Re: Fine Tuned Intelligent Design - should it be taught in schools?

[Robert Charleston <rc3673@student.open.ac.uk>]

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Hello everybody!

My paper on fine-tuning is now online at:

http://www.bups.org/fft_bupc05.pdf

If you don't know what we're talking about, weren't at the conference, or
don't want to download the whole paper without knowing what it's about
(though it's very small), I have copied the first page at the bottom of
this email, just as a taste-tester. I hope you find it interesting.

This version is a very slightly-modified version of the paper I gave at
the British Undergraduate Philosophy Conference 2005 in Durham. The
changes are really just a couple of extra lines in the 'secret agent'
example and a few words on falsifiability, plus a little general ironing.

My papers are now in, general BUPS admin stuff is at least known about
(rather than tremendous, scary unidentified mountain of last week) so I'm
now back on the scene. Thank you very, very much to people who have
emailed me comments in person or on the list. You are all stars, and I
really appreciate the questions. I will make sure every one gets a reply.

------------------------------------

Fine fine-tuning: Why schools should teach intelligent design

This is the story of some thinking I?ve been doing, and the rather
surprising conclusion it led me to. Arguments for Intelligent Design have
been in the news again, with President Bush commenting that he thinks the
possibility that the world and the creatures in it are designed things
ought to be mentioned in schools, and the Kentucky State education board
considering the same. There have, of course, been widespread condemnations
of these proposals from inside academia and the thoughtful classes, and
from many journalists. What got me thinking was first that most of this
has focused on the weaker, older argument for design ? that of William
Paley from the 18th Century, also known as the watchmaker argument ? which
is not seriously pursued by anyone anymore as far as I know, apart from a
few Bible literalists in America; and second that the responses to Bush
and the Kentucky proposal have been brief, mocking, but strangely lacking
in any clear statement of why such an idea is ridiculous. It does seem an
extre
mely antediluvian position, and so it was with a quiet a sense of
confidence that I sat down to formulate and articulate the reasons why it
is antiquated, superseded and safe to condemn. The problem is that I?ve
thrown pretty much everything I?ve got at the modern argument for design ?
also known as fine-tuning ? and if I?m honest with myself and my
arguments, I can?t knock it down. So we?ll see if you can tell me where
I?m going wrong, or what I?ve missed.

The modern argument for design ? fine-tuning ? concentrates on the
formation of the universe we live in at the time of the big bang.
Interestingly, it has been driven and formulated not by philosophers but
by scientists ? specifically astrophysicists and physicists. The basic
argument is deceptively simple. The behaviour and nature of our universe
is governed by physical constants and variables. Some of these are tied
together, such as the density of something being defined (almost caused,
in a very loose sense of the word) by its mass and size: the more massive,
or smaller something becomes, the higher its density. Others are cut free,
not discernibly defined by anything else that we can identify, arbitrary:
such as the amount of matter in the universe. There could have been more
of it, or less of it. The number quantifying it could have been bigger or
smaller in a way that Pi ? defined by the ratio of a circle?s
circumference to its diameter ? is fixed and could not.

In fact, there are about 20 such apparently arbitrary numbers describing
the fundamental make-up of our universe ? from the amount of matter in it,
to the force of the explosion that was the big bang, to the exact strength
with which the nuclei of atoms attract one another. There doesn?t seem to
be any reason for these numbers having the values they do. Physicists have
been extremely surprised when they have successfully measured them. Not
only does it seem reasonable to say they could have been different, but
from scientific data gathered in the past, they were expected to be
different from what they are.

But here?s the crux of the matter: if any of these 20 numbers were
different by even the very smallest of fractions, we would not be here
today. Our evolutionary, biological past would have been impossible.
Nothing even vaguely like us could have arisen anywhere in the universe.
The coincidence of all 20 numbers being within such a narrow knife-edge
range of toleration was too much for even lifelong atheist scientists such
as Fred Hoyle and Russell Stannard. The sheer unlikeliness of it all
coming together, they argued, shows that this universe was deliberately
fine-tuned.

It is precisely this idea that I?ve been trying to convincingly dismiss.



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