From: Technotranscendence (neptune@mars.superlink.net)
Date: Mon Jan 12 1998 - 17:49:23 MST
At 11:40 AM 1/12/98 +1100, Weslake, Brad BG <Weslake.Brad.BG@bhp.com.au> wrote:
>This discussion is quite amusing; akin to the sometimes-used creationist
>argument for God that because the earth is at the very nice distance
>from the sun which allows our type of life form, this was obviously by
>design. The reason the argument is meaningless is because life is only
>going to develop under conditions which enable this development. Now our
>type of life, naturally, has evolved to be best suited to our proximity
>to the sun. This reasoning can be extended to the universal constants:
>of course they appear to us to be finely tuned - because we evolved
>under their influence. Just because we find it hard to comprehend forms
>of life which might exist under alternate conditions does not mean that
>this is not so. But of course, this is moot, because even if our
>conditions _are_ the only ones that allow life, of course the life which
>does develop is going to do so under these conditions. If they were not
>- we would not be here to ponder the question. Am I making sense? Is
>this reasoning valid?
I wholeheartedly concur and wish the list would move on to more
practical matters, like actually achieving posthumanism.
Daniel Ust
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