"I’m happy to take “normal” worlds like ours to be a priori more probable."
Is there some explanation for this? It seems that it would be much simpler for us to have the same physical states but to either have no qualia, to have one single qualia constantly, or to have a thousand other disharmonious physical laws.
Hey Richard, interesting post. Tim Mulgan explores an interesting answer to the problem you pose. He develops a view called Axiarchism in an article (Beyond Theism and Atheism, 2017) and larger book project. The idea is roughly that value could be directly efficacious: the universe exists because it is fine tuned to harbour life and that is good, period. A strange causal mechanism for sure, but no deity needed! This view doesn't seem to be vulnerable to the same contingency argument you advance here. Value constrains the possible worlds that can exist in the same way logical necessities constrain the array of possible world. Anyway - would be interested to hear your thoughts on Mulgan's paper at some point.
I think one line of argument would be that universes with life are just more interesting (have lower entropy?) than universes without it. After all, universes unfit for life are generally unfit for anything having a complex structure. It's plausible that most gods would be more interested in creating more complex universes, just as hypothetical programmers simulating worlds would be more interested in worlds with non-trivial behaviour.
Jul 18, 2022·edited Jul 18, 2022Liked by Richard Y Chappell
This is quite interesting. It makes me picture the following conversation:
–Why did the apple fall? –Because of gravity. –But why is there gravity? –I could answer that, but OK, I see your point: ultimately, I will invoke an unexplained phenomenon in the course of offering these explanations. –But if you're willing to posit that unexplained phenomenon, why not just let the apple's fall be unexplained?
Can you explain the difference between your argument and that person's argument against explaining the apple's motion in terms of gravity?
Footnote: I'm not a theist at the moment, but I was one for a few months a few years ago, because I found this line of thought compelling: Given all the different ways the universe could have been set up, it's surprising that there are any true beliefs at all, and the fact that there are any indicates, to some degree, that the universe is non-accidentally conducive to the emergence of true beliefs. (Since I can't check my basic beliefs, I think it's a happy accident that my mind happens to have chanced upon the true ones. And though that thought makes skepticism look more appealing, I resist skepticism and stamp my foot: my basic beliefs are indeed true.) Intriguingly, this argument (which I thought of while reading Descartes and which I later found in GK Chesterton - I got scooped) might be more robust than the normal fine-tuning argument - since, though it's pretty undeniable that there is life, it's super-duper undeniable that one has some true beliefs. Since I must regard myself as one of the very few whose basic beliefs are true, this line of thought - if I had not become tired of it - might have led me to posit a God (or some other kind of truth-conducive force in the universe) that specifically favors me and my epistemic community.
"I’m happy to take “normal” worlds like ours to be a priori more probable."
Is there some explanation for this? It seems that it would be much simpler for us to have the same physical states but to either have no qualia, to have one single qualia constantly, or to have a thousand other disharmonious physical laws.
Hey Richard, interesting post. Tim Mulgan explores an interesting answer to the problem you pose. He develops a view called Axiarchism in an article (Beyond Theism and Atheism, 2017) and larger book project. The idea is roughly that value could be directly efficacious: the universe exists because it is fine tuned to harbour life and that is good, period. A strange causal mechanism for sure, but no deity needed! This view doesn't seem to be vulnerable to the same contingency argument you advance here. Value constrains the possible worlds that can exist in the same way logical necessities constrain the array of possible world. Anyway - would be interested to hear your thoughts on Mulgan's paper at some point.
I think one line of argument would be that universes with life are just more interesting (have lower entropy?) than universes without it. After all, universes unfit for life are generally unfit for anything having a complex structure. It's plausible that most gods would be more interested in creating more complex universes, just as hypothetical programmers simulating worlds would be more interested in worlds with non-trivial behaviour.
This is quite interesting. It makes me picture the following conversation:
–Why did the apple fall? –Because of gravity. –But why is there gravity? –I could answer that, but OK, I see your point: ultimately, I will invoke an unexplained phenomenon in the course of offering these explanations. –But if you're willing to posit that unexplained phenomenon, why not just let the apple's fall be unexplained?
Can you explain the difference between your argument and that person's argument against explaining the apple's motion in terms of gravity?
Footnote: I'm not a theist at the moment, but I was one for a few months a few years ago, because I found this line of thought compelling: Given all the different ways the universe could have been set up, it's surprising that there are any true beliefs at all, and the fact that there are any indicates, to some degree, that the universe is non-accidentally conducive to the emergence of true beliefs. (Since I can't check my basic beliefs, I think it's a happy accident that my mind happens to have chanced upon the true ones. And though that thought makes skepticism look more appealing, I resist skepticism and stamp my foot: my basic beliefs are indeed true.) Intriguingly, this argument (which I thought of while reading Descartes and which I later found in GK Chesterton - I got scooped) might be more robust than the normal fine-tuning argument - since, though it's pretty undeniable that there is life, it's super-duper undeniable that one has some true beliefs. Since I must regard myself as one of the very few whose basic beliefs are true, this line of thought - if I had not become tired of it - might have led me to posit a God (or some other kind of truth-conducive force in the universe) that specifically favors me and my epistemic community.