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A Critical Examination of the Anthropic Principle Author(S): John Earman Source: American Philosophical Quarterly, Vol North American Philosophical Publications The Sap Also Rises: A Critical Examination of the Anthropic Principle Author(s): John Earman Source: American Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. 24, No. 4 (Oct., 1987), pp. 307-317 Published by: University of Illinois Press on behalf of the North American Philosophical Publications Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20014208 . Accessed: 03/10/2014 09:49 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. University of Illinois Press and North American Philosophical Publications are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to American Philosophical Quarterly. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 158.143.86.112 on Fri, 3 Oct 2014 09:49:20 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions American Philosophical Quarterly Volume 24, Number 4, October 1987 THE SAP ALSO RISES: A CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF THE ANTHROPIC PRINCIPLE John Earman I conclude from these accidents of physics and mological Principle, charges that their "FAP" (short an astronomy that the universe is unexpectedly hospit? for future anthropic principle) is more accurately able for creatures tomake their home in. place living dubbed "CRAP" (completely ridiculous anthropic a scientist trained in the habits of and Being thought principle). of the twentieth rather than the language century The truth lies not so much between as outside I do not claim that the architecture of the eighteenth, the extremes of the and the critics. On universe the existence of God. I claim proponents proves only one does not deliver on that the architecture of the universe is consistent with hand, anthropic reasoning the promise of a new methodology of scientific the hypothesis that the mind plays an essential role in but on the other is the its functioning. explanation; neither, hand, AP an unscientific idea which has no place in ?F. Dyson, Disturbing the Universe physics or cosmology. Sifting the truth is no easy matter since even a casual glance at the rapidly T^HE Anthropic Principle ("AP" for short) is to literature reveals that the AP is not a ** expanding be found at work in scientific leading jour? single, unified principle but rather a complicated nals?Nature, The Journal Astrophysical Journal, network of postulates, techniques, and attitudes. the Astronomical of Royal Society, Philosophical Faced with such a diversity of ideas and conflicting Transactions the of Royal Society, Observatory, claims about their usefulness and validity, it seems others. It has been used a not among by insignificant best to begin by trying to understand the motivation of the who's who of relativistic percentage for and meaning of the AP as it was first introduced Carter, Hawking, Ellis, Bar? astrophysics?Dicke, by Dicke and Carter. row, Silk, to name a few. It has, not surprisingly, found its way into the and semi-popular popular 1. The Weak Anthropic Principle ("WAP") with articles in such literature, appearing journals of Dicke And Carter as Sky and Telescope, Scientific American, and It has also attracted the interest ... we Psychology Today. must be prepared to take account of the fact of of science because philosophers anthropic that our location in the universe is necessarily seen as reasoning has been holding the promise of privileged to the extent of being compatible with our a new methodology of scientific explanation that existence as observers. (Carter 1974, p. 293) places Man (or perhaps Consciousness or Observer [T]he observed values of physical variables are not ' ship) at the center of our understanding of nature. arbitrary but take values V(x,t) restricted by the spatial that x e where L is the set of sites able The enthusiasm of the proponents of the AP is requirement L, to sustain life; and the constraint that t matched by the trenchancy of the critics. Heinz by temporal is bounded by time scales for biological and cosmolog Pagels (1985) has charged that the AP is "an unsci? ical evolution of living organisms and life-supporting entific idea," that it "has no place in physics or environments. (Barrow 1983, p. 147) cosmology," that it "makes no progress towards The observed values of all physical and cosmological solving the great mysteries of the universe," and quantities are not equally probable but they take on that it "confronts us with a new How can mystery: values restricted by the requirement that there exist such a sterile idea itself so reproduce prolifically?" sites where carbon-based life can evolve and by the And Martin Gardner (1986), reviewing Barrow and requirement that the Universe be old enough for it to Tipler's encyclopedic work, The Anthropic Cos have already done so. (Barrow and Tipler 1986, p. 16) 307 This content downloaded from 158.143.86.112 on Fri, 3 Oct 2014 09:49:20 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 308 AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY Sifting through the portentous language of these observing (1) imposes a selection effect no less statements of WAP, it is hard to find anything than does the size of the mesh of the fish net. One stronger than a tautology. How then can Carter, way to model the selection effect is to use a mod? = who coined the term "anthropic principle" say that ified probability measure Prs(*) Pr(*/L) where 5 "a prediction based on the weak anthropic principle stands for selection and L is the proposition that (as used by Dicke) can amount to a complete expla? life such as ours now exists. Dicke and Carter then =* nation" (1974, p. 295)? Gale issues the mild make it plausible that Prs(C(l)/TBB) 1, with the demurrer that WAP "just isn't satisfying as an upshot that C( 1 ) gives no reason to prefer TD to TBB. explanation" (1986, p. 106). But ifWAP is vacu? Actually there is no need to define special selec? ous, how can it be the source of any explanation tion functions if one works within standard Baye at all? The answer is thatWAP, as originally intro? sian epistemology which demands that probabilities duced by Dicke and Carter, is not a claim or part be computed on the basis of the total evidence. of a proper explanation. It is simply a special case Suppose that Etot consists of the conjunction of of a familiar principle for judging the bearing of C(l), the observed coincidence (1); L, the proposi? evidence on theory. tion that life such as ours now exists; and B, the This interpretation of WAP emerges clearly from background evidence. By the multiplication axiom Dicke's (1961) and Carter's (1974) treatment of of probability, one of the famous 'large number coincidences' of = Pr(C(\)&L&B/T) Pr(C(l)/L&B&T) (4) that says that cosmology xPr(L/B&T)xPr(B/T) - - ctja0 alaG 1037 (1) Following the Dicke-Carter analysis, we assume = - - where t0 is the Hubble age of the universe, a0 that Pr(C(l)/L&B&TD) Pr(C(l)/L&B&TBB) = = 1. And to matters we also assume that h2/mee2, a e2/hc, and aG Dirac simplify Gm^hc. =* (1937, 1938) was so struck by this coincidence that Pr(B/TD) Pr(B/TBB). Thus, if the prior prob? he postulated (TD) that, in opposition to the standard abilities of TD and TBB are roughly the same, then big bang cosmology (TBB), the gravitational cou? Bayes' theorem implies that the posteriors on Etot pling constant is not really a constant but varies as will also be roughly the same, unless one of the the universe expands so as to maintain (1) theories makes the emergence of life more likely throughout all time. Dicke's criticism of Dirac is than does the other. a variant of the commonsensical observation that The last caveat is an important one since it tends finding fishes exclusively of lengths six inches and to be neglected inWAP arguments. Consider, for greater is not good evidence that all the fish in the example, the WAP objection to the steady-state sea are nets are longer than six inches if the used cosmology (Tss) of Bondi, Gold, and Hoyle. On not fine to smaller fish. enough hold TBB it is no surprise that the Hubble time t0 is of the lesson to the case at the Applying issue, the order of the age of a typical star whereas on coincidence does as the (1) not, following superfi? Tss it is surprising since on Tss there is a continuous cial seems to make more analysis suggest, TD likely creation of matter and thus there is no reason why than TBB. If C(l) is the evidence that (1) is now the timescale for stellar evolution should not be then true, (superficially) either much less than t0 or else much greater (see - Barrow and But this difference Pr(C(l)/TD) 1(2) Tipler 1986, p. 17). can be if ? PriLI Pr{C{\)ITBB) ? 1 compensated Pr(L/B&Tss) B&TBB), which is not implausible since a steady if and are Thus, TD TBB given roughly equal prior state universe can be expected to contain many it follows from theorem that probabilities, Bayes' locations supportive of carbon-based life while the same is not warranted for a Pr(TD/C(l))? Pr(TBB/C(l))(3) expectation typical big bang universe.2 But, Dicke and Carter respond, our probability cal? This brief overview of WAP suffices to establish culations should take into account the fact that our the following points.
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