Fine tuning: a discussion for the rest of us mortals

reminds me of the old sexist joke, "If a man speaks out loud in a forest and his wife is not there to hear him, is he still wrong?"

Hi cavediver,I know it's not very popular right now (though I've never minded it myself), but didn't the Gaia hypothesis make an attempt at answering your question? Have you read about it? Do you dislike it?More information hereI know it won't do very well in answering questions about why the speed of light is a constant, for example, but then that's not really a job for the life sciences.Mickin edit: the website i linked to says "biological responses tend to regulate the state of the Earth's environment in their favor.". I think a more modern interpretation would be that the Earth's physical/chemical environment and its biological life are in an evolutionary feedback loop. If life happens to make a more oxygen-rich environment, you get oxygen-respiring organisms evolving. etc. etc. But if the environment reaches a physical limit, then life is forced to adapt to it. That process of adaptation changes the Earth's environment. The process goes on...added in edit, again: I just discovered that most of the stuff on the web about the gaia hypothesis is pretty awful...This message has been edited by mick, 11-26-2005 05:08 PMThis message has been edited by mick, 11-26-2005 05:13 PM

Just to give a more concrete example:The concentration of oxygen in surface-level air on Earth is about 20%, and this appears to be very "fine-tuned" for the survival of all sorts of animal life.But in fact the 20% concentration of oxygen is the result of a very long term process of coevolution between physical planetary systems and the evolutionary diversification of life: More information hereThere was no fine tuning, apart from the fine tuning carried out by long term biological processes and geological events.MickThis message has been edited by mick, 11-26-2005 05:25 PM