[Mauneam]

>Where in the argument is the designer defined this way?

The argument is, roughly speaking:

(1) The fine-tuning of universal constants is due to either physical necessity, chance, or design. (2) It is not due to physical necessity or chance. (3) Therefore, it is due to design.

Ok, let me try and help you here.

In the argument, the designer is defined as beyond understanding right here: "(3) Therefore, it is due to design."

Still having trouble seeing it? Let me try and help a little more. It's here: "(3) THEREFORE, IT IS DUE TO DESIGN."

Do you see how absurd it would be for you to propose that this "design" came about on its own, or by chance? How that would put you right back on square one, exposing fine tuning as the mindless drivel that it is? Do you see how comical it would be of you to suggest that you have all the mysteries of this universe figured out and you are now ready to take on the challenge of figuring out its designer, or even more comically, that you have barely even begun understanding the universe you're in but you're "open" to leapfrogging right into figuring out the thing that designed it? Where else are you going to take this? The simulation hypothesis? As if the dude that built the simulator can be any less complicated than the dude that fine-tuned everything?

Let's resolve this disagreement before tackling the other issues you raise in your response. Do you still have trouble understanding where in the argument the designer is defined this way?

[knightoffaith]

Yes, I still have trouble where "beyond understanding" is in (3). One reason I'm having trouble is because theologians, for example, have made arguments about ascribing various properties about the designer, e.g. that the designer is omnipotent, spaceless, timeless, etc. This shouldn't be possible even in principle if the designer is beyond understanding by definition, just like it's impossible to make coherent arguments that a triangle does not have three sides. You've suggested that it seems silly to be able to understand anything beyond the physical universe accessible to us when we don't yet have a full understanding of it, but "it seems silly" seems to be different from "it follows by definition". And in any case, the multiverse hypothesis is an attempt to understand something beyond the physical universe accessible to us, but presumably you wouldn't leverage this same objection against it.

If you really mean "beyond empirical inquiry", I would be inclined to agree, though I don't know how other explanations for the fine-tuning of the universe are better in this respect.

[Mauneam]

Ahh, theologians have made various claims about the designer? The same people that claim that he showed up as a burning bush one day, and as his own son the next?

Theologians have made many garbage assertions throughout centuries. Just because something is self-contradictory, paradoxical or nonsensical does not mean that a human hand can't put it down on paper. Here, watch this:

"A triangle does not have three sides. To find out why, and to get saved, come to the service on Sunday! (don't forget the donation)"

Other than theologians and their quackery, is there anything else that troubles you with regards to the assertion that the designer must be complex beyond understanding?

Furthermore, were you not trying to divorce religion from fine tuning? Are you finding that a little difficult? Do you see irony in the fact that you dragged it back into the dialogue all the while claiming that fine tuning can stand on its own?

[knightoffaith]

These aren't the kind of assertions I'm referring to though---I'm referring to arguments whose conclusions follow logically from their premises, the kind you can't make about triangles not having three sides because you end up in logical contradictions. If you don't like theologians, go back to Aristotle and his arguments about, for example, the unmoved mover. I mention theologians because they are the ones most often in the business of making arguments about this subject. Of course, you still needn't buy into any religion or theology in going about this project of understanding the designer. Just one example: you might raise the famous problem of evil to claim that the designer cannot be all-good---that's a kind of understanding.

[Mauneam]

In an attempt to refute the point about the designer being beyond understanding, you appealed to religion, all the while claiming that you don't have to appeal to religion.

Then you claim that one can't make a kind of an argument that I just demonstrated one can make.

Now you bring the problem of evil into the dialogue, as if that somehow brings the designer within reach of our understanding, when if anything it moves the concept even further beyond our reach.

Not to mention that with the problem of evil, you're dragging morality into this, another framework of thought just like religion, and closely coupled with it, that science does not deal with or recognize. All the while claiming that fine tuning can stand on its own.

You brought up a bunch of very interesting points in one of your previous posts that I would love to respond to, and I have enjoyed the discussion thus far, but I feel like it would be pointless to engage further unless you can clean up and strengthen your argumentation with regards to understanding the designer, so that it's free of contradictions and self-refutations. Or at least demonstrate willingness to concede a point.

[knightoffaith]

What I said is that the fine-tuning argument does not commit you to any particular religion. In demonstrating how we can understand the designer, I gave theological arguments about God as an example.

Buying some of the theological arguments about God, even if they are employed by theists, still does not commit you to a particular religion. You can agree to the omnipotence and omnipresence of the designer but not its moral interest in the good of humanity, for example. See Spinoza's Ethics for an example of a thinker who subscribes to this and fleshes out an entire system with this in mind. (There might be some controversy on this point, but Spinoza scholar Steven Nadler calls Spinoza an atheist. It's not a stretch to say that you could agree to all the arguments made in Ethics but still not subscribe to any religion.) And of course, as I said in the last comment, you can still go to Aristotle's discussion of the unmoved mover as an example of a thinker who predated Christianity and had no affiliation with any traditional monotheistic religion. The point is that we need not commit to any religion but can still make arguments about certain properties of the designer.

>Now you bring the problem of evil into the dialogue, as if that somehow brings the designer within reach of our understanding, when if anything it moves the concept even further beyond our reach. >Not to mention that with the problem of evil, you're dragging morality into this, another framework of thought just like religion, and closely coupled with it, that science does not deal with or recognize. All the while claiming that fine tuning can stand on its own.

I only introduced the problem of evil so I could give a pithy description of an argument we can make that clearly does not commit us to any mainstream religion but still reveals something to us about the nature of the designer. This is just one clear example of how we could come to understand something about the designer, if you buy the argument.

But maybe this is the crux of the contention you're having with me - implicit in what you've just said is that when you say understanding, you only mean scientific understanding, and likely that when you say explanation, you only mean scientific explanation. As I said before, the fine-tuning argument does indeed move us out of the realm of science and into metaphysics. So the sense in which we can understand or explain things about the designer is no longer scientific, but metaphysical. But that's fine - understanding need not be scientific understanding, and explanations need not be scientific explanations.

Just to elucidate what exactly I've been defending:

The fine-tuning argument does not commit us to a particular religion (we can easily imagine that there is a designer but that no religion is true). It offers an explanation of why the universal constants are what they are (by design as opposed to chance or necessity). It does not shut down further discussion - we can still ask questions about the nature of the designer (see paragraphs 2 and 4 of this comment). The design theory has no predictive power, yes, just like how other explanations of why the universal constants are what they are have no predictive power.

[Mauneam]

First you repeat the claim that fine tuning does not commit you to a religion, and then you keep appealing to religion all the way throughout. That's self-refutation at its finest.

You can stop saying "any particular religion" and just say "religion." I do accept that although fine tuning is almost exclusively pushed by Christian quacks, other religions can push it too. It also seems to be a bit of a straw-man, as I never asserted that it commits you to a specific religion, or to religion for that matter. You inevitably have to come back to it, as there is nowhere else you can take this nonsense, as you have aptly demonstrated, but you don't have to "commit" to it at the onset.

Then you comically bring up Spinoza, seemingly to strengthen your "any particular religion" point, but perhaps without realizing that he undermines your "understanding the designer" point. And you acknowledge literally in the same paragraph that he might have been an atheist. And not only that, but his concept of God, such as it is, is totally incompatible with fine tuning, because he doesn't even ascribe it intelligence. And not just that, but Spinoza ascribes quite meager power to the human mind, even denying us free will. So much for "understanding the designer" with Spinoza. Another self-refutation.

Then you even more comically bring up Aristotle, claiming that he has "no affiliation with any traditional religion," perhaps without realizing that Aristotle has become a staple in Christian theology from St. Aquinas onward. And not just that, but Aristotle also thought that God was beyond human comprehension. Another self-refutation.

Then you repeat your point about the problem of evil, without adding anything new, although it's already been refuted. The problem of evil does not help you come to understand something about the designer. All it does is weaken the ontological argument, and other arguments that depend on benevolence, and brings into question free will in both the designer and the human mind, without moving the needle one bit on any of the other issues that you have to content with in a benevolent designer.

Then you concede that fine tuning does indeed move us out of science, when earlier you were trying to demonstrate that it doesn't by citing the Elon Musk simulation joke meme. Nice.

I appreciate you clarifying the language on "understanding." Of course there is no such thing as scientific understanding of the designer, as science doesn't even recognize the concept (thank God, pun intended.) I thought you were the one trying to stay within science because you kept saying that you don't have to commit to religion, and citing things like the simulation hypothesis. When I say that the designer is beyond understanding, I mean primarily in the religious and metaphysical sense. In religion, his ways are mysterious. In metaphysics, he is all-knowing while the human mind is constrained and limited to our senses. That said, I would have accepted it if you were able to somehow demonstrate that there can be a scientific understanding of this concept, but it's now clear that that's not happening.

Also when I say "understanding" I obviously don't mean ascribing it paradoxical and otherwise nonsensical attributes the way I can assert right now that it has three eyes and a four-sided triangle for a mouth. When I say "understanding" I mean understanding why and what this designer is, as you put it earlier. I mean understanding how it came to be this way; to be able to go around fine-tuning things?

In your last paragraph you seem to want to broaden the scope of the dialogue without having refuted or conceded the point on understanding the designer, but we're going to have to stick to that until it's resolved, because it's kinda important. So here is the simple assertion you need to either refute or concede:

"Fine tuning posits a designer that is beyond human capacity to understand."