Some Thoughts on Fine-Tuning in "The God Delusion"

If I could debate Richard Dawkins, I bet I could make an agnostic out of him. Here’s what I would say:

1. The only candidate solutions to the cosmological fine tuning problem (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-tuning) are the anthropic principle and intelligent design (I mean cosmological design, not evolutionary design).
2. The anthropic principle only works in a multiverse.
3. Science can’t detect the existence of a multiverse.
4. In other words, science can’t distinguish between a multiverse and intelligent design.
5. Given the fact of cosmological fine-tuning, it’s reasonable to assume that either a multiverse exists or a designer exists.
6. You can’t invoke Russel’s Teapot anymore. There’s no reason that the burden of proof should be on intelligent design, nor, for that matter, is the burden of proof on the multiverse.

Many people I’ve spoken to don’t accept premise #1 & #2, but Dawkins does, and I think he’s right. God willing, I’ll explain why in a future post, or you can just read “The God Delusion”.

Some people wouldn’t agree with #3, but I think most people, including Dawkins, probably would.

At point #5, Dawkins strongly disagrees. He thinks that there is a good reason not to believe in a designer. Here is his argument:

1. The universe is very complex.
2. If the universe had a designer, the designer must be very complex.
3. So someone must have designed the designer.
4. But then, of course, someone must have designed the designer of the designer, and so on.

In my arrogant opinion, this is kind of silly. It’s basically an argument from personal incredulity. The problem is point #2; who says the designer must have been complex? Maybe the designer was/is very simple. But Dawkins just can’t accept that a very simple being could have designed a very complex universe, so he doesn’t believe in intelligent design.