Is the Universe Fine-Tuned for Life—or Is It Just an Illusion?

 Daniele Sorini: Physicists have long grappled with the question of why the universe was able to support the evolution of intelligent life. The values of the many forces and particles, represented by some 30 so-called fundamental constants, all seem to line up perfectly to enable it.

Take gravity. If it were much weaker, matter would struggle to clump together to form stars, planets and living beings. And if it were stronger, that would also create problems. Why are we so lucky?

Research that I recently published with my colleagues John Peacock and Lucas Lombriser now suggests that our universe may not be optimally tailored for life. In fact, we may not be inhabiting the most likely of possible universes.

We particularly studied how the emergence of intelligent life is affected by the density of “dark energy” in the universe. This manifests as a mysterious force that speeds up the expansion of the universe, but we do not know what it is....<<<Read More>>>...