"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.
Well, given that I'm at least aware of my present qualia, we can rule out most weird worlds as incompatible with my present evidence. So then we're getting into "Should I believe that the world just came into existence one second ago" territory, and I just can't take that hypothesis seriously, which commits me to thinking that it must be a priori less likely than the "normal" hypothesis. Is there an explanation for this? Not sure. It'd be nice to have one, but it doesn't seem essential to me. If forced to choose, I'd sooner just take sensible priors to be brute and unexplained than to have silly skepticism-inducing priors.
Hmm, that seems really unsatisfying. If most sets of psychophysical laws produce disharmony, and the universes laws aren't selected with any regard for higher order phenomena, then harmony is utterly inexplicable! Theism provides an explanation, but suffers from being obviously false as a result of the problem of evil.
It seems pretty plausible to me that the most fundamental truths about the universe would be inexplicable. Why would you expect otherwise? (& note that laws aren't "selected" at all. It's not as though there was a lottery or other process at the beginning of time to determine how these things would fall out. They just *are* a certain way, and always have been.)
Eh, this just seems so suspicious. If it turns out that the carbon atoms, under a microscope, spell out the name of god in an intrinsically improbable way, it seems insufficient to just declare that to be a brute fact. That would be very good evidence for theism--so too, it seems, is this. Now, I'm inclined to reject theism, but it does seem like we need some explanation for this otherwise miraculous phenomena.
Those two cases don't seem remotely alike, though? Clearly, we should not expect atoms to carry seemingly-divine messages if atheism is true. There's an alternative (message-less atoms) that is far more credible. But nothing about atheism makes psychophysical harmony seem especially unlikely. Crazy mismatch worlds are not intrinsically more credible.
If atheism is true then it is extremely improbable that we'd have harmony. There are a much larger number of possible worlds where there's disharmony--e.g. inverted world, physically identical world where all conscious experience is just a faint buzzing, etc.
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.
Interesting challenge! I don't know much philosophy of science, but I assume that positing gravitational laws allows us to *systematize* a wide range of observations, and make accurate predictions that would otherwise be beyond us.
So one question is whether the God hypothesis is similarly fruitful, empirically speaking, to which my impression is: not so much. At least, I haven't heard of theistic scientists drawing upon their theism to make more accurate predictions. But maybe they at least do better on the systematizing front: if you count each physical parameter (and each physical-phenomenal connection) as a separate thing to be explained, and the right sort of divine mind as just one big thing, then that one thing may serve to explain a whole lot of other things. But I'm not sure whether that's the right way to count things. (Why couldn't fine-tuned laws be treated as one big bundle, or the divine mind be counted as the result of combining many distinct components -- e.g. each distinct desire that makes it up?)
I imagine philosophers of science must've said more illuminating things about the difference between scientific and divine explanations. If any other readers know of such, please share your recommendations here!
"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.
Well, given that I'm at least aware of my present qualia, we can rule out most weird worlds as incompatible with my present evidence. So then we're getting into "Should I believe that the world just came into existence one second ago" territory, and I just can't take that hypothesis seriously, which commits me to thinking that it must be a priori less likely than the "normal" hypothesis. Is there an explanation for this? Not sure. It'd be nice to have one, but it doesn't seem essential to me. If forced to choose, I'd sooner just take sensible priors to be brute and unexplained than to have silly skepticism-inducing priors.
Hmm, that seems really unsatisfying. If most sets of psychophysical laws produce disharmony, and the universes laws aren't selected with any regard for higher order phenomena, then harmony is utterly inexplicable! Theism provides an explanation, but suffers from being obviously false as a result of the problem of evil.
It seems pretty plausible to me that the most fundamental truths about the universe would be inexplicable. Why would you expect otherwise? (& note that laws aren't "selected" at all. It's not as though there was a lottery or other process at the beginning of time to determine how these things would fall out. They just *are* a certain way, and always have been.)
Eh, this just seems so suspicious. If it turns out that the carbon atoms, under a microscope, spell out the name of god in an intrinsically improbable way, it seems insufficient to just declare that to be a brute fact. That would be very good evidence for theism--so too, it seems, is this. Now, I'm inclined to reject theism, but it does seem like we need some explanation for this otherwise miraculous phenomena.
Those two cases don't seem remotely alike, though? Clearly, we should not expect atoms to carry seemingly-divine messages if atheism is true. There's an alternative (message-less atoms) that is far more credible. But nothing about atheism makes psychophysical harmony seem especially unlikely. Crazy mismatch worlds are not intrinsically more credible.
If atheism is true then it is extremely improbable that we'd have harmony. There are a much larger number of possible worlds where there's disharmony--e.g. inverted world, physically identical world where all conscious experience is just a faint buzzing, etc.
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.
Thanks for the pointer! (The described view certainly sounds strange...)
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.
Interesting challenge! I don't know much philosophy of science, but I assume that positing gravitational laws allows us to *systematize* a wide range of observations, and make accurate predictions that would otherwise be beyond us.
So one question is whether the God hypothesis is similarly fruitful, empirically speaking, to which my impression is: not so much. At least, I haven't heard of theistic scientists drawing upon their theism to make more accurate predictions. But maybe they at least do better on the systematizing front: if you count each physical parameter (and each physical-phenomenal connection) as a separate thing to be explained, and the right sort of divine mind as just one big thing, then that one thing may serve to explain a whole lot of other things. But I'm not sure whether that's the right way to count things. (Why couldn't fine-tuned laws be treated as one big bundle, or the divine mind be counted as the result of combining many distinct components -- e.g. each distinct desire that makes it up?)
I imagine philosophers of science must've said more illuminating things about the difference between scientific and divine explanations. If any other readers know of such, please share your recommendations here!