[From the earliest times, men have looked into the heavens and wondered...] Scientists have
come to realize a startling truth; the universe looks suspiciously like a fix.
Our existence is balanced on a razor's edge of incomprehensible fineness.
From the very first moment of its inception, the universe's fundamental parameters
were delicately calibrated so that intelligent life could exist. Scientists used to believe
that the Big Bang was utter chaos, a random state of nature. Given time and some luck, intelligent
life forms would eventually come about somewhere. But the more scientists studied the universe,
the more they realized that the opposite is true. A staggering list of initial conditions began to
emerge, all of which were incomprehensibly fine-tuned to allow intelligent life.
These are known as the fundamental constants and quantities of nature. These values are
so precise, so overwhelming, that it's difficult to illustrate the enormity of these findings.
To get a feel for the odds, consider the number of seconds that have ticked by since time began, 10
to the 20th power. That is 10 followed by 20 zeros. Now consider the force of gravity.
If the gravitational constant had been out of tune by just one part in 10 to the 60th power,
devastation would have ensued. The universe would have either expanded so rapidly
that no stars could form, or else collapsed back in upon itself with the same result:
no stars, no planets, no life [the heavens cannot be studied at firsthand,
for the information rides in on beams of light, the immense mysterious universe into which we
are born.] Or what about the distribution of the matter and energy in the early universe?
If these were not evenly distributed to an unthinkable precision, then the universe
would have been hostile to life of any kind. How extraordinary that anything should exist!
The fact that the universe is fine-tuned for life is uncontroversial. How then does one best explain
this incomprehensible fine-tuning? There are three live options: physical necessity, chance,
or design. The hypothesis of physical necessity says that the universe
must be fine-tuned for life. A universe which is hostile to life is impossible,
it's said. However, not only is a life-prohibiting universe possible, a universe without life is far
more likely. Each of the parameters that governs the universe can take on a wide range of values,
thus reinforcing the improbability of fine tuning. So what about the alternative of chance?
Most scientists recognize that pure chance is not an adequate explanation of the fine-tuning.
The mathematical odds are simply too great to overcome. Many scientists have tried
to increase the probability of a life-permitting universe by postulating a multiverse. They imagine
that there are an infinite number of universes, and we are just one member of the ensemble.
Since we have an unlimited amount of chances to get it right, then the odds will be in our favor.
This move is perhaps the greatest compliment to the power of the fine-tuning argument,
for in order to explain fine-tuning, scientists have turned to a philosophical explanation.
The multiverse itself cannot be detected, measured, observed, or proved. Moreover,
the multiverse faces a devastating objection. If we were just a random member of a multiverse, then
we could explain away all sorts of improbabilities in our everyday lives. We shouldn't be surprised
when the roulette wheel continually lands on the red 20. After all, the math implies that
this is happening somewhere without foul play in the multiverse, so why not here?
In the end, then, neither physical necessity
nor chance offers a good explanation of the fine-tuning of the universe.
As Freeman Dyson confesses, "The more I study the universe and the details of its architecture,
the more evidence I find that the universe in some sense must have known we were coming."
[Science is bringing us closer to an understanding of who and where we are...]