Stay up-to-date via RSS!

Explain the ‘fine-tuning’ version of the teleological argument. Then argue for whether or not it supports the rationality of theism.

♦

I shall argue that, while it might support the rationality of believing there is an explanation, the fine-tuning version of the teleological argument does not support the rationality of granting any particular explanation – e.g. theism – precedence.

Teleological arguments hinge upon certain attributes of natural phenomena being evidential of intentional purposiveness. Very crudely put; just as a painting must have a painter, so must the creation have a creator. Of course there is far between this simplistic reasoning and its more sophisticated kinship; most importantly, the replacement of question begging with a rationale for why said attributes are indicative of design.

One such common rationale is the improbability of an attribute emerging by blind chance as opposed to the greater likelihood of its emergence by conscious agency. This is the driving force of the fine-tuning version. The improbable attribute to be explained is the structured order of the universal laws. Particularly the emphasis is on their apparent finely tuned suitability to intelligent life.

When faced with this imposing list [of such “happy cosmic accidents.”], it’s shocking to find how many of the familiar constants of the universe lie within a very narrow band that makes life possible (Kaku, 2006, p. 247).

.

An existing universal lawmaker, who desired intelligent life, would be a perfectly reasonable explanation for why the laws allow it. Nonetheless, while certainly true, this immediately raises the question of why we should grant intelligent life the privilege of being such an end-goal. A much-used defence against the strong anthropic principle – stating that the universe had to permit the emergence of observers (Le Poidevin, 1996, p. 59) – is simply to turn it into a weak one. Perhaps most famously expressed by Douglas Adams:

[it] is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, ‘This is an interesting world I find myself in – an interesting hole I find myself in – fits me rather neatly, doesn’t it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it! (Digital Biota 2, 1998)’

However, Adams’ quip contains more than the superficial banality of a mere weak anthropic ‘wherever you go, there you are!’ If the hole is analogous to the universe and its shape represents one possible permutation of its laws, then Adams is entertaining the notion of observer-emergence independent of any particular permutation – i.e. a puddle would form snugly in any hole. Granted, such speculation of alternative biochemistry – e.g. non-carbon based life – is unverifiable science fiction. However, while the atheist cannot claim hypothetical alternative life-permitting universes, neither can the theist claim its negation. Though the recent discovery of fungi living on gamma radiation (Calvo, 2002) leaves something to be said for the potentiality of unlimited strangeness in life, it is fair to say that the latter assumption might not be as speculative as the former. Then again, the former is not being used as a premise for an even more speculative conclusion.

By no means is the argument unsalvageable, however, since it is unclear why it should require the strong anthropic principle. After all, the improbable attribute under consideration is the ordered structure of the laws – not their alleged purpose. It is easily imaginable then that conscious observers are just a by-product of God’s true purpose for creation. Presumably if God desired a universe containing black holes then it would have to include matter dense enough to allow gravitational singularities and carbon-based life alike. It is perhaps not as intuitively comforting as to believe all to be for one’s own benefit. But who would presume certainty that a supreme being does not fancy black holes over humans?

Could we then explain the improbability of our universal laws by altering our newly formulated strong black hole principle into a weaker version as with its anthropic counterpart? It seems unlikely without invoking modal realism or fecund universes theory. Accepting the actual existence of many worlds in order to escape the existence of God seems arbitrarily discriminatory (unless you are a quantum physicist and therefore believe that there is bona fide evidence for a multiverse). However – as with our previous considerations of alternative biochemistry – it is not necessary to grant any veracity to these speculations. Their mere conceivability still acts as a wedge between the premises of the fine-tuning argument and its conclusion.

The theist could still insist on an inference to the best explanation. Yet it remains to be seen why God’s agency is any better an explanation than the rest. The accuracy of such an inference depends on our knowledge of (i) preferably all – or at the very least most – of the possible explanations and (ii) the conditional framework in which they are competing to assess them against. We do not know (i) because it could be almost any imaginable or unimaginable thing. Neither do we know (ii) because we are attempting to explain the origin of the very framework with which we normally assess such matters.

One could say that the best explanation is the most probable one. However – as Le Poidevin argues in Arguing for Atheism (1996, pp. 49-54) – this is amenable to exactly the same critique:

[…] if the probability of events is determined in part by the laws of physics, what can it mean to talk of the probability of the laws of physics themselves? (loc. cit.)

.

After being stripped of the persuasive lure of appeals to design or probability, the fine-tuning argument is left to fend only with measly demands of ‘…but surely the universe did not originate arbitrarily? Why precisely these laws?’ These are perfectly valid concerns and few people think the universe ‘just happened.’ But atheism does not commit to that. It is disingenuous to present the issue as if one must either accept arbitrariness or God.

It is true that if God exists then the likelihood of a human existence is greater than not. However, as we have explored the same is true for any number of speculative explanations – with the added worry of those we have yet to think of. Inasmuch as the fine-tuning argument supports the rationality of any belief, it can only support that there is an explanation. To go from there to the assertion of God as the explanation to the exclusion of other possibilities is a textbook example of a fallacious ‘God of the gaps’ argument.

♦

I find it hard to believe that anybody would ever use the anthropic principle if he had a better explanation for something. I’ve yet, for example, to hear an anthropic principle of world history (Guth, Alan, cf. Lightman, 1990, p. 479).

.

Bibliography

Books:

Kaku, Michio, Parallel Worlds: The science of alternative universes and our future in the cosmos, (Penguin Books: London, GB, 2006)

Le Poidevin, Robin, Arguing for Atheism: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, (Routledge: New York, US, 1996)

Lightman, Alan, and Roberta Brawer, Origins: The Lives and Worlds of Modern
Cosmologists, (Harvard University Press: Cambridge, Mass, 1990)

Journals:

Calvo, Ana M. Et al. “Relationship between secondary metabolism and fungal development”, Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews (September 2002) p. 447-459, Vol. 66, No. 3

Web Pages:

Adams, Douglas, “Is there an Artificial God?” (speech), Digital Biota 2 (September 1998), URL = < http://www.biota.org/people/douglasadams/>.

Ratzsch, Del, “Teleological Arguments for God’s Existence”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/teleological-arguments/>.

Lecture slides:

Lecture 7: Analyzing Teleological Arguments.

Explain either the temporal or modal version of the cosmological argument.  Then argue for whether it is or is not a sound argument for the existence of God.

♦

Intention

In this essay I shall argue that the modal version of the cosmological argument for the existence of God is either not sound or not a problem for atheism.

Briefly on the Concept of ‘God’

For the purpose of this essay I assume that by ‘God’ we mean a sentient entity in possession of all the classical omni- characteristics. However, it should be noted that any sentient force, which could be said to have brought about the world, as we know it, would do. Admittedly, as religious commentator, Alan Watts, says in one of his lectures ‘sophisticated Christians [...] think beyond images’ and ‘[do] not imagine that God is a cosmic male parent with a white beard sitting on a golden throne above the stars (Watts, 1996, p. 74).’ Suffice it to say that if by ‘God’ we do not even refer to a personal creator but something more ineffable still, then I take no issue with that other than on a trivially semantic level, and my critique ceases to apply. However, it also ceases to be a problem, since such sophistry is atheism in anything but name.

The Modal Cosmological Argument

I shall base my analysis loosely on the modal cosmological argument as it is presented in Arguing for Atheism (Le Poidevin, 1996, pp. 8-9). With that in mind I shall take some liberties of my own. These are intended as an attempt at strengthening the argument against my own critique and will hopefully not misconstrue it.

Arguably the question at the heart of cosmological arguments is ‘why is there something rather than nothing?’ Modal logic is the study of expressions pertaining to necessity and possibility (Garson, 2009). That we are able to ask the question seems to imply that it is conceivably possible that nothing would have existed at all. Therefore, the fact that there are existing things, which do not necessitate their own existence, leads to the conclusion that their existence requires an independent, necessarily existing explanation. In my own words:

1.    Everything, which could have failed to exist, requires an explanation for why it does.
2.    Only necessarily existing things are self-explanatory.
3.    Therefore, there must be a necessary ultimate explanation for every contingently existing thing.
4.    (An inclusion I would rather avoid for reasons I shall make clear) ‘The universe’ is such a contingently existing thing.

Why the Concept of Causality is Irrelevant

In Le Poidevin’s rendition of the argument the word ‘cause’ is consistently used. I should like to abandon it in favour of ‘explanation,’ since the former is unnecessarily problematic. ‘Cause’ implies a temporally preceding chain of events. There is no reason to assume that creation from God’s perspective should be temporally situated at the farthest preceding event from ours. That is not to say God must have an entirely atemporal existence, as this too would be unnecessarily problematic. God just need not be located at the beginning of our timeline. Consider this by analogy of computer-simulations. It is entirely possible to program a computer to count numbers but start it off at say 354. From the programmer’s perspective the simulation began at some time – or perhaps multiple times in the case of repeated runs – on our timeline and began at 354 in the simulated timeline. However, for a hypothetical person living in the simulation it all started at zero. Or perhaps it stretches infinitely back into the negative integers.

The Universe

I have also sought to avoid mentioning the concept of ‘the universe.’ The word seems to be taken for granted. However, my intuitive understanding of it would wreak havoc on the cosmological argument. To me it just means something akin to ‘the set of everything there is.’ In this sense it would simply be ludicrous to insist that the existence of the universe requires an explanation, as ‘the universe’ is not an existing entity in itself but simply a word used to collectively denote all existing entities. Moreover, it would make no sense to speak of something existing outside of all there is. Clearly I must give the theist the benefit of the doubt and conclude that she means something radically different from what I do.

As with the word ‘cause’ I should like to replace it with something less problematic – but what? I must admit being at a complete loss. Supposedly we could replace it by ‘everything physical.’ However, this raises equally problematic questions as to what ‘physical’ means, and whether the fact that every particular physical entity is contingent – if granted – can be extended to physicality in general. Also it seems to beg the question to a physicalist, to whom the very idea of non-physical existence requires prior justification. Not to mention that it would invite a problem reminiscent of dualism’s mind-body problem (Robinson, 2008), in that it is unclear how something non-physical could explain physical existence.

A Face on the Ineffable

We could simply revert back to the initial question of why anything would exist at all. However, this would do the theist no favours since the modal cosmological argument is precisely an attempt to render this very question meaningless. If the ultimate explanation of all other existence itself exists necessarily, then there could not possibly have been nothing. The contingency of existence would therefore have to be localised and not applicable to all existence. Are we then speaking of different categories of existence? If so, how do we distinguish them?

The theist could still insist that the universe is contingent. I should then be very interested in learning what this intriguing word entails. However, I would posit that it poses no problem for the atheist. Atheism does not require one to deny the existence of everything other than the universe – regardless of what is meant by ‘universe.’

Conclusion

If the theist can appeal to the necessity of existence, then so can the atheist. Inasmuch as this is all the argument shows the atheist can simply refuse to acknowledge a personification of the ultimate explanation. It might be a sound argument albeit not one for the existence of ‘God’ as previously defined.

The theist would be required to justify that ‘God’ understood specifically as a sentient creator is, in fact, necessary. However, if such an ontological argument were to be achieved successfully, there should be no need for cosmological arguments.

♦

[I]f by ‘God,’ one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying… it does not make much sense to pray to the law of gravity (Sagan, Carl).

Bibliography

End-quote:

The quote is widely attributed to Carl Sagan and cited in numerous books, yet oddly enough never with the inclusion of a proper reference. As such I have included it by virtue of its own merits regardless of its dubious authenticity. A possible origin of the quote can be found in:

Sagan, Carl, Broca’s Brain: Reflections on the Romance of Science (Ballantine Books, 1993, CA, p. 330)

Books:

Le Poidevin, Robin, Arguing for Atheism: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion (Routledge: New York, US, 1996)

Watts, Alan, Myth and Religion: The Edited Transcripts (Tuttle Publishing, US, 1996)

Web Pages:

Garson, James, “Modal Logic”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2009 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), forthcoming URL = <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2009/entries/logic-modal/>.

Robinson, Howard, “Dualism”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2008 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2008/entries/dualism/>.