9. Like a Seed from a Tree
This is the ninth article in the series From Particles to Angels. If you are interested in this article you should read the previous articles in the series in order, beginning with the first (On Happiness).
There are estimated to be more than 100,000,000,000 stars in our galaxy, and more than 100,000,000,000 galaxies in the universe. Some galaxies are larger than ours, and some are smaller, but the total number of stars in the universe is thought to be about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. An astrophysicist called Frank Drake did a rough estimate (now called the "Drake equation") to predict "the number of active, communicative extra-terrestrial civilizations in the Milky Way [that is, our] galaxy", based on various probabilities. The equation was later refined by Drake, working with the astronomer Carl Sagan. The equation gives a range of values for the number of civilisations in the Milky Way galaxy of a level capable of interstellar communication of somewhere between 20 and 50,000,000. If the number was 20 per galaxy, across the entire universe this would amount to about 2,000,000,000,000 active, advanced civilizations. The question of why we have not discovered evidence of any extra-terrestrial civilisations if there are so many of them out there is therefore something of a mystery, but we will not go into that here.
The range given by the Drake equation is very broad, but even if we imagine the lower bound to be overly optimistic, the result still suggests that intelligent life, according to current models of physical evolution, should be fairly common, so that we should not be alone in the universe. We might then view the physical universe as, in a sense, an enormous device for the manufacture of intelligent life. But what is it exactly about the universe that leads to this result, and why should it be?
According to current cosmological thinking, the universe seems to be poised on the edge of a delicate balance between expansion and collapse, and a lot depends on the initial conditions at the time of the big bang. We have seen that the universe is currently about 13 billion years old, and should last at least another 13 billion. But if things had been only a little different, the universe might have only endured for a tiny fraction of a second before collapsing inescapably under the weight of its own gravity. Alternatively, it might have expanded too fast, so that galaxies and stars were never able to form, but just a faint dispersing vapour in the void. The various physical constants, the ratios between the strength of the various forces: gravity, electromagnetism, the strong and weak nuclear forces; and the density of matter and energy in space; and the ratios of the numbers of the different types of particles: all these factors must lay within certain parameters for a productive result. What if the universe consisted of particles that weren't inclined to combine into atoms and molecules. What if all the particles just floated inertly in a formless random endless haze and never did anything?
Instead, these three simple little elements with only a handful of physical characteristics: photons, together with protons, neutrons and electrons; just left to themselves, will form hydrogen, helium and stars. By means of the processes inside these stars they form the rest of the chemical elements, and by means of terrestrial environments, they form biological ecosystems.
The philosophy of Intelligent Design is inclined to attribute all of these coincidences to, ... well, intelligent design. Those inclined differently point to the fact that the system of the physical universe is such that it requires no input from any god, because it has all it needs within itself.
Consider an automated factory for manufacturing cars and household appliances. The factory is designed and built so well that it requires no human input whatsoever. It can repair itself and continues to function even after the entire human race, and all other life on the planet vanishes as a result of an antibiotic resistant virus. When aliens sometime later visit the dead industrialised world they speculate on the origin of these strange factories. Some of the more fantastically inclined among them suggest the factories were originally created by some vanished biological race, but the others argue that there is no evidence for such an invisible race, and positing them is unnecessary because the factories do not require any input from any fancied biological organisms, since they have everything they need within themselves to create, maintain, and reproduce themselves. The very perfection of the factories, and their thoroughgoing self-sufficiency becomes evidence against the existence of their creators.
One of the unattractive aspects of Intelligent Design is its seeking to exploit current gaps in scientific knowledge and to suggest divine intervention as the means of plugging the gap, to account for the effectiveness of physical and biological evolution. This leads in turn, every time one of these gaps is eventually plugged by a successful scientific hypothesis, that the cry goes out that the need for a god has yet again been dispensed with. So that it seems that the only way to provide evidence for the existence of god is to find fault with his handy-work, requiring him to intervene to keep it all running. If He creates a perfectly self contained physical universe, there is apparently no room in it for Him.
It was suggested earlier that regardless of whatever scientific view is in place it is always possible to harmlessly add god as the designer and author. We might equally well harmlessly posit god as standing behind the scenes supporting the entirety of the physical creation. We simply posit that the only way anything can exist is by the force of His will. A proton exists because His will maintains it according to the perfectly precise and predictable laws of accepted physics from one millisecond to the next. We might similarly posit that all this exists in His mind, and will only exist for as long as He thinks it.
There is a problem with our parable about the self maintaining factories. How do we explain their origin. How does the first factory create itself so that it is then able to create other factories? We embellish our parable to include tiny nanobots comprised of simple elements that are able to form themselves into complex machines. But then, how do we explain the origin of the first nanobots? We suggest that they form naturally from the basic constituents of matter: protons, neutrons and electrons.
That is exactly what protons, neutrons and electrons are: tiny, simple nanobots with just the right characteristics for manufacturing a universe of intelligent living beings, all without the need for any outside intervention. The universe is the perfect self-building factory. It all comes down to the careful and elegant design of protons, neutrons and electrons.
Philosophers of science have sought to account for how it is that we inhabit a universe that seems designed to be just right for the manufacture of beings like us. What they came up with was something called the "Anthropic Principle". Put rather simply, it says that the universe is the way it is because if it wasn't we wouldn't be here to perceive it. But the suggestion isn't quite what it seems. They are not suggesting a teleological explanation for the origin and form of the universe. In fact, not much can be made of the Anthropic Principle unless we combine it with the suggestion of an evolutionary theory of universes, a kind of "survival of the fittest" for universes.
Teleological explanation is typical of religion and ancient philosophy. It suggests that things are the way they are because it is best, because god will always choose what is best. Teleological explanation has now been replaced by the theory of evolution. The theory of evolution says that things are the way they are because it is fittest, because evolution will always favour what is fittest. Although the causes are different, the result is the same, whether we call it best or fittest.
But we can only apply the theory of evolution to universes if we have an ecosystem for manufacturing lots and lots of universes. If our single universe is the only universe there is, we cannot apply an evolutionary theory of universes to explain why it is the way it is.
If we have an ecosystem for manufacturing universes we can posit that lots of different universes are made, with all different, plausibly random physical laws, properties and constituents. Some of those universes indeed will only last a tiny fraction of a second before ending in collapse. Some will expand too fast and never form stars. Some will be composed of particles that never form atoms and molecules. But every once in a while, over the giga-ages, a universe emerges with just the right physical characteristics to generate stars, planets and biological life. We inhabit such a universe because we wouldn't exist in any of the other universes. That is the Anthropic Principle.
If parent universes are able to pass on their characteristics to child universes in some kind of genetic inheritance, their might be an inexorable trend toward ever "fitter" universes. Universes that last longer, and reproduce more effectively, perhaps even forming a balanced ecosystem of thriving universes. So that universes that are good at manufacturing intelligent life become the norm.
The Sun and Earth are thought to be about 4.5 billion years old. Primates emerged about 65 million years ago. Human beings evolved about 200,000 years ago. The Stone Age ended about 4,000 years ago when human beings began to work with metal. The oldest surviving written texts date from about 3,000 years ago. So in a few thousand years we have progressed from having stone tips for our spears, to the modern world of cities, aircraft and the internet. 3,000 years as a fraction of 13 billion years is about 0.00000023, that is 23/100,000,000ths. If that is what we have achieved in the last 3,000 years, what can we achieve in the next 3,000 years, or the next 200,000 years, or the next 65 million years?
The first electric programmable computer was built in the 1940s. The first human-made object to reach Earth orbit was the Soviet Union's Sputnik 1, in 1957. So modern technology is all less than a hundred years old. Notice that the rate of advancement of evolution appears to accelerate. The more evolution advances, the faster it advances. The rate that biological organisms evolve is much faster than the rate that galaxies and planets form. Human beings are able to consciously take control of their own evolution. I want you to try to think now on a different scale.
Let's imagine some possible advances. For instances, medical science learns how to replace old and dead cells in the body and repair damaged DNA so that, with luck, human beings can live indefinitely. All diseases are eradicated by designer viruses. We also create robot bodies and enhanced brains containing all human knowledge and able to process information at super speed and communicate with anyone anywhere. We populate the other planets in the solar system and use the minerals in the asteroid belt to build vast space cities so that the human population increases at an exponential rate from 10 billion to a billion billion billion. Exploiting solar energy and genetically engineered plants, and breaking down any other chemical element into water or air as required we have limitless power, food and air. Even if we don't discover faster than light travel, we live long enough now to venture outward to other stars the slow way in our vast zero point energy powered cities with our children's, children's ... children. We terraform worlds we reach as required. Some of these worlds we plant with genetic material we designed ourselves or together with our AI brothers. We can change our own bodies to any form we desire, or dissolve into data in the galactic web.
In accordance with our own prime directive: 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground': we make man in our own image on some of our worlds, watching benevolently and discretely over him from high mountain peaks and cities in the clouds, humbly accepting his worship. We glide through each other's consciousness inhabiting art created at the speed of thought by countless, nameless authors.
Eventually we are able to construct and deconstruct planets and stars, use black holes for fuel, and peel back the outer coverings of space-time; designing our own fundamental particles and physical laws. Arranging galaxy gardens, growing universe bubbles and joining our peers among the universe creator gods.
Where is society headed? We seek to cure disease, implement justice and maintain freedom, joy and abundance. We seek for society and civilisation to implement the same ideals we project into our god. We tend to divide the world into natural and man-made, natural and unnatural. Whatever a man does that is unique to man is unnatural by definition. But we should not distinguish what we do from nature. Biological organisms dominate the mineral world. It is natural for bees and termites to build hives, for beavers to build dams, and for humans to build cities, spaceships the computers. The human mind is only the latest innovation of material evolution in its inexorable drive to make god. The divine destiny of the universe is already there implicit in the protons, neutrons and electrons present at the birth of the universe. It's only a matter of time. The only question really is whether this time is the first time this has happened.
"What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun."
If we wonder why it is that the universe is the way it is, why it seems to have this destiny, consider a small seed fallen from a large tree, and the large tree that is there inherent within the seed. We are destined to become a large tree because that is where we came from. All the coincidences of creation are thus neatly explained, but the antinomy of first causes remains unchanged and unresolved. How did it all come about? So we ponder again of Ouroboros and our limited linear causal thinking. Where we are going and where we come from are both here now and forever. We seek to explain how it all came about when any explanation, material or religious is nonsensical: rather to be "I am that I am". We must wait for a new kind of mind to know such things if knowable at all. Perhaps all the clumsy contrivances of evolution and causation are merely the way for a smart "future" (while sleeping on primal Ananata) to communicate to a dumb "past", by breaking the I am of reality down into simple and seductive, successively digestible chunks. This universe shows us evolution as a way for things to become, but maybe it doesn't take countless universes just for one to be. The fact that the process both begins and ends with a tree should remind us again of: "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." (Revelation 22:13)
In the next article Unity vs Robot Zombies - Part 1 we begin our look at the nature of the soul.
Any comments welcome.
The Anthropic Principle:
In The Scientific Creation Myth we briefly reviewed the history of the universe from the Big Bang to the present, and in Mysteries of Light - Part 1, Mysteries of Light - Part 2 and Atom we examined the nature of matter.There are estimated to be more than 100,000,000,000 stars in our galaxy, and more than 100,000,000,000 galaxies in the universe. Some galaxies are larger than ours, and some are smaller, but the total number of stars in the universe is thought to be about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. An astrophysicist called Frank Drake did a rough estimate (now called the "Drake equation") to predict "the number of active, communicative extra-terrestrial civilizations in the Milky Way [that is, our] galaxy", based on various probabilities. The equation was later refined by Drake, working with the astronomer Carl Sagan. The equation gives a range of values for the number of civilisations in the Milky Way galaxy of a level capable of interstellar communication of somewhere between 20 and 50,000,000. If the number was 20 per galaxy, across the entire universe this would amount to about 2,000,000,000,000 active, advanced civilizations. The question of why we have not discovered evidence of any extra-terrestrial civilisations if there are so many of them out there is therefore something of a mystery, but we will not go into that here.
The range given by the Drake equation is very broad, but even if we imagine the lower bound to be overly optimistic, the result still suggests that intelligent life, according to current models of physical evolution, should be fairly common, so that we should not be alone in the universe. We might then view the physical universe as, in a sense, an enormous device for the manufacture of intelligent life. But what is it exactly about the universe that leads to this result, and why should it be?
According to current cosmological thinking, the universe seems to be poised on the edge of a delicate balance between expansion and collapse, and a lot depends on the initial conditions at the time of the big bang. We have seen that the universe is currently about 13 billion years old, and should last at least another 13 billion. But if things had been only a little different, the universe might have only endured for a tiny fraction of a second before collapsing inescapably under the weight of its own gravity. Alternatively, it might have expanded too fast, so that galaxies and stars were never able to form, but just a faint dispersing vapour in the void. The various physical constants, the ratios between the strength of the various forces: gravity, electromagnetism, the strong and weak nuclear forces; and the density of matter and energy in space; and the ratios of the numbers of the different types of particles: all these factors must lay within certain parameters for a productive result. What if the universe consisted of particles that weren't inclined to combine into atoms and molecules. What if all the particles just floated inertly in a formless random endless haze and never did anything?
Instead, these three simple little elements with only a handful of physical characteristics: photons, together with protons, neutrons and electrons; just left to themselves, will form hydrogen, helium and stars. By means of the processes inside these stars they form the rest of the chemical elements, and by means of terrestrial environments, they form biological ecosystems.
The philosophy of Intelligent Design is inclined to attribute all of these coincidences to, ... well, intelligent design. Those inclined differently point to the fact that the system of the physical universe is such that it requires no input from any god, because it has all it needs within itself.
Consider an automated factory for manufacturing cars and household appliances. The factory is designed and built so well that it requires no human input whatsoever. It can repair itself and continues to function even after the entire human race, and all other life on the planet vanishes as a result of an antibiotic resistant virus. When aliens sometime later visit the dead industrialised world they speculate on the origin of these strange factories. Some of the more fantastically inclined among them suggest the factories were originally created by some vanished biological race, but the others argue that there is no evidence for such an invisible race, and positing them is unnecessary because the factories do not require any input from any fancied biological organisms, since they have everything they need within themselves to create, maintain, and reproduce themselves. The very perfection of the factories, and their thoroughgoing self-sufficiency becomes evidence against the existence of their creators.
One of the unattractive aspects of Intelligent Design is its seeking to exploit current gaps in scientific knowledge and to suggest divine intervention as the means of plugging the gap, to account for the effectiveness of physical and biological evolution. This leads in turn, every time one of these gaps is eventually plugged by a successful scientific hypothesis, that the cry goes out that the need for a god has yet again been dispensed with. So that it seems that the only way to provide evidence for the existence of god is to find fault with his handy-work, requiring him to intervene to keep it all running. If He creates a perfectly self contained physical universe, there is apparently no room in it for Him.
It was suggested earlier that regardless of whatever scientific view is in place it is always possible to harmlessly add god as the designer and author. We might equally well harmlessly posit god as standing behind the scenes supporting the entirety of the physical creation. We simply posit that the only way anything can exist is by the force of His will. A proton exists because His will maintains it according to the perfectly precise and predictable laws of accepted physics from one millisecond to the next. We might similarly posit that all this exists in His mind, and will only exist for as long as He thinks it.
There is a problem with our parable about the self maintaining factories. How do we explain their origin. How does the first factory create itself so that it is then able to create other factories? We embellish our parable to include tiny nanobots comprised of simple elements that are able to form themselves into complex machines. But then, how do we explain the origin of the first nanobots? We suggest that they form naturally from the basic constituents of matter: protons, neutrons and electrons.
That is exactly what protons, neutrons and electrons are: tiny, simple nanobots with just the right characteristics for manufacturing a universe of intelligent living beings, all without the need for any outside intervention. The universe is the perfect self-building factory. It all comes down to the careful and elegant design of protons, neutrons and electrons.
Philosophers of science have sought to account for how it is that we inhabit a universe that seems designed to be just right for the manufacture of beings like us. What they came up with was something called the "Anthropic Principle". Put rather simply, it says that the universe is the way it is because if it wasn't we wouldn't be here to perceive it. But the suggestion isn't quite what it seems. They are not suggesting a teleological explanation for the origin and form of the universe. In fact, not much can be made of the Anthropic Principle unless we combine it with the suggestion of an evolutionary theory of universes, a kind of "survival of the fittest" for universes.
Teleological explanation is typical of religion and ancient philosophy. It suggests that things are the way they are because it is best, because god will always choose what is best. Teleological explanation has now been replaced by the theory of evolution. The theory of evolution says that things are the way they are because it is fittest, because evolution will always favour what is fittest. Although the causes are different, the result is the same, whether we call it best or fittest.
But we can only apply the theory of evolution to universes if we have an ecosystem for manufacturing lots and lots of universes. If our single universe is the only universe there is, we cannot apply an evolutionary theory of universes to explain why it is the way it is.
If we have an ecosystem for manufacturing universes we can posit that lots of different universes are made, with all different, plausibly random physical laws, properties and constituents. Some of those universes indeed will only last a tiny fraction of a second before ending in collapse. Some will expand too fast and never form stars. Some will be composed of particles that never form atoms and molecules. But every once in a while, over the giga-ages, a universe emerges with just the right physical characteristics to generate stars, planets and biological life. We inhabit such a universe because we wouldn't exist in any of the other universes. That is the Anthropic Principle.
If parent universes are able to pass on their characteristics to child universes in some kind of genetic inheritance, their might be an inexorable trend toward ever "fitter" universes. Universes that last longer, and reproduce more effectively, perhaps even forming a balanced ecosystem of thriving universes. So that universes that are good at manufacturing intelligent life become the norm.
Like a Seed from a Tree
So far we have looked at the evolution of the universe from the Big Bang to the present day, but we have not said much about the future. We looked at the last 13 billion years, now let's look ahead and speculate on the rest of the life of our little universe, the next 13 billion years.The Sun and Earth are thought to be about 4.5 billion years old. Primates emerged about 65 million years ago. Human beings evolved about 200,000 years ago. The Stone Age ended about 4,000 years ago when human beings began to work with metal. The oldest surviving written texts date from about 3,000 years ago. So in a few thousand years we have progressed from having stone tips for our spears, to the modern world of cities, aircraft and the internet. 3,000 years as a fraction of 13 billion years is about 0.00000023, that is 23/100,000,000ths. If that is what we have achieved in the last 3,000 years, what can we achieve in the next 3,000 years, or the next 200,000 years, or the next 65 million years?
The first electric programmable computer was built in the 1940s. The first human-made object to reach Earth orbit was the Soviet Union's Sputnik 1, in 1957. So modern technology is all less than a hundred years old. Notice that the rate of advancement of evolution appears to accelerate. The more evolution advances, the faster it advances. The rate that biological organisms evolve is much faster than the rate that galaxies and planets form. Human beings are able to consciously take control of their own evolution. I want you to try to think now on a different scale.
Let's imagine some possible advances. For instances, medical science learns how to replace old and dead cells in the body and repair damaged DNA so that, with luck, human beings can live indefinitely. All diseases are eradicated by designer viruses. We also create robot bodies and enhanced brains containing all human knowledge and able to process information at super speed and communicate with anyone anywhere. We populate the other planets in the solar system and use the minerals in the asteroid belt to build vast space cities so that the human population increases at an exponential rate from 10 billion to a billion billion billion. Exploiting solar energy and genetically engineered plants, and breaking down any other chemical element into water or air as required we have limitless power, food and air. Even if we don't discover faster than light travel, we live long enough now to venture outward to other stars the slow way in our vast zero point energy powered cities with our children's, children's ... children. We terraform worlds we reach as required. Some of these worlds we plant with genetic material we designed ourselves or together with our AI brothers. We can change our own bodies to any form we desire, or dissolve into data in the galactic web.
In accordance with our own prime directive: 'Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground': we make man in our own image on some of our worlds, watching benevolently and discretely over him from high mountain peaks and cities in the clouds, humbly accepting his worship. We glide through each other's consciousness inhabiting art created at the speed of thought by countless, nameless authors.
Eventually we are able to construct and deconstruct planets and stars, use black holes for fuel, and peel back the outer coverings of space-time; designing our own fundamental particles and physical laws. Arranging galaxy gardens, growing universe bubbles and joining our peers among the universe creator gods.
Where is society headed? We seek to cure disease, implement justice and maintain freedom, joy and abundance. We seek for society and civilisation to implement the same ideals we project into our god. We tend to divide the world into natural and man-made, natural and unnatural. Whatever a man does that is unique to man is unnatural by definition. But we should not distinguish what we do from nature. Biological organisms dominate the mineral world. It is natural for bees and termites to build hives, for beavers to build dams, and for humans to build cities, spaceships the computers. The human mind is only the latest innovation of material evolution in its inexorable drive to make god. The divine destiny of the universe is already there implicit in the protons, neutrons and electrons present at the birth of the universe. It's only a matter of time. The only question really is whether this time is the first time this has happened.
"What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun."
(Ecclesiastes 1:9)
If we wonder why it is that the universe is the way it is, why it seems to have this destiny, consider a small seed fallen from a large tree, and the large tree that is there inherent within the seed. We are destined to become a large tree because that is where we came from. All the coincidences of creation are thus neatly explained, but the antinomy of first causes remains unchanged and unresolved. How did it all come about? So we ponder again of Ouroboros and our limited linear causal thinking. Where we are going and where we come from are both here now and forever. We seek to explain how it all came about when any explanation, material or religious is nonsensical: rather to be "I am that I am". We must wait for a new kind of mind to know such things if knowable at all. Perhaps all the clumsy contrivances of evolution and causation are merely the way for a smart "future" (while sleeping on primal Ananata) to communicate to a dumb "past", by breaking the I am of reality down into simple and seductive, successively digestible chunks. This universe shows us evolution as a way for things to become, but maybe it doesn't take countless universes just for one to be. The fact that the process both begins and ends with a tree should remind us again of: "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." (Revelation 22:13)
In the next article Unity vs Robot Zombies - Part 1 we begin our look at the nature of the soul.
Any comments welcome.
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