Note the following concession at the end of this New Scientist interview: “If, for some unforeseen reason, the landscape turns out to be inconsistent – maybe for mathematical reasons, or because it disagrees with observation – I am pretty sure that physicists will go on searching for natural explanations of the world. But I have to say that if that happens, as things stand now we will be in a very awkward position. Without any explanation of nature’s fine-tunings we will be hard pressed to answer the ID critics. One might argue that the hope that a mathematically unique solution will emerge is as faith-based as ID.”
By the way, I cite Susskind in my book No Free Lunch (p. 338): “When Alan Guth first began proposing his inflationary cosmology, Lenny Susskind remarked [to Guth]: ‘You know, the most amazing thing is that they pay us for this.'” Don’t expect this sort of light-hearted incredulity from Susskind anymore. The stakes are now much higher. It’s no longer a matter of theoretical physicists with their heads in the clouds collecting fat paychecks from schools like Stanford and spinning out theories with only the most tenuous connection to empirical data. Now it’s a matter of destroying ID. Read More ›