Greetings Ian, Like I said, I can't get past three principle issues. First, if "life" (forget even _intelligent_ life, for the moment) was somehow built into the unfolding of the cosmos, if certain gravities and speeds were all constrained so as to one-day engender "life", why is it so incredibly rare? Why do we not see a cosmos swarming with amoebas and bacteria? It seems to me that given this, "life" is something that is able to emerge only under very rare, happenstance conditions within a very large cosmos.
Second, I think its quite arrogant to assume (anthropic, even :-)) that should any of the "cosmic variables" have been different, the cosmos would be entirely devoid of life. This sets up a "the universe gets US or it gets nothing". Perhaps, had those variables been different, the cosmos WOULD be teaming with life. Perhaps the universe collapsed and exploded a zillion times, and this one time we see as special is actually the one comparatively devoid? Third, isn't it also arrogant to assume "we" are the final leg in this chain? Maybe, like the dinosaurs, we exist only so that our decomposing bodies will one day grant a future species some form of fuel. We have this illusion of being on a pinnacle because we can look back but never ahead. I am reminded of Calvin and Hobbes yet again, where Calvin proclaims himself the "zenith of evolution", saying something like (not exact), "think about it, hobbes, every event, every decision that has ever happened has happened to produce 'me', therefore I am what the universe planned all along!". Really, think about it Ian, if your great-great-great grandparents had never met, you would never have been born, but you were born and therefore their meeting had to be part of a cosmic plan to produce you. That's really what we are saying, no matter how you dress it up. Yes, there is much interesting in the debate, and yes, I do believe we will one day encounter life "out there". The idea of multiverses and inter-dimensional realities I find fascinating. Maybe we are squares unable to comprehend a sphere. Arlo Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
