What would a designed universe look like?

[Pardalis]

That's easy. A "Christian" "Skeptic's" creator god has mysterious ways, and is not for us to understand.

God I hate that "mysterious ways" excuse... It's not mysterious it's just stupid.

 

[I Ratant]

It's a blanket... a security blanket, the same nonsense phrase used to not respond to why bad/good things happen to good/bad people.

 

[KingMerv00]

It's a blanket... a security blanket, the same nonsense phrase used to not respond to why bad/good things happen to good/bad people.

It is hypocritical too. "God works in mysterious ways and we can never understand him." Yet they KNOW he loves us. Hasn't it ever crossed the Christian's mind that God might be a sadist?

Looking at the universe objectively, it almost seems that God wanted to create a stable universe that had the LEAST amount of life possible.

 

[Fredrik]

I was wondering because in a nother post people were saying the universe is as you would expect if there was no designer? Which means - people must know what a designed universe would look like.

No, that's not what it means. It means that there could exist things in our universe that everyone would interpret as strong evidence of design, but nothing of that sort has ever been found.

It's just not as strong a claim as you take it to be. No one claims to know exactly what design looks like.

Now why don't you explain to us why Yahwe created a universe that's big and old enough to make it plausible that life started and evolved in a way that's consistent with the laws of physics. Did he do that just to trick smart people into believing things that would give him a reason to send us to hell?

 

[JoeEllison]

It is hypocritical too. "God works in mysterious ways and we can never understand him." Yet they KNOW he loves us. Hasn't it ever crossed the Christian's mind that God might be a sadist?

Looking at the universe objectively, it almost seems that God wanted to create a stable universe that had the LEAST amount of life possible.

And, it is silly and self-centered: "I know that I worship the correct god, and I can tell you exactly what will happen to you if you worship the wrong god, or no god, or the correct god incorrectly. My knowledge is perfect and incontrovertible... unless it looks like I'm wrong(which I cannot be), in which case my god works in 'mysterious ways.' They are all mysterious, of course, but I am nevertheless absolutely sure about the ones that send you to hell for asking!"

 

[Third Eye Open]

I really don't get the fine-tuning argument.

After reading Just Six Numbers by Martin Reese, about all the constants in the universe and how if they are changed even slightly, the whole universe goes kapow, I got a very different impression.

It made it look to me like the universe had just haphazardly fallen together, and is at the moment just barely balancing, and if we were to breath on it wrong it would all just fall apart.

 

[ImaginalDisc]

I really don't get the fine-tuning argument.

After reading Just Six Numbers by Martin Reese, about all the constants in the universe and how if they are changed even slightly, the whole universe goes kapow, I got a very different impression.

It made it look to me like the universe had just haphazardly fallen together, and is at the moment just barely balancing, and if we were to breath on it wrong it would all just fall apart.

I haven't read that book, but Neil DeGrasse Tyson made the opposite point. It seems a universe without the weak nuclear force wouldn't be appreciably different from ours, and even living things in this universe don't need gravity to live. So, if you knocked out two of the universal forces, it'd at least be habitable by living things from this universe.

 

[andyandy]

Not at all arbitrary. In fact it would be a direct consequence of a life-desiring designer. If the universe were constructed by a "life designer", then it would seem obvious that there would be more life in it. Otherwise it would appear that life were not an important criterion, but just "happened" here (or perhaps, in a few places).

There is no requirement for a life desiring designer to fill his universe with an arbitrarily imposed amount of life. Perhaps he thought the universe would look best with just one planet full? we have a universe in which life does exist, so one can hardly use that to demonstrate that a designer looking to design a universe in which life exists would not have chosen this one. It makes absolutely no sense to create an added constraint simply because you think that is what a god should have done....

In any case, it seems overwhelmingly likely that there will be an astronomical number of lifeforms throughout the universe, so I'm not sure of the merit of this line of argument.

If you had a clothes designer, then it would be obvious that the objects they designed would all (or at least mostly) be items you could wear. If it turned out that only a tiny percentage of their designs were wearable, then you could hardly call them a "clothes designer".

But this is the arbitrary imposition again. It would be like looking at a pond in a garden and deciding that a pond could not possibly been intended as part of the design because the majority of the garden is filled with flowers and trees. I don't see why the existence of a designer necessitates the sole motivation for the design as being the existence of an arbitrary amount of life.

True, but this concept of God is totally indistinguishable from "no god". In order to be called a "designer", then the designer must do something that can be identified as design. If no claims about God are made, then it would be incorrect to call that God a designer. That would be a claim.

God as cosmic originator certainly ticks the "God" box as far as I would be concerned.

Not that I think that such a god is required, but just to play devil's advocate

 

[andyandy]

I haven't read that book, but Neil DeGrasse Tyson made the opposite point. It seems a universe without the weak nuclear force wouldn't be appreciably different from ours, and even living things in this universe don't need gravity to live. So, if you knocked out two of the universal forces, it'd at least be habitable by living things from this universe.

But this does not address the 30 or so parameters which do require such fine tuning. As I have said already, this is not left Field science, but mainstream physics. This is the reason why the unfalsifiable multiverse theory is currently in vogue. And whilst occam's razor is so liberally employed on this forum, an explanation for the existence of one universe, requiring an infinite number more is not especially satisfactory. A hypothesis that simply requires two universes, and one alien intelligence to serve as cosmic originator does not I think fare too badly with reference to occam relative to the multi-verse theory.

 

[bokonon]

I'm inclined to reject the unfalsifiable multiverse theory for just that reason. I don't see that numerous universes are necessary to "up the odds" that we'll get one that's habitable. Until and unless such universes (or "heavy protons" or "light electrons" or "screw-top gravitons" or "planet kryptons") can be demonstrated, I'm perfectly content to say the one verifiable example is "evidence enough for now" that this is the way things have to be, and more evidence than anyone positing a multiverse has presented. No supernatural being, and no extraneous universe required.

 

[Robin]

What would a designed universe look like?

It is just a meaningless question. What does a designed anything look like?

I could design something to look undesigned so a designed anything could look undesigned.

Take a look at the Earth for example. Was there really no way an infinitely intelligent being wielding all power in existence could have designed a planet to generate the requisite magnetic field and still have a stable crust? Or failing that an intelligent species that could exist on a planet without a magnetic field?

But people will simply say "oh earthquakes were part of God's purpose", in other words the world was designed to look undesigned.

Take diseases. Was there really no way an infinitely intelligent being wielding all power in the universe could have designed a sentient species that was resistant to diseases like cancer?

But people simply say "oh, cancer is part of God's plan". In other words the biosphere was designed to look undesigned.

 

[Robin]

I'm inclined to reject the unfalsifiable multiverse theory for just that reason. I don't see that numerous universes are necessary to "up the odds" that we'll get one that's habitable. Until and unless such universes (or "heavy protons" or "light electrons" or "screw-top gravitons" or "planet kryptons") can be demonstrated, I'm perfectly content to say the one verifiable example is "evidence enough for now" that this is the way things have to be, and more evidence than anyone positing a multiverse has presented. No supernatural being, and no extraneous universe required.

If the choice were between "many universes" and "one universe coupled to super-mind" I would plump for the former.

But I am inclined to agree that on present knowledge we have need of neither hypothesis.

I would point out though, that if the observation is "one universe" then "many universes" is no more an extravagant conjecture than "exactly one universe".

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

It would have a version number.

~~ Paul

 

[Hindmost]

Oh what the heck - since this is probably one of the few last posts for a while for me. Let's derail this thread from the OP question.

My position: I believe the universe was created. I've never said it was designed in any manner that some here are taking it or Intelligent Design people seem to be taking it.

But I have heard lots of people use that argument against there being a God - including the most recent - which led to this thread. I have no further definition of "DESIGN" for this topic since I never use that term with God or creation.

Designed? I'm not even sure what that would mean for a God - who am I to judge? Some of your ideas are interesting though - thanks. I'll think on them. I haven't read any Intelligent Design arguments (other than some Fine Tuning observations) so I'm not sure what they are seeing. Maybe I'll look into them sometime.

I will give this a go...

Since I am a geeky engineer, you will get a limited viewpoint. Even though I haven't done much design work, I always had one thing on my mind...to get the design perfect. I wanted anything I did to be the best of the best.

fast forward.

I am creating a universe...a good one...the best. I have every ability that can be imagined. I can create matter, energy; I can define everything.

I would leave out earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes--essentially any natural disaster that could aimlessly harm innocent people.

Murder, rape, wars, famine, racism, horrible disease would not exist. There wouldn't be a word for violence.

If I was the creator, I would show up everynow and then--because I can do anything. Any prophecies I had would actually agree with science.

I would get it right.

The universe we have today has the design of an initial random event. The universe exploded into existence and then physics took over. Eventually, evolution took over. And here we are.

glenn

 

[Third Eye Open]

If I were God I'd get a bunch of slaves to do everything
Norwegian lesbians that feed me grapes and know how to sing

If I were God thou shall not wear tube socks with Flip-Flops
Thou shall sit and thou shall spin thou shall even wife swap
Thou shall resist the Olsen Twins, thou shall not cut "Footloose"
If I were God that's what I'd do, Heavens no

Hell yeah

 

[Robin]

My position: I believe the universe was created. I've never said it was designed in any manner that some here are taking it or Intelligent Design people seem to be taking it.

...

Designed? I'm not even sure what that would mean for a God - who am I to judge?

Oh, now that is an interesting distinction. What on earth do you think you mean by "created" in that case?

"Designed" would simply mean that the result of the creation was according to a prior intention. If you mean that no event in the universe since the big bang is the result of an intention by God then you are as much an Atheist as me.

 

[Robin]

It would have a version number.

~~ Paul

Presumably in our case a beta number.

 

[Hokulele]

Presumably in our case a beta number.

And the tech support would suck.

Oh, wait . . .

 

[schlitt]

I think a better question is: "What would a universe that formed under natural laws without a designer look like?"

This question is easy to answer.

 

[Robin]

And the tech support would suck.

"Thank you for holding, your prayer is important to us."