These galaxy clusters are part of a large study using Chandra and Hubble that sets new limits on how dark matter \u2014 the mysterious substance that makes up most of the matter in the Universe \u2014 interacts with itself. The hot gas that envelopes the clusters glows brightly in X-rays detected by Chandra (pink). When combined with Hubble\u2019s visible light data, astronomers can map where the stars and hot gas are after the collision, as well as the inferred distribution of dark matter (blue) through the effect of gravitational lensing.
(Smithsonian Institution public domain image)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Here are few more or less unrelated quotations that I\u2019ve drawn from Geraint F. Lewis and Luke A. Barnes,\u00a0A Fortunate Universe: Life in a Finely Tuned Cosmos<\/em>\u00a0(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016):<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Our models are mixtures of well-tested theories, reasonable assumptions and guesses; as Richard Feynman noted, \u2018it is not unscientific to make a guess.\u2019 \u00a0Science happens when we ask the Universe whether we guessed right. \u00a0Otherwise, the experimenter is doing little more than stamp collecting, and the theorist is just playing with numbers. \u00a0(26)<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
Discussions of the idea of cosmic fine-tuning commonly involve incomprehensibly improbable small numbers in some cases and incomprehensibly improbable large numbers in others. \u00a0Lewis and Barnes illustrate probability and improbability with a sketch from either the television series Police Squad<\/em> or one of the Naked Gun<\/em> films (or, at least, using their main character):<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
A bank vault is robbed. \u00a0The armoured door was opened without force; the robbers used the access code. \u00a0The police arrive on the scene.<\/span><\/p>\nDrebin: \u00a0Maybe they guessed the code.<\/span><\/p>\nHocken:\u00a0 No way, Frank. \u00a0There are a trillion combinations. \u00a0The system shows that they entered the code correctly on the first attempt. \u00a0Surely the odds against that are astronomical.<\/span><\/p>\nDrebin: But it\u2019s still possible, right? \u00a0(28)<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
The fine-tuning of the Universe for life<\/em> . . . is fine-tuning applied specifically to the fact that this universe supports life forms. \u00a0The claim is that small changes in the free parameters of the laws of nature as we know them have dramatic<\/em>, uncompensated<\/em> and detrimental<\/em> effects on the ability of the Universe to support the complexity needed for physical life forms. \u00a0(29, italics in the original)<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
The great scientist Ludwig Boltzmann was driven to despair, a despair that contributed to his eventual suicide in 1906, by the continued resistance to his ideas that the properties of gases could be explained by assuming they consisted of a multitude of colliding atoms. \u00a0(40)<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
If we think of an atomic nucleus as being about the same size as a fly, the surrounding electrons would be orbiting more than a hundred metres away. \u00a0(42)<\/span><\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 \u00a0 Here are few more or less unrelated quotations that I\u2019ve drawn from Geraint F. Lewis and Luke A. Barnes,\u00a0A Fortunate Universe: Life in a Finely Tuned Cosmos\u00a0(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016): \u00a0 Our models are mixtures of well-tested theories, reasonable assumptions and guesses; as Richard Feynman noted, \u2018it is not unscientific to make […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[10121,548,71,8307,10127,545,12455,4063,12452,243,10130],"class_list":["post-85801","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-anthropic","tag-anthropic-principle","tag-cosmology","tag-cosmos","tag-fine-tuned","tag-fine-tuning","tag-improbability","tag-life","tag-probability","tag-science","tag-universe"],"yoast_head":"\n
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![\"Chandra](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2017\/07\/Dark_Matter_is_Darker_Than_Once_Thought_18434588884.jpg\")
<\/a>