Wednesday, January 27, 2010
God and the fundamental physical constants
As far as I know, there is no reason to believe the values of the physical constants are necessary, in which case, we have the following likelihood ratio:
P(physical constants and the universe in which we exist|God)/P(physical constants and the universe in which we exist|no God) =
P(physical constants|God)P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and God)/
P(physical constants|no God)P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and no God)
Now, P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and God)/P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and no God) is essentially one since it does not seem likely that our universe depends on whether the physical constants we observe arose by design or not. Therefore, the likelihood ratio takes the form:
P(physical constants|God)/
P(physical constants|no God)
which I argue is large since it is easy to conceive of God wishing to create a particular universe and choosing the appropriate values of the physical constants whereas a random selection would be very unlikely to achieve the correct values.
Incidentally, I "borrowed" this argument from David Bartholomew's article, "Probability, Statistics and Theology." (Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Vol. 151, No. 1
1988, pp. 137-178)
|
P(physical constants and the universe in which we exist|God)/P(physical constants and the universe in which we exist|no God) =
P(physical constants|God)P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and God)/
P(physical constants|no God)P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and no God)
Now, P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and God)/P(the universe in which we exist|physical constants and no God) is essentially one since it does not seem likely that our universe depends on whether the physical constants we observe arose by design or not. Therefore, the likelihood ratio takes the form:
P(physical constants|God)/
P(physical constants|no God)
which I argue is large since it is easy to conceive of God wishing to create a particular universe and choosing the appropriate values of the physical constants whereas a random selection would be very unlikely to achieve the correct values.
Incidentally, I "borrowed" this argument from David Bartholomew's article, "Probability, Statistics and Theology." (Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Vol. 151, No. 1
1988, pp. 137-178)
Labels: God, physics, probability, statistics, theism, theology
# posted by O'Brien @ 1/27/2010 10:15:00 PM 
