Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site utastro.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!ut-sally!utastro!dipper
From: dipper@utastro.UUCP (Debbie Byrd)
Newsgroups: net.astro
Subject: StarDate: October 21 The Anthropic Principle
Message-ID: <678@utastro.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 21-Oct-84 02:00:20 EDT
Article-I.D.: utastro.678
Posted: Sun Oct 21 02:00:20 1984
Date-Received: Mon, 22-Oct-84 19:09:12 EDT
Organization: UTexas Astronomy Dept., Austin, Texas
Lines: 42

Some cosmologists are wondering whether our universe came into being
just so people could.  More -- right after this.

October 21  The Anthropic Principle

Cosmologists are astronomers who study the whole universe.  They wonder
how the universe came into being -- and where it's going from here.

A question in cosmology today is, why IS our universe the way we
observe it to be?  One answer -- which has been debated by cosmologists
over the last decade -- may be that the universe evolved the way it did
just so people could come along later -- to turn around and observe the
universe.  In other words, maybe consciousness is central to the
universe.

This idea even has a name in cosmology -- it's called the anthropic
principle, which just means a principle relating to people.

The anthropic principle came about when cosmologists began wondering
how the orderly structure of our universe could have evolved from the
chaos of the Big Bang -- the primordial explosion thought to have
marked the birth of the universe.

The anthropic principle can be stated in a mild way -- saying that if
the universe were any different, we wouldn't be here to observe it.
If, for example, the universe expanded outward from the Big Bang at a
different rate -- or if the strength of gravity were slightly altered
-- then intelligent life couldn't have evolved.  Or the anthropic
principle can be stated in a strong way -- perhaps intelligent life is
a natural result of the universe -- that people are in fact the
universe observing itself.

So that's the anthropic principle -- the idea that people are necessary
to the universe.  And if this all sounds more like philosophy than
astronomy -- well, many astronomers think so too.


Script by Deborah Byrd.



(c) Copyright 1983, 1984 McDonald Observatory, University of Texas at Austin