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Physicists Want to Put Cosmic Design to the Test

Photo credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, P. Zeidler.

At Universe Today, Mark Thompson reports that two physicists, Nemanja Kaloper and Alexander Westphal, believe that they have come up with a way to determine whether the universe has been “designed to support life”:

The paper, published in the Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics was authored by Nemanja Kaloper from the University of California and Alexander Westphal from the Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron. They propose for the first time, a way that the principle can be experimentally tested. 

“Has the Universe Been Designed to Support Life? Now We Have a Way to Test It!” December 9, 2024. The paper is open access.

Here’s the Abstract

We propose using fuzzy axion dark matter to test the anthropic principle. A very light axion can be directly detectable, at least by black hole superradiance effects. The idea then is that gravitational and astrophysical observations can discover a light axion in the regime where it must be all of dark matter with abundance which must be set up by the anthropic principle, due to excessive primordial misalignment induced by inflation-induced Brownian drift of fluctuations. Yet it may turn out that dark matter is something else instead of this axion. Since the de Sitter-induced axion misalignment controlled only by the de Sitter curvature cannot be evaded, this would invalidate the anthropic prediction of the dark matter abundance.

At Phys.org we learn,

The anthropic principle (AP) can be formulated in different ways. These range from a simple description of the facts — ”if we are here observing it, the universe evolved with the conditions necessary for the emergence of intelligent life,” known as the weak AP — to something a bit more radical: “the universe had to evolve in a way that led to our existence.”

This stronger interpretation, called the strong AP, often ventures into metaphysical territory, suggesting a kind of “design” and moving beyond the realm of scientific inquiry into the universe. International School of Advanced Studies (SISSA), “‘We live in a universe that is just right for us’:

“Study proposes a test for the Anthropic Principle,” December 9, 2024

It is not more “metaphysical” to say that the universe shows apparent evidence of design than to say it does not. The bias in insisting otherwise is pretty evident.

“Finally,” adds Kaloper, “it is possible that future direct dark matter searches discover that dark matter is predominantly not made up of ultralight axions. In which case, we’d think that the anthropic principle fails.”

However, this outcome is not guaranteed.

“On the other hand, if direct dark matter searches find that dark matter is, in fact, ultralight axion,” Kaloper continues, “then I think we’d agree that the anthropic principle in fact passed this test; indeed, this might happen.”

Perhaps. But Perhaps Not.

Their thesis is based on cosmic inflation theory and on the behavior of dark matter, whose nature remains unknown. These are hardly the most certain propositions in physics.

It’s worth noting that the epigraph to their paper is attributed to Nobelist Steven Weinberg (1933– 2021): “A physicist talking about the anthropic principle runs the same risk as a cleric talking about pornography: no matter how much you say you’re against it, some people will think you’re a little too interested…” 

It’s hard to believe somehow that they are genuinely curious about the matter.

Cross-posted at Mind Matters News.