There’s an intriguing possibility that the emergence of conscious life is not just a coincidence, but an inevitable outcome of cosmic evolution.
Have you ever wondered why our universe is made up of something rather than nothing? It can hurt your brain if you think about it too much because if there were nothing you would have no brain—no you at all—to consider the question.
So let’s contemplate something simpler: why does the universe allow us to exist? Yet again, we run into the same problem: if the universe didn’t allow us to exist, we wouldn’t be here to think about it. This is called the “anthropic principle.” For some, it’s the only answer we need to explain, well, everything; but for others, it’s a philosophical thorn in the side. Everything we know about the universe so far—dating back to the 16th-century Polish astronomer Copernicus, who first proposed that Earth travels around the sun rather than the other way around—tells us that we have no special place in the cosmos. We are not at the center. This is the “Copernican principle.”
Why do we exist as self-aware beings, tiny in size and minuscule in lifespan, relative to the lonely cosmic vastness mostly devoid of life?
The anthropic and Copernican principles are conflicting axioms about the universe’s existence and our place within it. The anthropic principle says the universe depends on our being here. Meanwhile, the Copernican principle says that we are not special, and no law of physics should depend on our existence. Yet, the vast and ancient universe we see in our telescopes appears to balance both principles, like a pin balanced on the edge of a glass.
So why is our universe the way it is, and why do we exist as self-aware beings, tiny in size and minuscule in lifespan, relative to the lonely cosmic vastness mostly devoid of life? If the universe were made just for us, surely it would be small, human sized, perhaps just one planet or solar system or galaxy, not billions. Why should a universe made for us have black holes, for example? They seem to contribute nothing to our welfare.
Some scientists believe the universe wasn’t finely tuned to create intelligent life like us at all. Instead, they say, the universe evolved its own insurance policy by creating as many black holes as possible, which is the universe’s method of reproduction. Following this line of thinking, the universe itself may very well be alive—and the fact that we humans exist at all is just a happy side effect.
A Finely-Tuned Universe
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According to the cosmic inflation theory, there are an infinite number of universes in the multiverse that may each have their own laws of physics with different collections of forces and particles.
One of the biggest philosophical problems with the universe is that it has to be finely tuned for us to even exist. If the universe were random, things would quickly become messy. If modified only a tiny bit one way or another, physical parameters such as the speed of light; the mass of the electron, proton, and neutron; the gravitational constant; and so on would eliminate all life—possibly all matter itself—and even the universe as a whole would not last long enough to evolve anything. For example, if their masses were slightly different, protons would decay into neutrons instead of the other way around, and as a result, there would be no atoms.
Read More – All Human Existence May Have Begun in a Black Hole, Some Scientists Believe
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