The Anthropic Principal - Cosmology

Well, lets take this one.3)postulate the whole shebang has existed forever and so wasn't createdI guess if research shows that the universe won't contract (and so permit somekind of recursion) And that it had a starting point. Then I would say this one is false.

LOL, oh I'm sorry - I didn't pick the one you wanted me to?or is it .... you want to talk about God again.knock yourself out; Untitled Document

K, in truth i skipped you because there were too many people. I thought people would discuss with each other but almost all seen to want a reply from me.

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Is it reasonably possible that things could be otherwise, that instead of being on one of the few life-friendly planets we could be elsewhere, without some reason why?

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But If we were elsewhere we would classify it as life-freindly because we would be on it. The statement is a tautology.In my mind this just boils down to "Things are the way they are"

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"It is not a causal explanation but it presents reasons to expect things to be as they are"

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But It doesn't give a reason.Edited by bebotx1, : No reason given.

That was quick - I thought you'd be on that site for hours.Actually - this post is talking about how AP is just a description of how things are and RD claiming it is some kind of explanation is nuts.now, to the more recent point.Yes of course if the earth was intentionally created it would be an explanation of why it was here.Are you gonna argue with that?

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It would have to be life-friendly FOR us to be there

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Yes, and that is why the statement is a truism.It MUST always be true. It's obviously true. And it says nothing.I think this is probably one of those things were people just end up shouting louder and louder at each other without ever finding the common ground.

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Sure, even since you've qualified the fuck out of it. (I guess we can assume you know you were wrong with your first phrasing?)

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I'm not sure. Can you show me what I said with the internet linking trick again please.Actually it was RD's alternative in the book (TGD)

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Saying the earth was intentionally created says nothing about what the intent was. Therefore, it doesn't explain why the Earth is here. It just says it is, which we already know.

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Well maybe you'd find that out along the way. If it was intentionally created perhaps you could get in contact with the creators or find clues about why they did it and what they were like.

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As I said at the start it isn't so obvious that it doesn't sometimes need saying. If it didn't then why would anyone ask the question in the first place ? Why would we have people arguing that this planet is so life firendly it had to be set up for us by a god, for instance?

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Perhaps you havn't understood me. The statement is ALWAYS true.Lets assume for a moment (purely hypothetically) that God specially created the earth especially for people to live on. The statement would STILL be true. This is my whole point.

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All logical truths are tautologies. Every valid logical argument is a tautology. If tautologies said nothing then logic would be of no use whatsoever. Thus the fact that logic is useful proves that identifying a tautology CAN tell us something.

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Every valid argument is not a tautology. Deductive logic is a system to validly get from a set of premises to a conclusion, the truth of the conclusion still rests on the premises. The generation of tautologies is not it's primary purpose.
http://thinker.blog.co.uk/...ngu_does_some_reasoning~1904805

Are you saying I'm lying about it being RD's point in the book. 'Cos I have it open in front of me.

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ch4 (pg136 hardback) “Two main explanations have been offered for our planet’s peculiar friendliness to life. the design theory says that God made the world... The anthropic principal is the other.. .”

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And I'm sorry to have to tell you but yes, it would count as a valid explanation for it being there. You can't just tack on extra conditions like intent and insist on them. Are you saying unless you can show intent it's false? Edited by bebotx1, : shorten quote

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Maybe. However we cannot conclude that that is the case from the mere fact that we exist on a life-friendly planet. And some people need to be informed of that. Thus, they at least, are being told something by Dawkins' point.

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Definitiley.No, of course you could not conclude that.I guess it would make them think about it.Forget the logic it's getting off topic.Edited by bebotx1, : No reason given.

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The God-did-it "*explanation*" is okay for ONE planet, and it 'worked' when that was all that was known in the cosmology of the times. We now know there are not only other planets in this system but planets around other stars. The God-did-it "*explanation*" FAILS to explain the apparent absence of other life on equally designed and created planets. Seems like a waste eh? A rather extravagant waste.

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yea, i guess I was just on about the AP thing.I wasn't really considering the alternatives.The design type explanation could take a lot of forms I guess. It would depend on what the designers wanted out of the situation.

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So long as you insist that tautologies tell us nothing the logic is definitely on-topic. Identifying tautologies does tell us something and obviously there are people who haven't identified this particular one

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I think something that is trivially true is called a truism. A tautology is a completely true statement relying on zero assumptions. I thought this one didn't say much, but maybe for some...

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(although it isn't quite a tautology if there was a God it could keep us going even in an environment we "shouldn't" be able to survive in).

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Very good observation - I missed that.Edited by bebotx1, : No reason given.

But how would you tell if it was the case?