4 ms·
There is additional significance to 0.4. Maybe I didn't clarify that well enough in my original post. "0.4" represents the class of universes that support lif
by Xcelerate 14y ago
There is additional significance to 0.4. Maybe I didn't clarify that well enough in my original post. "0.4" represents the class of universes that support life in a comfortable way. What do I mean by comfortable? I mean that there are far, far more combinations of universe classes that would result in life that is painful (or even extremely painful). Short lifespans, constant agony as a result of different processes, etc. How do I know this? I don't -- it's just a conjecture (and everyone is just conjecturing too). I could be wrong. But it seems intuitively that there would be infinitely more permutations of a painful but life-supporting universe than the "comfortable" one we live in (I don't mean "comfortable" in the literal sense -- there's still plenty of pain in our world).
- jlgreco 14y agoPenrose was explicitly talking about biological evolution. If we are actually in a "fine tuned universe" discussion now, then all I have to say is "Anthropic Principle". I don't think there is much more meat there to discuss otherwise. We cannot (yet?) reason about any deterministic processes that may have lead the universe itself to have the constants it does. Of course we already know about many processes that support the formation and existence of life in this already existing universe. Stellar evolution for example, is a rather healthy branch of scientific inquiry. There are not "mysterious" things at play, unless Penrose and yourself are simply intending to imply that there are still things which we do not fully understand (which is obvious, and that is a very confusing way of stating something so obvious and universally recognized).
- calinet6 14y agoExcellent summary, and very clear. I enjoyed reading your line of thinking. Thanks!