Rebecca asked:

Can you explain to me what the anthropic principle is and what conclusions one might draw from it?

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Does the evolving universe have a meaning and if it does, what would this mean? Science answers
the first question by claiming that increasing complexity is explained by the random co-existence of a
number of physical processes. The question of significance is answered by some theologians in
terms of the anthropic principle. They assume a kind of teleology in the universe and deny that it is
the product of chance.

The anthropic principle is concerned with the ontological origin of the universe. Why is there
something rather than emptiness? Defenders of the anthropic principle think that the universe is as it
is in orderthat we can live in it. The universe is created and accessible to human understanding;
various contingent physical processes (e.g. the rate of acceleration of the universe and the way in
which it cooled) were as they were so that human life might evolve. If any of those processes had
been different, we would not have come to exist.

Adam Gatward