[Merged] Immortality & Bayesian Statistics

[Slowvehicle]

- Otherwise, to the extent that I can really understand the rebuttals given, I just don't see the wreckage that you guys do. To me, the AP is a real conundrum, and another big reason for thinking that the "scientific opinion" about one finite life doesn't make sense.
- Can one of you put one of the arguments against the AP in your own words?

How many different ways?

I have posted links; I have given you explanations; I have provided you analogies; you have, apparently, simply dismissed them all without seeming to attempt to comprehend them.

1.The claim that the observable universe is fine-tuned for LAWKI simply ignores the fact; the empirical, observable, demonstrable, objective fact; that most of the universe is inimical to LAWKI. Most of the universe will kill LAWKI quickly, casually and messily. Look at the post above, with Gawdzilla's analysis. I have also asked you to consider the fact that you would not have survived one night this year outside in my garden, in your natural state; this environment is not "fine tuned for LAWKI".

2. You are continuing to make the "5 Aces" error, no matter how often you deny it. The only reason you see a hand of a Royal Flush as "special" is that that particular arrangvement of cards has been declared special by the rules of your game. Every other hand of 5 cards is just as unlikely,

3. The "Pangloss" arguments demonstrated the problems caused by looking at the universe through the AP filter. Noses hold up glasses (fairly well), NOT because noses were prefigured by the AP, but becasue, having evolved with noses and with eyes subject to presbyopia and other focal problems, we designed glasses to fit the noses we have.

...not to mention that none of this addresses the false dichotomy of your claim that if you can just kinda sorta demonstrate that maybe the "scientific model" might kinda sorta have some maybe kinda sorta ways in which it could (sort of) be claimed to be inaccurate, then the ONLY ITHER option is that "souls" are "immortal". Never mind the fact that the "soul" has not been demonstrated to exist; that the "mind" is an emergent property of "brain"; and that reincarnation simply clouds the issue with its own set of logical absurdities.

Instead of simply repeating "I think science is wrong therefore immortality I think science is wrong therefore immortality I think science is wrong therefore immortality"; consider actually demonstrating the existence of "mind" independent of "brain", or supporting any of your other claims.

Dump the "essentially prove" dead end, and get to the empirical, practical, objective support for your ideas.

 

[Jabba]

Assuming that what you're actually asking for is arguments against the claim that the universe is fine tuned for life:

2. The fact that if you change a single parameter you make the universe no longer suitable for our kind of life does not mean that there is only one possible combination of parameters that supports life. In the latest Science of the Discworld book the authors use the analogy of a car engine: if you change a single component (say the diameter of one of the bolts) the engine ceases to function, but if you simultaneously change the size of the nut that goes with it you have a working engine again. There are millions of workable designs for a car engine, some with differences as radical as the kind of fuel they use.

- What if the universe was all gas? If that were the case, you couldn't have a car to begin with.

 

[Jabba]

How many different ways?

I have posted links; I have given you explanations; I have provided you analogies; you have, apparently, simply dismissed them all without seeming to attempt to comprehend them...

Slowvehicle,
- That's because you are always insulting.

 

[Jabba]

She's saying it's trivially true that intelligent life will find itself in a universe capable of supporting intelligent life...

What's to understand?

dlorde,
- Isn't that the multiverse argument?

Not necessarily; it holds for a single universe.

dlorde,
- How can intelligent life find itself a universe capable of supporting intelligent life if there is only a single universe?

 

[Pixel42]

Pixel,
- I think that you're argument requires there to be many basically different ways for life to occur. For instance, if the universe was all gas, life could/would(?) still occur. (I understand that if the force of gravity was just slightly weaker, the universe would be all gas.)
- And so far, I think that's exactly what the puddle analogy is about.

No, that's not at all what the puddle analogy is about.

Your reply is actually more applicable to argument 2.

 

[Slowvehicle]

- What if the universe was all gas? If that were the case, you couldn't have a car to begin with.

In a hypothetical universe in which the physical constants were such that solid matter never formed, there would be no solid matter. At the same level of speculation by which such a universe may be postulated, life (not LAWKI, but life) can be imagined based upon interactions of energy, or upon structural relations of gasses.

This, however, is not that universe.

 

[Pixel42]

- Re #3: To me, that's like saying that a true God wouldn't allow bad things to happen to good people.

In what way?

- Re #4: That's the multiverse argument.

Indeed. Which is, of course, a valid possibility.

 

[Pixel42]

- What if the universe was all gas? If that were the case, you couldn't have a car to begin with.

You do know what an analogy is?

 

[Pixel42]

How can intelligent life find itself a universe capable of supporting intelligent life if there is only a single universe?

If there is a single universe and it supports intelligent life then that single universe's laws and constants must be such that it is capable of supporting intelligent life.

As I said, the anthropic principle was originally formulated as a way to rule out various theoretical possibilities which are incompatible with a universe that supports intelligent life, as we know this isn't such a universe from the fact that we're here.

 

[zooterkin]

dlorde,
- How can intelligent life find itself a universe capable of supporting intelligent life if there is only a single universe?

The phrase was "find itself in a universe capable of supporting intelligent life...". Passive, not active.

 

[shuttlt]

Jabba,

How are you estimating the odds of a universe coming into being that is capable of supporting intelligent life? We don't even know if there is one universe or many.

 

[Jabba]

Pixel,
- I think that you're argument requires there to be many basically different ways for life to occur. For instance, if the universe was all gas, life could/would(?) still occur. (I understand that if the force of gravity was just slightly weaker, the universe would be all gas.)
- And so far, I think that's exactly what the puddle analogy is about. The fluid filling the puddle is totally "flexible." It would take on whatever shape is available. I think that such an analogy requires that life be totally (or, significantly) flexible. I assume that is not what you're saying.

No, that's not at all what the puddle analogy is about.

Pixel,
- Then, what IS it about?

 

[steenkh]

- Can one of you put one of the arguments against the AP in your own words?

Jabba, let us for a moment think of two different situations:

In one we have a scenario where humans exist by pure chance, and in the other humans are created. What would the humans think about the anthropic principle in each scenario?

In both scenario, people can see that the world fits them perfectly, and consequently, they might think that this is not a coincidence. From the AP alone, you cannot determine if you humans created or not.

 

[godless dave]

- What if the universe was all gas? If that were the case, you couldn't have a car to begin with.

If it were, we wouldn't be here asking this question.

That's all the anthropic principle says.

 

[Pixel42]

Pixel,
- Then, what IS it about?

I'm sorry, but Douglas Adams' puddle analogy really does explain the fundamental logical error as simply as I think it is possible to explain it. If you still don't get it, then you probably never will.

 

[Jabba]

...
3. Most of the universe is actually inimicable to life, which is odd if it's supposedly fine tuned for it...

Pixel,
- Re #3: To me, that's like saying that a true God wouldn't allow bad things to happen to good people...

In what way?

Pixel,
- If God exists, 'He' lets a lot of bad things to happen to good people. Isn't that odd if God is supposedly a loving God?

 

[zooterkin]

Pixel,
- If God exists, 'He' lets a lot of bad things to happen to good people. Isn't that odd if God is supposedly a loving God?

Why do you keep bringing God into this?

 

[Pixel42]

Pixel,
- If God exists, 'He' lets a lot of bad things to happen to good people. Isn't that odd if God is supposedly a loving God?

Yes. Just as the fact that bad things happen to good people is evidence against an omnipotent loving God, the fact that almost all the universe is inimicable to life is evidence against the universe being fine tuned for life.

You see, you do know what an analogy is!

 

[shuttlt]

Why would an omnipotent God care about the waste involved in creating an entire lifeless universe when his/her real goal was just to bring Jabba into being. What is waste if you are omnipotent?

 

[Slowvehicle]

Pixel,
- Then, what IS it about?

You are invited to consider three puddles, just out of sight of each other, with no way to communicate.

The first puddle (never mind the fact that the puddles are imbued, for pedagogical purposes, with consciousness--just go with it) observes her world. "My," she thinks to herself, "this hole, with its, smooth bottom, regular edge, and overall round shape, fits my smooth-bottomed, regular-edged, overall-round-shaped self exactly! This puddle proves that the universe was made just to contain me!"

The second puddle, all unaware of the first, observes all he can see. "Goodness," says he, "This hole, with its irregular edge, pebbly bottom, and shallow, sloping sides, fits me to a 'p'. Why the bumps in my bottom fit each pebble precisely! The shallow sloping sides and irregualr edge match my shape, precisely! This proves the universe was created just to contain me!"

The third puddle, in a hole next to an uprooted highway sign, thinks: "This square, straight-edged, straight-sided, pointy-bottomed hole fits me as if it were made for me...therefore, the universe was fine-tuned just to contain me!"

The irony of the analogy, and its pedagogical power, is that it does not take much experience with water and holes to know that the puddles are wrong. It is the shape of the hole that determined the shape of the puddle, not the other way 'round.

This universe was not "designed" to be "fine-tuned" for LAWKI. The incidents and accidents of the characteristics of this universe do not have the inception of life as their goal, target, or purpose. Instead, LAWKI adapted to, and continues to adapt to, the incidents and accidents of the conditions under which it came to be, and in which it had developed. If the incidents and accidents of this universe were different, a different kind of life might be having these same reflections--or life might not have ever developed in the first place.

The point of the "shaking the dog at the stick" aphorism is that it reverses the effective order--it would be silly to try to threaten a dog with a stick by picking up the dog and brandishing it (the dog) at the stick (on the ground). If one did not have it backwards, one would shake the stick at the dog.