What are the odds that Pi has the value that it does? 1:1. And as far as we know the same is true for the physical constants. It's entirely reasonable to think that the odds of a universe existing with the exact physical constants we observe may in fact be 1:1. Until we can show that other values for the physical constants are even possible - which we have NOT done - there is no reason to think that our universe is in any way special. Fine Tuning is just religion desperately trying to find a gap to wedge a god into.

Think about this. Even for bayesian probability, you have to know what's called a sampling space, which is the set of all possible outcomes, before even thinking of a prior probability distribution. This is because of the very definition of probability (search for Kolmogorov's axioms for more info). In this respect, the fine tuning argument is like trying to determine if a die is loaded using bayesian statistics, saying that any real value is possible and then claiming that the die is obviously loaded towards values 1 through 6 after throwing it. It's kinda worse, because you could argue it's more like finding a die with the number 1 heading up, not even checking if the die can have other values, not throwing the die multiple times (imagine it's impossible for some reason), assuming that any number is possible, and then saying that getting 1 by chance is highly improbable, so it must be 1 intentionally.

Why do the constants have the values that they do?

@@DingleberryPie why? I don’t think nature is capable of making decisions so “why” is a bit of an irrelevant question. What you might want to ask yourself though is that if God made the decision to make the constants the way they were for our sakes, then why did it take over 13 billion years for us to appear? Surely you can see that WE are fine tuned to fit the universe’s arbitrary rules for life, not the other way around. We are the ones that die if the conditions are not right, we are the ones that pass on our stronger and more survival-worthy characteristics to our young, we are the ones who are not constant, we are the ones who tune.

@@marquisinspades1 I didn't say there was a decision, didn't mention God, didn't mention life. We ask "why?" for everything. When the apple fell from the tree, what did Newton ask himself? What about when Darwin observed his finches? Though I am a theist, I don't think God just set these values. I think that there is an underlying equation/principle/interaction that allowed these (theoretically free-floating) values to emerge. I recall one theory about adjacent possibles, but my point is that this is just as much a scientific question as anything. Deny that is akin to a "God-of-the-gaps" argument. Furthermore, even if explanation evades us, this doesn't mean there isn't one (again speaking in naturalistic terms). As for your other statements: How do you know that life isn't extremely hard to produce? Not to mention intelligent life. How do you know that it doesn't take billions of stars to live and die to produce heavier elements to allow for such life? How do you know that is doesn't take billions of planets to get one/some that are just right to allow for life? If life can be tuned to fit its environment, why is there none that we can obverse outside Earth? Surely some would have emerged and evolved billions of years ago. We don't even know if the constants are constant. We don't know if the are uniform across the universe. But, you want to bar us from asking "why?"

@@DingleberryPie I’m just saying we need to be careful with the “why” question. Without a conscious mind, we usually mean “how”. HOW did the apple fall from the tree? Gravity. WHY did the apple call from the tree?… sounds more like you’re asking about the apple’s emotional state. Ask how as much as you like.

@@marquisinspades1 Why in these contexts refers to the reason. If you ask using “how”, it sounds like the answer should be “straight down”. Gravity, whatever it is, is the force/phenomenon that compelled it to fall straight down. But, asking “how is it that the constants of nature have the values that they do?” Does not change much..

The Second Law of Thermodynamics does not “happen”. That “Law” is a construct of the human mind. It is only a description of what exists.

​@@yamahajapan5351 A law implies a law-giver. haha :) The only reason why the early scientists (Newton, Kepler, Doyle etc) found laws in nature, is because they already expected it from their theistic worldview. A rational intellect created an orderly universe that can be studied by created rational intellects in his image. That is what caused western science to flourish. I fail to see how you would expect an orderly universe on an atheistic (materialistic) worldview. You would have to presuppose that.

@@hhstark8663 not one thing that science has ever discovered so far has ever been explained by god, and I'm 99% sure nothing ever will be.

Harry - that such constants are discovered is because people are try to explain why something ‘always’ happens. Why do apples always fall down to the ground? It is observation that gives people cause to think that there are ‘laws’ Also to say ‘a law implies a law giver’ is fine but to be convincing you need to prove it. Something can lead to a person saying it ‘implies’ something else, but you could be wrong.

What do you mean by "anything for sure"? Is that the same as knowing something with 100% probability? If that's the correct understanding of your question, why would knowing something with 100% probability even be an issue on the table?

Typical theist argument. Sye ten beefburger still lives.

@@holdontoyourwig Lol

@@holdontoyourwig what do you mean by a typical Theist argument?

@@madmax2976 she is making so many philosophical assertions, just wondering how does she know for sure?

By "specific," do you mean "purposeful"?

I think you don't really know what constants do...ofc they are expressed in our current system of mathematics, but the forces which they describe exist in a material way, so even if we had a different language (=mathematics) do describe them, they wouldn't suddenly stop to exist or be less precise. The forces are not construed through language, and their precision in enabling life etc is neither.

@@vosselator Constants are just mathematical statements about what’s observed. While the constants themselves won’t change, how they fit in our future understanding will….My point is that the Fine Tuning concept is an artifact of our mathematics that’s all…

Loool anything to deny the obvious 😂 😂

@@TheQuranExplainsItself what's obvious about fine tuning? There isn't any actual reason to believe that the physical constants can be anything other than what they are. And we have examples of constants that cannot possibly have any value, such as Pi. Can you prove that any of the physical constants is in fact a variable? If not - and so far, definitely not - then Fine Tuning is nothing more than a thought experiment. That's what is actually obvious.

@@yamahajapan5351 what makes you think the physical constants have to be what they are?

It’s not a miracle that if we change gravity by even a tiny fraction of a percent-enough so that you would be, say, one billionth of a gram heavier or lighter-the universe becomes so different that there are no stars, galaxies, or planets. And with no planets, there would be no life. What is it then? A coincidence? Chance? Steven Weinberg, a Nobel Laureate in Physics, wrote, …how surprising it is that the laws of nature and the initial conditions of the universe should allow for the existence of beings who could observe it. Life as we know it would be impossible if any one of several physical quantities had slightly different values. Chance? Coincidence?

@@JoshuaMSOG7 your answer rests entirely on the word IF. The fact that we are here in this universe proves that as unlikely as you think it might have been, it happened. And maybe it could not be any other way and hence it's probability is 1. No, the universe was not made for us, most of it would kill us instantly, even this excellent planet we live on has managed to exterminate 99% of all species that ever struggled to evolve, It's like the puddle that thought to itself "Isn't it amazing this hole was made just for me!"

@@alexfocus3474 The fact that we are here proves that the unlikely happened, happens? Do your hear yourself buddy lol. I mean Answer me then, was it chance or coincidence? I don’t see you using any plausible argument.. unless you just want to use the argument from ignorance. The fact that we can know the measurements of gravity and we can TEST it, that’s how we know we wouldn’t be here. The “ IF “ relies on testable science. I hope you got stuff to back up buddy and not throw all the evidence on me since you CLAIMED the fine tune argument is irrational. When I press you, don’t back up and say “ I don’t know.” Because that’s the typical answer many give . As astronomer Fred Hoyle wrote, “A commonsense interpretation of the facts suggests that a super-intellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology.” Physicist Freeman Dyson wrote, “The more I examine the universe, and the details of its architecture, the more evidence I find that the Universe in some sense must have known we were coming.” Francis Crick put, biologists must “constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved” (Crick 1988, 138). Crick later developed this idea with his famous “sequence hypothesis,” according to which the chemical parts of DNA (the nucleotide bases) function like letters in a written language or symbols in a computer code. Just as letters in an English sentence or digital characters in a computer program may convey information depending on their arrangement, so too do certain sequences of chemical bases along the spine of the DNA molecule convey precise instructions for building proteins. Theory of information developed by the famed M.I.T. scientist Claude Shannon in the late 1940s. Instead, DNA contains information in the richer and more ordinary dictionary sense of “alternative sequences or arrangements of characters that produce a specific effect.” Where does information come from? If there was nothing, then Big Bang, and cosmic explosion & then particles .. what caused information? The laws of the universe? Common, what do youuuuu believe? Don’t avoid my question.

@@JoshuaMSOG7 chance or design are not a dichotomy. You've chosen to exclude necessity for instance. Pi for instance is a necessary value, with no other possible value. There's no demonstration that things like the gravitational constant are in fact variable. Until you can prove that it is indeed a variable, fine tuning is dead in the water. It's just philosophical nonsense at this point.

Your phone number is the exact number that it is because of an organized system that designates a number to every person with a phone, with specific area codes determined by region, a system designed by intelligent minds.

In an infinite multiverse, there are infinite universes that you couldn't make the argument in. Where is the evidence for all these universes? Does your phone number ensure the universe evolves in a manner that will produce galaxies, stars, planets, life, and cell phones?

@@young_dan_kee good point!

@@DingleberryPie good point

Indeed, there is no possibility of any universe existing without a universe maker. That would be the Fine-Tuner. Therefore, of course, there's no possibility of any real universe where a fine-tuning argument couldn't be made because every real universe would be a fine-tuned universe.

Andrew, you miss the point of the fine tuning argument. There are many good treatments you can find, but the basic idea is the improbability of life without these “fine-tuning” parameters. There have also been many treatments of trying to discredit the argument. Your puddle analogy doesn’t really apply…several versions of it have been posited and all have been shown to be lacking. While I realize that you may not personally be convinced or someone else may be convinced, most humans are subject to confirmation bias because we all want to feel/believe our position is correct. I think most of us humans would be better served by moving inward instead of outward. The truth is we know so little. The truth is we control almost nothing. The truth is the arrogance of humanity knows no bounds. Whatever one believes, we all need much more humility.

@@TheOnlyStonemason - thanks for the reply. I can see one assumption there - that life is so improbable that there must of be fine tuning of some constants? Well how many other planets have life? We don't know. How big is the universe? very big. So we have 1 known location for life and a universe which the part visible to us has a radius of...45 billion light years. Just how much more improbable does life have to be than that for the constants not to be too amazingly set for life in your opinion? I can't help but think this challenge is grasping at straws. The constants are not set up perfectly for life - the universe screams this out. It seems that whatever science doesn't know or can't explain is the realm of god..whichever god depends on the believer setting out the argument. If science finds that these constants are the properties of some more elemental particles etc then those particles will be snapped up by believers as the next case for god.

@@wessexexplorer , life being improbable is mathematics (my expertise) not an assumption. As I stated previously, you miss the point.

@@TheOnlyStonemason Why should life be considered a desired outcome? Why is a universe wife life any more special than one with out? Seems a subjective value statement. If we were to grant the constants could actually be different, there may be types of lifeless universes even more impobable than ours.

@@Daz19 , you too miss the point. The why questions are excellent ones, e.g. why is there something as opposed to nothing? However, I am simply pointing out mathematical realities which don’t explain why.

yes, they depend way to much on observable evidence and avoid conjecture.....

And philosophers are bad scientists.

@@pannonia77 That's why philosophers' of science need to be listened to (at least more seriously) 😁

Ever heard the word "some"? It's a quantifier.

Sadly, most scientists today are woefully unaware of philosophy or even which philosophy they actually but unknowingly use in their work…

Thanks for nothing.

Because it's a stupid question.

It’s not clear that Hoyle died an atheist. He was closer to some kind of deist

Admitting that the universe appears to be governed by physical constants that make life possible is not the same thing as drawing the conclusion that only a god could have made it be that way.

@@scotte4765 But it does make it more probable

@@whatsinaname691 No, it doesn't. We have no information that allows us to make any kind of statement of probability for the universe's physical constants. That is the flaw in Barnes's argument that Hossenfelder pointed out in their full discussion.

@@scotte4765 For dimensional parameters, we have the cutoff scale (bounded between 0 and Planck scale) for physically motivated bounds and the probabilities of dimensionless parameters are motivated by ‘naturalness’ and are predicted to have peaks with order unity of 10^-2 to 10^3. Barnes has dealt with this extensively in this discussion and in his published work. Hawthorne, Benton, and Isaacs have also done a great job making this stuff clearer

Just like Hegel. Wonder if she lives in the old Prussia?

What do you mean by submit your standards, and what are these standards

What?

@@justinsmart5870 The standards are the fine tuned parameters. In order for them to be fined tuned, we are saying there is something special about these parameters that make them conducive to what see in this universe. We are also thereby admitting that a diving being has to respect these parameters in order to make what we see in this universe. The problem being that a diving being would not need to submit to these parameters if it wanted to make life as we know it. So the question becomes, does God need to respect the parameters? Then he is not omnipotent. Does he not need to respect the parameters? Then they are not fine tuned.

@@evangelistkimpatrik See my reply below.

@@achooothanks When you say a diving being do you mean like Tom Daley? Maybe they should try to get him on Unbelievable?

No, not the same thing. PI is a *descriptive* value. It's basically a numerical representation of a circle. The fine tuning constants are actual physical forces like gravity and strong/weak nuclear force. One we use on paper to describe the sizes of circles, the other literally pulls planets, forms mountains etc.

​@@thegreatcornholio7255 It's a universal constant all the same. In all possible worlds, the value of PI is the same. We have no reason to believe that the other universal constants do not share this property. And no, the constants don't act on reality, they are descriptions themselves. The gravitational constant doesn't literally pull planets, it is just a scaling factor between ((M1*M2)/r^2) and Fg. It's a *descriptive* value, as you put it. We don't know why the fine structure constant is ~1/137.036, but we have no reason to believe that it could be different. Considering how many other physical constants have (relatively) simple relationships to the fine structure constant, it seems likely that invariance in one is invariance in all. Interestingly, many of those relationships use PI in their formulae. Vacuum permittivity is 1/(4 PI a) for instance. So if a (the fine structure constant) is truly constant, so is vacuum permittivity. And if that's constant so is vacuum permeability. And so on. Until someone figures out why these apparent constants are what they are, and finds a mechanism by which they could be different, we have no reason to believe that the universe is in fact fine tuned.

To me, it seems like you are suggesting metaphysical necessity to explain fine tuning. I would like to express why I think this concept is problematic, and supply a better theory for further thought. First, let's define fine tuning. Fine tuning is based on the discovery that in order for intelligent life to exist or develop, the constants (or whatever, I'm not a scientist) must be a certain way. The reason to think that it could have been different is because it could have been conceivably different. It is an inference to the best explanation. The hypothesis you offer here is that the constants are metaphysically necessary. The reason why this is not the best hypothesis is because it is extremely complex and arbitrary. Why is this universe metaphysically necessary, and not one that is unfriendly for life? While you might argue that there is no ontological dial of how the universe could be, there is a conceivable one. You would need to explain why it is on the dial that it is and not elsewhere. If you want to say it's simply necessary, that's fine, but you're being arbitrary. Allow me to provide a parody. My thumb exists necessarily. It couldn't have not existed. As a matter of fact, since this is true, my thumb always existed, matter arranged thumb wise. All the lines, nails, etc. It's necessary so I don't need to explain it, remember? You can't rule it out, therefore you're merely walking in faith by denying my claim. The problem is that there is a better conceivable explanation for the existence of my thumb. My thumb came from the fetus in my mom's womb. That fetus came from you know what. We don't need scientific proof to know this. A better or simpler hypothesis is that every conceivable universe exists because it is grounded in a deeper explanation, for example a metaphysically necessary universe generator.

@@lalosalamanca4226 "To me, it seems like you are suggesting metaphysical necessity to explain fine tuning." What I'm suggesting is that there are some constants which are necessarily what they are in all possible universes. The example I gave was the value of Pi, which is fixed for circles in all Euclidean planes. It's not a value that could have been set, it simply is what it is. There is no possible universe in which the value of Pi in any Euclidean mathematics is different from what we observe. (And no, expressing it in a different base isn't a change in value, only representation.) "The hypothesis you offer here is that the constants are metaphysically necessary." Not at all. I'm pointing out that there are some constants that are known to be metaphysically necessary, and that we don't know which of the other constants are or are not metaphysically necessary. Until we can positively demonstrate that any particular constant is not in fact metaphysically necessary we cannot rationally posit that the universe is finely tuned. "Why is this universe metaphysically necessary, and not one that is unfriendly for life?" I never claimed that it was. I only pointed out that there's no reason to believe that the constants are in fact variables. You're reading something that I never wrote. "While you might argue that there is no ontological dial of how the universe could be, there is a conceivable one. You would need to explain why it is on the dial that it is and not elsewhere. If you want to say it's simply necessary, that's fine, but you're being arbitrary." On the contrary, I am exposing a substantive flaw in the fine tuning argument. You are assuming that there is a dial simply because you can conceive of one. You seem to believe that simply by conceiving of a thing you can make it a reality. I don't accept that premise. "The reason to think that it could have been different is because it could have been conceivably different. It is an inference to the best explanation." That is not an inference to the best explanation, it's wishful thinking. Unless you can demonstrate that the conception of different values for the fundamental constants is anything other than a flight of fancy then any inference you draw from that conception is flawed. Ex phantasia, phantasia fit. "My thumb came from the fetus in my mom's womb. That fetus came from you know what. We don't need scientific proof to know this." Not only do we know for certain that your thumb is not in fact a metaphysically necessary existence, we have plenty of scientific evidence about the formation of humans in utero.. You need to find a better analogy. "A better or simpler hypothesis is that every conceivable universe exists because it is grounded in a deeper explanation," I can conceive of a universe which is necessarily the only actually possible universe. By your logic that universe exists, which means that no other universe *can* exist. So either only that universe actually exists or other conceivable universes exist. This demonstrates that your position is logically incoherent.

@@TheMonk72 I didn't say that there's an actual ontological dial. I'm saying that by reason, the constants are unlikely to be necessary unless they're grounded in a deeper explanation. For example, my multiverse idea, that every universe exists necessarily. This is similar to mathematics. The problem is that the hypothesis that this is metaphysically necessary is not the best, because it is extremely arbitrary as it is. The conceivable dial highlights how many brute facts are in your theory, therefore making it a weaker one. We should prefer the simplest, least arbitrary theory, all things being equal. PI being necessary firstly assumes platonism, but given this assumption, mathematics can actually be grounded in a deeper, necessary explanation, like rules of perfect reasoning or the laws of logic. Otherwise, 2+2 could equal 5. But it doesn't, because of perfect reasoning. Furthermore, you do not know that my thumb specifically is contingent. This has not been scientifically verified, only the possibility of it has been. My thumb is special, and I do not need to explain where it came from. I never said that all thumbs are necessary, just mine. Your comment seems to have some scientism, which is the philosophical view that we can only *know* what science tells us. This is deeply problematic because you must make unscientific assumptions to arrive at this conclusion. For example, the fact of whether or not your empirical senses correspond to reality. Science does not verify that you are not a brain in a vat, a boltzmann brain, or in a simulation. This you simply cannot know for certain, and I could just tell you that it's question begging to think otherwise, much like your attitude on science. Furthermore, how do you know that it's not metaphysically necessary that the universe is an illusion? I mean it's a possibility, and by thinking otherwise, it's just wishful thinking, right?

You're an idiot, Zapp. However, "fine-tuning" isn't the clearest evidence for God: the clearest evidence is the question of the origin of matter and energy. If you or someone much smarter than you wants to tackle that, I'm here!

@@mark1484 How do you explain matter without God?

@@mark1484 OK. Let's discuss the scientific alternative explanations of you want to discuss some science. Otherwise, I've stated my belief and the first basis of it: there is no other explanation for the matter around us that is not in heat death.

@@mark1484 No, you can't simply ask "where did God come from?" as you can simply ask "where did matter come from?" because matter is subject to thermodynamics. God and matter are equal in this sense: IF either began to exist, they had a cause. God may or may not exist, BUT IF He exists, He's not subject to thermodynamics. That's an important asymmetry. I'm going to bed soon, but if you respond I sincerely hope YT lets me know (alas, their system is unreliable).

@@mark1484 God dont need no books.