[escepticos] Is God in the Details?

["Pedro J. Hernández" <phgt@...>]

REASON * July 1999

Is God in the Details?
>From cosmic coincidence to conservative cosmopolitics.

By Kenneth Silber

Victor J. Stenger has created new universes. Lots of them. In some, the
stars shine for only a fraction of a second. In others, atoms are the size
of tennis balls and a typical day lasts trillions of hours. Stenger achieves
these wildly disparate results by altering a few of the underlying
"constants" of nature--the mass of a proton, for example, or the strength of
the electromagnetic force. He ends up with worlds that look radically
different from our own.

Stenger is a theoretical physicist at the University of Hawaii and author of
a book titled The Unconscious Quantum: Metaphysics in Modern Physics and
Cosmology. His "universes" are computer simulations, the output of a program
that he wrote and has named--a bit provocatively--"Monkey God." Stenger does
not plan out the universes that he creates; he has allowed particle masses
and force strengths to vary randomly, many orders of magnitude different
from the levels observed in nature. A lot of the resulting universes, says
Stenger, "look pretty funny but still had long-lived stars."

The behavior of stars and atoms in imaginary universes might seem like a
topic unlikely to interest anyone who is not a theoretical physicist. Yet
Stenger's calculations pertain to an issue that was initially raised by
physicists but has lately echoed far beyond the scientific community--even
spilling onto the covers of popular magazines and into the world of
politics. The issue is an apparent "fine-tuning" of the laws of physics, a
set of circumstances without which humans would not exist. And Stenger, with
his computer universes, is trying to inject a note of reality into a public
discussion that has run far afield of the relevant science.


A Custom-Made Universe
"Science Finds God," trumpeted a Newsweek cover story in July 1998. The
article, by journalist Sharon Begley, ranges broadly across modern physics,
finding various possible links to theology. Some of these links seem little
more than metaphorical; for example, electrons behave simultaneously like
waves and particles, and (perhaps similarly) Jesus is understood by
Christians to be both human and divine. But Begley also cites what seems
like real evidence of divine action: "Physicists have stumbled on signs that
the cosmos is custom-made for life and consciousness. It turns out that if
the constants of nature--unchanging numbers like the strength of gravity,
the charge of an electron and the mass of a proton--were the tiniest bit
different, then atoms would not hold together, stars would not burn and life
would never have made an appearance."
"Science Sees the Light," announced The New Republic last October. This
cover story, by journalist Gregg Easterbrook (and adapted from his book
Beside Still Waters: Searching for Meaning in an Age of Doubt), also raises
the fine-tuning question. Easterbrook writes: "Researchers have calculated
that, if the ratio of matter and energy to the volume of space, a value
called `omega,' had not been within about one-quadrillionth of one percent
of ideal at the moment of the Big Bang, the incipient universe would have
collapsed back on itself or suffered runaway relativity effects. Instead,
our firmament is stable and geometrically normal: `smooth,' in the argot of
cosmology postdocs."

George F. Will seems to be impressed. Citing Easterbrook's book, Will writes
in his Newsweek column that the "news from the cosmos" is "staggeringly
implausible" and therefore "theologically suggestive." Humanity owes its
existence, Will notes, to the delicate balancing of forces in the early
universe: "The odds against us were--this is just the right
word--astronomical." The conservative columnist muses that soon "the
American Civil Liberties Union, People for the American Way, or some similar
faction of litigious secularism will file suit against NASA, charging that
the Hubble Space Telescope unconstitutionally gives comfort to the
religiously inclined."

Easterbrook's article, despite its bold headline, is hedged with
uncertainties; he notes that the value of omega and other seemingly
improbable features of the universe might yet lend themselves to a
naturalistic explanation. A different tone is set by Patrick Glynn, whose
1997 book God: The Evidence asserts that recent scientific developments
constitute a "powerful--indeed, all-but-incontestable--case for what once
was considered a completely debatable matter of `faith': the existence of
soul, afterlife, and God." Glynn, who served as an arms control expert in
the Reagan administration, writes frequently for National Review and other
conservative magazines.

Glynn's argument incorporates psychological and medical issues (including
reports of "near-death experiences"). But much of his book is about physics.
Glynn writes that physicists have discovered "an increasingly daunting and
improbable list of mysterious coincidences or `lucky accidents' in the
universe--whose only common denominator seemed to be that they were
necessary for our emergence." Even "minor tinkering" with the strength of
gravity and other forces, or with the masses of subatomic particles, writes
Glynn, "would have resulted in an unrecognizable universe: a universe
consisting entirely of helium, a universe without protons or atoms, a
universe without stars, or a universe that collapsed back in upon itself
before the first moments of its existence were up."

According to Glynn, this all amounts to a momentous scientific discovery,
one that goes by the name "the anthropic principle." This term was
introduced by cosmologist Brandon Carter at a conference in 1973, but
according to Glynn, Carter presented the idea "in an unfortunately technical
and roundabout way," such that its full implications were slow to be
recognized. What is the anthropic principle? "In essence," Glynn writes, the
principle "came down to the observation that all the myriad laws of physics
were fine-tuned from the very beginning of the universe for the creation of
man--that the universe we inhabit appeared to be expressly designed for the
emergence of human beings."

God: The Evidence, which was recently reissued in paperback, has received
favorable reviews in the conservative press. Moreover, Glynn's exposition of
the anthropic principle has been greeted with enthusiasm in conservative
intellectual circles, where arguments for natural "design" were previously
limited to critiques of evolutionary biology. In The Wall Street Journal,
editorial page assistant editor Melanie Kirkpatrick writes approvingly that
Glynn's "thesis is that the scientific discoveries of the past 25 years,
especially in the physical sciences, have refuted the idea of a `random
universe'--the modern idea that human life was a chance event--in favor of
the `anthromorphic [sic] principle': the idea that there is an intelligent
guiding hand at work." Similar compliments were published in The Washington
Times, Insight, and National Review.

Robert Bork, whose favorable blurb adorns the dust jacket of God: The
Evidence, takes note of Glynn's argument (expressed in an earlier National
Review piece) in his own book Slouching Towards Gomorrah. Bork writes that
"the argument from design is now bolstered by the findings of physics
concerning the Big Bang. We now know that there were a great many
`coincidences' at the outset of the universe that were essential if life was
to exist." These "findings," coupled with arguments for creationism in
biology, provide Bork with a ray of hope in his otherwise grim assessment of
current intellectual trends. "Religion," he asserts, "will no longer have to
fight scientific atheism with unsupported faith."

Glynn, for his part, is positively exultant. He explains, in a March 1998
interview with Insight, that "the anthropic principle is a major turning
point in Western intellectual history--a major, major turning point--because
it really marks the end of the modern period when mechanism was triumphant,
when the view of the universe as matter and motion was triumphant. The
anthropic principle undercuts that completely." He adds: "The anthropic
principle puts the antitheists, the people who are arguing against the
existence of God, in a very tough spot."


Carbon Chauvinism
To evaluate such claims, it is necessary first to clarify some confusing
terminology. The "anthropic principle" is a much-discussed concept among
physicists. Most of this discussion, however, has nothing to do with
intelligent design. This is because the "principle" has multiple definitions
and shades of meaning. A crucial distinction is between the "strong
anthropic principle" and the "weak anthropic principle." The "strong"
version is an argument for design (or, in some variations, that the universe
somehow "requires" that life exist). The "weak" version, by contrast, is
generally what physicists mean when they discuss the anthropic principle.
The "weak" anthropic principle, simply stated, is that life does exist and
the laws of physics allow this to occur. That might sound like an obvious
point, but it can produce useful insights. In the 1950s, for example,
astronomer Fred Hoyle predicted a particular "resonance," or energy level,
for the nuclei of carbon atoms. Subsequent experiments proved him correct.
How did Hoyle know? Because without such a resonance, stars would not
produce much carbon--and life as we know it would not exist. (Of course, it
does not necessarily follow that the carbon resonance was "designed" or
"required" for that purpose.)

Moreover, the term anthropic may be misleading, as it implies that the laws
of physics have some particular suitability for humans, as opposed to other
species. But in fact, the "fine-tuning," such as it is, appears compatible
with the entire range of life on Earth, past and present. Mathematician
David A. Shotwell, commenting on Glynn's book in Skeptical Inquirer
magazine, writes: "Perhaps the Creator, if there is one, really wanted to
produce dinosaurs, and we [humans] are an unimportant byproduct of the
enterprise. It might be objected that dinosaurs are, after all, extinct.
That is true enough, but does anyone think that we will be here forever?"

Furthermore, if dinosaurs were not the objective, Shotwell points out, then
it might be "insects, the most successful of all life forms. The total
number of them is somewhere in the trillions, as compared with only a few
billion humans." Shotwell therefore proposes an "entomologic principle,"
which states that the laws of physics were fine-tuned to produce insects.
(The late astronomer Carl Sagan took this line of thinking even further,
proposing a "lithic principle." The universe, Sagan observed, seems
exquisitely fine-tuned to produce rocks.)

Leaving aside questions about what species may be favored, it may still seem
remarkable that, as Newsweek puts it, "life would never have made an
appearance" in a slightly different universe. But any such claim requires
considerable assumptions about both life and the universe. That, in fact, is
the point made by the University of Hawaii's Stenger and his "Monkey God"
program. Stenger allowed the strengths of forces and the masses of particles
in his "universes" to vary randomly across ten orders of magnitude (in other
words, as much as 100,000 times more or 100,000 times less than their values
in nature). The resulting "universes," in most cases, had stars lasting over
a billion years--an apparently crucial prerequisite for the evolution of
life.

To be sure, most of these propitious "universes" would be unlikely to
produce humans, insects, or other carbon-based life forms such as exist on
Earth. But they might well allow something to evolve. There is no good
reason, says Stenger, to "assume that there's only one kind of life
possible"--we know far too little about life in our own universe, let alone
"other" universes, to reach such a conclusion. Stenger denounces as "carbon
chauvinism" the assumption that life requires carbon; other chemical
elements, such as silicon, can also form molecules of considerable
complexity. Indeed, Stenger ventures, it is "molecular chauvinism" to assume
that molecules are required at all; in a universe with different properties,
atomic nuclei or other structures might assemble in totally unfamiliar ways.

But what about the fine-tuning of something called "omega," without which
the universe would have, as Easterbrook puts it, "collapsed back on itself
or suffered runaway relativity effects"? Isn't this, as George Will writes,
"theologically suggestive"? Actually, this particular cosmic mystery may
have already been solved, without recourse to theology. The answer lies in
the theory of cosmic inflation, first developed by MIT physicist Alan Guth
and now widely accepted among cosmologists. Inflation theory states that the
early universe underwent a brief period of exponential growth before
settling into the slower expansion seen since. And the relevant point here
is that omega (which is a measure of the "curvature" of space) is not a
constant; it changes with time.

Easterbrook writes that omega had to be "within about one-quadrillionth of
one percent of ideal at the moment of the Big Bang." But actually, omega
could have started out at just about any number, and it still would have hit
the required "ideal." Why? Because this ideal is a very special number: one.
If omega equals one, the universe is perfectly "flat" or "smooth" (whereas
numbers higher or lower mean its geometry is warped by matter and energy).
Now, think of a balloon; as it inflates, its surface becomes increasingly
flat and smooth. And if the universe (or a balloon) is inflating
exponentially--which is to say, extremely fast--then its geometry will get
extremely flat very quickly, no matter how wrinkled it may have been before.

As Guth explains in his book The Inflationary Universe, "With inflation, it
is no longer necessary to postulate that the universe began with a value of
omega incredibly close to one. Before inflation, omega could have been 1,000
or 1,000,000, or 0.001 or 0.000001, or even some number further from one. As
long as the exponential expansion continues for long enough, the value of
omega will be driven to one with exquisite accuracy." Moreover, in the
billions of years since, as stars and galaxies formed, the curvature of
space likely has drifted from its "fine-tuned" value. (In case you're
curious, current astronomical evidence indicates omega is somewhere between
0.1 and two.)

"Mathematics works. Religion doesn't," says Rocky Kolb, a cosmologist at the
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Illinois. Kolb is not denouncing
religion. Rather, he is saying that the "strong" anthropic principle--the
argument for design--merely cuts short further study of phenomena such as
cosmic inflation. And the "weak" principle, he notes, is essentially a
stopgap tool, not an explanation of anything. "If you just shrugged your
shoulders and mumbled `anthropic principle,' then science doesn't advance,"
says Kolb. "Sometimes, the alternative to the anthropic principle is work."


A Vast Froth of Bubbles
Why do the seeming "constants" of nature--the strengths of forces and the
masses of particles--have the values that they have? It may be that they are
not constants at all. Much current work in cosmology points to two
remarkable, and interrelated, possibilities: What we regard as the universe
may in fact be just one part of a far larger "multiverse." And the laws of
physics may have "evolved" in a process similar to natural selection in
biology. These ideas remain speculative, but they cast the "fine-tuning"
issue in a whole new light--and they do so without invoking intelligent
design.
According to theories of the multiverse, the Big Bang was not a unique
event. Instead, numerous "big bangs" have occurred--and continue to do so,
in regions beyond our observational horizon. Each "bang" leads to a new
universe, one bubble in a vast froth of bubbles. (One might object that the
"universe" by definition is everything that exists, but its expanded scope
if such theories are correct has given rise to the "universe/multiverse"
terminology.) Different universes contain different combinations of forces
and particles. If the range of combinations that support life is narrow,
then the multiverse might be littered with uninhabited bubbles. But in at
least one universe, the "constants" are suitable for carbon-based life.

The latter may be just a matter of chance. Given enough universes, sooner or
later one is likely to hit upon the "right" combination for life (even
assuming only one type of life is possible). But there may be more to it
than that. Consider the theory of "cosmological natural selection" proposed
by Penn State physicist Lee Smolin and detailed in his 1997 book The Life of
the Cosmos. In this theory, our universe emerged from a black hole in a
previous universe; moreover, each black hole in our universe (and other
universes) generates yet another universe. Universes that produce lots of
black holes therefore have more "progeny" than universes that don't. The
laws of physics are reshuffled slightly with each black hole, and
increasingly the multiverse is dominated by universes whose laws are
"fine-tuned" to produce black holes.

So what? Well, black holes are formed when massive stars collapse. Stars are
massive if they contain heavy elements--elements such as carbon. The
selection process thus gives rise to universes such as our own, where carbon
and other heavy elements are available as the building material for life.

In God: The Evidence, Glynn dismisses all multiple-universe theories,
including Smolin's. These, he argues, are contrivances produced by
"secular-minded scientists" to explain away the evidence for design. Glynn
writes that "some scientists have speculated that there may exist billions
of `parallel' universes--which, mind you, we will never be able to
detect --of which ours just happens to be one. If there were billions of
invisible universes, then the series of miraculous coincidences that
produced life in this one might not seem so unlikely." Such theories,
according to Glynn, are "reminiscent of medieval theologians' speculations
about the number of angels that could dance on the head of a pin."

But is the multiverse so far-fetched? The Big Bang seems to have occurred
under conditions of extremely high density; similar conditions occur
throughout our universe--in black holes. Similarly, Stanford cosmologist
Andrei Linde argues that the fast inflation of the early cosmos--which
requires merely a small region of curved space, or "false vacuum," to get
started--implies a "self-reproducing" universe. The assumption that there
are not multiple universes seems unwarranted by current evidence. Says
Stenger: "There's no law of any kind that we know that says this could only
have happened once. In fact, you'd have to invent a law of nature to explain
why there was only one universe."

Moreover, while we may "never be able to detect" other universes, there are
indirect ways to assess whether they exist. If Smolin's theory of
cosmological natural selection is correct, then our universe should be
"optimized" for black-hole production. This can be tested; for instance, a
particle known as the kaon, which can be created in particle accelerators,
should have a mass in the "correct" range to ensure that neutron stars
eventually become black holes. So far, the theory has held up under such
testing, but the evidence is inconclusive.

Perhaps surprisingly, however, Smolin is hoping that the theory as stated in
his book is false. He's not particularly fond of its multiple universes. "I
would be very, very happy if in the final picture we got rid of it," he says
in an interview. "That it was just a kind of way station." A way station to
what? To a similar theory in which the laws of physics undergo "natural
selection" entirely within our universe. In such a theory, different regions
of the early universe "compete for dominance," some expanding faster than
others. That is what he is working on now, and he is trying to make it
testable.


Politics By Design
Has physics found God? The evidence is, at best, highly ambiguous. Some of
it points in an opposite direction--toward a universe that can appear
marvelously fine-tuned even if there is no Fine Tuner. Certainly, not many
physicists are prepared to announce that a cosmic plan has been unveiled.
The few cosmologists who favor the "strong" anthropic principle usually
defend it as plausible speculation, not established fact. (And even the
"strong" principle has versions that seem unrelated to religion.)
How then did this arcane scientific discussion get converted into popular
articles and books touting evidence of the divine? The answer no doubt lies
partly in the exigencies of media sensationalism. Had Newsweek proclaimed on
its cover "Science Still Not Sure About God," then newsstand sales would
have slumped that week. Had The New Republic headlined its cover story
"Science Sees a Blurry Picture That May Have Something to Do With God but
Mainly Just Shows the Universe Is an Interesting Place," it would have
lacked the pungency of "Science Sees the Light" (though it would have more
accurately reflected Easterbrook's article).

But what about the conservatives who have embraced the "anthropic" design
argument? They seem to have more serious priorities than merely titillating
readers. Glynn points to "the mischievous consequences of atheistically
inspired social policy and social experimentation." These consequences, in
his telling, range from Soviet atrocities to America's sexual revolution,
with its "explosion in teenage pregnancies" and "epidemic of sexually
transmitted diseases." Now, however, "the anthropic principle" is replacing
"the random universe," and the scientific basis for atheism is crumbling.
Bork, for his part, welcomes evidence for design in nature because it lends
support to religious belief, and "such belief is probably essential to a
civilized future."

Clearly, these conservatives have found an interpretation of cosmology that
is congruent with their political beliefs. Yet that doesn't mean the
interpretation is presented insincerely. Ronald Bailey has speculated in
REASON that conservative opponents of Darwinism might be following a tenet
of philosopher Leo Strauss: that religious belief is unfounded but still
required by society. (See "Origin of the Specious," July 1997.) But in God:
The Evidence, Glynn denounces the Straussian position; moreover, he traces
his own spiritual crisis and recovery of religious belief with considerable
emotion. He clearly means what he says about both God and the anthropic
principle.

Nor is there any reason to doubt the sincerity of Bork, Will, or other
conservatives who have discovered evidence of design in the laws of physics.
In many cases, however, there is plenty of reason to doubt their knowledge.
Bork and Will make sweeping statements about the universe based on a cursory
reading of popular accounts. The Wall Street Journal's and The Washington
Times' reviewers of Glynn's book accept at face value his misleading
definition of the anthropic principle. Glynn devotes four pages to a puerile
analogy about monkeys with typewriters. (Yes, if the monkeys are assumed to
be unchanging beings with limited capacities, they would never type
Shakespeare. It does not follow that the universe is subject to similar
constraints.)

It is hard to believe that the "anthropic" conservatives have contemplated
the full implications of their position. There is, to begin with, a
theological puzzle. Why would an omnipotent or highly powerful deity need to
fine-tune physical laws? Such tinkering seems to set limits on what the Fine
Tuner can do. Did this entity have no choice but to produce carbon-based
life--or would other physical laws have generated other types of life? (If
the latter, then the fine-tuning argument collapses.) If the laws of physics
were not compatible with our type of life--and yet we were here--wouldn't
that be evidence for God?

Moreover, if there is now evidence for God's existence, what happens if the
evidence doesn't hold up under scrutiny? Religious faith need never be
damaged by a scientific advance; one can always believe that a powerful
deity intervenes in the universe while erasing all proof of such
intervention. But evidence can be overturned or reinterpreted any time (as
appears to have already happened with the "fine-tuning" of omega). Won't
society be harmed if the strength of gravity or the mass of the proton turn
out not to have the religious implications that conservatives have
publicized?

Finally, what does the apparent fine-tuning in physics imply for biology?
Glynn claims that the fossil record shows that "natural selection is not the
magic bullet biologists once thought it was." Bork states that the
complexity of organisms could not have evolved unaided. But if the cosmos is
precisely fine-tuned for the development of life, then why is further
tinkering required? The traditional argument for design is that nature is
too inhospitable for life to have evolved. The "anthropic" design argument
is that nature is eerily hospitable to life. If both are true, it's a
strange universe indeed.


Kenneth Silber has written about science and technology for The New York
Post, The Washington Times, Insight, Commentary, and other publications.

Pedro J. Hernández
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