Fine tuning of the Universe

[Mr.Badham]

I'm confused, because it seems like the argument could go both ways.

Either the universe is fine tuned for life, and therefore is full of it, or only Earth is fine tuned for life, and the rest of the universe will have none of it.

I want theists to take a stand right here and say;

The universe is fine tuned, and is full of life.

Or

The Earth is fine tuned, the rest of the universe has none of it.

Then I want you to stake your religiosity on it. If you make the claim, one way or the other, and are shown to be wrong, you will then become an atheist.

If you are not willing to do this, I would like you to proclaim that the argument is bogus, and should never be used.

You have 1 of 3 options;
The universe is full of life.
Only earth has life.
The fine tuning argument is bogus and should never be used.

[Divine Insight]

The fine tuning argument is bogus and should never be used.

You got me. I surrender. It's a bogus argument.

[Mr.Badham]

The fine tuning argument is bogus and should never be used.

You got me. I surrender. It's a bogus argument.

Sweet!!

Next argument?

[Divine Insight]

Next argument?

The Bible tells us that God spoke from a cloud proclaiming Jesus to be his only begotten son. Since the universe isn't fined tuned for life it's probably not fine tuned for speaking from clouds either. Therefore the voice from the cloud must have been from God.

Q.E.D.

[Box Whatbox]

But we are 'speaking from a cloud' every time we use the interwebs! (Maybe the Turin Shroud was the proto-Facebook?

[Wootah]

[Replying to post 1 by Mr.Badham]

Life on another planet especially human level intelligence on another planet would be an issue for my faith.

At the moment the science says life is only here.

How is the fine tuning argument in trouble?

[Divine Insight]

[Replying to post 1 by Mr.Badham]

Life on another planet especially human level intelligence on another planet would be an issue for my faith.

At the moment the science says life is only here.

How is the fine tuning argument in trouble?

How can you not see the problem?

If the argument is that the universe is fine tuned for life, then why should there only be life on earth? If the universe is fine tuned for life then life should be everywhere all through the universe.

[Wootah]

[Replying to post 7 by Divine Insight]

Do you think life has to be able to survive in a vacuum or in the sun?

In certain conditions life appears to be able exist and where those conditions exist life might exist there. If we find another planet like ours we can hypothetically go there and exist there.

[Divine Insight]

[Replying to post 7 by Divine Insight]

Do you think life has to be able to survive in a vacuum or in the sun?

In certain conditions life appears to be able exist and where those conditions exist life might exist there. If we find another planet like ours we can hypothetically go there and exist there.

But that's the whole point isn't it?

If the universe itself is fine tuned for life then it should be easy to find more earth-like planets.

And this is especially true if the universe is fine tuned for human life.

[Box Whatbox]

Humanity has only very recently developed the technology to begin searching for exoplanets. Already a lot have been found,http://exoplanets.org/, even though we have so far only been able to examine a tiny fraction of the universe.

It's beginning to confirm what Laplace showed mathematically two centuries ago; that , given a large region of random stuff, and Newton's laws of motion, something similar to our solar system is the most probable outcome.
We are not yet at the stage where we can tell whether any of these exoplanets have life on them.

I don't think it's relevant to the religious debate; either God made life on all the planets that could sustain life, for reasons we 'don't understand' or, out of all the possibilities, God chose to make life on just one planet, for reasons we 'don't understand', or (my own guess) life is what happens if the conditions are right. In our universe, the conditions mat well be right on a lot of planets.

I have never thought that the fine-tuning concept had any relevance to the question of God's existence, and I don't understand why so many theists present it as evidence of a Creator, except that it has a great 'woo' factor.
50 years ago the 'woo' factor was quantum physics; a hundred years ago it was electromagnetism. Now it's fine-tuning.