Hi Luis,

You can read more about the misconceptions of the anthropic principles (including the strong anthropic principle) by reading Nick Bostrom's excellent paper (dissertation) that discusses some of the misinterpretation (e.g., Gould 1985, Worrall 1996, Gale 1981). I have seen this misunderstanding myself through the years (with even confusion between the various principles throughout a discussion). It is my view that even Hawking at one time misunderstood the anthropic principle in his 'Brief History of Time' p.126. [However, it's been awhile since I've read that section so I should look at it again - I know the page number only because I have access to the reference but not exact content of the book].

In any case, read the paper. It is one of the best on the subject (from a philosophers point of view which is usually a superiort persective ;-)):

http://www.anthropic-principle.com/phd/phdhtml.html

Warm regards, Harv

• I like... - luis_hamburgh - November 9, 2001 - 01:47 UTC