Looking for best refutation of the "finely tuned universe"

[skepticalbip]

Just like the tornado where people may be ripped apart or crushed.

It hasn't hurt me.

All is perfectly tuned.

Good defense for Christains or other sociopaths, i suppose, but most evangelicals don't like to say it so expressly.

Although I did hear an army Chaplin say that seeing others in your squad killed and you spared proves god was protecting you. This brought smiles to many of us thinking, "WTF this god doesn't give a shit about those others."

 

[untermensche]

Just like the tornado where people may be ripped apart or crushed.

It hasn't hurt me.

All is perfectly tuned.

Good defense for Christains or other sociopaths, i suppose, but most evangelicals don't like to say it so expressly.

I'm just saying it isn't a convincing argument to somebody who thinks they don't have to feel sorrow because their god has everything under control.

 

[Keith&Co.]

somebody who thinks they don't have to feel sorrow because their god has everything under control.

Yeah, i got that. I was agreeing with you.
Although i'd say 'under control for their personal benefit.'

 

[Rhea]

What would a universe that was poorly tuned for life look like? Would it be filled with lots of deadly ways to kill living things? Would it be nearly completely inhospitable? Would it take billions of years for 'life' to be develop enough to be smugly pleased that everything was designed for its own benefit?

If a company released a product on the market that was as finely-tuned as the universe, it would be buried into oblivion with class-action lawsuits.

I think this one is the best fit for an internet discussion. Because really, yeah - answer this before I can even tell if you're speaking human words.

 

[Brian63]

There are a lot of good responses and refutations mentioned already in this thread, and I just want to add that if you are having a discussion about this topic with another person, you are probably better off mentioning several different rebuttals rather than just 1 or 2. The more, the better (to an extent). Having multiple of them that you mention will make you appear better prepared, more serious, and more informed about the topic. If you instead mention just 1 though for instance, that other person will probably see it more as an emotional reaction of yours rather than an intellectual one (which is how they are conditioned to view us in the first place), and you are just clinging to that argument. So mentioning several different rebuttals and flaws in the finely-tuned universe argument is better than mentioning just a single one, as it will make it appear that you have a generally worthy case against it. Appearances matter so much to them, even though they likely are unaware of that effect on themselves.

To everyone's recommendations so far, I will just add a discussion we had here a few years ago on a related topic that may assist you---

Fine tuning vs. intelligent design---contradictory?

It would only really work though if your friend believes in intelligent design. If they are more liberal and believed evolution, it would not apply much (maybe a little, just not a lot).

Good luck,

Brian

 

[braces_for_impact]

Universe finely tuned? Hell even earth isn't finely tuned, and this is the only place we've found life so far. Drop a naked human randomly on the planet and the odds are they'll be dead shortly.

 

[James Brown]

Universe finely tuned? Hell even earth isn't finely tuned, and this is the only place we've found life so far. Drop a naked human randomly on the planet and the odds are they'll be dead shortly.

Yep. "If our universe is so finely tuned for life, then why is life in our universe so rare?"

Imagine a giant iceberg entirely sterile, and somewhere on the iceberg sits a mote of dust, and on that mote of dust dwells a single bacterium. Who would then conclude that A) the iceberg was designed to support life and B) that the iceberg was designed especially for the benefit of the bacterium?

 

[Terrell]

Is this the only universe that ever existed? If not, how many others are there, and how many different universes didn't have life, how many do/did, besides our own? If ours is the only one, either in existence or with life, how do we rule out random chance? As other posters have pointed out, why is so much of the Universe uninhabitable by life as we'd understand it? Is there life out there that we might not recognize as life? "It's life Jim, but not as we know it" ~Spock, comes to mind.

 

[Shadowy Man]

If there is a god who fine-tuned the universe to be the way it is, he's a hell of a lot smarter than that guy we read about in the Bible.

 

[skepticalbip]

Imagine a giant iceberg entirely sterile, and somewhere on the iceberg sits a mote of dust, and on that mote of dust dwells a single bacterium. Who would then conclude that A) the iceberg was designed to support life and B) that the iceberg was designed especially for the benefit of the bacterium?

Why else would that ice berg be there if not to support that bacterium? C'mon use a little logic.

 

[Bronzeage]

I've read several. I'm looking for one to to explain to someone else. Thanks. Links appreciated.

Imagine a universe that was finely tuned. It would be made up of various bodies and gases, all influenced by the gravity of one another, in mathematically precise patterns. Now imagine our universe as it is and compare the two models.

 

[bilby]

I've read several. I'm looking for one to to explain to someone else. Thanks. Links appreciated.

Imagine a universe that was finely tuned. It would be made up of various bodies and gases, all influenced by the gravity of one another, in mathematically precise patterns. Now imagine our universe as it is and compare the two models.

Imagine an automobile engine; it is made up of various wheels and interlocking parts, all turning about one another. Now imagine your wristwatch as it is and compare the two models.

If your argument implies that ours is a finely tuned universe, then mine implies that your wristwatch is an automobile engine.

It must be a struggle to walk around with that on your wrist

 

[Atheos]

What is so stupid about the FTA in my opinion is the idea that a creator god with no limits on its power would be constrained in any way to fine tune anything. According to the very proponents of this bizarre claim this god exists already in some form that doesn't even require the existence of this "fine tuned for life" universe, thus completely nuking the ridiculous claim that somehow this universe is fine tuned for life. The very premise of the argument rests on the idea that the universe is not necessary for life to exist.

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

What would a universe that was poorly tuned for life look like? Would it be filled with lots of deadly ways to kill living things? Would it be nearly completely inhospitable? Would it take billions of years for 'life' to be develop enough to be smugly pleased that everything was designed for its own benefit?

This is the best I have seen.

 

[Bronzeage]

Imagine a universe that was finely tuned. It would be made up of various bodies and gases, all influenced by the gravity of one another, in mathematically precise patterns. Now imagine our universe as it is and compare the two models.

Imagine an automobile engine; it is made up of various wheels and interlocking parts, all turning about one another. Now imagine your wristwatch as it is and compare the two models.

If your argument implies that ours is a finely tuned universe, then mine implies that your wristwatch is an automobile engine.

It must be a struggle to walk around with that on your wrist

That would entirely depend upon the mass of the nearest object larger than an automobile engine.

In any case, we can't use words such as "finely tuned" to describe our universe because we haven't seen it's counterpart, the coarsely tuned universe. We construct a mental image which models what we believe we see and to our astonishment, everything works exactly as we perceive it. It's impossible to pass judgment on the universe without introducing human prejudice into the matter. For myself, I would think a few more Class M planets within a reasonable distance would be very nice, but getting them just the right distance from the Sun to maintain the temperature range of liquid water is the tricky bit. If not for that little bit of astrothermodymanics, we wouldn't be here to wonder whether or not we got the best possible deal.

 

[Atheos]

What would a universe that was poorly tuned for life look like? Would it be filled with lots of deadly ways to kill living things? Would it be nearly completely inhospitable? Would it take billions of years for 'life' to be develop enough to be smugly pleased that everything was designed for its own benefit?

This is the best I have seen.

I don't know, as an apologist I would have simply countered that the support infrastructure necessary to foster life mandated a universe where vast stretches of what looked like wasteland all serve their purposes. We may not yet understand the relationship between a pulsar billions of light years away and how it serves in its own way to enhance the life-friendly characteristics of our universe, but that doesn't mean that the relationship doesn't exist. I'd conclude with a passionate appeal to how much God loves us that he was willing to bring forth all of this to provide us with a home.

It's a bullshit argument once you lay it alongside the claim that god and all the other pre-universe minions didn't need this universe in order to live, but that's why many creationists wear specially crafted blinders. Helps focus on one argument without being distracted by the absurdity revealed in the next.