Alex Shrugged’s Reviews > The Anthropic Cosmological Principle > Status Update

They make a very good case for calculating how many intelligent civilizations would likely exist in the Milky Way Galaxy... 1.

The biology argument seemed repetitive, but I understand they were trying to be thorough and it was not their field. I liked the quote they used to introduce the chapter though: "Of my discipline Oswald Spencer understands, of course, not the first thing, but aside from that the book is brilliant." --typical German professor's reaction to Decline of the West.

This Many Worlds Interpretation of quantum mechanics makes more sense than the Copenhagen Interpretation, but I find it hard to visualize.

Finished chapter 5. Lots of math which I could follow, but it was tedious. About half way through I skipped trying to work out the math, took his word for it and my comprehension did not suffer. On to chapter 6 The Anthropic Principles in Classic Cosmology. Ugg! More math. Looks like calculus for sure. I'll see if I can follow along. (Unlikely.)

Reading a couple other books from Barrow made reading Chapters 3 & 4 here a lot easier to absorb.

I've completed the first two chapters. It is an excellent source on science history concerning design arguments and the anthropic cosmological principle. It is going to be slow-going though. This is really dense material.

I learned about the likelihood that intelligent life could develop on Earth (unlikely) or anywhere in the galaxy (maybe 1 time, meaning us). Good arguments for why we are alone, at least in this galaxy. (The page number is approximate. I left off at the beginning of the last chapter.)

I made a mistake. I'm only on page 512, not 520.

Quantum cosmology!
I'm only getting about half of this stuff. It's over my head, but the stuff I do understand is helpful.

Lots of equations. I skip them and keep on going.