Friday, January 31, 2014

Multiverse tries to escape the supernatural

The WSJ published this letter:
Multiverse Doesn't Help Explain Origins
Kurt Gödel's "Incompleteness Theorem" basically proves mathematically that the answer to the origin of anything, even the physical universe, always lies outside of the thing itself.

Peter Woit's review of Max Tegmark's "Our Mathematical Universe" (Books, Jan. 18) emphasizes the role of math in physics but leaves out the work of 1930s mathematician Kurt Gödel and his "Incompleteness Theorem." This theorem basically proves mathematically that the answer to the origin of anything, even the physical universe, always lies outside of the thing itself. Therefore the origin of this universe that is incredibly fine-tuned in over 100 parameters, must have a supernatural agent outside of itself. A natural agent would have to be included in the encircled physical universe.

The multiverse concept basically says that there are an infinite number of universes out there, and we just happen to live in the one and only one where all the dials were randomly set "just right." In a nutshell, perhaps many are simply trying to intellectually escape from accountability to this supernatural agent.
James Kraft
Green Bay, Wis.
Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says nothing of the kind. Tegmark's answer is that Godel uses infinities, and the physical universe has no infinities. Tegmark says that there are an infinite number of universes in the multiverse.

The universe is fine-tuned, but I am not sure why that implies a supernatural agent. It has been known for centuries that the Earth is fine-tuned for life.

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