Alister McGrath's embarrassing answer to a question

During Q & A in his talk "Biology, the Anthropic Principle and Natuarl Theology," given at the Faraday Institute on Science and Religion, a couple of questioners asked questions that AM did not meet head-on. They were (paraphrased):

1. Isn't saying that the universe is fine tuned so that humans can exist like saying that my nose is fine tuned so that glasses can be placed on them?

2. If we can reasonably say that the universe is fine-tuned so that we might exist, then wouldn't it be even more reasonable to say that it is fine tuned so that The Wheel of Fortune might play on television?

Alister's answer was very non-confrontational (and I misquote): "I just think that the possible fine-tuning of the universe is something that we should think about."

A better response to the first question would have been to point out how inapt the comparison was: the nose/glasses comparison relates one item in nature to something else that in no way arose as a result of it, whereas the fine tuning argument relates an earlier state of nature as a whole to a later state of the same whole . To make the comparison more apt, we might ask, "What if noses grew pairs of glasses without human invention, then wouldn't we suspect that the earlier state of the human body was already predisposed to bring it about that glasses arose?

In short, fine-tuning is about the possible inner teleology of the universe as a whole, not about how one thing can serve as an instrument.

But the nose/glasses comparison falls short, even with the proposed (somewhat silly) modification. For a hidden assumption int he fine tuning argument is that biological life is in some sense the crowning achievement of the physical universe. So if you thought that the supreme human achievement was to see the world through glasses, then the analogy would not fall short. But if you think that the exercise of rational faculties is a better candidate, then a perhaps apter comparison would be between the human body as a whole and the exercise of rational faculties. This comparison too falls short, because humans "obviously" come from other humans, so we would have to modify it further by saying, "Suppose a robot came into existence 'out of the blue' and eventually developed the ability to exercise rational faculties. Assuming that this achievement is the greatest thing that this robot can have, wouldn't we suspect that the human was made so that it could exercise these faculties?"

A better answer to #2 would have been to say that the fact that there is life, and rational life at that, is not something trivial but rather seems more like the crowning achievement. If you think Vanna White spinning the Wheel of Fortune is the crowning achievement of humankind, then, yes, for you, the universe would seem to you to be fine tuned so that she could spin that wheel, and -- even more importantly -- so that you can watch her.

In other words, the argument from fine-tuning doesn't prove teleology--it assumes it. Like other scientific explanations, it proceeds by affirming the consequent, which is formally invalid. A critic might bring up the "Vanna White" fine-tuning thesis in order to show the same logical form allows for a rather silly claim. But what is really silly is to think that belief in teleology is naive. For those who take the life world as the starting point for rational thought, the burden of proof lies on the shoulders of those who would deny teleology. For those who take science as an ateleological method of reasoning that overthrows the teleological rationality of the life world through a Copernican revolution, the burden of proof lies on the shoulders of the naive, prescientific. Given their understanding of genuine rationality as requiring the scientific method, they are rightly confident that this burden will never be met. But that is because, by absolutizing one method of reasoning, they have put their blinders on and are unable to see other aspects of reality. Theirs is a blind faith.

Dembski's "specified compexity" semiotics and teleology (both ad intra and ad extra)

Integral to Dembski's idea of specified complexity (SC) is the notion that something extrinsic to evolution is the source of the specification in how it develops. He compares SC to the message sent by space aliens in the movie "Contact." In that movie, earthbound scientists determine that radio waves originating in from somewhere in our galaxy are actually a signal being sent by space aliens. The scientists determine that these waves are a signal is the fact that they indicate prime numbers in a way that a random occurrence would not. What is interesting to me is the fact that Dembski relies upon an analogy with a sign rather than a machine. Like a machine, signs are produced by an intelligent being for the sake of something beyond themselves. Machines, if you will, have a meaning. Signs, if you will, produce knowledge. But the meaning/knowledge is in both cases something other than the machine/sign itself. Both signs and machines are purposeful or teleological...

particular/universal event/rule

While listening to a recorded lecture on Quine's Two Dogmas of Empiricism, it occurred to me that every rule is in a way, a fact about the world. Think about baseball: from the p.o.v. of an individual player, a baseball rule is not a thing but a guide for acting and interpreting the actions of others. But this rule, like the action it guides, is part of a concrete individual --i.e., part of an institution that has come into existence at a particular place and time, has endured and may eventually go out of existence. The baseball rule, as a feature of that individual, is likewise individual. The term "baseball rule," on the one hand, links us to a unique cultural event; it can, on the other hand, name a certain type of being. In this way, it transgresses the boundary between proper and common noun. If there were no such overlap, then we might be tempted to divide our ontology between a bunch of facts "out there" and a bunch of common nouns "in here....

continuing the discussion with Tim in a new post

Hi Tim, I am posting my reply here, because the great blogmeister won't let me put it all in a comment. Me thinks I get your point: is it that we can name and chimps can't, so therefore we are of greater value than chimps? Naming is something above and beyond what a chimp can do, right? In other words, you are illustrating the point I am making (if I catch your drift). My argument is only a sketch, but I think adding the ability to name names, as it were, is still not enough to make the argument seem cogent. For one can still ask why we prefer being able to name over other skills had by animals but not by humans. The objector would demand a more convincing reason. The answer I have in mind is, to put it briefly, that there is something infinite about human beings in comparison with the subhuman. That "something" has to do with our ability to think of the meaning of the cosmos. Whereas one might say"He's got the whole world in His han...

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