The Psilocybin Solution

they need to be to allow us to be here now to reflect upon them? This is somewhat hard to ascertain since we know of only this Universe. We can’t examine other Universes with slightly different laws and initial states to see if they also bring forth life and consciousness. However, many scientists have concluded that for conscious life as we know it to have evolved, the laws of physics and the initial conditions had to have been exactly the way they are. Indeed, it seems that there are many “cosmic coincidences” that have “conspired” to elicit life. In The Mind of God, for instance, Paul Davies has commented upon the combined effects of hydrogen, subatomic neutrinos, and physical law in their impact upon the emergence of organic life.

It is particularly striking how processes that occur on a microscopic scale—say, in nuclear physics—seem to be fine-tuned to produce interesting and varied effects on a much larger scale—for example, in astrophysics. Thus we find that the force of gravity combined with the thermodynamical and mechanical properties of hydrogen gas are such as to create large numbers of balls of gas. These balls are large enough to trigger nuclear reactions, but not so large as to collapse rapidly into black holes. In this way, stable stars are born.^{40}

Davies goes on to describe how some stars eventually explode and how the remains of supernovas (exploding stars) form the basis of planets like the Earth. Apparently, every heavy atom in our bodies had to go through many supernova cycles before ending up as an integral part of terrestrial life. The force of an exploding star derives, in part, from the presence of neutrinos, which Davies refers to as “ghostly entities.”

In other words, the long and complex chain of state transitions of the Universe that eventually yielded life and consciousness was determined by the precise manner (both microscopic and macroscopic) in which the universal dialogue unfolded. An appropriate set of grammatical rules/ physical laws that would eventually generate life and consciousness was seemingly “set up” at the very beginning of time. Once the laws of physics and an initial input state had been specified, they eventually went on to facilitate the evolution of planets and people made of stardust. Even dour Mr. Skeptic must concur that this has been a somewhat fortuitous turn of events. One has to be near dead not to marvel at least a little at our conscious existence at this stage of the Universe’s evolution.

Consider also the so-called constants of Nature, like the mass of the electron and Newton’s gravitational constant. Their value is considered absolutely precise, and they determine how the language of physics is conducted. These constants also seem to be fine-tuned to allow organic life to emerge. If their value was but a fraction different, then life as we know it could not exist. Some scientists have introduced the strong anthropic principle to account for this phenomenon. This principle holds that the fundamental constants of Nature have the value they do precisely to allow life and consciousness to develop somewhere and somewhen in the Universe. It sounds like design. Needless to say, other scientists balk at such talk, preferring to seek a less astounding explanation.

The “life-friendly” nature of Nature is seen elsewhere. The element carbon, which is so crucial for life on Earth, is generated inside stars by an extraordinary series of “lucky flukes.” It just so happens that normally rare high-speed collisions of three helium nuclei are favored to occur within stars due to fortuitous quantum effects. The resulting carbon that is formed eventually gets blasted out into space when stars go supernova. Because carbon is the basis of all organic chemistry, we really can thank our “lucky stars” for its biologically constructive presence here on Earth.

Even the expansion of the Universe is precision-based so as to allow time enough for galaxies, planets, and life to form. If the expansion of the Universe were too fast, then galaxies could not form, and if the expansion were too slow, it would recollapse before anything interesting happened. According to some estimates, if the velocity of expansion in the first second of the big bang was a mere trillionth slower, the Universe would have collapsed within fifty million years, during which time the temperature would have remained above ten thousand degrees, clearly a state unfit to yield life as we know it.

And let us not forget good old water. Water is indispensable for life. The various unique physical and chemical properties of water—as utilized by life in such processes as photosynthesis, nutrient transport, osmosis, heat reduction through sweat evaporation, and so on—make water a form of fluidic information fundamental to the art of living.

Then there is DNA. Not only is it remarkable that something like the genetic code was always waiting to fall into place once certain precursor events had unfolded here on Earth, but it is equally remarkable that DNA has the specific kind of variability and mutability that it does. If it were much more subject to mutability and change, then it would not be robust enough for life to take hold; and if it were too accurate in terms of replicational fidelity, then it could not become subject to natural selection. As with many other creative properties of Nature, it seems there are specific windows of opportunity present, and it “just so happens” that DNA has all the qualities necessary for it to work.

These are but a handful of the countless examples that show how finely tuned the Universe must be to bring forth organic life. This situation echoes the precise conditions needed in the Game of Life for cellular automata to bring forth elaborately organized forms. In both cases, the real world and the model world, it is clear that specific fundamental laws in association with specific fundamental constants and precise initial conditions are needed to ensure that interesting organized patterns evolve.

Now, Wait Just a Goddamn Chronon!

We might protest here and argue that life has merely exploited the conditions that happen to prevail. In that case, life has just seized on whatever “chances” are on offer, where chances is the appropriate word. Life might therefore reflect what can be achieved in an essentially uncontrived Universe. But how can we be positive that life and consciousness could have evolved in “any old kind” of Universe? Could one just throw some dice to determine, say, the mathematical nature of the laws of physics, and then still expect to get life and consciousness at some stage in the resulting reality? Could one think of any number between 1 and 1 million, add 5, randomly shuffle the decimal point, designate this number as the value of a constant, and then still expect to come up trumps with the subsequent Universe? Come to think of it, why should there be any laws, energy, and dimensions at all?

It appears impossible to conclusively prove that an evolutionary process in which consciousness is eventually formed depends on our particular type of Universe with its particular initial conditions, physical laws, constants, and so on. And yet it is easy to imagine stupid and very silly Universes in which nothing of interest happens. Letting our imagination go, we can picture Universes in which the laws of physics stop complex structures from forming or in which the constants of Nature force the Universe to form into a bland and stagnant conglomeration in which nothing creative happens. More chaotically, we can imagine Universes with little or no law and order at all, or with just a couple of unstable dimensions. Or, even more absurdly, we can imagine a Universe in which life starts, only to be inevitably destroyed soon after by some immutable principle of physical law. There are trillions and untold zillions of possible boring lifeless Universes, just as there are billions and untold zillions of possible uncreative cellular automata. So, why is our Universe so very, very interesting? And why us?

One “fast-food” solution is to suppose that the Universe expands from a big bang only to eventually contract into a “big crunch” at some later stage. Out of a big crunch a new Universe evolves and the cycle continues, only this time the successive Universe has slightly different laws and initial conditions. This “pulsation of Universes” is presumed to have been going on forever without any reason whatsoever—an infinite chain of Universes with no end and no beginning. One of these, ours, just happens to be one of the significant ones among a literal infinity of boring ones.

A similar scenario to this is the arch-cunning multiple-Universe theory touted by a disturbing number of quantum physicists. They view the Universe dividing whenever a quantum event takes place in which more than one outcome is possible. This happens more than a lot. Thus, the Universe is forever branching into an endless amount of Universes. Again, we merely happen to be in one of the more interesting ones.

Finally, there is the “birthing Universe” theory, also of appeal to some cosmologists. This imaginatively fertile scenario views black holes giving birth to new Universes with slightly different laws and constants, one of