Dear reader, I'm fascinated with the fact that I am here writing my blog and you will be there, sometime, reading me. Can you imagine the amount of coincidence that has occurred for that to happen?
To begin with, we have time scale. Do you know the amount of time needed for the evolution of intelligent life in the Universe? Estimates vary but, approximately, it took 14,000 million years.
The universe began with the Big Bang. At the start it was all energy. The energy coalesced into matter (e=mc2, remember?). The first stars were born. The elements of matter were formed in the core of the stars by nuclear fusion: hydrogen, helium and, in ever increasing complexity, the rest of elements of the periodic table. Stars exploded and planets formed.
In a remote star, a special planet was born made out of the debris of previous stellar explosions. Its orbit was nearly perfectly circular, neither too far nor too close to its star, so as to have liquid water. In this planet life erupted by a process we are not able to duplicate today. Life evolved, species were created and destroyed by the works of natural selection. And, after thousands of millions of years, about a couple of millions years ago, an ape capable of language and constructor of tools started to reflect and communicate.
This is dear reader, our common ancestor. So, you and I, descendants of that lineage, are capable of communicate today by electronic means.
In addition to this breathtaking time scale and transformation, the laws of the Universe appear to have been finely tuned for intelligent life to appear. Any slight deviation and life would not be present.
Take, for instance the gravity force, which is inversely proportional to the square power of the distance. If, for instance, we substitute the square by the third power, the orbits of the planets will be, one way or another, unstable and the planets will precipitate in a downward spiral into the Sun. Even a slight deviation of 2 --2.0001, for instance--, could be enough to make life impossible today.
Let's consider the stability of the atoms. The proton mass is 1,800 times that of an electron, but the electric charge of both is the same. Exactly. If it were different the atoms will not be stable and life won't be possible.
Think of the constant of proportional gravity (big G). Its value is 6,67 x 10 -8. If it were ten times bigger (6,67 x 10 -7) the only type of stars available will be the blue giants which spend their nuclear fuel so fast, that they will not last enough for life to form in their planets.If it were ten times smaller (6, 67 x 10-9), the only stars available will be red dwarfs. They emit so weak a light that all the water in their planets will be frozen. Life will be also impossible.
Martin Rees has written a magnificent book about this: Just six numbers, the deep forces that shape the universe.
How is it that everything works so well for life to flourish? Some speak of the anthropic principle: the universe is designed with the objective of generating and maintaining "observers", that is to say, us. Others say it's God the one who fine-tuned the universe's laws for the man to appear.But what happens if men destroy themselves in a nuclear holocaust, then it was not an omnipotent God the one who designed the universe, but an inexpert engineer.
Well, before that happens, I’ll will write my blog and you, hopefully will read it, God willing.
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