How Can We Have Laws of Science Without Design?

[emilynghiem]

I think the biggest road block is folks' inability to believe that there is a power greater than themselves and more intelligent than their finite minds and limited intelligence. Perhaps your earlier quote is right: not everyone is wired or "designed" to grasp what others have no problem grasping. In similar fashion, some folks can walk across a canyon on a high wire with ease while most others wouldn't even attempt it. They're not "wired" to overcome that sort of fear or they were gifted with that sort of balance and/or concentration level.

Perhaps, or it could be the other way.
That the wonders of the world and life seem so naturally given, self-existent by science,
not all people see any need to seek some personified God to attribute this to.

The most wonderful statement I ever heard on this vein
was by the humorist Tim Minchin in "Storm" poetically ranting against the anti-establishment ramblings
of a new age guest at dinner he feels is missing the whole point of science and life:

Tim Minchin's Storm the Animated Movie with subtitles | Amara

He asks "isn't it ENOUGH" -- Just this beautiful complex world?
Instead of being afraid there is a God, he asks are you "so afraid" that there may BE knowledge and explanations out there, waiting to
be discovered, that we COULD understand the workings of the world, instead of chalking it up to only an omnipotent God to know these things.

I like his presentation because he avoids the "Bill Maher" approach of "selectively" attacking religions and theists, and trying to defend atheism based on discrediting flaws in them, which
still does not prove or disprove anything about the existence or nature of God.

Personally, I find the "religious" issues are what atheists, nontheists and agnostics
have problems with. The same rules of science and life work regardless; it's these
religions that get in the way of discussing and agreeing on universal concepts and principles.

 

[hortysir]

We speak of laws of science that are discovered in scientific inquiry.

And yet all systems of laws are ordered and designed by their very nature.

So how does anyone that respects science not also recognize the design inherent in said laws?

The law of biogenesis comes to mind

 

[emilynghiem]

Hi Orogenic:

1.

Well, for one thing, human beings didn't exist during the big bang, or even for billions of years afterwards. So to suggest that we had a hand in creating the laws of physics is absurd. We didn't create them. We discovered them.

1. Yes, I see we are all in agreement that these laws were already in existence and operation, and humans merely developed our minds and language to communicate
and express these relationships in tangible form.

2.

And Jimbo. The fact that the universe is not here for us is a fundamental issue, so it is not a non-sequitur.

It I s a non sequitur to the discussion so far. You jump to a conclusion and claim it derives from what we observe but it does not and you have not made that case at all.

It most certainly does derive from what we can observe. The bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life, being composed of hard vacuum and deadly radiation. The fact that it was here for about 8.5 billion years before we evolved in the African rift valley is also solid evidence that the universe is not here for us. The fact that 99% of all life that has ever lived on Earth is already extinct indicates that the universe is not finely tuned for us. I could post a huge list of factoids explaining why it is not here for us, but I doubt if it will make any difference to you.[/QUOTE]

2. on that note, the world already existed before we entered the picture, and we entered the picture BEFORE we developed the ability to understand our existence and relationship with the rest of the world, including each other within humanity which we STILL have not totally mastered yet!

This does NOT mean that this MASTERY and UNDERSTANDING is NOT a key purpose in our existence as self-aware human beings. Just because we came into existence before fully mastering our understanding. Same with the world; just because it existed and went through billions of years of development doesn't mean the later stages of development are not the critical ones the whole process is working to fulfill.

The world is certainly not for us to take for granted, to trash the planet and pollute the air, thinking all the animals, fauna, and resources are solely for humans to do as we wish at our convenience.

However, the RELATIONSHIP between us and the world, UNDERSTANDING the laws of life, balance and harmony, this well may be what drives us as a key part of our purpose here.

As a science minded person, you may focus more on the laws of science to express the "relationships " in the world. for those who look at life using scriptural laws for wisdom and principles in life, these people may focus on the "relationship between man and God."

In either case, we are looking at the RELATIONSHIP between the individual and "collective" level. We may use different "laws" to describe this relationship, how it works, and how it stays in harmony, or the laws of cause and effect when balance is disrupted and recovered.

But regardless which system of laws or language we use,
we as humans are still seeking to define and agree on the principles
behind these RELATIONSHIPS. That seems to be a common purpose in people,
regardless if we follow a secular approach using science or civil laws and government, or a spiritual approach using religion and church structure. Ideally, shouldn't we agree how to use each system to provide benefits to humanity, so we make the most of all knowledge?

Why do these need to be in conflict? Why can't we focus where our principles agree?

 

[edthecynic]

We speak of laws of science that are discovered in scientific inquiry.

And yet all systems of laws are ordered and designed by their very nature.

So how does anyone that respects science not also recognize the design inherent in said laws?

But doesn't the Supernatural God violate all the natural laws?

 

[edthecynic]

We speak of laws of science that are discovered in scientific inquiry.

And yet all systems of laws are ordered and designed by their very nature.

So how does anyone that respects science not also recognize the design inherent in said laws?

Dang you. Quit making so much sense. You're gonna confuse the science community.

The Universe SCREAMS design.

I don't know what universe you are looking at, but as you look farther and farther into space you see explosions and collisions galore. If that kind of chaos screams "design" to you, I would never want you to design my house!

 

[edthecynic]

There is no reason that life should have to depend on the fine tuning that we have. There are literally hundreds of features to our universe, solar system and chemical behavior that if any *one* of them are significantly different life on Earth is GONE.

First of all, there is no "fine tuning." The Earth was very different in the past and will be very different in the future. As the Earth changes, life adapts to the changes. For example there are sulfur bacteria that need no sunlight and consume sulfur as food. Life can and does exist under the most extreme conditions on Earth. Life existed in various forms before mankind and will continue to exist after mankind is gone. Change the present conditions on Earth and life will not be "gone," it simply be different.

 

[orogenicman]

Hi Orogenic:

1.

Well, for one thing, human beings didn't exist during the big bang, or even for billions of years afterwards. So to suggest that we had a hand in creating the laws of physics is absurd. We didn't create them. We discovered them.

1. Yes, I see we are all in agreement that these laws were already in existence and operation, and humans merely developed our minds and language to communicate
and express these relationships in tangible form.

2.

And Jimbo. The fact that the universe is not here for us is a fundamental issue, so it is not a non-sequitur.

It I s a non sequitur to the discussion so far. You jump to a conclusion and claim it derives from what we observe but it does not and you have not made that case at all.

It most certainly does derive from what we can observe. The bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life, being composed of hard vacuum and deadly radiation. The fact that it was here for about 8.5 billion years before we evolved in the African rift valley is also solid evidence that the universe is not here for us. The fact that 99% of all life that has ever lived on Earth is already extinct indicates that the universe is not finely tuned for us. I could post a huge list of factoids explaining why it is not here for us, but I doubt if it will make any difference to you.

2. on that note, the world already existed before we entered the picture, and we entered the picture BEFORE we developed the ability to understand our existence and relationship with the rest of the world, including each other within humanity which we STILL have not totally mastered yet!

This does NOT mean that this MASTERY and UNDERSTANDING is NOT a key purpose in our existence as self-aware human beings. Just because we came into existence before fully mastering our understanding. Same with the world; just because it existed and went through billions of years of development doesn't mean the later stages of development are not the critical ones the whole process is working to fulfill.

The world is certainly not for us to take for granted, to trash the planet and pollute the air, thinking all the animals, fauna, and resources are solely for humans to do as we wish at our convenience.

However, the RELATIONSHIP between us and the world, UNDERSTANDING the laws of life, balance and harmony, this well may be what drives us as a key part of our purpose here.

As a science minded person, you may focus more on the laws of science to express the "relationships " in the world. for those who look at life using scriptural laws for wisdom and principles in life, these people may focus on the "relationship between man and God."

In either case, we are looking at the RELATIONSHIP between the individual and "collective" level. We may use different "laws" to describe this relationship, how it works, and how it stays in harmony, or the laws of cause and effect when balance is disrupted and recovered.

But regardless which system of laws or language we use,
we as humans are still seeking to define and agree on the principles
behind these RELATIONSHIPS. That seems to be a common purpose in people,
regardless if we follow a secular approach using science or civil laws and government, or a spiritual approach using religion and church structure. Ideally, shouldn't we agree how to use each system to provide benefits to humanity, so we make the most of all knowledge?

Why do these need to be in conflict? Why can't we focus where our principles agree?

You seem to think that there is some purpose or goal behind the evolution of life. Biologically, if not the only goal, at least the most important goal, in life is to reproduce, and thus perpetuate itself. It is the most conserved trait in all life forms. Everything else is just gravy. Conservatives don't get this.

 

[orogenicman]

There is no reason that life should have to depend on the fine tuning that we have. There are literally hundreds of features to our universe, solar system and chemical behavior that if any *one* of them are significantly different life on Earth is GONE.

Actually, there is no way we can know that because, although multiverses have been postulated, the universe in which we live is the only one we know of for certain, the only one on our graph. And as we all know, you need more than one data point to make a graph. Secondly, as I keep having to point out in these discussion, the bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life - much of it being composed of hard vacuum and penetrating radiation. And if you want to talk about stupid designs, I can talk about those for days.

 

[Montrovant]

So you think these 'laws', these conceptualizations of how the universe behaves, exist independently of human observation.

Now how does that happen? No laws exist without an author, so how did the conceptualizations come to exist?

And what I am saying is that when we describe the behavior of nature in specific concepts with words, we are actually putting our own understanding of these behaviors into concepts. We never perfectly understand them, so we are not describing true behavior of the universe but only our understanding of it. And yes, WE make that up.

The laws of physics are not the same as the laws humanity writes to govern itself.

Never said that they were the same, but they do have some close similarities or we would call them something other than 'laws'. These concepts we use to describe the behavior of the universe and call 'laws' exist independently of human observation, i.e. the law of gravity existed prior to being discovered by anyone. This is order, and design by definition.

Unless you want to get into a Schrodinger's cat type of discussion, our descriptions of our observations as laws does not effect the existence of what we observed. So the things we observe exist independent of us, and humanity creates the conceptualizations of those things.

So we come up not with the laws of the universe, but with our descriptions of those laws.

No, but our observations of sub atomic process does change the processes observed many times, and then there is the whole light wave slit experiment paradox where light shows different behavior if observed than if not observed by the human eye..

I don't know why you think the label used (in this case laws) is how the nature of a thing should be determined.

Would you be more comfortable if we instead used the word principles? How about truisms? If using the word laws is causing you issues, will a different word negate the argument?

That gravity existed prior to humanity in no way requires design.

As to the last part, I brought up Schrodinger's cat for a reason.....

 

[JimBowie1958]

I think the biggest road block is folks' inability to believe that there is a power greater than themselves and more intelligent than their finite minds and limited intelligence. Perhaps your earlier quote is right: not everyone is wired or "designed" to grasp what others have no problem grasping. In similar fashion, some folks can walk across a canyon on a high wire with ease while most others wouldn't even attempt it. They're not "wired" to overcome that sort of fear or they were gifted with that sort of balance and/or concentration level.

Perhaps, or it could be the other way.
That the wonders of the world and life seem so naturally given, self-existent by science,
not all people see any need to seek some personified God to attribute this to.

The most wonderful statement I ever heard on this vein
was by the humorist Tim Minchin in "Storm" poetically ranting against the anti-establishment ramblings
of a new age guest at dinner he feels is missing the whole point of science and life:

Tim Minchin's Storm the Animated Movie with subtitles | Amara

He asks "isn't it ENOUGH" -- Just this beautiful complex world?
Instead of being afraid there is a God, he asks are you "so afraid" that there may BE knowledge and explanations out there, waiting to
be discovered, that we COULD understand the workings of the world, instead of chalking it up to only an omnipotent God to know these things.

I like his presentation because he avoids the "Bill Maher" approach of "selectively" attacking religions and theists, and trying to defend atheism based on discrediting flaws in them, which
still does not prove or disprove anything about the existence or nature of God.

Personally, I find the "religious" issues are what atheists, nontheists and agnostics
have problems with. The same rules of science and life work regardless; it's these
religions that get in the way of discussing and agreeing on universal concepts and principles.

As well they should.

Scientists are so often like the teen ager who just cant wait to get the car keys while religion says, 'Not so fast, dude, there is more to this than your one drum band.'

If we left the science community to its own devices we would have human cloning research causing immeasurable damage to real people. We would have lab created human chimeras for research purposes, never mind the risk of cross over diseases and just the void of morality it would entail.

We need philosophers and theologians to ask the pertinent moral questions just as we need scientists to ask the naturalistic questions. And when they clash (in the main stream) it is usually the scientist at fault.

 

[JimBowie1958]

There is no reason that life should have to depend on the fine tuning that we have. There are literally hundreds of features to our universe, solar system and chemical behavior that if any *one* of them are significantly different life on Earth is GONE.

First of all, there is no "fine tuning." The Earth was very different in the past and will be very different in the future. As the Earth changes, life adapts to the changes. For example there are sulfur bacteria that need no sunlight and consume sulfur as food. Life can and does exist under the most extreme conditions on Earth. Life existed in various forms before mankind and will continue to exist after mankind is gone. Change the present conditions on Earth and life will not be "gone," it simply be different.

This isn't just about mankind, it is about ALL life would not exist without these fine tuned features to the universe. There wouldn't be any 'living through it'.

The way water bonds is an excellent example, the only dipole molecule to make the angle it does and so it expands on freezing instead of contracting further. This allows our planet a lot of range in temperature and to not eventually become a huge ice ball as the ice floats on the surface of our oceans, letting the sun eventually melt it.

etc, there are hundreds of little things like that, and I doubt you are familiar with many if any of them.

 

[JimBowie1958]

Hi Orogenic:

1.

Well, for one thing, human beings didn't exist during the big bang, or even for billions of years afterwards. So to suggest that we had a hand in creating the laws of physics is absurd. We didn't create them. We discovered them.

1. Yes, I see we are all in agreement that these laws were already in existence and operation, and humans merely developed our minds and language to communicate
and express these relationships in tangible form.

2.

It most certainly does derive from what we can observe. The bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life, being composed of hard vacuum and deadly radiation. The fact that it was here for about 8.5 billion years before we evolved in the African rift valley is also solid evidence that the universe is not here for us. The fact that 99% of all life that has ever lived on Earth is already extinct indicates that the universe is not finely tuned for us. I could post a huge list of factoids explaining why it is not here for us, but I doubt if it will make any difference to you.

2. on that note, the world already existed before we entered the picture, and we entered the picture BEFORE we developed the ability to understand our existence and relationship with the rest of the world, including each other within humanity which we STILL have not totally mastered yet!

This does NOT mean that this MASTERY and UNDERSTANDING is NOT a key purpose in our existence as self-aware human beings. Just because we came into existence before fully mastering our understanding. Same with the world; just because it existed and went through billions of years of development doesn't mean the later stages of development are not the critical ones the whole process is working to fulfill.

The world is certainly not for us to take for granted, to trash the planet and pollute the air, thinking all the animals, fauna, and resources are solely for humans to do as we wish at our convenience.

However, the RELATIONSHIP between us and the world, UNDERSTANDING the laws of life, balance and harmony, this well may be what drives us as a key part of our purpose here.

As a science minded person, you may focus more on the laws of science to express the "relationships " in the world. for those who look at life using scriptural laws for wisdom and principles in life, these people may focus on the "relationship between man and God."

In either case, we are looking at the RELATIONSHIP between the individual and "collective" level. We may use different "laws" to describe this relationship, how it works, and how it stays in harmony, or the laws of cause and effect when balance is disrupted and recovered.

But regardless which system of laws or language we use,
we as humans are still seeking to define and agree on the principles
behind these RELATIONSHIPS. That seems to be a common purpose in people,
regardless if we follow a secular approach using science or civil laws and government, or a spiritual approach using religion and church structure. Ideally, shouldn't we agree how to use each system to provide benefits to humanity, so we make the most of all knowledge?

Why do these need to be in conflict? Why can't we focus where our principles agree?

You seem to think that there is some purpose or goal behind the evolution of life. Biologically, if not the only goal, at least the most important goal, in life is to reproduce, and thus perpetuate itself. It is the most conserved trait in all life forms. Everything else is just gravy. Conservatives don't get this.

And abortion pushing libtards appreciate it even less, apparently.

 

[JimBowie1958]

There is no reason that life should have to depend on the fine tuning that we have. There are literally hundreds of features to our universe, solar system and chemical behavior that if any *one* of them are significantly different life on Earth is GONE.

Actually, there is no way we can know that because, although multiverses have been postulated, the universe in which we live is the only one we know of for certain, the only one on our graph. And as we all know, you need more than one data point to make a graph. Secondly, as I keep having to point out in these discussion, the bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life - much of it being composed of hard vacuum and penetrating radiation. And if you want to talk about stupid designs, I can talk about those for days.

We agree that the bulk of the universe is hostile to life. So what? Many items designed for one function have the bulk of their volumes not suitable for that function. Take an automobile sedan. The majority of its volume is not suitable for human driving, and yet, it is still designed for humans to drive them.

So the majority of the universe is not friendly to human life.
Woop-tee-doo.

I would expect that to a degree.

 

[JimBowie1958]

The laws of physics are not the same as the laws humanity writes to govern itself.

Never said that they were the same, but they do have some close similarities or we would call them something other than 'laws'. These concepts we use to describe the behavior of the universe and call 'laws' exist independently of human observation, i.e. the law of gravity existed prior to being discovered by anyone. This is order, and design by definition.

Unless you want to get into a Schrodinger's cat type of discussion, our descriptions of our observations as laws does not effect the existence of what we observed. So the things we observe exist independent of us, and humanity creates the conceptualizations of those things.

So we come up not with the laws of the universe, but with our descriptions of those laws.

No, but our observations of sub atomic process does change the processes observed many times, and then there is the whole light wave slit experiment paradox where light shows different behavior if observed than if not observed by the human eye..

I don't know why you think the label used (in this case laws) is how the nature of a thing should be determined.

Would you be more comfortable if we instead used the word principles? How about truisms? If using the word laws is causing you issues, will a different word negate the argument?

That gravity existed prior to humanity in no way requires design.

As to the last part, I brought up Schrodinger's cat for a reason.....

Again you miss or just avoid the point. The word law is not the critical item here, though it is a give away. The critical point is that these things we call laws are cognitive concepts that reflect the universe's behavior quite well, and in a way that accommodates the making of concepts to model them. These concepts that in science is thought of as undiscovered law is in a designed and highly organized system.

To talk about it, expand it and test that system while refusing to recognize its inherent design is simply ludicrous.

 

[orogenicman]

There is no reason that life should have to depend on the fine tuning that we have. There are literally hundreds of features to our universe, solar system and chemical behavior that if any *one* of them are significantly different life on Earth is GONE.

Actually, there is no way we can know that because, although multiverses have been postulated, the universe in which we live is the only one we know of for certain, the only one on our graph. And as we all know, you need more than one data point to make a graph. Secondly, as I keep having to point out in these discussion, the bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life - much of it being composed of hard vacuum and penetrating radiation. And if you want to talk about stupid designs, I can talk about those for days.

We agree that the bulk of the universe is hostile to life. So what? Many items designed for one function have the bulk of their volumes not suitable for that function. Take an automobile sedan. The majority of its volume is not suitable for human driving, and yet, it is still designed for humans to drive them.

So the majority of the universe is not friendly to human life.
Woop-tee-doo.

I would expect that to a degree.

You're really going to try to make an irreducible complexity argument here?

To a degree? What degree would you expect the universe to be inhospitable to life if it was designed FOR life? Is an entertainment complex placed adjacent to a sewage system a good design, or a stupid design?

Woop-tee-doo? The fact that the universe is utterly unfriendly to life is a death nell to the anthropic principle, which is what your argument supports.

 

[JimBowie1958]

Actually, there is no way we can know that because, although multiverses have been postulated, the universe in which we live is the only one we know of for certain, the only one on our graph. And as we all know, you need more than one data point to make a graph. Secondly, as I keep having to point out in these discussion, the bulk of the universe is utterly hostile to life - much of it being composed of hard vacuum and penetrating radiation. And if you want to talk about stupid designs, I can talk about those for days.

We agree that the bulk of the universe is hostile to life. So what? Many items designed for one function have the bulk of their volumes not suitable for that function. Take an automobile sedan. The majority of its volume is not suitable for human driving, and yet, it is still designed for humans to drive them.

So the majority of the universe is not friendly to human life.
Woop-tee-doo.

I would expect that to a degree.

You're really going to try to make an irreducible complexity argument here?

No, I am not. Do you see me even mentioning irreducible complexity?

To a degree? What degree would you expect the universe to be inhospitable to life if it was designed FOR life?

I would expect the majority of any system to support the primary function and not perform that function itself, much like most of the mass to a blender is not doing any blending, and the majority of the mass and volume of your sedan is not transporting people. None of this negates the fact that blenders are designed for blending and sedans designed to transport people.

Is an entertainment complex placed adjacent to a sewage system a good design, or a stupid design?

The location of the reproductive system and the urinary and excrement systems of the body in the bottom most area of the torso is good design. These systems use gravity to assist their function to a degree, and their location keeps their proclivity to infection away from the critical upper body areas. Great design.

Woop-tee-doo? The fact that the universe is utterly unfriendly to life is a death nell to the anthropic principle, which is what your argument supports.

It is not a fact that the universe is UTTERLY unfriendly to life or life would not be here.

The vast majority of the universe would appear to be hostile to life, but then again, we don't really know that for a fact either. It could be that most heavenly bodies have some form of life but we have not come to understand that yet.

 

[Montrovant]

Never said that they were the same, but they do have some close similarities or we would call them something other than 'laws'. These concepts we use to describe the behavior of the universe and call 'laws' exist independently of human observation, i.e. the law of gravity existed prior to being discovered by anyone. This is order, and design by definition.



No, but our observations of sub atomic process does change the processes observed many times, and then there is the whole light wave slit experiment paradox where light shows different behavior if observed than if not observed by the human eye..

I don't know why you think the label used (in this case laws) is how the nature of a thing should be determined.

Would you be more comfortable if we instead used the word principles? How about truisms? If using the word laws is causing you issues, will a different word negate the argument?

That gravity existed prior to humanity in no way requires design.

As to the last part, I brought up Schrodinger's cat for a reason.....

Again you miss or just avoid the point. The word law is not the critical item here, though it is a give away. The critical point is that these things we call laws are cognitive concepts that reflect the universe's behavior quite well, and in a way that accommodates the making of concepts to model them. These concepts that in science is thought of as undiscovered law is in a designed and highly organized system.

To talk about it, expand it and test that system while refusing to recognize its inherent design is simply ludicrous.

I'm not missing the point. I think you may be, though.

While the universe may well have been designed, the fact that it functions in the way it does is not objective evidence of design.

Your argument is that only complete and utter chaos can exist without some form of intelligent design; that any kind of order or regularity must be the result of conscious decision. That is not an objective, provable truth.

Whether one believes in a designer for the universe or not, the fact of the universe's existence does not provide any answers to that argument one way or another.

 

[orogenicman]

We agree that the bulk of the universe is hostile to life. So what? Many items designed for one function have the bulk of their volumes not suitable for that function. Take an automobile sedan. The majority of its volume is not suitable for human driving, and yet, it is still designed for humans to drive them.

So the majority of the universe is not friendly to human life.
Woop-tee-doo.

I would expect that to a degree.

You're really going to try to make an irreducible complexity argument here?

No, I am not. Do you see me even mentioning irreducible complexity?



I would expect the majority of any system to support the primary function and not perform that function itself, much like most of the mass to a blender is not doing any blending, and the majority of the mass and volume of your sedan is not transporting people. None of this negates the fact that blenders are designed for blending and sedans designed to transport people.

And what, exactly do you suppose the primary function of the universe is?

Is an entertainment complex placed adjacent to a sewage system a good design, or a stupid design?

The location of the reproductive system and the urinary and excrement systems of the body in the bottom most area of the torso is good design. These systems use gravity to assist their function to a degree, and their location keeps their proclivity to infection away from the critical upper body areas. Great design.

Really? And you don't see a disease issue with these functions being adjacent to one another (not to mention the ick factor)? No engineer would design it that way. If you don't see a problem here, you are probably the only one who doesn't.

Woop-tee-doo? The fact that the universe is utterly unfriendly to life is a death nell to the anthropic principle, which is what your argument supports.

It is not a fact that the universe is UTTERLY unfriendly to life or life would not be here.

The vast majority of the universe would appear to be hostile to life, but then again, we don't really know that for a fact either. It could be that most heavenly bodies have some form of life but we have not come to understand that yet.

Yes we do know. The vast majority of the universe is composed of hard vacuum and deadly radiation, both of which are utterly destructive to life. And Jimbo, most of the mass of the universe is found inside stars. You aren't trying to argue that there is life inside such raging infernos, are you? Because if you are, that is, at best, a very weak argument, and unsupported one at that.

 

[edthecynic]

There is no reason that life should have to depend on the fine tuning that we have. There are literally hundreds of features to our universe, solar system and chemical behavior that if any *one* of them are significantly different life on Earth is GONE.

First of all, there is no "fine tuning." The Earth was very different in the past and will be very different in the future. As the Earth changes, life adapts to the changes. For example there are sulfur bacteria that need no sunlight and consume sulfur as food. Life can and does exist under the most extreme conditions on Earth. Life existed in various forms before mankind and will continue to exist after mankind is gone. Change the present conditions on Earth and life will not be "gone," it simply be different.

This isn't just about mankind, it is about ALL life would not exist without these fine tuned features to the universe. There wouldn't be any 'living through it'.

The way water bonds is an excellent example, the only dipole molecule to make the angle it does and so it expands on freezing instead of contracting further. This allows our planet a lot of range in temperature and to not eventually become a huge ice ball as the ice floats on the surface of our oceans, letting the sun eventually melt it.

etc, there are hundreds of little things like that, and I doubt you are familiar with many if any of them.

Again, there is more life than human life that can survive at extremes human life can't. There are thousands of examples, and I doubt you are familiar with many if any of them.

 

[edthecynic]

The vast majority of the universe is composed of hard vacuum and deadly radiation, both of which are utterly destructive to life.

Not all life!

Ultraviolet lighting is integral for the growth and maintenance of many reptile and amphibian species. In fact, in many home terrariums, many diseases seen by veterinarians are attributed to ultraviolet lighting deficiencies!