Evidence for instances of astrophysical 'fine tuning' (or 'coincidences') is thought by some to lend support to the design argument (i.e. the argument that our universe has been designed by some deity). We assess some of the relevant empirical and conceptual issues. We argue that astrophysical fine tuning calls for some explanation, but this explanation need not appeal to the design argument. A clear and strict separation of the issue of anthropic fine tuning on one hand and any form of (...) Eddingtonian numerology and teleology on the other, may help clarify arguably the most significant issue in the philosophy of cosmology. (shrink)

Evidence for instances of astrophysical ‘fine tuning’ (or ‘coincidences’) is thought by some to lend support to the design argument (i.e. the argument that our universe has been designed by some deity). We assess some of the relevant empirical and conceptual issues. We argue that astrophysical fine tuning calls for some explanation, but this explanation need not appeal to the design argument. A clear and strict separation of the issue of anthropic fine tuning on one hand and any form of (...) Eddingtonian numerology and teleology on the other, may help clarify arguably the most significant issue in the philosophy of cosmology. (shrink)

Recent discussions of theorigins of the thermodynamical temporal asymmetry (thearrow of time) by Huw Price and others arecritically assessed. This serves as amotivation for consideration of relationshipbetween thermodynamical and cosmologicalcauses. Although the project of clarificationof the thermodynamical explanandum is certainlywelcome, Price excludes another interestingoption, at least as viable as the sort ofAcausal-Particular approach he favors, andarguably more in the spirit of Boltzmannhimself. Thus, the competition of explanatoryprojects includes three horses, not two. Inaddition, it is the Acausal-Particular approachthat could benefit enormously (...) from dissociationfrom fanciful ideas of low-entropy futureboundary conditions entertained by Price. Novelrevolutionary developments in observationalcosmology, as well as in the nascentastrophysical discipline of physicaleschatology, have obliterated such hypotheses.Also, the Acausal-Anthropic approach wepropose, offers another clear instance ofdisteleological nature of the anthropicprinciple. (shrink)