Related papers: Why anthropic reasoning cannot predict Lambda
Selection effects in cosmology are often invoked to "explain" why some of the fundamental constant of Nature, and in particular the cosmological constant, take on the value they do in our Universe. We briefly review this probabilistic…
The anthropic principle is one of the possible explanations for the cosmological constant ($\Lambda$) problem. In previous studies, a dark halo mass threshold comparable with our Galaxy must be assumed in galaxy formation to get a…
The usage of the anthropic principle in modern cosmology is reviewed. It is argued that its recent use to explain the observedvalues of cosmological parameters as most probable values for an ensemble of universes, is not justified. However,…
Prediction in quantum cosmology requires a specification of the universe's quantum dynamics and its quantum state. We expect only a few general features of the universe to be predicted with probabilities near unity conditioned on the…
In the absence of a fundamental theory that precisely predicts values for observable parameters, anthropic reasoning attempts to constrain probability distributions over those parameters in order to facilitate the extraction of testable…
Anthropic models can give testable predictions, which can be confirmed or falsified at a specified confidence level. This is illustrated using the successful prediction of the cosmological constant as an example. The history and the nature…
Anthropic arguments in multiverse cosmology and string theory rely on the weak anthropic principle (WAP). We show that the principle, though ultimately a tautology, is nevertheless ambiguous. It can be reformulated in one of two unambiguous…
We show that anthropic selection emerges inevitably in the general framework for prediction in quantum cosmology. There the predictions of anthropic reasoning depend on the prior implied by the universe's quantum state. To illustrate this…
A brief explanation of the meaning of the anthropic principle - as a prescription for the attribution of a priori probability weighting - is illustrated by various cosmological and local applications, in which the relevant conclusions are…
The anthropic explanation for the peculiarly small observed value of the cosmological constant $\Lambda_{\rm obs}$ argues that this value promotes the formation of stars, planets, and ultimately of observers such as ourselves. I show that a…
The anthropic principle has been proposed as an explanation for the observed value of the cosmological constant. Here we revisit this proposal by allowing for variation between universes in the amplitude of the scale-invariant primordial…
The observed value $\Lambda_{\rm obs}$ of the cosmological constant $\Lambda$ is extremely smaller than theoretical expectations, and the anthropic argument has been proposed as a solution to this problem because galaxies do not form when…
Anthropic reasoning often begins with the premise that we should expect to find ourselves typical among all intelligent observers. However, in the infinite universe predicted by inflation, there are some civilizations which have spread…
It has been claimed that the observed magnitude of the vacuum energy density is consistent with the distribution predicted in anthropic models, in which an ensemble of universes is assumed. This calculation is revisited, without making the…
Anthropic principle can help us to understand many properties of our world. However, for a long time this principle seemed too metaphysical and many scientists were ashamed to use it in their research. I describe here a justification of the…
The causal entropic principle aims to predict the unexpectedly small value of the cosmological constant Lambda using a weighting by entropy increase on causal diamonds. The original work assumed a purely isotropic and homogeneous cosmology.…
We re-examine claims that anthropic arguments provide an explanation for the observed smallness of the cosmological constant, and argue that correlations between the cosmological constant value and the existence of life can be demonstrated…
One way that an anthropic selection mechanism may be manifest in a physical theory involves multiple domains in the universe with different values of the physical parameters. If this mechanism is to be relevant for understanding the small…
The (re)introduction of $\Lambda$ into cosmology has spurred debates that touch on central questions in philosophy of science, as well as the foundations of general relativity and particle physics. We provide a systematic assessment of the…
The Anthropic Principle has been with us since the 1970s. This Principle is advanced to account for the "fine tuning" of the 25 constants of the Standard Model of Particle Physics. Were these constants very different, life could not exist.…