If they are even as advanced as we are, they could spot us using the methods we use to spot exoplanets. But if they are technologically advanced, wouldn’t they be here by now?
Let’s look at the possibility that the extraterrestrial intelligences could be alive and watching us right now, using the very same methods we use to spot exoplanets. A recent open-access astronomy paper tried to calculate which aliens could actually spot us by whether Earth dims the Sun when passing it …
But now, on the other side, let’s look at the Hart-Tipler Conjecture: “Extraterrestrial intelligent beings do not exist” (1980). If they did, within 300 million years, they would have developed advanced technology and be here by now.” Or maybe by 650,000 years. Either way, they have had enough time.
News, “Space aliens could in fact be watching us” at Mind Matters News
The Hart-Tipler conjecture (they don’t exist) is, of course, very unpopular in sci-fi. But let’s confront it, if only to move on to more promising (or maybe scarier) speculations. Here are some:
1.Are the Aliens We Never Find Obeying Star Trek’s Prime Directive? The Directive is, don’t interfere in the evolution of alien societies, even if you have good intentions. Assuming the aliens exist, perhaps it’s just as well, on the whole, if they do want to leave us alone. They could want to “fix” us instead…
2.How can we be sure we are not just an ET’s simulation? A number of books and films are based on the idea. Should we believe it? We make a faith-based decision that logic and evidence together are reasonable guides to what is true. Logical possibility alone does not make an idea true.
3.Did the smart machines destroy the aliens who invented them? That’s the Berserker hypothesis. A smart deadly weapon could well decide to do without its inventor and, lacking moral guidance, destroy everything in sight. Extinction of a highly advanced civilization by its own lethal technology may be more likely than extinction by natural disaster. They could control nature.
4.Researchers: The aliens exist but they are sleeping… And we wake them at our peril. The Aestivation hypothesis is that immensely powerful aliens are waiting in a digitized form for the universe to cool down from the heat their computers emit.
5.Maybe there are just very few aliens out there… The Rare Earth hypothesis offers science-based reasons that life in the universe is rare. Even if life is rare in the universe, Earth may be uniquely suited to space exploration, as the Privileged Planet hypothesis suggests.
- Does science fiction hint that we are actually doomed? That’s the implication of an influential theory as to why we never see extraterrestrials. Depending how we read the Kardashev scale, civilizations disappear somewhere between where we are now and the advanced state needed for intergalactic travel.
At the foundation of the belief that the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences are the assumptions that, number 1, planets that can host life are fairly common in the universe. Number 2, life can, relatively easily, spontaneously emerge on any planet that can host life, And number 3, human like intelligence is basically considered to be inevitable in any evolutionary scenario.
All three assumptions are false.
As to the first false assumption that “planets that can host life are fairly common in the universe.”
There are many independent characteristics required to be fulfilled for any planet to host advanced carbon-based life. I know of four books have been written on this subject, ‘The Privileged Planet’ by Guillermo Gonzalez, ‘Rare Earth’ by Donald Brownlee, “Lucky Planet” by David Waltham, and ‘Improbable Planet’ by Hugh Ross,,
,,,, All four books indicate that the earth is extremely unique in its ability to host advanced life in this universe.
On top of that, Dr. Hugh Ross, and his team, have studied this question extensively and have found that there are a total of 816 known parameters which have to be met for any planet to be able to host intelligent physical life In this universe,
Individually, these parameters are not that impressive but when we realize ALL these parameters have to be met at the same time on the same planet and not one of these parameters can be out of its life permitting range for any extended period of time, then, as you can see, the probability for a world which can host advanced life in this universe becomes very extraordinary. i.e. “less than 1 chance in 10^1032”
For comparison sake, the entire universe itself is estimated to only have 10^80 particles in it. Thus the probability of a planet ‘accidentally’ meeting all the conditions that are necessary to host intelligent life is far less likely than that of finding any particular particle in the universe by accident.
As to the second assumption that lies behind the belief that the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences, i.e. that “life can, relatively easily, spontaneously emerge on any planet that can host life,”,,,,.
The probability against ‘simple’ life spontaneously appearing on any life supporting planet makes the 1 in 10^1032 estimate for any planet to be able to support intelligent life look like child’s play.
Working from the thermodynamic perspective, Harold Morowitz, of Yale University, found that the probability of life spontaneously forming, under “ideal natural conditions (the best possible chemical environment)”, would be one chance in 10^100,000,000,000
As to the third assumption that lies behind the belief that the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences, i.e. that ‘human like intelligence is basically considered to be inevitable in any evolutionary scenario.’
The belief that human like intelligence is, basically, inevitable in any evolutionary scenario is simply a false assumption. After all, out of millions of species on earth, only humans themselves have demonstrated themselves to be capable of complex, abstract, i.e. intelligent, thought.
As Dr. Egnor pointed out, it is our ability to think abstractly, i.e. intelligently, that makes us “more different from apes than apes are from viruses.,,,”
You don’t have to take Dr. Egnor’s word for it, leading Darwinists themselves have honestly confessed that they have no clue how the human capacity for language, (i.e. our ability to communicate our abstract thoughts to one another, i.e. our intelligence), could have possibly evolved,
As the leading Darwinists honestly confessed, we have “essentially no explanation of how and why our linguistic computations and representations evolved.,,,”
Thus, since leading Darwinists themselves have honestly admitted that they have no clue how human intelligence could have possibly evolved, then it is clear that the assumption that human-like intelligence is, basically, inevitable in any evolutionary scenario is a false assumption for people who want to believe that the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences..
Moreover, Barrow and Tippler, in their book “The Anthropic Cosmological Principle”, estimated that there were 16 steps that were necessary during the course of human evolution. They calculated that ‘the probability of all 16 steps occurring to be less than one chance in 10^24,000,000.’
William Lane Craig, after reviewing Barrow and Tipler’s book, stated, “They estimate that the odds of the evolution (by chance) of the human genome is somewhere between 4 to the negative 180th power, to the 110,000th power, and 4 to the negative 360th power, to the 110,000th power. Therefore, if evolution did occur, it literally would have been a miracle and evidence for the existence of God.” ”
Thus all three assumptions behind the belief that the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences, (number 1, planets that can host life are fairly common in the universe. Number 2, life can, relatively easily, spontaneously emerge on any planet that can host life, And number 3, human like intelligence is basically considered to be inevitable in any evolutionary scenario.),,, all three assumptions are found to be false assumptions.
There is another false assumption, an assumption that I did not mention, that also lies behind the belief that the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences.
Namely, that is the false assumption of the Copernican Principle, and/or ‘The Principle of Mediocrity’ which holds that the Earth does not hold a privileged position in this universe.
As Hawking himself bluntly put the ‘Mediocrity Principle”.
Yet, the Copernican Principle, and/or ‘The Principle of Mediocrity’ has now itself been overturned by our most powerful theories and discoveries in science.
One final note, here is a humorous video clip about a “oh so coincidental” phone call at SETI that had a very interesting timing as to its occurrence
As a Christian who has seen a few answered prayers during my life, I find it strange that the SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) organization spends millions of dollars vainly searching for signs of extra-terrestrial life in this universe, when all anyone has to do to make solid contact with THE primary ‘extra-terrestrial intelligence’ of the entire universe is to pray with a sincere heart.
God, who created heaven and earth, certainly does not hide from those who sincerely need and seek Him.
I would think that personally communicating with the Creator of the universe would be a lot more exciting than not communicating with some little green men that in all realistic probability, given naturalism, do not even exist.
It has been my personal experience that God, who created heaven and earth, certainly does not hide from those who desperately need Him and who sincerely seek Him. (and boy have I, due for my tendency of getting myself into desperate situations, desperately needed God several times during my life to bail me out of my unwise choices),,, 🙂
They’ll be here as soon as they decide what condiments and barbecue utensils to pack into their spacecraft.
There are morons who think that a re dwarf could be a host star for a habitable planet or moon. That is total nonsense as any planet in the habitable zone would be in tidal lock with the star. Meaning the rotation = revolution with one side always facing the star. Nothing can live on that planet. There wouldn’t be a magnetic field and one side would be toast while the other side is frozen.
It isn’t enough to just be in the habitable zone. The planet needs to be terrestrial with surface water. It needs to have a thin crust to allow for plate tectonics. It needs to have the right rotation to mix the surface gasses and create a magnetic field- and that requires a molten iron flowing internally.
And that planet needs a large, stabilizing moon or else it will tumble as it rotates.
So yes, in an Intelligent Design scenario extraterrestrials are pretty much a given.
This argument: intelligent life is rare because both it and the circumstances that provide for it here on Earth are extremely rare and must be designed…
…is self defeating. Granting that it's a matter of design, the designer can obviously generate as many "Earth" and "earth-like" systems as it desires into the universe. The argument that intelligent life is "exceedingly rare" can only be made from the non-design perspective. Under a design perspective, the universe can in fact be teeming with intelligent life. One might even reasonably argue that because it is designed for intelligent life, it is likely full of intelligent life.
WJM,
I 100% agree – and this is a place where I think “generic” ID exposes a weakness against a fundamentalist Christian YEC view. Which argument is consistent, not self-defeating, and supported by the evidence?
1) The universe, earth, and humanity are NOT intelligently-designed, or special. Where are all the aliens then?
2) The universe, earth, and humanity ARE intelligently-designed, by some generic designer. There could be other designed intelligent life, or maybe not. If they do exist, they must have been designed. The lack of other intelligent life is consistent with design, but not necessarily predicted.
3) The universe, earth, and humanity ARE intelligently-designed by God. There are no aliens because the universe was designed for humans, uniquely made in God’s image, for the glory of God (Gen 1-2, Ps. 19:1, etc.).
The argument then becomes: intelligent life is unique to earth because both it and the circumstances that provide for it here on Earth are unique and must be designed by God.
Drc466:
Agreed. I think the “Earth circumstances” being factually or demonstrably “unique” in the universe is a pretty steep climb to make without referring to a non-design premise. I’m not a Bible expert; does the Bible actually say humanity is unique? I’m not sure many Biblical scholars or theologians claim that God has a human-looking body, or that any passage specifically denies the existence of intelligent beings on other planets.
WJM: I’m not a Bible expert; does the Bible actually say humanity is unique?
Why do you think it matters what the Bibles says? Or are you just asking out of curiosity? And, more importantly, why don’t you know what the Bible says on such matters? Are you just feeding the conversational flames . . .
WJM:
Yes
And science backs that claim up.
The attack on human exceptionalism, i.e. the attack by Atheists on the specific belief that we are ‘made in the image of God’ is twofold.
First, Atheists appeal to the Copernican Principle and/or the Principle of Mediocrity, to argue that we are not special in the universe. And secondly, atheists appeal to Darwinian evolution to argue that we are not all that different from the animals here on earth and therefore we are not made in the image of God.
In the following post I addressed the fact that the Copernican Principle and/or the Principle of Mediocrity has now been overturned by our most powerful theories in science, General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics.
And in the following post I addressed the fact that the fossil record and the genetic evidence is far more discordant with Darwinian claims than Darwinists portray to the general public:
And although the evidence for human evolution is far more discordant with Darwinian claims than (most) Darwinists are willing to admit to the general public, it is interesting to note the one human trait that even leading Darwinists themselves admit that they have no clue how it could have possibly of evolved.
In 2014, a group of leading (Darwinian) experts in the area of language research, authored a paper in which they admitted that they have, “essentially no explanation of how and why our linguistic computations and representations evolved.,,,”
The late best selling author Tom Wolfe was so taken aback by this honest confession from leading Darwinists that he wrote a book on the subject. Here is a general outline of his main argument;
In other words, humans have, completely contrary to Darwinian ‘survival of the fittest’ thinking, managed to become masters of the planet, not by brute force, but simply by our unique ability to communicate information and also to, more specifically, infuse information into material substrates in order to create, (i.e. intelligently design), objects that are extremely useful for our defense, basic survival in procuring food, furtherance of our knowledge, and also for our pleasure.
And although the ‘top-down’ infusion of immaterial information into material substrates, that allowed humans to become ‘masters of the planet’, was rather crude to begin with, (i.e. spears, arrows, and plows etc..), this top down infusion of immaterial information into material substrates has become much more impressive over the last half century or so.
Specifically, the ‘top-down’ infusion of mathematical and/or logical information into material substrates lies at the very basis of many, if not all, of man’s most stunning, almost miraculous, technological advances in recent decades.
What is more interesting still about the fact that humans have a unique ability to understand and create information, and have come to ‘master the planet’ through the ‘top-down’ infusion of immaterial information into material substrates, is the fact that, due to advances in science, both the universe and life itself, are now found to be ‘information theoretic’ in their foundational basis.
It is hard to imagine a more convincing proof that we are ‘made in the image of God’, than finding that both the universe and life itself are ‘information theoretic’ in their foundational basis, and that we, of all the creatures on earth, uniquely possess an ability to understand and create information, and have come to ‘master the planet’ precisely because of our ability to infuse information into material substrates.
WJM also states,
I guess WJM is unaware of the ‘little’ fact that Jesus claimed to be God incarnate?
A more convincing proof that we are ‘made in the image’ of God, (rather than just the fact that we uniquely possess an ability to manipulate information), is the fact that God Himself became a man, defeated death on a cross, and then rose from the dead to prove that He was God.
And that just so happens to be precisely the proof claimed within Christianity.
And although Christianity is certainly rich in apologetic resources that Christians can utilize to defend their Christian faith, my favorite ‘proof’ that Jesus is exactly who He claimed to be, (namely God incarnate), is the Shroud of Turin,,, which just so happens to be, by far, the most ‘scientifically’ scrutinized ancient relic on the face of earth.
Verse:
BA77,
I’ll take your word that those scriptures mean what you say they mean.
Now, let’s please return to the topic at hand. Or let the thread die a noble death 🙂
No problem, you brought the subject up. If you don’t believe me on scriptures look them up for yourself. The Bible does indeed claim that we are UNIQUELY made in God’s image and also that Jesus is God incarnate, I.e. God in human flesh.
I thought at least that much of the Bible was common knowledge, at least in America.
As to the topic at hand, I see no evidence presented thus far that would challenge anything that I presented in posts 1 and 2.
BA77
I don’t see how God creating us in his image makes us unique in the universe. He could easily have created other life forms on other planets in his image. The Bible says nothing to preclude this.
Incidentally, I once asked a colleague who was participating in SETI many years ago whether intelligent life on earth could be detected from the places we were searching if the scientists there used the same technology we were using.
He posed the question to SETI and the answer was no.
-Q
WJM, MacM, et.al.:
If you are interested in the general theology behind the fundamentalist Christian YEC belief that we are unique in the universe, here’s a decent starting place:
Did God Create Life on Other Planets?
Alien Life / UFO Questions and Answers
The TL;DR version has to do with man’s sin, Christ’s redemption, and the purpose/destruction/re-creation of the universe all being very man-focused. Includes Bible references.
Drc466,
The point is that from a design perspective there can be as many Earth-like planets as the designer wants to put in it. There may be doctrinal arguments against it, but I don’t see a logical argument from the pure design perspective.
Earth was created first before sun, moon, stars. In God’s factory was a moment when Earth is alone in all universe . In conclusion the universe is created as a complement for Earth.
Follow-up question:
If we assume that human life on Earth is unique, how do we account for evidence of what are commonly called extra-terrestrials, such as testimony from multiple sources of interactions with ETs? Is that evidence dismissed? Viewed as non-credible?
It seems to me that people who hold that God could have created as many worlds in this universe with creatures ‘made in his image’ as He wanted to are, scientifically speaking, in the same boat as Darwinists are.
That is to say, scientifically speaking, we are, (whether you are a Darwinist or a ‘generic’ Intelligent Design advocate), still left with the question of, ‘if the universe is teeming with extraterrestrial intelligences then where in blue blazes are they?’
Contrary to however many ‘ancient alien’ episodes on the History channel you may have watched, (with that rather wild haired narrator), there simply is no hard evidence for extraterrestrial intelligences.
The unanswered question is this, ‘if they exist then where are they?’ This is commonly known as the Fermi paradox.
I guess the generic ID advocate could argue, ‘well maybe God just didn’t want us to hear from them?’ But that would just be speculation on their part and certainly would not provide a satisfactory scientific explanation as to why we find ourselves to be alone in the universe as far as solid, undeniable, contact with extraterrestrial intelligences is concerned.
Moreover, scientifically speaking, that would put the ‘generic’ ID advocate in the same boat as the Darwinist in that they both would hold that Copernican Principle and/or ‘The Principle of Mediocrity’ to be true.
That is to say, both the ‘generic’ ID advocate and the Darwinist would both hold that there is nothing particularly special about the earth and/or humanity in the universe.
And whereas the ‘generic’ ID advocate would, at least, have a leg up on the Darwinist in that the ‘generic’ ID advocate could account for the, at least, 816 parameters that enable intelligent life to be possible on earth, (see Hugh Ross in post 1), the ‘generic’ ID advocate would still fail to be able to account for the fact that the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation, (CMBR), has now been found to contain ‘anomalies’, (anomalies that were recently discovered by the WMAP and Planck telescopes), that strangely line up with the earth and solar system.
At the 13:55 minute mark of this following video, Max Tegmark, an atheist who specializes in this area of study, finally admits, post Planck 2013, that the CMBR anomalies do indeed line up with the earth and solar system
And here is an excellent clip from the movie “The Principle” that explains these ‘anomalies’ in the CMBR, (that ‘unexpectedly’ line up with the earth and solar system), in an easy to understand manner.
Moreover, due to the ‘insane coincidence’ of the flatness of the universe being fine-tuned to within one part to the 10^57, we find that “These tiny temperature variations correspond to the largest scale structures of the observable universe.”
And we also find that Radio Astronomy now reveals a surprising rotational coincidence for Earth in relation to the quasar and radio galaxy distributions in the universe:
Thus contrary to the presupposition of Darwinists, and to the presupposition of ‘generic’ ID advocates, we find that the “tiny temperature variations” in the CMBR, (from the large scale structures in the universe, to the earth and solar system themselves), reveal teleology, (i.e. a goal directed purpose, a plan), that specifically included the earth from the start. ,,, The earth, from what our best science can now tell us, was specifically intended by God when he first created the universe..
This is exactly what the Bible ‘predicted’
Thus in conclusion, scientifically speaking, the Christian who holds that the earth is unique in this universe,, (i.e. who holds that God had, and has, a special plan for the earth in this universe), has a leg up on both the Darwinist and the ‘generic’ ID advocate in that the Christian can account for, number 1, why we are alone in the universe, (i.e. can account for the Fermi paradox), and more importantly, number 2, the Christian can also account for why the CMBR anomalies would ‘unexpectedly’ line up with the earth and solar system.
BA77,
IF I understand it correctly, the CMBR data can be reasonably construed to indicate that there is a universally preferred plane (two-dimensional axis) that corresponds to (1) the 3-axis position of the solar system and (2) the 2-dimensional axis plane representing the equator of the Earth. IOW, if you extend a plane out from the equator, the CMBR indicates a universal temperature difference between what is universally located above that plane and what lies below it.
This would only indicate (following the assumption and logic here) that intelligent life may be regulated to those Earth-like planets which have equators aligned on this plane in a solar system that moves along this plane. Let’s also throw in other data, like our privileged position in the galaxy, our privileged distance from the sun, the specific nature of the moon, etc.
The problem here is this: even with all that, you’re importing probabilities that rely an a non-design premise to make a specific design argument – that the Earth is unique in the universe. Any number of Earths can exist with a functionally equivalent equatorial plane, solar dynamics and axis location, galactic position, qualities of the moon, etc.
The argument that it is highly improbable that other such planets exist with the same axis orientation and finely-tuned conditions can only be made from the non-design perspective. It doesn’t import into the design argument because a designed universe is not a probabilistic situation; it is a designed situation. Probabilistic arguments become irrelevant beyond showing that we are not in a probabilistic universe.
It would be no more “unlikely” for the designer to design a billion such worlds with all of the intelligent-life specific characteristics along that axis plane than it would be to design one, because “likelihood” isn’t even a thing under the design paradigm.
The “why haven’t we met them yet” argument assumes we have not. It assumes they haven’t been here and interacting with us since the dawn of recorded history. Whether you consider the evidence “solid” or not, the evidence exists nonetheless, most prominently in the form of first-hand experiential testimony from a large number of people, many of them highly credible.
Continuing from #19,
To make the scientific case Earth and human intelligence is unique in the universe, once it is established we live in a designed universe, probabilities are no longer applicable. One would have to find non-probabilistic evidence that the Earth is factually unique. I don’t see how that can be done.
WJM claims,
Umm No. The anomalies correspond back to THIS earth and THIS solar system in particular. That is what makes it so ‘spooky’ and is also what makes it so antagonistic to those who would, for philosophical reasons, prefer that the earth and solar system were ‘mediocre’ rather than special in this universe.
As I referenced, and you apparently ignored, the CMBR anomalies, (due to the extreme flatness of the universe), correspond to the large scale structures in the universe and those large scale structures now reveal a surprising rotational coincidence for Earth in relation to the quasar and radio galaxy distributions in the universe:
Thus contrary to the presupposition of Darwinists, and to the presupposition of ‘generic’ ID advocates, we find that the “tiny temperature variations” in the CMBR, (from the large scale structures in the universe, to the earth and solar system themselves), reveal teleology, (i.e. a goal directed purpose, a plan), that specifically included the earth from the start. ,,, The earth, from what our best science can now tell us, was specifically intended by God when he first created the universe..
That is what the science itself says, not what my philosophical presupposition is saying.
BA77,
I didn’t make a claim other than that of my understanding of what CMBR shows (note how I began the comment, “IF I understand it correctly, ….”)
Maybe I’m missing it, but I still don’t see how the CMBR data goes beyond establishing the uniqueness of the solar and axis plane. Perhaps you could tell me how any other planet with the same orbital plane and the same axis tilt in a solar system inhabiting the same universal plane would have a different CMBR observation?
To ask where in the blazes are they with respect to extraterrestrials means you are ignoring centuries of evidence.
@ET
ET are you ET?
They are initials, Sandy.
WJM, as I pointed out three times now, the “large scale structures now reveal a surprising rotational coincidence for Earth in relation to the quasar and radio galaxy distributions in the universe:”
Apparently you, philosophically, want this to be transferable to other places in the universe. It is not transferable.
ET:
Well, not to belittle ‘centuries of evidence’, but exactly how are our diplomatic relations currently going with these ETs? i.e. Exactly “where are they?”
Why do we need diplomatic relations with them in order for them to exist? And they are here. Ask the witnesses. Read the documentation such as the Vedas and the recently released government files.
BA77,
I don’t have any such philosophical requirement. None of any of this violates MRT. My interest here is purely in the logic.
Let me put my objection another way: imagine a plane that dissected the Earth at the equator extending outward. Now lets take the galaxy with the solar system and move it along that plane, keeping the Earth precisely dissected by that plane, 10 million light years in any direction along that plane.
What would be the observational difference wrt the CMBR? I don’t see the difference. The universe will still be observed to have a temperature difference dissected by the Earth’s equatorial plane.
ET:
You mean this?
Umm, seeing as the theory of evolution itself finds its deepest metaphysical root in the pagan religion of Hinduism, I’ll think I’ll take an extremely skeptical approach to any purported evidence arising for ETs from the Vedas.
WJM, whatever. I’ve already repeated the evidence for the large scale structures of the universe several times now. Again, the earth’s ‘preferred’ position in relation to the large scale structures of the universe is not transferable to other places in the universe despite your apparent philosophical preference that it should be transferable.
Whatever. Your willful ignorance on this subject is not an argument.
ET, the Vedas, for a Christian, is certainly not to be considered a credible source.
You call it ‘willful ignorance’. I call it not being gullible.
BA77,
“Whatever?” The evidence you cited points to the preferred position of a plane that dissects the universe into a “top” and “bottom,” not a particular point on that plane. That plane also dissects the Earth at its equator. Is that correct or incorrect? Or does the CMBR also isolate Earth’s point location on that plane?
I call it willful ignorance because that is exactly what it is. The Vedas aren’t the only documentation for aliens and UFOs.
If there’s anything Hinduism doesn’t support, it’s materialism. Can’t really get from Hinduism to Darwinism.
WJM, my post at 31 is unambiguous.
I am not proficient in any other language other than English. i.e. I don’t know how to make it any easier for you to understand.
The earth’s ‘preferred’ position in relation to the large scale structures is not transferable to any other position.
You apparently are desperately trying to find a workaround because of your a-priori philosophical bias against the earth being ‘preferred” in the universe..
I, on the other hand, am just fine with the evidence. Indeed, I was pleasantly surprised when I first learned about it and how it ‘refined’ Gonzalez’s overall thesis for the ‘Privileged Planet’ to the earth itself, specifically.
WJM, you might want to watch the video I cited before you make sweeping claims as to what Hinduism supports and what it does not support..
Well ET, you certainly are not going to win any points with me by simply calling me ‘willfully ignorant’.
You have provided no evidence, other than the Vedas, that I can be willfully ignorant of.
And the Vedas, as I explained, is certainly not to be considered a credible source by most Christian scholars. In fact, it is considered to be pagan.
And apparently, as the Fermi paradox itself makes clear, I am not nearly alone in being ‘willfully ignorant’ of the compelling evidences for ETs that you insist exists, Apparently many high caliber scientists themselves, , as the Fermi paradox itself makes clear, are also willfully ignorant of all this compelling evidence for ETs that you insist exists.
BA77,
But you’re not answer my simple yes/no questions that will unambiguously let me know if I am interpreting the CMBR data wrong. Let me try this in a true/false manner:
1. The CBMR reveals a preferential plane that dissects the known universe into “top” and “bottom” halves that also dissects the Earth at the equator. True or false?
2. Any planet anywhere on that plane, where the plane dissected its equator, in a solar system/galaxy arrangement that kept the planet’s equator perfectly dissected by that plane, would see the same CMBR effect. True or false?
I call it as it is. You refuse to read the relevant documents. That is the very definition of willful ignorance.
Whether or not the documents are considered pagan has NO bearing on whether or not they are true and represent reality.
Governments have released their UFO files. There are literally thousands of witnesses. Some witnesses are formed NASA astronauts. Some are formed Presidents of the USA.
WJM,
1 true.
2. false.
Again, the large scale structure of the universe drives the nail in the coffin on that point.
Any other planet with observers would not see the same large scale structures of the universe ‘preferring’ their particular position in the universe.
BA77,
You can certainly draw evolution from Hindu sources – their whole thing is basically about the evolution of the soul. But you can’t extract materialism from it, and Darwinism depends on materialism. You can no more extract Darwinism from Hinduism than you can extract it from Christianity.
ET, well, although you may find pagan sources to be credible, I certainly consider pagan sources to be false.
And “Government files’ certainly does not move the needle much for me either.
Conspiracy theorists often rely on ‘Government files’ in order to support their claims. i.e. 9-11 conspiracy theorists for example..
Astronauts and Presidents is a bit more impressive, but still not compelling evidence as far as empirical science itself is concerned.
If ETs really exist, it should be overwhelming evidence that no one could doubt. But as Enrico Fermi asked “Where is everybody?”, ,,, ET diehards simply don’t have that level of scientific evidence that would put their case beyond reasonable doubt.
And you calling me ‘willfully ignorant’ is not going to change that fact.
But anyways, I am tired of being insulted and will no longer play along with you.
Well WJM, actually, as Paul James-Griffiths explained in his video, there is a materialistic element to Hinduism to go along with its spiritual element.
Darwinism and Hinduism overlap in fundamental ways. For instance. ‘Aryan master race’, (which the Nazis ‘religiously’ believed in), was originally a Hindu concept,
BA77 @42,
Unless the CMBR provides more than a plane as the identifier of Earth’s preferential location, #2 cannot be false.
WJM. I’ve repeated the large scale structure of the universe numerous times now as the piece of the puzzle that drives the nail in the coffin. It ain’t rocket science.
Well anyways. It seems apparent that you are committed to your view no matter what,,, I am therefore out of here. I have more productive things to do.
Have a good day.
BA77,
Unless “large scale structure of the universe” refers to something other than the CMBR data, repeating it doesn’t change the fact it is referring to a preferential plane, not any specific location on that plane.
WJM,,,
You are kidding right??
Once again, for the forth time,
And again, the large scale structures of the universe, which give the earth a ‘preferred position’, corresponds back to the CMBR via the ‘insane coincidence’ of the universe being flat to 1 in 10^57
Of note, this is my absolute last time trying to explain this to you.
I’m sorry. Again, I have more productive things to do today than trying to explain something to someone who apparently has a mental roadblock that prevents him from understanding..
@ET
UFO , ETs are part of mind control. I’ve red somewhere a doc where UFO effect was an option for submission of population ( “awe effect” produced by holograms in the sky ), among other options like start a war between blacks and whites, release a deadly virus, start “unplanned” terorist atacks . It’s true on that paper was mentioned as last option .
BA77 @46 said:
The inclusion of “matter” in any metaphysical view, including Christianity, does not indicate an “materialistic element.” Materialism by definition is that matter is all that exists (in terms of matter and energy,) Materialism cannot be extracted from Hinduism.
Overlapping aspects of ideology do not indicate that one ideology can be extracted from the other. Darwinism cannot be extracted from Hinduism, because Darwinism (as we know it today) requires materialism, and materialism cannot be extracted from Hinduism.
By “extracted,” I mean be a logically supportable implication. Neither Christianity or Hinduism can be logically construed support materialism or Darwinism.
BA77 @49,
When trying to explain something to someone who doesn’t understand how what you said makes your case, cutting and pasting the same exact information and repeating that it makes your case isn’t helpful. You can paste it 100 times, you can even put it in bold. It adds no explanatory value.
What I do if someone is having a hard time understanding my argument is to rephrase it. I am trying to understand your argument, which is why I rephrase my questions. Maybe I’m not asking the right questions, or I misunderstand the information you’ve provided.
Let me ask it this way.
Let’s assume that there’s lots of intelligent life out there. They have the same scientific, mathematical and logical capacity as we do. They too would discover the fine-tuning of the universal constants and the precision of their environmental factors – fine tuned for intelligent life. The would find that the universe is flat, etc.
Let’s say they live far up in the “northern” hemisphere of the universe perpendicular to the CMBR preferential plane. They would find the preferential plane using CMBR technology, and realize they lived far to the “north” of that plane. Let’s say that they discovered that the rotational axis of their planet is not even in alignment with that distant CMBR plane.
Now lets say this alien race X has super-powered telescopes and can look at planets located on that CMBR plane. They discover a planet, Earth, that is not only on the plane, but the plane also dissects that planet exactly at its equator.
Now let’s say they also find another planet, planet B, on the CMBR plane 10 million light years distant from the first planet, and it also has an axis where the plane is dissecting it at it’s equator.
Is there any other universal architecture that prefers Earth over planet B? If so, what is it? The CMBR seems to only show a preferred plane and a preference towards planets on the plane where the plane dissects that planet at the equator. What would be the distinguishing universal architecture between Earth and planet B?
A more succinct geometrical phrasing occurs to me.
I understand that the CMBR information puts the Earth at the center of a perpendicular axis in 3-dimensinal space; is there any information that shows we are at the center of the two horizontal axes?
bornagain77:
That doesn’t follow. There is overwhelming evidence for intelligent design in biology and yet it is doubted by millions of people.
Gordon Cooper, astronaut, discusses UFOs
More NASA astronauts weigh in
Then there are a number of pilots with verified sightings.
bornagain77:
That is not even wrong.
The Sanskrit word “arya” means “noble” or “distinguished”, in a social context.
BA77 said:
Isn’t this a version of the fallacious “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” argument? No, evidence for ETs have no more of an evidential burden than anything else, much less the impossible standard of “no one can doubt it.” Humans can doubt anything.
There is an enormous amount of evidence for the existence of non-human intelligences that do not seem to come from this planet. There is evidence at least some of them come from other star systems. Other evidence seems to indicate a transdimensional nature for some.
Like evidence for the afterlife, unless you put your attention on it and do some open-minded research, you’ll never even see it.
🙂 I bet if ETs would appear on TV station and would say christianity is true, people who now believe in ETs existence would became skeptics and would say must be a hoax, and they will change their mind about ETs existence. 🙂 🙂 🙂
One thing you’ll find in the Bible is that God created angelic beings in their own “domain” that apparently can cross into ours. Their manifestations include intelligence, physicality, and immense power. They can appear as ordinary humans or clothed in bright light. In the book of Revelation there are angelic beings in strange hybrid forms as well. Some prophetic representations seem like they are intended to be symbolic, both in the Tanakh and in the New Testament.
-Q
To go over the evidence one more time, more slowly.
The way in which they were originally able to detect the anomalies in the CMBR, (anomalies which ‘strangely’ line up with the earth and solar system), is that they ‘smeared’ and/or ‘averaged out’ the tiny temperature variations in the CMBR.
Here is an excellent clip from the documentary “The Principle” that explains, in an easy to understand manner, how these ‘anomalies’ that line up with the earth and solar system were found, via ‘averaging out’, in the tiny temperature variations in the CMBR data.
And here is an article, by one of the producers of the preceding video, which states, “Max Tegmark describes in a simplified way how spherical harmonics analysis decomposes the small temperature fluctuations into more averaged and spatially arranged temperature components, known as multipoles.
The “Axis of Evil” correlates to the earth’s ecliptic and equinoxes, and this represents a very unusual and unexpected special direction in space, a direct challenge to the Copernican Principle.”
And while that is certainly bad enough for anyone who wants to ‘philosophically’ believe that the earth is not that special in the universe, the problem gets worse when we don’t ‘average out’ the small temperature fluctuations in the CMBR.
As mentioned previously, due to the ‘insane coincidence’ of the universe being flat to 1 part within 1×10^57 parts, we now know that “These tiny temperature variations correspond to the largest scale structures of the observable universe. A region that was a fraction of a degree warmer become a vast galaxy cluster, hundreds of millions of light-years across.”
And it is these large scale structures of the universe, (which were not derived via averaging out the tiny temperature fluctuations of the CMBR), which drive the final nail in the coffin for the belief that the earth does not have a ‘preferred’ position in the universe.
As the following article stated, “why should there be such large anisotropies present in the sky distribution of some of the strongest and most distant discrete sources, implying inhomogeneities in the universe at very large scales (covering a fraction of the universe)? Secondly why should such anisotropies lie about a great circle decided purely by the orientation of earth’s rotation axis and/or the axis of its revolution around the sun? It seems yet more curious when we consider the other anisotropies, e.g., an alignment of the four normals to the quadrupole and octopole planes in the CMBR with the cosmological dipole and the equinoxes. Then there is the other recently reported large dipole anisotropy in the NVSS radio source distribution differing in magnitude from the CMBR dipole by a factor of four, and therefore not explained as due to the peculiar motion of the Solar system, yet aligned with the CMBR dipole which itself lies close to the line joining the equinoxes.”
As to, “implying an apparent breakdown of the Copernican principle”, that is for the author to say that these findings are a direct challenge to the belief that the earth is not special in this universe.
In other words, the distribution of quasars and radio galaxies, “in the universe at very large scales”, are arrayed about the earth in such a way as to give the earth a ‘preferred’ position in the universe.
And it is this ‘preferred position’, (that is found by looking at the large scale structures of the universe themselves, i.e. quasar and radio galaxy distribution), which is definitely not transferable to other positions in the universe.
Thus, contrary to the presumption of atheists, far from the temperature variations in the CMBR being a product of randomness as they presuppose, the tiny temperature variations in the CMBR correspond to the ‘largest scale structures of the observable universe’ and these ‘largest scale structures of the observable universe’ reveal “a surprising rotational coincidence for Earth”.
Moreover, we were only able to discover this correlation between the tiny temperature variation in the CMBR and the largest scale structures in the universe via the ‘insane coincidence’ of the universe being fine-tuned to at least 1 in 10^57 flatness.
Atheists simply have no clue why the universe should be ‘insanely’ flat, whereas the Bible predicted the universe to be flat thousands of years before it was discovered by modern astronomy.
In fact, the Bible also predicted God to ‘draw a circle on the face of the deep’ thousands of years before the CMBR was discovered:
Shoot, even the scientists who discovered the CMBR stated that,
And indeed, the evidence for a ‘Biblical creation” has only gotten stronger since they made those statements.
As I have outlined in this post, The “tiny temperature variations” in the CMBR, to the largest scale structures in the universe itself, reveal teleology, (i.e. a goal directed purpose, a plan, a reason), that specifically included the earth from the start.
And again, the Bible alone, among all holy books of the world, uniquely predicted the earth to be ‘intended’ from the beginning of creation:
BA77,
Repeating the same information in the same way “slower” isn’t a good plan to aid in my understanding of what you’re trying to tell me. As far as I can tell, the CMBR shows a preferred plane, nothing else. The “flatness” of the universe has, as far as I can tell, nothing whatsoever to contribute to the claim that the Earth is in a preferred position, spatially speaking.
Absent “preference” information that actually narrows Earth’s location to something considerably smaller than a universe-wide plane, there is no good scientific design argument that the Earth and human intelligence is likely unique.
Whatever WJM, I explained the evidence to the best of my ability. The ‘preference’ for the earth’s position from the large scale structures of the universe is not transferable to other positions in the universe as you are erroneously assuming in your ‘single plane’ model. That is exactly why the various studies say it is a challenge to the Copernican principle.
I don’t know how to make it any clearer for you.
I am fairly confident that others, who are not so philosophically committed to the earth being mediocre in the universe, will be able to, relatively easily, understand the evidence.
Of related interest to ‘philosophical biases’, I just remembered this quote from George Ellis,
There are references to UFOs in the Bible. So I don’t understand the issue.
William J Murray,
What did you think of “the Axis of Evil” in the video?
-Q
@Bornagain77
Thanks, I didn’t know about this movie from 2014. Wow!
https://www.bitchute.com/video/5MZhT865KVom/
BA77 said:
If by “explaining it to the best of your ability” you mean copy-pasting the exact same thing 4 times in a row, only adding you saying almost the exact same thing as what you quoted between quotes, then okay. You wouldn’t answer the questions I asked in order to help me understand your point.
I didn’t assume anything. I asked you if the CMBR info revealed a preferred plane because I didn’t know if I was interpreting it correctly. You said yes. I asked you repeatedly, in different ways, if any particular location on that plane was preferred by that data, and if so, how? You kept referring to the flatness, which as far as I can tell has nothing to do with our spatial location, and then you kept copy-pasting the CMBR data, which you already agreed only showed preference for a particular plane.
Until you can tell me specifically what would make one particular location on that plane unique compared to any other particular location on that plane, you haven’t made your case.
I have no ideological dog in this fight. It doesn’t make me any difference if humans and earth are unique in this universe. It doesn’t make me any difference if ETs exist or not. That’s not something I care about in any way.
Since I’ve given BA77 ample opportunities to argue that the Earth is in a preferred position compared to other positions on the CMBR plane (I don’t refer to it as “Axis of Evil, Q, because that’s too confusing for God’s sake,) I’ll explain why that perspective is problematic.
In order for Earth’s (or our solar system’s) particular position on that plane to be unique wrt the rest of the universe, the entire universe would literally have to have Earth at its functional center. The apparent motion of our planet around the sun, our solar system through space according to the gravity center of the galaxy and the motion of the galaxy itself through space, would all have to be an illusion. Earth would have to be fixed in a 3-axis location and everything else be revolving around it.
I’m not saying that’s not the case; I’m saying that for the Earth to exist in a unique 3D or 3-axis location, it means everything in the universe is moving through space but Earth is not. We would literally have to be in the same spot since the beginning in order for the Earth to be in a privileged 3-axis spatial location. The only alternative to this is that the Earth, solar system and galaxy have been moving in a coordinated fashion that keeps the Earth’s equator fixed on the CMBR plane. Any location on the plane, with the Earth’s equator dissected by it, would reveal the same kind of CMBR data, so as we move along the plane the CMBR data stays consistent.
This necessarily would mean that there could be any number of planets on that universal-width plane that would see the same kind of CMBR data. We would have found it 100 years ago 1000, years ago, etc. as we are moving horizontally across that plane. Unless the entire universe is literally revolving around a motionless Earth, our previous locations on the plane would have revealed the same data.
Once we establish that the universe is designed, probabilistic arguments are no longer applicable. If one solar system can be moving along that plane so perfectly that one of it’s planets has an equator that is always dissected by it, any number of such planetary systems and dynamics can exist.d
Unless Earth is literally the motionless (wrt motion through space) center of all celestial mechanics and motion. Is that the case you are attempting to make, BA77?
I wonder if the CMBR data is revealing a 3-chamber Maxwell’s Demon situation wrt entropy, where intelligence is managing incoming organized (useful) information/energy and outgoing (non-useful) information/energy, and the CMBR plane is the middle chamber? It seems like that would account for the three zones and why extremely low entropic systems like intelligent life would necessarily exist in the CMBR plane. Seems like a good setup for preserving the source supply of low-entropy information/energy if you’re also “pumping out” used, high entropy information/energy into a separate “waste” area.
From a generic design perspective, this CMBR-revealed arrangement doesn’t make sense unless it serves a functional purpose. In other words, it can’t just be a “hello, I did this so you’ll know you’re special” purpose. It would be how a functional, high-efficiency system would be set up.
Take a typical home (at least in the USA) for example. You put your air conditioning unit where it has the most shade or relief from the heat. You want it to be drawing in the coolest air possible. Work done in the house that generates heat, like the hot water heater, the bathroom where heat collects due to hot water baths and showers, and the stove are vented away from the AC unit.
The maximal use of the three-chamber Maxwell’s Demon arrangement would not only place intelligent life-sustaining planets between an import source and an export area (the CMBR plane,) it might also very precisely align that planet’s equator with the plane for maximum efficiency. And here’s the thing; over time the entropic disparity between the import source and the export area would necessarily show observable differences, not only in relative temperature, but in other features as well – which is what the CMBR data reveals.
Now I’ll explain why the CMBR data, rather than indicating that the Earth is unique, actually indicates the opposite – that it is not unique – from a design perspective.
If the Earth was unique, the CMBR data would reveal a spherical, not hemispherical, difference in structure and temperature distribution. It would point at Earth from all directions, not just at the universal-width plane the Earth occupies.
Under the 3-chamber entropy model, the “import” zone would be represented by the direction we are going, spatially speaking. The export zone would be trailing after us. This would be the most efficient set-up. Our past would be high entropy, our future lower-entropy. That directly conflicts with observations.
What we observe is more in line with a universe that began with maximally low entropy, with half the universe earmarked for information import and the other half earmarked for waste export, set up for the purpose of creating the largest intelligent life zone possible under a maximum efficiency 3-chamber Maxwell Demon system. You don’t do that to create one planet with intelligent life, otherwise the system could be more efficiently constructed and would reveal different observations – at least with our current information.
So here we also see the difference between a generic-ID perspective and any particular religious or spiritual ID perspective; the generic ID perspective doesn’t stop at “the evidence shows we are in a preferred location.” “Hey look, we’re in a special location” isn’t a scientific explanation for the CMBR data from a design perspective; it’s the creator making itself known from a religious perspective. This is the big problem with mixing ID theory and religion.
I’ve offered a rough model that attempts to explain the CMBR data as functional and efficient design. I think I’ve also offered a general argument why that design indicates there is likely more than one planet housing intelligent life; what we see would look different if Earth was unique because the design would indicate a preferred point – Earth – wherever it traveled in the universe and not a universe-wide plane that would only be efficient design if there are a number of worlds with intelligent life on them distributed (probably in an efficient pattern) along the CMBR plane.
WJM continued to push his ‘single plane’ model though he was corrected on it and was specifically asked by Querius “What did you think of “the Axis of Evil” in the video?”
Go figure. Then WJM goes off on a highly speculative tangent about entropy with no reference to any actual empirical evidence that I could see
But in the midst of all his smoke and heat, WJM did make this statement,
Although the vast majority of people, including the vast majority of Christians, hold the Copernican principle to be unquestionably true, and hold that it is a undeniable fact that the earth is in, very rapid, motion through space, the fact of the matter is that no one has ever scientifically proven that the earth is actually in motion and that the earth is not the still center of the universe.
In other words, contrary to popular belief, Copernicus never did prove that the heliocentric model was true and the geocentric model was wrong, (and no one even tries to argue that the sun is the center of the universe anymore)
There simply is no empirical reason to prefer the sun, or any other place in the universe, as being central in the universe over and above the earth being considered central in the universe, in any model that we may choose to make for the universe.
As Einstein himself noted,
Here are a few more notes backing up the claim that there is no empirical reason to prefer the sun, or any other place in the universe, as being central in the universe over and above the earth being considered central in the universe, in any model that we may choose to make for the universe.
In fact, as far as empirical science itself is concerned, in the 4 dimensional spacetime of Einstein’s General Relativity, we find that each 3-Dimensional point in the universe is central to the expansion of the universe,,,
,,, and since any 3-Dimensional point can be considered central in the expanding 4-Dimensional space time of General Relativity, then, as the following articles make clear, it is now left completely open to whomever is making a model of the universe to decide for themselves what is to be considered central in the universe,,,
As the preceding articles made clear, General Relativity itself does not care if we choose the earth, or the sun, or any other place in the universe, as the central point for our model of the universe.
As Stephen Hawking himself explained, ‘our observations of the heavens can be explained by assuming either the earth or the sun to be at rest.,,, the real advantage of the Copernican system is simply that the equations of motion are much simpler in the frame of reference in which the sun is at rest.’
And as George Ellis stated, “I can construct you a spherically symmetrical universe with Earth at its center, and you cannot disprove it based on observations… You can only exclude it on philosophical grounds…”
And as Fred Hoyle stated, “Today we cannot say that the Copernican theory is ‘right’ and the Ptolemaic theory ‘wrong’ in any meaningful physical sense.”
And even Einstein himself stated, The two sentences: “the sun is at rest and the earth moves” or “the sun moves and the earth is at rest” would simply mean two different conventions concerning two different CS [coordinate systems].”
Again, there simply is no empirical, nor mathematical, reason to prefer the sun, or any other place in the universe, as being central in the universe over and above the earth being considered central in the universe, in any model that we may choose to make for the universe, (save for making the equations of motion easier for us to calculate).
Moreover, as the the anomalies in the CMBR and the large scale structures of the universe make clear, (as referenced in post 60), we now do have empirical evidence that strongly suggest that we should, at the very least, consider the earth to be a viable candidate for centrality in our, (arbitrarily chosen), model of the universe.
In other words, we have no empirical reason to prefer any other place in the universe as being central over and above the earth in our model of the universe, whereas, on the other hand, we now do have empirical evidence that strongly suggest we should, at the very least, consider the earth as being a very viable candidate for centrality in our, (arbitrarily chosen), model of the universe.
To repeat what George Ellis stated prior to the discovery of the anomalies in the CMBR by the WMAP and PLANCK satellites,,
Might it be to obvious to point out, (given the ‘philosophical hoops’ that WJM himself has tried to jump through in order to maintain his philosophical belief in a mediocre earth in the face of empirical evidence to the contrary), that the ‘philosophical criteria’ for ignoring the apparent centrality of the earth in the universe is becoming far harder to maintain?
BA77, as I said before, I have no philosophical belief in a mediocre Earth.
I am honestly trying to understand how the evidence you’ve provided indicates a preferential point (Earth) on the CMBR plane (or Axis of Evil). I’ve watched several videos on it, one from the perspective that the CMBR plane was evidence Earth was in a special location; but the only evidence it provided (and all of the others) was that Earth was special because of it’s alignment with the plane. And, it showed that the plane doesn’t go through our equator, but close enough for horseshoes and hand grenades.
The plane shown nearly dissecting the Earth closely matches the plane of the elliptic. Equinox axis is just in alignment with the dipole positions, so that doesn’t add anything as far as the physical location of the Earth within the CMBR plane.
The videos state flatly that the CMBR doesn’t show a center of the universe, but rather axes that corresponds with our elliptic and equinox. It would only be “pointing at Earth” in the same way it would be pointing at any planet with an elliptic that was similarly close to the CBMR plane and aligned with it and which had an elliptic with a tilt that matched ours in relation to the dipoles.
Apparently, the idea that it specifically “pointed at Earth” was an assumptive result of the same inapplicable use of non-design probabilities being wrongfully imported into a design perspective.
So I was right, apparently: the CMBR only reveals a preferred plane, not a preferred position on that plane. Unless there is other universal architecture indicating we are in a preferred position on that plane, then the most we can say is that any planet with a similar elliptic and axis tilt near that plane seem to be preferred planets.
However, unless one comes up with a functional reason why that plane and that tilt axis would be more conducive to intelligent life, then it really is of no value other than in religious ideological terms. (I think there is evidence that the axis tilt is beneficial to, perhaps even necessary for, life.) I think I’ve provided one (admittedly, rough and from only a general understanding of the concepts it employs) using an entropy explanation.
I do appreciate the detailed information about how all the celestial mechanics can be used to equally support both Ptolemic and Copernican perspectives. That’s very exciting information!!
WJM, I’m very satisfied that the unbiased readers, with the information provided thus far, can judge for themselves .
Sandy, thanks for the link to the entire video, I only had a link to the clip of the video that I have referenced. It is nice to have a link to the entire video:
William J Murray,
If you want to see the “fingers of God” that point to the Earth, read this article by the late cosmologist Halton Arp:
https://www.haltonarp.com/articles/fingers_of_god_in_an_expanding_universe
Actually, according to the inflationary model, the Earth is indeed at the universe’s functional center–and so is every other location.
Furthermore, I believe galactic environment is more important than geometric centricity. Similarly, I would speculate that you don’t consider your bellybutton as the most important feature in your body.
The special coincidences of the location of the Earth are presented in this book (and also a video):
The Privileged Planet: How Our Place in the Cosmos Is Designed for Discovery
https://www.amazon.com/Privileged-Planet-Cosmos-Designed-Discovery/dp/1684510775
by the astronomer Guillermo Gonzalez
-Q
Q,
I watched the Privileged Planet. Unfortunately, as I explained to BA77, once it is established that we live in a designed universe, probabilities are no longer meaningful in establishing Earth as the focus of creation. Feel free to join in and share if you think there is evidence that indicates Earth, specifically Earth, is unique.
Remember, if intelligence can design one privileged planet, it can design any number of them. Probabilities no long matter.
Thanks for the link Querius. It is a keeper.
So again, as it has pointed out to WJM several times now, it is these large scale structures of the universe, on top of the CMBR anomalies, which drive the final nail in the coffin for the belief that the earth does not have a ‘preferred’ position in the universe.
I bet there are even reasons, pertaining to being able to maintain life on earth for long periods of time, for why the universe is structured around us the way it is.
For instance, maintaining a stable solar system, that contains a world which is able to host intelligent life, is a far more delicate balancing act than most people realize:
So again, I would be willing to bet that there are unknown reasons, pertaining to maintaining life on earth for long periods of time, for why the universe is structured around us the way it is.
After all, the list for life enabling characteristics is fairly long as it is right now,,,
Bornagain77,
What’s interesting is that Halton Arp wrote a book called Seeing Red many years ago, for which he was shunned–disinvited from conferences and prevented from accessing major telescopes.
His crime?
He used the sausage shaped clusters all pointing to us as an argument that current distance calculations are flawed, namely that these clusters should actually be globular. He caught the academic community in a quandary: Either their distance calculations were seriously off or there are massive sausage shaped clusters all pointing to us–i.e. “the fingers of God.”
It’s been many years since the controversy was smothered so I don’t know whether the distances were quietly corrected now that Halton Arp is safely dead or not.
-Q
William J Murray,
What did you think of “the Goldilocks zone” in the book or movie?
-Q
BA77 said:
I looked up the fingers of God phenomena. As far as I can tell, the phenomena has a red shift explanation where any observer in any location would see the same thing.
The information about the solar system being a delicate balancing act is irrelevant after one has agreed that we live in a designed habitat.
Querius asks:
As far as I can tell, it was well documented and a great argument that the situation Earth is in was designed. As I’ve said, we’re well past the point where we understand that the universe is designed for the existence of intelligent life. That’s where probability arguments end.
The only science-based arguments that are useful now in establishing Earth as “unique” are non-probabilistic arguments based on evidence and theoretical models that explain, from a design perspective, what that evidence means (other than God winking at us.)
WJMs argument appears to be something like this.
“I agree that the universe is intelligently designed but I hold that the earth is not unique because God, (and/or what WJM might call ‘ “universal mind”), could have created as many worlds with intelligent life as He wanted to.”
As has been pointed out several times now to WJM, the anomalies in the CMBR, and the large scale structures of the universe give the earth in particular a ‘preferred position’ in the universe.
WJM has countered that it is only on a single plane that the earth is given a preferred position, and that other planets on that plane would also see themselves as having a preferred position. (As well WJM assumes that life could also be possible on other planets in the universe that are not on the CMB plane, i.e. he assumes the plane to not be essential for enabling intelligent life, i.e. he philosophically, not scientifically, assumes ‘non-design’ for the CMB plane in particular.)
If it was just the CMB plane in particular, WJM might have a point. But as I have pointed out to WJM several times now, specifically pointed out with the Ashok K. Singal paper, it is the large scale structures of the universe, on top of the CMBR anomalies, which drive the final nail in the coffin for the belief that the earth does not have a ‘preferred’ position in the universe.
As the following article, (with a illustration) explains,
Thus again, it is not just a single plane from the CMB that WJM has to account for. The large scale structures of the universe are indeed arrayed about the earth in order to give it its ‘Z axis” and there ‘true centrality’ in the universe.
WJM may still hold that that still does not mean that God could not have created intelligent life in other places of the universe that are not at its center, but as I pointed out in post 77,
In other words, I hold that our ignorance of any life enabling characteristics that may be associated with out ‘preferred’ position in the universe is not an argument that a Design proponent should be making. Obviously, a design proponent, if he is to be consistent, should presuppose a design perspective and not presuppose non-design perspective, in any situation where our knowledge of the situation is incomplete.
As to the ‘fingers of God’ paper that Querius brought up, WJM comments that.
But as Querius pointed out in post 78,
But let’s give WJM the benefit of a doubt and assume that this ’embarrassing situation’, as Arp termed it, has been worked out and is merely a distortion “where any observer in any location would see the same thing.”
Let’s concentrate on ‘observers’ in particular.
When Einstein first formulated both Special and General relativity, he gave a ‘hypothetical’ observer a privileged frame of reference in which to make measurements in the universe.
Whereas Einstein, when he first formulated both Special and General Relativity, gave a ‘hypothetical’ observer a privileged frame of reference in which to make measurements in the universe, In Quantum Mechanics we find that it is the measurement itself that gives each observer a privileged frame of reference in the universe.
As the following article states, “It proves that measurement is everything. At the quantum level, reality does not exist if you are not looking at it,”,,,
Likewise, the following violation of Leggett’s inequality stressed ‘the quantum-mechanical assertion that reality does not exist when we’re not observing it.’
Moreover, this recent 2019 experimental confirmation of the “Wigner’s Friend” thought experiment established that “measurement results,, must be understood relative to the observer who performed the measurement”.
Because of such consistent and repeatable experiments like the preceding from quantum mechanics, Richard Conn Henry, who is Professor of Physics at John Hopkins University, stated “It is more than 80 years since the discovery of quantum mechanics gave us the most fundamental insight ever into our nature: the overturning of the Copernican Revolution, and the restoration of us human beings to centrality in the Universe.”
On top of all that, and completely contrary to the Copernican Principle and/or the Principle of Mediocrity, in quantum mechanics we find that humans, (via their free will), are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level.
As Steven Weinberg, who is an atheist himself, stated in the following article, In the instrumentalist approach (in quantum mechanics) humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level.,,, the instrumentalist approach turns its back on a vision that became possible after Darwin, of a world governed by impersonal physical laws that control human behavior along with everything else.,,, In quantum mechanics these probabilities do not exist until people choose what to measure,,, Unlike the case of classical physics, a choice must be made,,,
In fact Weinberg, again an atheist, rejected the instrumentalist approach precisely because “humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level” and because it undermined the Darwinian worldview from within.
Yet, regardless of how Weinberg and other atheists may prefer the world to behave, quantum mechanics itself could care less how atheists prefer the world to behave.
As leading experimentalist Anton Zeilinger states in the following video, “what we perceive as reality now depends on our earlier decision what to measure. Which is a very, very, deep message about the nature of reality and our part in the whole universe. We are not just passive observers.”
As well, although there have been several major loopholes in quantum mechanics over the past several decades that atheists have tried to appeal to in order to try to avoid the ‘spooky’ Theistic implications of quantum mechanics, over the past several years each of those major loopholes have each been closed one by one. The last major loophole that was left to be closed was the “setting independence” and/or the ‘free-will’ loophole:
And now Anton Zeilinger and company have recently, as of 2018, pushed the ‘free will loophole’ back to 7.8 billion years ago, thereby firmly establishing the ‘common sense’ fact that the free will choices of the experimenter in the quantum experiments are truly free and are not determined by any possible causal influences from the past for at least the last 7.8 billion years, and that experimenters themselves are therefore shown to be truly free to choose whatever measurement settings in the experiments that he or she may so desire to choose so as to ‘logically’ probe whatever aspect of reality that he or she may be interested in probing.
Thus regardless of how Steven Weinberg and other atheists may prefer the universe to behave, with the closing of the last remaining free will loophole in quantum mechanics, it is empirically demonstrated that “humans are indeed brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level”, and thus these recent findings from quantum mechanics directly undermine, as Weinberg himself stated, the “vision that became possible after Darwin, of a world governed by impersonal physical laws that control human behavior along with everything else.”
Moreover, the validation of free will in quantum mechanics differentiates WJM’s generic ‘universal mind’ version of Intelligent Design from Christianity’s version of Intelligent Design in a profound way.
Namely
To give us a small glimpse of the power that was involved in Christ’s resurrection from the dead, the following recent article found that, ”it would take 34 Thousand Billion Watts of VUV radiations to make the image on the shroud. This output of electromagnetic energy remains beyond human technology.”
Verse:
Thus in conclusion, I find WJM arguments against the ‘preferred’ position of the Earth in the universe to not hold up to scrutiny. In fact, I find that he assumes a ‘non-design’ perspective in order to try to maintain his belief that the earth is not to be ‘preferred’.
Moreover, even when we granted WJM that the ‘fingers of God’ anomaly, in particular, was due to distortions that any observer would see, even there, when looking at ‘observers’ themselves in particular, we find that Christianity offers us something that WJM ‘mental reality theory’ cannot offer.
Namely, we find that the ‘observer’ of Jesus Christ Himself provides us with a very plausible, even empirically backed, reconciliation between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics into the much sought after ‘theory of everything.
I would hold that to be a rather dramatic differentiation between WJM’s generic ‘mental reality theory’ which holds that there is nothing special about earth or humanity in the universe in particular, and Christianity which holds both the earth and humanity to be very significant in the universe.
Bornagain77,
Good points all! It seems that William J Murray simply waves off the data falsifying his position.
The fact that “the fingers of God” are likely the result of a gross error in theory, which astronomers were unwilling to admit, assumes that hypothetical astronomers everywhere in the universe would also be that stubborn. Halton Arp unfortunately fell between the data and the academic arrogance. He also pointed out a visible interaction between two stars that were supposedly only apparently close, which was prominently discernible on the cover of an issue of (IIRC) Astronomy magazine. But the editors and their supporters waved that off as well to protect their narrative.
The ability for God creating some really interesting worlds elsewhere is actually fine with me. Pluto and Charon are particularly interesting. As to the Goldilocks Effect, which he also waves off, none of the observability factors cited by Guillermo Gonzalez is necessary for life on Earth. The fact that Earth is ideally placed is wildly improbable considering all the stars and their planets that aren’t! That this data was unimpressive should also be illuminating to you.
Jesus termed this behavior willful blindness. In that day, the pharisees willfully ignored the hundreds of years prior prophecies in Daniel that specified the year of Messiah’s coming and the fact that it would have to occur before Jerusalem and the Temple were going to be destroyed. And not only that, the Christians in the first few centuries noted that the pharisees had gone and changed various prophecies about Messiah in the Tanakh, which is now demonstrable in the Septuagint, the Syriac Peshitta, and the Dead Sea Scrolls.
-Q
BA77 et al,
I would like you to keep this debate in mind in future discussions when you start thinking I’m ideologically committed to a perspective. That is not the case; I was trying to collect and understand evidence and information. It was never my position either way; I had no dog in the fight.
If anyone attempted to point me to “The Principle” before, I take full responsibility for, for whatever reason, not following up on it. I did not deliberately “not look” at it beforehand. I either didn’t see it or saw it and forgot about it after having my attention here distracted. These things happen. I always argue in good faith and am willing to check out information.
Perhaps, BA’77, you were talking about the same information but I was unable to understand it or process it correctly. My apologies if that was the case. This video laid it all out in a way I could understand it.
The evidence provided by “The Principle” was what I was asking for. This is why I found your information about the Earth-centric theory exciting and was actually going to look more into it.
The evidence is unambiguously on the side of the Earth-centric theory. Not because of the CMBR information, but that was definitely part of it. The most compelling part of the video was just understanding how the Earth-centric theory was hands down the more efficient theory and was a far better explanatory model for the experimental results.
I think it may be that the specific gravitational dynamics that come with being at the “center of mass” location plays a huge factor in the development of life, but I don’t know if that’s the case. Perhaps there is additional information that would make the scientific case that life either cannot, or probably cannot, develop elsewhere in the universe.
While the evidence so far supports the Earth centric view, so far I’m not sure how that would scientifically preclude the existence of intelligent life elsewhere in the universe. Can that case be made?
WJM,
WOW, I for one really do appreciate that. After years of debating diehard Darwinists, it certainly is VERY refreshing to see someone actually follow the evidence where it leads.
BA77
No problem. I appreciate the time you and others invested in providing avenues of evidence and research, and again, I’m sorry for any inability of mine to process your information, evidence and argument in a more timely fashion.