

Ok lets end this anthropic principle crap now - samh
http://www.samonsoftware.com/?p=134

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albertsun
It sounds like what he's talking about is the weak anthropic principle, that
if the universe were any other way we wouldn't be here and able to observe it,
and so it must be that way.

The pebble analogy doesn't really hold true for that.

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IsaacSchlueter
Agreed.

It's not clear if the OP knows what "anthropomorphic" means. It's not the same
as "anthropic".

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samh
I meant anthropic, and have changed the post and link title.

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nopassrecover
This has been a personal bugbear of mine for a while. The anthropic principle
is science's equivalent of the "God did it" card and is invoked anytime people
test the limits of existing models.

Take for example this extract from the wiki
article(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle>)

Roger Penrose explained the weak form as follows:

    
    
        "The argument can be used to explain why the conditions happen to be just right for the existence of (intelligent) life on the earth at the present time.
        For if they were not just right, then we should not have found ourselves to be here now, but somewhere else, at some other appropriate time. 
        This principle was used very effectively by Brandon Carter and Robert Dicke to resolve an issue that had puzzled physicists for a good many years. 
        The issue concerned various striking numerical relations that are observed to hold between the physical constants (the gravitational constant, the mass of the proton, the age of the universe, etc.). 
        A puzzling aspect of this was that some of the relations hold only at the present epoch in the earth's history, so we appear, coincidentally, to be living at a very special time (give or take a few million years!). 
        This was later explained, by Carter and Dicke, by the fact that this epoch coincided with the lifetime of what are called main-sequence stars, such as the sun. 
        At any other epoch, so the argument ran, there would be no intelligent life around in order to measure the physical constants in question-so the coincidence had to hold, simply because there would be intelligent life around only at the particular time that the coincidence did hold!"
        The Emperor's New Mind, Chapter 10
    

Rather than create a model of how this coincidence occurs, it is simply
ignored as "well it had to occur or we couldn't talk about it". For example,
this coincidence may occur because we somehow derive our relational
understandings and measurements from universal constants in the first place.

You can certainly derive something from the fact that we (life) exist but when
you explain away observations with a simple "well we couldnt be here to talk
about it otherwise" you are implying one of the following:

1\. There is a design to the universe

2\. The universe as it is is inevitable

3\. Every possible combination of variables has existed or does exist and we
are simply the result of the law of large numbers.

Either way there is some burden of proof.

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praptak
The king went through a village and was amazed to see shooting targets painted
everywhere - fences, walls, trees. Exactly in the middle of each target was an
arrow.

"Wow, the greatest archer in the whole kingdom must live here" thought the
King to himself. Soon he spotted a man carrying a bow and some arrows.
Pointing to the targets and arrows the King asked the man "Have you shot all
of them?". "Yes" replied the man. "How did you manage to do that?" "Simple"
replied the man "It's not that hard if you shoot before painting the target."

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gort
"He then thinks, Wow the chances of me picking up a pebble at random that has
this weight and this diameter are tiny"

Meh. The difference between anthropic thinking and the pebble example is that,
without the universe being the way it is, I wouldn't even be here to see it.
This is a relevant difference.

ETA: Another relevant difference is this: the amazing thing is not that the
universe has precisely the physical constants that it has. The amazing thing
is that it has _any_ physical constants suitable for conscious observers.

~~~
mquander
Not if you rephrase the argument. Regarding the pebble, one might say that no
matter which pebble he chose, its measurements would be unique and equally
"unlikely." Similarly, no matter which universe we could ever observe
ourselves in, it would have equally "unlikely" parameters enabling us to live
in it.

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gort
"no matter which universe we could ever observe ourselves in"

But you can't just assume that our existence is necessary. We might not have
existed at all.

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samh
Any universe in which a thinking being exists will be suited to the existence
of that thinking being.

No one can claim "isn't it suprising that the universe suits me" because
anyone who can say it, can say it :)

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jibiki
Any universe in which I win powerball 10 times in a row will be suited to me
winning powerball 10 times in a row.

I can't claim "isn't it suprising that I won powerball 10 times in a row"
because anyone who can say it, can say it :)

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dablya
Do you know how unlikely you are to win 10 times in a row? The odds of you
winning 10 times in a row are exactly the same as the odds demonstrated by the
results of the last 10 times powerball was run.

Do you find the results of last 10 powerball runs surprising?

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teilo
What this says to me is that the argument is fruitless, whether you are an
IDer, or a "new athiest". So let's stop using it.

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nopassrecover
Except that the argument is used as part of science not just religious
discussions.

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samh
I modified the title to Anthropic on the post and here.

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boredguy8
I thought this was going to be a post about people who over-use "Information
wants to be free/anthropomporphized." That would have been worth reading,
perhaps.

Clearly NHN

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hc
i'd say you nailed it here

