[asa] Life Imperative

Paul Davies has an interesting article in SA

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=are-aliens-among-us&print=true

entitled "Are Aliens Among Us?"

Well, at least I found it interesting. It addresses, in part, the idea of
the life imperative—in short the idea that life arises because it is built
into the fabric of spacetime.

I am going to put forth, once again, that most IDers have it wrong from the
beginning. Almost all, if not all, ID is based on the premise of
improbability. Dembksi's theoretical design inference requires low
probability to prime the pump. Hugh Ross strings long probability chains
together. Many talk about the improbability of protein folding.

I have been asserting just the opposite for some time, primarily with the
thought of ID's only real metaphysical competitor, multiple universes of
some variant, in mind. So far I haven't seemed to convinced anyone!

It seems to me that if life is a low probability event—that is, the fine
tune physical constants are extremely unlikely and biogenesis extremely
unlikely, then ID—unless it transforms into a bona fide science that makes
positive testable predictions, will be at a perpetual stalemate with another
toothless (in terms of testability) theory: multiple universes. Multiple
universe theories are perfectly compatible with life's improbability, with
the advantage that they make no appeal to the supernatural.

But multiple universes, especially of the Super String landacspe type, do
not survive if life is highly probable. They describe a universe of
virtually random fields producing virtually random constants with no
fundamental theory at the helm. In these theories there is no life
imperative, it all depends on a random draw producing a cosmic royal flush.

A fundamental theory that predicts the constants and has a life
imperative—that is life approaches unit probability—well such a universe
would be theologically profound. Short of God appearing in person, what
could hint more at cosmic design than a universe in which the fundamental
laws faithfully produce the conditions for life?
Folks, ID is attempting to carve out an existence on the wrong end of the
probability range.

David Heddle

Associate Professor of Physics

Christopher Newport University &

The Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility

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Received on Fri Nov 23 14:23:26 2007