The Fine Tuning Argument
The Fine Tuning Argument can be simply presented as an argument in the following premises and conclusion form:
P1: Inference to the Best Explanation, that is, if fact X stands in need of explanation and hypothesis Y is best able to explain X, then we should believe that X provides the best evidence to support Y.
P2: The fact that our universe is hospitable to life stands in need of explanation.
P3: The fact that God adjusted the cosmological constants in order for living things to exist provides a satisfactory explanation for why our universe is hospitable to life.
P4: That the premise above is the most satisfying explanation for how the universe is hospitable to life.
Conclusion: The reason for the existence of living things within our universe is due to God's adjustment of the cosmological constants.
In his essay, “The Argument From Cosmological Fine-Tuning”, Prof. Roger White presents this scenario:
“A high security combination lock is wired up to nuclear warheads that threaten to destroy the whole world. The bombs will be detonated unless several dials are set to a very precise configuration of values. Miraculously it turns out that the dials are delicately set within the tiny range that deactivates the bombs. Had they differed ever so slightly from their actual positions all life would be gone.”
There are two possibilities here: either by random chance, perhaps a strong gust of wind, the passcode has magically been entered into the keypad, and that is why you are alive. The other and more likely scenario, at least according to Prof. White, would be that someone wanted to help you defuse the bomb.
This situation, according to White, can be equated to another scenario: simply replace “you” with “life”, replace the passcode for the bomb with the exact cosmological constants that will allow life to exist, and replace your anonymous benevolent savior with “God”.
The Weak Anthropic Principle
One of the most common and popular refutations of the Fine-Tuning Argument is the Weak Anthropic Principle. It goes as follows:
P1: We exist because the cosmological constants are set to allow us to exist.
P2: If we did not exist because the cosmological constants were not set in a way to allow for our existence, then we would not be able to observe the cosmological constants that could have allowed for our existence.
Conclusion: It is not surprising that we are able to observe the cosmological constants that allow for our existence.
In other words, we could say: "Because we wouldn't be around to observe the values of the cosmological constants unless they were life-permitting, it is not surprising that our universe is hospitable to life."
Because this is such a popular response to the Fine-Tuning Argument, White has a rebuttal against this argument — the Firing Squad example.
White’s Firing Squad
“You are standing before a firing squad with fifty rifles aimed in your direction. To your astonishment as the guns blast each bullet flies closely by you leaving you unharmed. Why did all the bullets miss? Was it just an accident? Surely this cries out for explanation if anything does. It cannot help to be told, “Well if they hadn’t all missed you wouldn’t be alive to see it.” This is true but does nothing to remove the mystery of how the bullets all managed to miss you.
Prof. White asks us to consider this situation as analogous to his Fine-Tuning Argument. To the proponents of the Weak Anthropic Principle, he would say:
“Does the fact that we are still alive make the fact that every single bullet missed its mark seem inevitable, or not surprising at all?”
Objections to White’s Firing Squad
I have three main objections to Prof. White’s Firing Squad example/ his idea for the Fine-Tuning argument in general. They are as thus:
The Frog-in-the-Well Theory: As the ancient Chinese story goes, all that a frog stuck in a well can see is the sky and the walls of its well. Because of this, the frog narcissistically thinks that the entire world is the well, and that there is nothing outside.
We can apply the same logic to ourselves: We exist in a universe whose constants are adjusted to be able to allow us to exist, and so it would be very difficult for us to imagine what other universes with different constants would be, especially considering the fact that we have not even come up with a concrete definition of life.
While White’s argument could have potentially been convincing in the 18th century, when the inner mechanics of a human seemed essentially like “black boxes”, this is no longer the case. As we learn more and more about ourselves, we begin to discover in greater and greater detail how it seems that we are nothing more than complex biological algorithms. Our sensation of pain or joy is merely a process of receptors capturing the signal and transmitters transmitting the signal to the control center, which processes the signal and instructs the body to behave similarly in response to the signal in order to maintain homeostasis. This process is no more interesting and “life-like” than some other algorithm, perhaps something like binary search or Google’s PageRank; it's just more complicated. If we don’t even know what life is, how can we say it wouldn’t exist in other possible manifestations of the universe?
We may not be as unique as we thought.
The Multiverse Theory: This is one of the most widespread rebuttals against White’s argument: If there were an infinite number of universes, why would it still be shocking to see that ours contains life (or, as a variation on this theory, it could be that, as some scientists have proposed, the universe is in a perpetual cycle of expanding universes that eventually collapse in on itself, creating enough pressure to set off a new Big Bang and thus possibly creating entirely new cosmological constants)? If life is possible in our universe, as shown by our own existence, then it must be possible in other universes as well. There does not need to be a God that adjusts the cosmological constants when every possible adjustment to the cosmological constants already exists.
The Problem of Evil: Let us assume for argument’s sake that the God we are referring to here is omnipotent, omnibenevolent, and omniscient (which is what a God would have to be if he were to have created and fine-tuned a universe for life anyway). Imagine if he saw us in the position of the ones being shot at by the soldiers in the earlier scenario and intervened to save us. Could he have just not put us in that situation in the first place? If he had been able to fine-tune our universe in order for it to be able to sustain life, could he not have just created heaven on Earth and gotten rid of all evil and misfortune? If he were able to create heaven on Earth, but did not for some reason, he would have had to not have been either omnipotent or omnibenevolent, which is impossible, as if he were able to literally create a universe perfect for life, could he really not create a planet that is wholly perfect for life? I will not go into the full extent of the Problem of Evil here, as it requires far more room to explain than what is available here, but even the limited amount that I have presented shows that God either does not exist or that he may exist in a paradoxical form, both omnipotent and not.
The argument presented in premise and conclusion form goes as follows:
P1: Some terrible things happen
P2: If an omniscient, omnibenevolent, and omnipotent being (God) exists, then terrible things would not happen.
Conclusion: Such a God does not exist.
Conclusion
Ultimately, we can see that while the Fine-Tuning argument and the firing squad example that White provides are on the surface compelling arguments for the existence of God, the three objections I have pointed out will surely plant a seed of doubt within the heads of believers in White’s hypothesis.
My three points were: The Frog-in-the-Well Theory, which states that with our limited knowledge of the universe, we are unable to make overarching suppositions about the nature of life and the cosmological constants; The Multiverse Theory, which states that if there were in fact infinite universes, then the fact that at least one universe has life is not surprising in the slightest; and finally, the Problem of Evil, which states that if a God as described by White truly exists, why does evil still persist in our world? Would not an omnipotent, omnibenevolent, and omniscient God seek to rid the world of sin and corruption?