Saturday, April 10, 2010

Mapping the Fine-Tuning Argument

I'm thinking about starting a series. Luke Muelhauser over at Common Sense Atheism has been running a series called "Mapping the Kalam". I'm thinking about doing a similar series: "Mapping the Fine-Tuning Argument".

The idea would be to start out with purely logical/philosophical objections to the argument and then work our way into objections that have more to do with physics.

I'm aware of the multiverse objections (including Lee Smolin's cosmological natural selection hypothesis). I've also made a short laundry list of various other objections I know about it. But until I get the series up and running, I'd like my readers to post (in the comments) all the objections you know of, and preferably include a source for who argued the claim (a philosophical paper, book, etc.).

1 comment:

Samphire said...

I think that the puddle argument is as good a refutation as any other.

The FTA is based upon ignorance. We simply do not know if this is the only universe or one of a near infinity of universes or perhaps one that goes round the back of itself and pops out anew through a hole in its middle - each new universe having different characteristics to the others. Who knows?

A better argument is: if a good God, why mosquitos?

I like Sam Harris's comment. Why is God particularly concerned about this one species of mammal on this insignificant planet in the middle of nowhere and, in particular, what it does when it takes its clothes off.