The Fine Tuning Argument debunked by a Jar of Beans

The fine tuning argument for God claims that a fine tuned universe for life is far more likely given God than without God. It's based on the notion that it is extremely unlikely that we could get life permitting values for the constants of nature without a designer. In this short film, Chris Hitchcock, Professor of Philosophy at Caltech and an expert in probability theory and the philosophy of science offers a critique. This clip was taken form a longer film on the subject, you can see here:

for a reply from the proponents of the argument see here:

and for our counter reply see here:

[terenceskywalker]

I agree. There isn't an intellegent agency shaking the jar.

[SES]

Given the physical parameters of the beans, jar, and motion applied, there was not a 1/2^100 probability. But for the universe there was no matter, energy, time, nor space; so there could be no prior physical parameters.

Wasn't this dude the intelligent agent behind this experiment? He chooses what to put in the jar. He chose to shake it. All for a purpose. His "jar universe" was designed.

[Ultras]

Sorry but I'm not understanding how this Jar analogy debunks the fine-tuning argument. Surely if we shook around the constants and it somehow came within the exact space of values of a life-permitting universe this is still the fine-tuning problem but pushed one step back? Why is the most probable outcome in the extremely fine range of life-permitting constants?

[TheJackjack]

The real question is how did the red beans and the black beans get in the jar ?

[ChaseMcClendon]

The irony is that it took a human to shake the jar in order for the laws of nature to work in the scenario, haha.

[MatthewFearnley]

This doesn't really add much to the "maybe there's a multiverse, we don't know" counterargument.

The only thing it's really saying is "maybe there's some kind of natural selection process that optimises for our universe, meaning we only need 100 iterations of a universe rather than 2^100 of them, we don't know".

[joelmathewjohn]

Although a good experiment, I do find a problem with it. There is a particular manner in which the jar's shaking must be done. If it were too vigorous, we wouldn't have been able to separate the beans. Thus, the experimenter has a conscious input to maintain such an optimal force, which is a point for the fine-tuning argument!

[gimpo]

No intelligent agency? He literally disproved this point. He did not shake them. He stir them in a way where the black beans would rise to the top and the smaller ones with filter to the bottom. Shake them at random up and down side to side and a figure eight and we'll see if they filter the same. He plays God in the bean universe while simultaneously proclaiming that there is no god in the bean universe

[broken]

This has to be the stupidest excuse atheists came with, aside from the fact that the probability he calculated is based on one simple shake of the jar and not playing with it for some time until he INTENTIONALLY got the black beans on top, the fact the he SHOOK the jar, implies INPUT! INTENTION! Get it ?

[ApologeticsSquared]

See, I think it's totally possible for there to be some naturalistic tendency for constants to look a certain way. But, I would not assign a higher (a priori) credence to the constants being predisposed to any particular value. There could totally be some natural thing that would predispose the gravitational constant, for example, to have a value of 6.67408 × 10^-11 m^3/(kg s^2). But why would you expect it to be predisposed to that, rather than 1 m^3/(kg s^2)?

Basically, we go from P(G = 6.67408 × 10^-11 m^3/(kg s^2)) being small due to competing possibilities to P(G is disposed to 6.67408 × 10^-11 m^3/(kg s^2)) being small due to competing possibilities.

[pansepot]

As others have pointed out, if anything, the fine tuning argument proves we live in a naturalistic universe. The omnipotent god of the Abrahamic religions, if he is indeed all powerful, would not need any stinking “fine-tuning” to create an universe and make it work.

[scoredkoi]

The problem with this argument is that it is employing already established Constants but where do these constants come from or laws? Laws don’t create them selves in the loss of cells are fine tuned to allow for life.

[stevemeisternomic]

The problem with this argument is that it is limited to a one dimensional single event. The fine tuning argument basically means that a collection of impossible events happened at the same time, and all of the events are mandatory. Yes, one single highly unlikely event can and do happen on occasion, but when 10 to 20 of them happen simultaneously you are no longer dealing with chance.

[drawnmyattention]

Watch the Sean Carroll/WL Craig debate. Scientist Carroll doesn't let philosopher Craig get away with his usual confident assertions about the physics of fine tuning. 😊

[christiangadfly]

1) shaking the beans randomly is a random action.
2) Having the black beans got to the top looks like order
3) After shaking the black beans go above the red beans
C) randomness can create order.

This is actually an example of the opposite. Order is implicit in the system by the symmetry of the black beans to each other and red beans to each other. It literally proves the opposite of what Phil is trying to prove. The beans in the jar are fine tuned to collect where they do given an event with a random variable (the shaking). But this doesn't prove order from randomness. This is much like evolution being constrained by the universal constants.

You can see something similar if you have marbles in a box. Get a bunch of identical-sized marbles and shake the box randomly and as they settle in the box they form symmetrical hexagonal patterns. The order is implicit in the system, despite the random shaking, by the symmetry of the equal sized marbles to each other.

This same order is in God's creation at the subatomic level. This is why you see symmetry in snow flakes and crystals.

[Rakscha-Sun]

Yea… the multiverse explanation is totally like the same than the beans example. Just that we have proof that beans exist and know that gravity exist. While we have never seen any other universes nor any law that would select livable ones over non-livable one. And can even in theory not falsify there existence. But this is totally science nonetheless…Even the inventor of the multiverse hypothesis said it is as profable as supernatural entities but whatever.

[clay]

Can we still easily shake out the arrangement of black beans on the top layer from the glass bottle filled with beans if we take it to outer space without gravity? The answer is no!

The example of this jar of beans is fundamentally different from the fine-tuning of the universe because you assume the existence of some physical laws outside the universe, but the universe already encompasses everything physical, so there wouldn't be other physical laws "fine-tuning" the universe.

[mecky]

"There isn't an intelligent agency behind it" is false. I mean the fine-tuning argues about the origin of the fine-tuning. He (intelligent) shakes the jar and randomises the beans. The question is: Who or what is the best explanation for the mechanism that "shakes" the jar / tuned the constants.

[radirandom]

You guys are running away from the argument of ibn sina (avicenna) which is a contingency type argument

[MambaSanon]

If atheist believe the universe doesn’t exist for a reason and it’s just the results of mindless matter and random process, why wouldn’t the value of the constants be random? Why would the constants of nature be non random, selected values under naturalism?