"A superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with...

"A superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology" was his famous assertion that the universe's fundamental constants are so precisely tuned for life that its origin couldn't be accidental but rather the product of intelligent design,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Hoyle
https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Hoyle%27s_fallacy
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Sir Fred Hoyle's statement that "A superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology" was his famous assertion that the universe's fundamental constants are so precisely tuned for life that its origin couldn't be accidental but rather the product of intelligent design, a concept sometimes called the fine-tuning argument or Hoyle's Fallacy. While an atheist, Hoyle found the probabilities for life arising randomly to be so overwhelmingly small that he concluded a guiding hand must be responsible.

Context of the Statement

• Cosmologist and Astronomer:

  Fred Hoyle was a prominent 20th-century English astronomer and cosmologist known for his work on stellar nucleosynthesis and his (though ultimately rejected) steady-state model of the universe.
• Fine-Tuning Argument:

  The "monkeyed with physics" phrase is central to the fine-tuning argument, which highlights that many physical constants, if even slightly different, would render the universe inhospitable to life.
• The "Junkyard Tornado":

  Hoyle used the metaphor of a tornado creating a Boeing 747 from a junkyard to illustrate the improbability of life arising by random chance, a concept sometimes called "Hoyle's Fallacy".
• Intelligent Design:

  Despite his atheism, the conclusion Hoyle reached — that the universe shows signs of intelligent design — is often cited by proponents of Intelligent Design.

Hoyle's Argument in Practice

• Element Formation:

  Hoyle and his colleagues studied how elements form in stars. They noted that the conditions required to form carbon, essential for life, from hydrogen and helium were incredibly unlikely, pointing to the existence of a specific resonance in carbon-12 that Hoyle correctly predicted.
• Cellular Biology:

  Hoyle also extended this argument to biology, stating that the complex order of a living cell couldn't arise by chance.
• Cosmic Intelligence:

  The idea that life and intelligence are "cosmic" and not unique to Earth was part of his larger argument for the directed, intelligent origin of the universe.