Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

The Privileged Planet

Guillermo Gonzalez

Friday Afternoon, Session 6

Jay Richards

Copernican Principle

“Because of the reflection of sunlight . . . the Earthseems to be sitting in a beam of light, as if there weresome special significance to this small world. But it’sjust an accident of geometry and optics. . . . Ourposturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusionthat we have some privileged position in the Universe,are challenged by this point of pale light. . . .

“. . . Our planet is a lonely speck inthe great enveloping cosmic dark.In our obscurity, in all this vastness,there is no hint that help will comefrom elsewhere to save us fromourselves.”

Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Is the Earth really aninsignificant speck in animpersonal universe?Do we exist for nopurpose? Or is the truthotherwise?

“The combined circumstance that we live onEarth and are able to see stars—that theconditions necessary for life do not excludethose necessary for vision, and viceversa—is a remarkably improbable one. . .What a fragile balance between theindispensable and the sublime.”

Hans Blumenberg

• A terrestrial planet that supportscomplex carbon- and water-based life

• Planet in “Circumstellar Habitable Zone”

• Planetary system in “Galactic HabitableZone”

A Habitable Planet

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Some things you needfor a habitable planet

• Right terrestrialplanet

• Stabilizing moon• Plate tectonics• Right atmosphere• Right planetary

neighbors

• Right single star• Right galaxy• Galactic location• Right cosmic time• Universe fine-

tuned for life

Our Argument

Habitabilitycorrelates

withmeasurability

The same narrow circumstancesthat allow us to exist also provideus with the best overall setting formaking scientific discoveries.

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

The very conditions that makeEarth hospitable to intelligent lifealso make it well suited to viewingand analyzing the universe as awhole.

• Perfect solareclipses

• Layeringprocesses

• Plate tectonics• Transparency of

atmosphere

• Planetaryneighbors

• Stars• Galactic location• Cosmic time• Fine-tuned

cosmos

Examples of the“Correlation”

�Perfect solareclipses

• Layeringprocesses

• Plate tectonics• Transparency of

atmosphere

• Planetaryneighbors

• Stars�Galactic location• Cosmic time• Fine-tuned

cosmos

Examples of the“Correlation”

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Total Solar Eclipses

The start of an enquiry…

To produce a total solareclipse you need thefollowing:

• A luminous body• An eclipsing body• An observer platform• The right distances apart• All in a straight line in space

The apparent size of the Moon justbarely covers the Sun as seen fromEarth, giving us perfect eclipses.

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

EarthMars

Jupiter

Saturn

Uranus

NeptunePluto

0.01 0.1 1.0 10.0

Angular Size Ratio (Satellite/Sun)

Perfect eclipses of the Sunare important for scientific

discovery.

• Test of General Relativity

• Makes chromosphere detectable

• Helps reveal stars as hot balls of gas

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Conclusion

The requirements for producing perfectsolar eclipses, which provide scientificinsight, also contribute to the Earth’shabitability. This is only one examplewhere the conditions for habitabilityoverlap the conditions for measurability.

The Galactic Habitable Zone

The GalacticHabitable Zone

• Requirements for a habitable planet

• Survival of complex life

Two broad categories ofphenomena define the GHZ:

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

We arehere

Summary of GalacticHabitable Zone

• Low metallicity in outer disk of Milky WayGalaxy limits terrestrial planet formation there.

• Threats to complex life greater in innerregions of Milky Way.

• The most habitable place in the Milky Way isa ring about half way out from its nucleus (andnot including the spiral arms).

The Galactic HabitableZone

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

For scientific discovery, wherewould you want to be?

The Galactic Habitable Zone

Discovery and the GHZ• The low gas and dust “pollution” in the solar

neighborhood permits clear views of distantgalaxies and redshift.

• Location in thin disk gives us close-up viewof diverse types of stars–vital for properlyinterpreting observations of distant galaxies.

• Location far from nucleus and asymmetricshape of galaxy gives us good view ofcosmic microwave background radiation.

So what?

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Mount Rushmore

Complexity plus specificity:A signature of intelligence

“Welcome To Victoria”

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Complexity = Improbability

• The conditions that allow forhabitability are improbable.

• The conditions that allow formeasurability are improbable.

Specification =a meaningful pattern

The correlation of habitability andmeasurability forms a meaningfulpattern.

The Pattern:Observers plus good conditions for observing

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

The Pattern Recognized

Theorem: An exactly total solar eclipse isa unique phenomenon in thesolar system.

Lemma: There are observers on Earthto witness the remarkable eventof an exactly total solar eclipse.

Michael Mendillo and Richard Hart (Boston University),“Resonances,” Physics Today 27:2 (1974), p. 73:

A planet/moon system will have exactly total solareclipses only if there is someone there to observethem. As only Earth meets this requirement, there isno extraterrestrial life in the solar system.

Corollary In a system composed of nine planets and32 moons, for only Earth with its single moon to haveexactly total solar eclipses is too remarkable anoccurrence to be due entirely to chance.

Conclusion A

Therefore, there is a God.

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

A More Modest ConclusionThe universe is fine-tunedso that environmentshabitable to observers willprovide the best overallconditions for observationand discovery.

The universe isdesigned for discovery

What does design tellus about God?

Design confirms theism:The correlation is morelikely given theism than

given naturalism.

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Research Opportunities

• Are there additional examples of thecorrelation?

• Any research in astrobiology has abearing on our hypothesis.

• Many research opportunities arepossible on topic of measurability ordiscoverability—a topic ignored bynaturalists.

Suggested Research Examples

• What is the optimal time in the history of theuniverse to measure the CMB?

• Are there other historical examples of“natural physics experiments”?

• Would the discovery of Kepler’s Laws bedelayed in other planetary configurations?

• What is the optimal stellar spectral type forextracting the highest quality data?

Objections

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Objection:There are lots ofcounterexamples.

Response: Constrainedoptimization and thresholds.Our location is the best overalllocation for measuring andmaking scientific discoveries.

Henry Petroski

“All design involves conflictingobjectives and hence compromise,and the best designs will always bethose that come up with the bestcompromise.”

Objection: Cherry-picking

Response: We’ve picked important examplesfrom a number of scientific disciplines.

You’re cherry-picking. You have used abiased sample to argue for the correlation.

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Objection: It’s inevitable.

Response: We can compare diverseconditions from other environments(e.g., murky atmospheres).

Whatever environment we foundourselves in, we would find examplesof fine-tuning for measurability.

Objection: It’s just aselection effect.

Response: Theory may suggest thingsthat are in principle measurable. Forthese things, we can compare oursetting with others.

The argument is biased towardmeasurable phenomena.

Objection: Complexity

Response: This concedes part of ourargument, and isn’t obviously true (e.g.,a transparent atmosphere isn’t morecomplex than an opaque one).

Complexity makes the correlationlikely. The greater the complexity, thegreater the chance for a correlation.

Session 6 - The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards

© Reasons To Believe's 2003 Conference, "Who Is the Designer?"

Objection: Correlation

Response: True, but so what?

The correlation isn’t mystical orsupernatural, since it’s the result ofnatural processes.

Objection: God

Response: Theological objectionsrequire theological answers.

“God wouldn’t do it that way.”