Editor:

I am writing in response to Mathew Myrup’s letter (“Intelligent design is not scientific,” Dec. 6). He proposes that even though life is extremely improbable, with the amount of stars in the universe, life is bound to happen some place.

Is this a scientific claim? Scientists admit that our earth is tuned in almost every way to support life: in its magnetic field, its internal structure, its orbit, its chemical composition, its atmospheric conditions, its size, its temperature, its many intricate chemical cycles, its unique location in a safe zone of a galaxy, the nature of our sun, etc. Scientists concede that without most these properties, there would be no life here.

Our planet is unique, and the probability that even this planet exists is quite small, but let’s pretend for argument’s sake that there are many other “privileged” planets out there.

Astronomers and physicists agree that our universe is extremely fine-tuned. The consensus is that if one of the six universal constants that underlie the fundamental physical properties of the universe were altered “even to the tiniest degree, there would be no stars, no complex elements, no life.”

To explain this apparent fine-tuning of the cosmos, atheistic scientists have expounded upon Myrup’s idea by saying “there must be billions upon billions of universes. With so many, it’s inevitable that there would be one out there that is tuned to allow for stars, complex elements and life.” This idea, as romantic as it sounds, is not based at all on evidence-it is entirely speculation.

Essentially, to avoid evidence that points toward design, naturalists build themselves a metaphysical escape hatch. They say: If life is improbable, do we need to account for a designer? Not if we pretend that there are random chemical reactions happening on billions of planets across billions of universes.

I suppose everyone’s got his or her faith in something. Some put it in God, others put it in unscientific naturalistic speculation. In my opinion, just because some atheist scientists believe it without proof, it doesn’t make for good science; it makes for a boring religion.

Matt Weinstock

Junior, Biochemistry