Maybe some of us (yer news writer, for one) have been unkind to Avi Loeb, the Harvard astronomer who continues to insist that space debris Oumuamua is an extraterrestrial lightsail. Anyway, at 29:06 in this vid, Loeb says “nature does not produce such things.” We’re told Loeb is using a design filter like design theorist Read More…
Fine tuning
Another attempt to blame Earth’s habitability on chance
Researchers: Earth’s long-lasting habitability was therefore most likely a contingent rather than an inevitable outcome.
New atheist Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) on fine-tuning of the universe
He found fine-tuning of the universe a reasonable argument against his position. In the meantime, new atheism has become the godlessness that failed.
The habitability of Earth is, we are told, due to luck
“It was discovered that out of the 100,000 planets, only one was able to maintain habitability for all 100 of its simulations.” Sounds like winning a hundred lotteries in a row. Luck? Naw.
Was first life’s biggest threat … water?
If we are looking for random generation of life, we must default to puddles if oceans don’t work, right?
Researchers: If exoplanets are ocean planets, we won’t see ET
Seriously, there is considerable evidence that the universe is fine-tuned for life. Maybe we should look at a simpler explanation for why we and ET don’t communicate.
So fine tuning of the universe for life goes right down to the level of the atom?
Our universe seems fine-tuned for life to come into existence, as Michael Denton stresses. If so, life may indeed inhabit other planets. If people believe that there is intelligent life on other planets in the galaxy, the best theory to support it, absent evidence at present, is intelligent design.
Life is rare in the universe—IF there is no design
It would make a lot of sense for astrobiologists to be fans of intelligent design theory. Eventually, they will fall and hit their heads and realize that.
Are radioactive elements crucial for rocky planets?
So even the “nukes” are needed for life as we know it?
The Privileged Planet, Redux
We’ve all heard about the fine-tuning of physical constants–just change them ever so slightly and a different kind of universe emerges. Then, there’s simply our location in our galaxy that allows us to see outwards to the galaxy itself, and beyond. Now, even the radioactivity in the earth’s core seems to be conducive to life. Read More…
Biochemist Fuz Rana on a curious pattern in the origin of life algorithm, Alchemy
Rana: there appear to be constraints on prebiotic chemistry that inevitably lead to the production of key biotic molecules with the just-right properties that make them unusually stable and ideally suited for life.
Water on the Moon? Not what we expected
Maybe time to dust off the ID idea that Earth is fine-tuned for space discovery?
Karsten Pultz offers some thoughts on the flap over the now-famous Thorvaldsen and Hössjer paper
It should also be considered that in his book Der Teil und das Ganze, Werner Heisenberg expresses his own and also Niels Bohrs’ doubt that random mutations could have produced any of the complex biological systems… Bohr adds that while natural selection obviously occurs it is the idea that new species come about by random changes, which is very hard to imagine, even if this is the only way science can explain it.
Sabine Hossenfelder dismisses fine-tuning; Brian Miller and Steve Meyer respond
Fine-tuning of the universe is one of those concepts that can pass every possible evidence test and still be rejected because it is just not supposed to be true. No matter how foolish the arguments against it are, they will always appear preferable. If the situation results in confusion, well, confusion is clarity.
ID and space exploration: The Privileged Planet Hypothesis
Earth is actually in a favored position for space exploration