Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-12T19:43:30.611Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Copernicanism and the typicality in time

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 August 2019

Milan M. Ćirković  and
Amedeo Balbi Open the ORCID record for Amedeo Balbi [Opens in a new window]
Milan M. Ćirković
Affiliation:
Astronomical Observatory of Belgrade, Volgina 7 11000 Belgrade, Serbia Faculty of Philosophy, Future of Humanity Institute, University of Oxford, Suite 8, Littlegate House, 16/17 St Ebbe's Street, Oxford, OX1 1PT, UK
Amedeo Balbi*
Affiliation:
Dipartimento di Fisica,Università di Roma ‘Tor Vergata’, Via della Ricerca Scientifica, 00133 Roma, Italy
*
Author for correspondence: Amedeo Balbi E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

How special (or not) is the epoch we are living in? What is the appropriate reference class for embedding the observations made at the present time? How probable – or else – is anything we observe in the fulness of time? Contemporary cosmology and astrobiology bring those seemingly old-fashioned philosophical issues back into focus. There are several examples of contemporary research which use the assumption of typicality in time (or temporal Copernicanism) explicitly or implicitly, while not truly elaborating upon the meaning of this assumption. The present paper brings attention to the underlying and often uncritically accepted assumptions in these cases. It also aims to defend a more radical position that typicality in time is not – and cannot ever be – well-defined, in contrast to the typicality in space, and the typicality in various specific parameter spaces. This, of course, does not mean that we are atypical in time; instead, the notion of typicality in time is necessarily somewhat vague and restricted. In principle, it could be strengthened by further defining the relevant context, e.g. by referring to typicality within the Solar lifetime, or some similar restricting clause.

Keywords

cosmology: theoryextragalactic astronomyastrobiologyfutures studieshistory and philosophy of astronomyCopernicanismanthropic principleextraterrestrial intelligence
Type
Research Article
Information
International Journal of Astrobiology , Volume 19 , Issue 2 , April 2020 , pp. 101 - 109
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Adams, FC and Laughlin, G (1997) A dying universe: the long-term fate and evolution of astrophysical objects. Reviews of Modern Physics 69, 337–372.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anglada-Escudé, G, Amado, PJ, Barnes, J, Berdinas, ZM, Butler, RP, Coleman, GA, de La Cueva, I, Dreizler, S, Endl, M, Giesers, B and Jeffers, SV (2016) A terrestrial planet candidate in a temperate orbit around Proxima Centauri. Nature 536, 437–440.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Astudillo-Defru, N, Forveille, T, Bonfils, X, Ségransan, D, Bouchy, F, Delfosse, X, Lovis, C, Mayor, M, Murgas, F, Pepe, F and Santos, NC (2017) The HARPS search for southern extra-solar planets-XLI. A dozen planets around the M dwarfs GJ 3138, GJ 3323, GJ 273, GJ 628, and GJ 3293. Astronomy and Astrophysics 602, A88 (21pp).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balashov, Yu (1994) Uniformitarianism in cosmology: background and philosophical implications of the steady-state theory. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 25B, 933–958.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balbi, A (2013) Cosmology and time. In EPJ Web of Conferences, vol. 58, EDP Sciences p. 02004 (8pp). https://www.epj-conferences.org/articles/epjconf/abs/2013/19/epjconf_tm2012_02004/epjconf_tm2012_02004.htmlCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Balbi, A (2018) The impact of the temporal distribution of communicating civilizations on their detectability. Astrobiology 18, 54–58.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Beer, ME, King, AR, Livio, M and Pringle, JE (2004) How special is the Solar system?. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 354, 763–768.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Behroozi, P and Peeples, MS (2015) On the history and future of cosmic planet formation. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 454, 1811–1817.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beisbart, C (2009) Can we justifiably assume the cosmological principle in order to break model underdetermination in Cosmology? Journal for General Philosophy of Science 40, 175–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benétreau-Dupin, Y (2015) Blurring out cosmic puzzles. Philosophy of Science 82, 879–891.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bondi, H (1961) Cosmology, 2nd Edn.. London: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Bondi, H and Gold, T (1948) The steady-state theory of the expanding universe. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 108, 252–270.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Buchert, T, Carfora, M, Ellis, GFR, Kolb, EW, MacCallum, MAH, Ostrowski, JJ, Räsänen, S, Roukema, BF, Andersson, L, Coley, AA and Wiltshire, DL (2015) Is there proof that backreaction of inhomogeneities is irrelevant in cosmology? Classical Quantum Gravity 32, 215021.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chyba, CF and Hand, K (2005) Astrobiology: the study of the living universe. Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics 43, 31–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ćirković, MM (2004) The temporal aspect of the Drake equation and SETI. Astrobiology 4, 225.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ćirković, MM (2005) Brown Dwarf accretion: nonconventional star formation over very long timescales. Serbian Astronomical Journal 171, 11–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ćirković, MM (2015) Kardashev's classification at $50+$: a fine vehicle with room for improvement. Serbian Astronomical Journal 191, 1–15.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ćirković, MM, Sandberg, A and Bostrom, N (2010) Anthropic shadow: observation selection effects and human extinction risks. Risk Analysis 30, 1495–1506.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Clarkson, C, Ellis, G, Larena, J and Umeh, O (2011) Does the growth of structure affect our dynamical models of the Universe? The averaging, backreaction, and fitting problems in cosmology. Reports on Progress in Physics 74, 112901 (17pp).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Coley, AA (2010) Averaging in cosmological models using scalars. Classical and Quantum Gravity 27, 245017 (21pp).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dayal, P, Cockell, C, Rice, K and Mazumdar, A (2015) The quest for cradles of life: using the fundamental metallicity relation to hunt for the most habitable type of galaxy. The Astrophysical Journal Letters 810, L2 (5pp).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dayal, P, Ward, M and Cockell, C (2016) The habitability of the Universe through 13 billion years of cosmic time, arXiv:1606.09224.Google Scholar
Drake, F (1965) The radio search for intelligent extraterrestrial life”, in Current Aspects of Exobiology, ed. Mamikunian, G and Briggs, M. H., 323–45. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dryden, DTF, Thomson, AR and White, JH (2008) How much of protein sequence space has been explored by life on Earth? Journal of the Royal Society, Interface 5, 953–956.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dyson, L, Kleban, M and Susskind, L (2002) Disturbing implications of a cosmological constant. JHEP 0210, 011.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ellis, GF (2011) Inhomogeneity effects in cosmology. Classical and Quantum Gravity 28, 164001 (21pp).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fowles, J (1974) On chronocentrism. Futures 6, 65–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gonzalez, G (2005) Habitable zones in the universe. Origin of Life and Evolution of the Biosphere 35, 555–606.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gorenstein, MV and Smoot, GF (1981) Large-angular-scale anisotropy in the cosmic background radiation. Astrophysical Journal 244, 361–381.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gott, JR (1993) Implications of the Copernican principle for our future prospects. Nature 363, 315–319.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Green, SR and Wald, RM (2014) How well is our universe described by an FLRW model? Classical Quantum Gravity 31, 234003.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gustafsson, B (1998) Is the sun a sun-like star? Space Science Reviews 85, 419–428.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hammer, F, Puech, M, Chemin, L, Flores, H and Lehnert, MD (2007) The Milky Way, an exceptionally quiet galaxy: implications for the formation of spiral galaxies. The Astrophysical Journal 662, 322–334.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hartle, JB and Srednicki, M (2007) Are we typical? Physical Review D 75, 123523(6).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Holland, HD (2006) The oxygenation of the atmosphere and oceans. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society 361, 903–915.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Kardashev, NS (1964) Transmission of information by extraterrestrial civilizations. Soviet Astronomy 8, 217–220.Google Scholar
Kardashev, NS (1985) On the inevitability and possible forms of supercivilizations, In Papagiannis, MD (ed.), The Search for Extraterrestrial Life: Recent Developments. Dordrecht: IAU,pp. 497–504.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kašpar, P and Svítek, O (2014) Averaging in cosmology based on Cartan scalars. Classical and Quantum Gravity 31, 095012 (11pp).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kennicutt, R (1998) The global Schmidt law in star-forming galaxies. The Astrophysical Journal 498, 541–552.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Krauss, LM and Turner, MS (1999) Geometry and destiny. General Relativity and Gravitation 31, 1453–1459.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Larson, RB, Tinsley, BM and Caldwell, CN (1980) The evolution of disk galaxies and the origin of S0 galaxies. The Astrophysical Journal 237, 692–707.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Laughlin, G, Bodenheimer, P and Adams, FC (1997) The end of the main sequence. The Astrophysical Journal 482, 420–432.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Linde, AD, Linde, D and Mezhlumian, A (1994) From the big bang theory to the theory of a stationary universe. Physical Review D 49, 1783–1826.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lineweaver, CH (2001) An estimate of the age distribution of Terrestrial planets in the universe: quantifying metallicity as a selection effect. Icarus 151, 307–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lineweaver, CH, Fenner, Y and Gibson, BK (2004) The Galactic Habitable zone and the age distribution of complex life in the Milky Way. Science 303, 59–62.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Loeb, A, Batista, R and Sloan, D (2016) Relative likelihood for life as a function of cosmic time. Journal of Cosmology and Astroparticle Physics 8, 10.Google Scholar
Martin, CL and Kennicutt, RC Jr (2001) Star formation thresholds in galactic disks. The Astrophysical Journal 555, 301–321.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McLeish, TCB (2015) Are there ergodic limits to evolution? Ergodic exploration of genome space and convergence. Interface Focus 5, 20150041 (12pp).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Olson, SJ (2017) Life-hostile conditions in the early universe can increase the present-day odds of observing extragalactic life, preprint https://arxiv.org/abs/1704.04125.Google Scholar
Page, DN (2008) Is our universe likely to decay within 20 billion years? Physical Review D 78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Powell, R and Mariscal, C (2015) Convergent evolution as natural experiment: the tape of life reconsidered. Interface Focus 5, 20150040 (13pp).CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Prantzos, N and Silk, J (1998) Star formation and chemical evolution in the Milky Way: cosmological implications. The Astrophysical Journal 507, 229–240.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Price, H (1996) Time's Arrow and Archimedes' Point. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Roberts, MS (1963) The content of galaxies: stars and gas. Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics 1, 149–178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Robles, JA, Lineweaver, CH, Grether, D, Flynn, C, Egan, CA, Pracy, MB, Holmberg, J and Gardner, E (2008) A comprehensive comparison of the sun to other stars: searching for self-selection effects. The Astrophysical Journal 684, 691–706.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruddiman, WF (2013) The Anthropocene. Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences 41, 45–68.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shilov, GE and Gurevich, BL (1978) Integral, Measure, and Derivative: A Unified Approach, Silverman, Richard A., trans. Dover Publications.Google Scholar
Smoot, GF, Gorenstein, MV and Muller, RA (1977) Detection of anisotropy in the cosmic blackbody radiation. Physical Review Letters 39, 898–901.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinberg, S (2008) Cosmology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Ward, P and Brownlee, D (2000) Rare Earth. Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe. New York: Copernicus.Google Scholar
Wiltshire, DL (2009) From time to timescape – Einstein's unfinished revolution. International Journal of Modern Physics D18, 2121–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zackrisson, E, Calissendorff, P, González, J, Benson, A, Johansen, A and Janson, M (2016) Terrestrial planets across space and time. The Astrophysical Journal 833, 12, article id. 214.CrossRefGoogle Scholar