I feel that our universe does exist because of the habitation of intelligent life forms, however my first reaction to this question was that it didn't matter, the universe would be the same with or without intelligent life. But then I started to hink about it more and realized if the universe was created for some certain reason, it must have been created with the intent to support intelligent life. I don't think there is a wrong or right way to answer this question. A lot of someone's opionion could be due to religion. I think a religious person would be more prone to answer that the universe does exist because of intelligent life, because God made the universe (and earth) to support life. From a non-religious point of view one might argue that life just happened to "sprout" from our universe and there is no reason telling why. I personally think there is a reason for everything, and therefore believe the universe was created in order to, someday (evolution), maintain an environment to support life.

Anthropic Principle

I think that not only is the Anthropic principle necessary, but it's a pretty intelligent philosophical concept. It's kind of hard for me to understand but the way I'm thinking of it, I think it makes perfect sense. If the universe were any different, we wouldn't even be here. It's been created the follow certain laws of physics and adjusted to the tee so it is completely and utterly perfect for human life to thrive just the way it is in this specific moment of history. If these laws were to change, we wouldn't be here to discover or argue about them. This "anthropic principle" probably doesn't have much of a place in most physics discussions, because the fact is, we are here and we are asking these questions. So most people get over this principle and get on with their discussions. But the thought should still hang there in the back of our minds...

Anthropic Principle

1. Are there important aspects of the Universe that can only be understood using the Anthropic Principle? Or is this principle unnecessary, or perhaps inherently unscientific?
Very roughly speaking, the Anthropic Principle says that our universe must be approximately the way it is for intelligent life to exist, so that the mere fact we are asking certain questions constrains their answers. This might "explain" the values of fundamental constants of nature, and perhaps other aspects of the laws of physics as well. Or, it might not.