Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

Darwinists Now say “Parsimony Smarsimony.”

Barry Arrington
September 4, 2007
Intelligent Design
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“In science, parsimony is preference for the least complex explanation for an observation. This is generally regarded as good when judging hypotheses. Occam’s razor also states the ‘principle of parsimony.'”  See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsimony

In the post below (“Multiverse of the Gaps”), I point to a recent paper in which a Darwinist attempts to get around the extremely small probability (less than 1 in 10 raised to the negative 1,018) of life emerging by chance by invoking an infinite “multiverse.”

 The question for the class today is which is the most parsimonious hypothesis:  One designer or infinite universes?

Comments
shaner74 "what's stopping them from laughing in the face of the numbers too?" People have a basic understanding of probability. Therefore, the Darwinists cannot just wave their hands and make the probabilities go away. They have to deal with them. This is their latest attempt.BarryA
September 4, 2007
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"a Darwinist attempts to get around the extremely small probability (less than 1 in 10 raised to the negative 1,018) of life emerging by chance by invoking an infinite “multiverse.”" Honestly, I'm surprised the "multiverse" was ever even brought into the mix. When faced with daunting statistics, why not just do away with math altogether? They've already done that with physics. They believe you really can get something for nothing, so what's stopping them from laughing in the face of numbers too?shaner74
September 4, 2007
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Then by default it is also infinitely possible for God to exist.
bornagain77, This was my thought as well, but the problem I see with this reasoning is that God is necessarily transcendent, just as the multiverse mechanism is necessarily transcendent. This suggests that God could not exist in any of the universes generated by the multiverse mechanism, unless He was determined to be a product of the universe (a theologically untenable proposition) instead of outside it. However there seems to be another issue with the multiverse mechanism. Such a device would need to be more complex than any of its generated universes, by orders of magnitude. This device would itself require fine-tuning in order to function. This fine tuning would be even more unlikely than the anthropic principal suggests for our universe, and so would require a higher level multiverse mechanism for it as well. And so it goes on and on. An infinite number of multiverses would be required to produce one capable of generating an anthropically tuned universe like ours, but that itself would be even more unlikely, and so be dependent upon a higher multiverse in order to exist. Unless one is willing to inject intelligent purpose at some point in the chain, it looks like it's multiverses all the way up.Apollos
September 4, 2007
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the designer him/her/itself would have to be infinitely complex
I don't see the logic that makes that a necessary conclusion. Perhaps "sufficiently" complex, but infinitely?Atom
September 4, 2007
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I imagine the Darwinian response would be to say that the multiverse scenario is no less parsimonious that the design inference because the designer him/her/itself would have to be infinitely complex. The fact that this argument blatantly begs the question in favour of materialism hasn't stopped them yet.mattghg
September 4, 2007
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The multi-verse fails in logic for this reason. If it is required for an infinite number of other universes to exist to account for the fine tuning of this universe and to make the materialistic philosophy palatable, Then by default it is also infinitely possible for God to exist. Thus, if it is infinitely possible for God to exist than God certainly must exist no matter how small the probability.bornagain77
September 4, 2007
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Recommend using Einstein's Razor over Occam's Razor. Einstein's Razor: a theory should be as simple as possible (but no simpler). On Einstein's Razor: Quinn Tyler Jackson Darwinian Evolution with Random Mutation and Natural Selection might be considered to satisfy Occam's razor as the simplest explanation. However it fail's Einstein's razor as being insufficient to explain abiogenesis to self reproducing life, let alone the rest of nature.DLH
September 4, 2007
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Good point Atom. Move to the head of the class.BarryA
September 4, 2007
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...or, put another way... One unobserved (but potentially observable) entity or an infinite number of unobserved (and forever unobservable) entities?Atom
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