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This is a continuation of this thread, which included this curious passage...
Walter Bradley, 56, professor emeritus of mechanical engineering at Texas A&M University, ... argued it's simply not rational to conclude that such a complex system as life was created by random chance. Scientists have been trying to prove that for decades, some working in labs and some using computer simulations, without convincing success.
It's true that molecules can spontaneously organize themselves as, for example, when water forms snowflakes or minerals form crystals. But those are simple molecules -- far simpler than complex sequences of amino acids, which when put together just right form proteins, the building blocks of life.
Bradley quoted one like-minded scientist, Fred Hoyle, who said the idea that molecules could spontaneously organize themselves into living proteins is as likely as a tornado passing through a junk yard beside a Boeing aircraft plant accidentally creating a working 747 airplane. If you brought together all the carbon molecules in the universe, the chances of them spontaneously reacting to form a single perfectly sequenced protein are about 1 in 10 to the 60th power, Bradley said.
A common creationist strawman tactic involves calculating the statistics for a complex modern entity (organism or protein or set of proteins) coming together by chance in order to buttress a claim that NO replicating entity could possibly ever have come together by natural means, while ignoring the fact that the first replicating entity was vastly simpler than anything seen in today's modern highly evolved organisms.
To illustrate, consider this calculation, from Creation Essay #44, Probability and the Origin of Life by Robert E. Kofahl:
Next we will calculate a probability for the chance production of a single small protein molecule. A protein molecule consists of one or more chains made up of amino acid molecules linked together. There are 20 different amino acids molecules which the cells use to construct the protein molecules needed for the life of cells. We will think about a small protein molecule with only 100 amino acid molecules in its chain. Assume we have a reaction pot containing a mixture of the 20 different amino acid molecules, and they are reacting at random to form chains. What is the probability, when a chain with 100 amino acids is formed, that it will by chance have the sequence of amino acids needed to form a particular working protein molecule?There are 100 positions along the chain. What is the probability that a particular one of the 20 different natural amino acid molecules will by chance be placed at position number 1 in the chain? It will be P1 = 1/20. When the complete chain has formed, what is the probability that the necessary particular amino acids will be placed at each of the 100 positions in the chain? It will be the product of the probabilities at the 100 positions. Thus the probability will be the fraction 1/20 multiplied by itself 100 times. So P100 = (1/20)x(1/20)x(1/20)x...x(1/20) = (1/20)100 = (1/10)130 = 1/10130. This is an extremely small fraction. It is the fraction formed by the number 1 divided by the number formed by 1 followed by 130 zeros!
But we have oversimplified a little bit. In actual fact a protein molecule can have a substantial variability at many of the positions on its amino acid chain. In 1975 I examined the data for a particular protein molecule called cytochrome a which has about 100 amino acids in its chain. This is an important enzyme molecule in all living cells, and the sequence of amino acids has been determined for cytochrome a molecules in about a hundred different species. From the quantitative data I made a rough estimate that on the average up to five different amino acids could fill a particular position on the chain of the enzyme molecule. Thus the probability that an acceptable amino acid would be found by chance at a particular position would be 5/20 = ¼. So the probability for a working enzyme molecule to be formed by chance would be (¼)100 = 1/1060. This is still a very, very small probability. It is the fraction formed by 1 divided by the number 1 followed by 60 zeros.
OK. I'm no professional mathematician, but I did get good grades in High School. (In college, integration & differentials were my downfall. I don't wanna talk about it...)
I think Kofahl's calculations seem reasonable, as far as they go. But to get a more honest probability of life forming by chance, we must apply his reasoning to a real-life replicator, a 32-mer peptide:
First, the pessimistic calculation, assuming no substitutions allowed at any point in the peptide:
P32p = (1/20)x(1/20)x(1/20)x...x(1/20) = (1/20)32 = 1/(2x1042)
If we use Kofahl's optimistic figure of five different amino acids being able to be substituted at each position:
P32o = (1/4)x(1/4)x(1/4)x...x(1/4) = (1/4)32 = 1/(5x1020)
But I think five different amino acids is too optimistic, because in a 32-mer chain, each amino acid is more significant to the overall shape of the molecule than in a 100-mer, so there's less room for error. So let's be realistic & say there are only 2 different amino acids that can be substituted, on average, at each point on the peptide:
P32r = (1/10)x(1/10)x(1/10)x...x(1/10) = (1/10)32 = 1/(1x1032)
Now remember, this is the probability for a SINGLE set of amino acids combining in a functional sequence. But each time the amino acids slip around into a new configuration, there's a new "attempt", with the same probability as the first. Now chemicals in solution rearrange themselves many times per second. Let's say 1,000/sec. That's 86,400,000 attempts/day, or 3x1010 attempts/year, or 3x1018 attempts/100 million years. (I've seen conservative claims that there must be only a couple hundred million years from the Earth cooling to first life.)
But that's not all: That's the number of attempts occurring in that one microscopic point in the prebiotic soup. Now, let's assume conservatively that life couldn't have formed just anywhere, like in the open sea or anywhere exposed to the Sun (UV rays w/no ozone layer, you know). In fact, let's assume there were only 1,000 sq. miles over the whole Earth that had the right combination of energy input, clay surfaces to catalyze the reactions, a little water (but not too much) so the bonds don't keep getting broken too early, etc. Well, chemicals are very tiny things, and so we'll assume 100 attempts per linear inch of clay catalyst surface, or 100x100 = 10,000 = 104 attempts per sq. inch:
63,360 inches/mi, so 63,3602 = 4014489600 = 4x109 sq inches available for the attempts
1x104 attempts/sq inch x 4x109 sq inches x 3x1020 attempts/100my/location = 1.2x1035 attempts/100my
So if a 32-mer peptide was the first replicator, then realistically the probability is (1.2x1035)/(1x1032), or 1.2x103, or a one-in-twelve-hundred chance that life did NOT form by chance.
But anyway, all this is still too pessimistic, since RNA strands of as little as six units is enough to provide a template for the creation of new copies of itself. Six units! And in 1996, Ferris et.al. created both proteins and RNA strands of up to 55 units in about two weeks, using certain types of clay as catalysts. Clearly, given the creationists' own framework for deriving probabilities of abiogenesis, the probability that life did not arise by chance is what's truly astronomical.
Beating-a-dead-horse-bump.
The more you run over a dead cat, the flatter it gets.
Well, I could care less about your calculations in this matter. Whatever the mechanism, it was put in place by God.
End of pointless discussion. The zealotry of atheists to disprove the existence of God is truly amusing. Why fight so hard to disprove something that doesn't exist?
A: Because you are trying to advance your own false RELIGION, that may be summarized as "secular humanism". Of the kind that brought us Auschwitz. And Dachau. And Stalin's purges. And Cambodia's killing fields.
Without God, every man seeks to become a god and impose his will on others. In that sense, the only ultimate alternative to faith in God is faith in totalitarianism. Oh, yes, I know that not every atheist can ever hope of becoming Hitler and Stalin; but every one of them tries, on some level, to establish his own power and dominance. (Though only the ones with a true ruthless genius can achieve such depths).
So that is what all of you atheists are: would-be Hitlers and Stalins. Without God, the only thing left is Will-to-Power.......and then the fires of eternal hell, that shortly follow the hell on earth that you create with your man-worshipping ideology.
Not only were you bad in math, Jenny, you evidently did not take any history or philosophy courses either. Now what I want to know is....can you duplicate your post above WITHOUT resorting to your calculator?
Cordially, your pal,
Al, an equal-opportunity fraud debunker
While I firmly believe that GOD set the wheels in motion, I do believe that evolutionary theory is valid...
...What I fail to see is how environmental whackos, who generally extol Darwinism and oppose Creationist Theory, cannot accept the concept of, "survival of the fittest."
If, as Darwin posits, some species which fail to adapt, are doomed to extinction, why do we go out of our way to preserve their existence? Perhaps, by their logic, it is the Endangered Species Act, and such other like-minded legislation that is putting our environment akilter. Such efforts would seem to me, illogical, unnatural, and ultimately, destructive.
Where are all the conservationists calling for Creationism to be taught? Just another highlight of liberal intellectual inconsistency.
Clearly an area where you lead and I follow. Your math history sounds like a triumphal parade compared to mine. Your argument makes more sense to me, though, than the various Hoyle-ian strawmen posted on this forum all the time.
Here's a little article about How DNA repairs itself. Deep-sea Bugs Shine From Radiation Repair . Fascinating conjecture.
This really is flogging a dead horse, but here are a couple of points anyway.
Point #1: There remains considerable debate today about whether RNA was the original source of life. I don't pretend to know the particulars of that debate, I just happen to know that it continues. Therefore, your crowing is a bit premature.
Point #2: In case you hadn't noticed, there is a considerable difference of degree between six random characters and an encyclopedia. The simplest life-forms require an encyclopedia's worth of DNA/RNA, not six characters.
Your "proof" is therefore lacking. That's like getting a monkey to press six random keys on a typewriter and then claiming that it is therefore proven that that monkey could write out The Lord of the Rings. For some reason, that fact blows right over your head every time you whip out your supposed "proof."
Get real, jennyp. If abiogenesis were all that simple, you wouldn't find so many evolutionary scientists either saying flatly that evolution makes very limited (or no) claims in the actual origins of life or suggesting panspermia of the ET variety.
I'll tell you what, let's get together. You bring the typewriter and I'll acquire a monkey. We'll sit it down in front of your typewriter and offer it bannanas to peck away on it. If and when that monkey manages to write a comprehensive book--any book, even an original work, as long as it uses proper grammar and spelling and manages to be coherant the whole way through--I'll become a confirmed evolutionist. You can decide when to give up and become a believer in God.
Yours in Truth,
To: jennyp
Well, I could care less about your calculations in this matter. Whatever the mechanism, it was put in place by God. End of pointless discussion. The zealotry of atheists to disprove the existence of God is truly amusing. Why fight so hard to disprove something that doesn't exist? A: Because you are trying to advance your own false RELIGION, that may be summarized as "secular humanism". Of the kind that brought us Auschwitz. And Dachau. And Stalin's purges. And Cambodia's killing fields. Without God, every man seeks to become a god and impose his will on others. In that sense, the only ultimate alternative to faith in God is faith in totalitarianism. Oh, yes, I know that not every atheist can ever hope of becoming Hitler and Stalin; but every one of them tries, on some level, to establish his own power and dominance. (Though only the ones with a true ruthless genius can achieve such depths). So that is what all of you atheists are: would-be Hitlers and Stalins. Without God, the only thing left is Will-to-Power.......and then the fires of eternal hell, that shortly follow the hell on earth that you create with your man-worshipping ideology. Not only were you bad in math, Jenny, you evidently did not take any history or philosophy courses either. Now what I want to know is....can you duplicate your post above WITHOUT resorting to your calculator?
Cordially, your pal,
Al, an equal-opportunity fraud debunker
4 Posted on 03/08/2000 15:10:53 PST by Al Simmons
==================================
Goodness Al, I'd hate to see your un'cordial' side. - Pal -.
Your own unchristan zealotry evidenced here is beyond the pale. Very offensive.
And as a serbian patriot [is it 'Arkan' you admire so much?] you should know where the Pale was/is, don't you?
IMHO it is religious bigotry such as you evidence above that is at the core of most of the political problems in this world. I would suggest you look deep into your pitiful soul.
Hi Jenny, I thought it was you who had the long form debunk of this strawman. Of course, that exposes the whole chain of fallacies in the original post. First you get authorities to propose the strawman, the strawman produces an astonishing number, the astonishment is accepted as proof by creationists that a magic pixie named Yahweh created it all.
Of course, a similar strawman can be used to "prove" the earth had to be created. Gather all the molecules necessary to constitute a planet like the earth. Given the almost infinite variety of shapes the molecules could form, what's the probability that they would form an almost perfect sphere? Nearly zero! It's a miracle I tell ya!!!!!
Now, your post corrects the obvious and fatal flaw of ignoring the concurrecy of protein formation, but it doesn't even go into the restrictions that replication places on the types of protein. It's just like ignoring the restriction gravity places on the shapes of planets in my example above.
The zealotry of atheists to disprove the existence of God is truly amusing. Why fight so hard to disprove something that doesn't exist?
The hard fight is to expose the lies, distortions, and fallacies propagated by creationists, such as your original post.
And when it comes to existence, the burden of proof is on the positive claimant.
I'm with you; evolution is a part of creation.
Your "proof" is therefore lacking.
Jenny wasn't attempting a proof. She successfully debunked the astonishing numbers used by Hoyle and the Nasa guy by pointing out that they ignore the concurrency of protein formation in many different places.
Further, I point out in post #10 that they ignore the restrictions placed on the types of proteins by successful replicators.
The use of a simple combinatorial model to determine the probablity of protein formation is invalid.
Point #2: In case you hadn't noticed, there is a considerable difference of degree between six random characters and an encyclopedia. The simplest life-forms require an encyclopedia's worth of DNA/RNA, not six characters.
Buggman, you hit the nail on the head. A simple question for JennyP. If the odds are in your favor, for the random creation of a simple cell from inanimate matter, then with the available science, why not just create one??
W.K.
Not only were you bad in math, Jenny, you evidently did not take any history or philosophy courses either. Now what I want to know is....can you duplicate your post above WITHOUT resorting to your calculator?
<ahem> This thread was a continuation of one that was started by YOU, Al, posting the article about how a NASA scientist confirms for us laypeople that it is indeed logical to believe in creationism. This former NASA scientist threw out several arguments from incredulity, one of which is the fantastical 1060 odds against even one functional protein (!) ever being formed on its own. This former NASA scientist was misquoting a popular creationist canard, and I was simply showing why this former NASA scientist was mistaken on several of his points.
How could I not use a calculator to debunk a mathematical "proof" like that???
This response was so fun to read I'll quote it at length...
A: Because you are trying to advance your own false RELIGION, that may be summarized as "secular humanism". Of the kind that brought us
Auschwitz. And Dachau. And Stalin's purges. And Cambodia's killing fields.
Without God, every man seeks to become a god and impose his will on others. In that sense, the only ultimate alternative to faith in God is
faith in totalitarianism. Oh, yes, I know that not every atheist can ever hope of becoming Hitler and Stalin; but every one of them tries, on
some level, to establish his own power and dominance. (Though only the ones with a true ruthless genius can achieve such depths).
So that is what all of you atheists are: would-be Hitlers and Stalins. Without God, the only thing left is Will-to-Power.......and then the fires
of eternal hell, that shortly follow the hell on earth that you create with your man-worshipping ideology.
Not only were you bad in math, Jenny, you evidently did not take any history or philosophy courses either.
The zealotry of atheists to disprove the existence of God is truly amusing. Why fight so hard to disprove
something that doesn't exist?
Al, the horrors of the 20th century have little to do with atheism and everything to do with moral collectivism.
Remember: Evolution and mainstream science are innocent bystanders to the real war between moral individualism and moral collectivism. In an age when economic collectivism has been roundly falsified in practice, and leftists are licking their wounds in the safe harbors of environmentalism, feminism, and postmodernism, we can't afford to waste our time by beating up on innocent third parties. We need to focus on the real enemy!
Al, the horrors of the 20th century have little to do with atheism and everything to do with moral collectivism.
We need moral absolutes instead of relative moral collectivism (where, as you said, the group, or majority, controls morals).
As for your mathematical proof above, I'd like to inquire something of you. In your proof, you assume that there was an environment capable of creating the experiments in order to make the self-replicating strands of RNA. Why is this?
1) You can assume the primoridal soup was there. In this case, you base your calculations on an assumption. The conclusion is therefore based on the assumption, making them invalid for a proof (but keeping them valid as a theoretical possibility if the environment existed to allow this).
2) You can assume that evolution happend to come up with the conclusion that the conditions existed. But then, your conclusion would be attempting to validate the probability of evolution happening. This would turn it into circluar reasoning (evolution happend, therefore the conditions existed, therefore life could evolve, therefore evolution happend). If you assume evolution happend, you couldn't use your conclusion to try to validate evolution (though you could use it to try to show the probability of abiogenesis happening if evolution and the conditions existed).
3) You could use the argument that since life is here, the conditions must have existed. But then again, you would be assuming, indirectly, that evolution happend, so couldn't use the conclusions to validate evolution.
Which one will you pick? Or would you like to add another?
-The Hajman-
I'd like to add one more to my list in #16.
4) You could argue that it shows that life had a high probability of evolving. But then again, you'd be assuming the conditions existed to let it evolve, which would assume evolution. Your conclusion, once again, would not be usable to help validate evolution.
-The Hajman-
Point #1: There remains considerable debate today about whether RNA was the original source of life. I don't pretend to know the particulars of that debate, I just happen to know that it continues. Therefore, your crowing is a bit premature.
True, but both peptides and RNA will both grow to dozens of units long on the clay substrates, and at those lengths you start getting into the length required for both peptides and RNA that have cross-catalytic & auto-catalytic capabilities. (That's what pretty much defines the start of metabolism - self catalyzing reactions can keep themselves going & muscling out all the competing junk reactions which heretofore kept gumming up the works.)
Point #2: In case you hadn't noticed, there is a considerable difference of degree between six random characters and an encyclopedia. The simplest life-forms require an encyclopedia's worth of DNA/RNA, not six characters.
Yes, but replication of existing strands is required for any kind of evolution to get going in the first place. The point is that replication happens very soon in the scheme of things.
Your "proof" is therefore lacking. That's like getting a monkey to press six random keys on a typewriter and then claiming that it is therefore proven that that monkey could write out The Lord of the Rings. For some reason, that fact blows right over your head every time you whip out your supposed "proof."
Nope, all the monkeys (billions of them) have to do is write a few phrases that are grammatical enough to be understood. Then these phrases automatically start duplicating on their own & linking together randomly. Then whenever two gramatically correct sentences come in contact with each other, they get to replicate really fast (autocatalytic sets), crowding out the ungrammatical ones. Eventually the monkeys can sit back & eat bananas while replication & natural selection & Hayekian spontaneous order take over.
Now, the odds against this process producing The Lord of the Rings specifically is very small, but it would eventually produce something understandable. Brave New Jungle, perhaps. Or The Last of the Macaques. Or Yes We Have No Bananas. Or...
Anyway, the infinite monkey analogy only works up to the point that you have replication and self- or cross-catalysis.
Get real, jennyp. If abiogenesis were all that simple, you wouldn't find so many evolutionary scientists either saying flatly that evolution makes very limited (or no) claims in the actual origins of life or suggesting panspermia of the ET variety.
"So many evolutionary scientists" advocating panspermia??? I doubt it.
I'll tell you what, let's get together. You bring the typewriter and I'll acquire a monkey. ...
Oooh, I've always wanted a monkey! Well, a chimp really...
Buggman, you hit the nail on the head. A simple question for JennyP. If the odds are in your favor, for the random creation of a simple cell from inanimate matter, then with the available science, why not just create one??
Because it still seems to have taken nature a couple hundred million years to get to actual cells.
There has to be something for the next generation of scientists to accomplish! :-)
Hi Hajman,
As for your mathematical proof above, I'd like to inquire something of you. In your proof, you assume that there was an environment capable of creating the experiments in order to make the self-replicating strands of RNA. Why is this? ...
Actually I wasn't trying to prove abiogenesis; I was refuting a supposed disproof of abiogenesis. It's still a largely conjectural theory - still concentrating on showing what pathways are more plausible than others. I don't know if we'll ever know for sure how it all specifically happened. But in general, I think it's been shown pretty well that some pathways are very plausible.
How many times must your use of this nonsense be debunked before you stop posting it? Or is it simply that you have no shame?
Anyone wishing to respond to jennyp's "evidence" should read this post. The following are just two examples of that which passes as "evidence" for the doctrinaire evolutionist.
Post 1:
A common creationist strawman tactic involves calculating the statistics for a complex modern entity (organism or protein or set of proteins) coming together by chance in order to buttress a claim that NO replicating entity could possibly ever have come together by natural means, while ignoring the fact that the first replicating entity surely was vastly simpler than anything seen in today's modern highly evolved organisms.
64 Posted on 11/08/1999 20:48:46 PST by jennyp
Note the usage of the terms " vastly simpler" and "modern, highly evolved organisms."
Post 2:
But anyway, all this is still too pessimistic, since the first replicators were probably short RNA strands. A nucleotide sequence of just six units is enough to provide a template for the creation of new copies of itself! Six units! And in 1996, Ferris et.al. created both proteins and RNA strands of up to 55 units in about a week, using certain types of clay as catalysts. Clearly, given the creationists' own framework for deriving probabilities of abiogenesis, the probability that life did not arise by chance are astronomical indeed.
64 Posted on 11/08/1999 20:48:46 PST by jennyp
In this post (part of a larger one, cited above) we see that "nucleotide sequences of "just six units" are sufficient to get the self-replicating ball rolling. Again, this "first replicating entity" was "vastly simpler than anything seen in today's modern highly evolved organisms."
Post 3:
"I mean, what is he claiming here? That a T.Rex's body was simpler than an iguana's? That dinosaurs' chromosomes had fewer genes than a modern salamaner? Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!) You COULD say that a larger animal is more complex than a smaller one, using different metrics (# of differentiated organs, # of cells, total # of molecules, etc.). And some organisms have more genes than others. But the general progression from single-celled to large multicelled organisms stopped hundreds of millions of years ago. By any meaningful chemical metric (which is the only kind that's relevant to the 2LOT), evolution hasn't been working to create more complex species over time."
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
In this post, jennyp tells us that even though those early "self-replicating nucleotides" just "six units" long, which were "vastly simpler than anything seen in today's modern highly evolved organisms," didn't really evolve into those big "T-Rex" body's, because "By any meaningful chemical metric...evolution hasn't been working to create more complex species over time." What's more, we can't observe evolution today because "...the general progression from single-celled to large multicelled organisms stopped hundreds of millions of years ago."
Now, having read the above carefully, ask yourself these two questions:
And while you're pondering those two questions, consider this bold statement:
"Evolution is an observed fact."
See if you can tell which kind of "evolution" evolutionists are talking about here. Is it the one set forth by Darwin and Huxley?
Looking to the future, we can predict that the groups of organic beings which are now large and triumphant, and which are least broken up, that is, which as yet have suffered least extinction, will for a long period continue to increase. But which groups will ultimately prevail, no man can predict; for we well know that many groups, formerly most extensively developed, have now become extinct. Looking still more remotely to the future, we may predict that, owing to the continued and steady increase of the larger groups, a multitude of smaller groups will become utterly extinct, and leave no modified descendants; and consequently that of the species living at any one period, extremely few will transmit descendants to a remote futurity.
Charles Darwin, "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life."
"Evolution in the extended sense can be defined as a directional and essentially irreversible process occurring in time, which in its course gives rise to an increase of variety and an increasingly high level of organization in its products. Our present knowledge indeed forces us to tile view that the whole of reality is evolution—a single process of self-transformation."2
2. Julian Huxley: "Evolution and Genetics" in What is Man? (Ed. by J. R. Newman, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1955), p.278.
Or is it the one tossed around here with impunity by the likes of garbanzo, jennyp, et al?
"Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!)"
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
"Maybe Darwin thought it was neat & linear. But it turns out it's actually quite a chaotic (unpredictable in advance) process. Wild & bushy, more like. Kinda like the dynamic free-market economy vs. the intelligently designed Soviet economy."
98 Posted on 10/03/1999 22:23:54 PDT by jennyp
"evolution is usually defined as any shift of allele frequencies in a population. Scientists don't usually make value judgments on whether or not a particular shift in frequency is "upward" or "downward". In fact in a book by Gould that I read, he gives an example of a plankton species that got smaller over time. While it's a common misstatement among even many of those who accept evolution as fact that evolution is "progress" it's not really a part of evolutionary theory."
49 Posted on 10/21/1999 07:40:16 PDT by garbanzo (garbanzo@worldnet.att.net)
Although 90 percent of Americans believe in God, "no divine intervention" is what their kids have been learning in public schools. As late as 1995, before yielding to anti-Darwinian pressure, the National Association of Biology Teachers made this clear when it described evolution as "impersonal, unsupervised, unpredictable."
Published: 08.22.99 Author: JACK CASHILL
If, as you imply, evolution is ongoing, where, exactly is it headed?
"We'll never know until we get there. Evolution doesn't have a predetermined goal, in the sense that we could predict beforehand. I guess you could say that it's headed in the direction of optimal fitness of each species to its local ecology. Of course, ecologies change all the time."
71 Posted on 10/03/1999 00:12:01 PDT by jennyp
The sheer dishonesty with which evolutionists approach the whole subject is quite clear.
When they want to prove evolution, they simply call it "change." When they want to attack creationists for distorting evolution, they trot out "improvement." The truth is, they're the ones making distinctions between "simple" and "complex" in their own evolution FAQ's!
One last question:
Why is it important for evolutionists to believe that human beings are no "better" than bacteria? After all, if we're not better qualitatively - just better suited to our respective environs - have they not dehumanized humanity? And once fully dehumanized, can we not say that what we've seen with two world wars, abortion-on-demand, and eugenics, is precisely what we should expect to see "...if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference?" (Dawkins.)
In answering that question, consider the following:
"They [secular humanists] have reduced Man to even less than his natural finiteness by seeing him only as a complex arrangement of molecules, made complex by blind chance. Instead of seeing him as something great who is significant even in his sinning, they see Man in his essence only as an intrinsically competitive animal, that has no other basic operating principle than natural selection brought about by the strongest, the fittest, ending on top. And they see Man as acting in this way both individually and collectively as society."
Francis A. Schaeffer,
"A Christian Manifesto"
"No totalitarian authority nor authoritarian state can tolerate those who have an absolute by which to judge that state and its actions. The Christians had that absolute in God's revelation. Because the Christians had an absolute, universal standard by which to judge not only personal morals but the state, they were counted as enemies of totalitarian Rome and were thrown to the beasts."
Francis A. Schaeffer, How Should We Then Live?
"And immortality makes this other difference, which, by the by, has a connection with the difference between totalitarianism and democracy. If individuals live only seventy years, then a state or a nation, or a civilization, which may last for a thousand years, is more important than an individual. But if Christianity is true, then the individual is not only more important but incomparably more important, for he is everlasting and the life of a state or a civilization, compared with his, is only a moment."
C. S. Lewis
When humanists and evolutionists have succeeded in wiping out the last vestage of God from the American body politick, ask yourself, "with what will God be replaced?" Look at the last hunred years for the answer.
Evolution wouldn't be so harmful if evolutionists weren't in a position to inflict it on everyone else. That - in part - is what the forthcoming elections are about.
I realize this has been a long post, but it's important to examine the utter illogic and irrationality that lies at the heart of evolution and those who defend it.
Actually I wasn't trying to prove abiogenesis; I was refuting a supposed disproof of abiogenesis. It's still a largely conjectural theory - still concentrating on showing what pathways are more plausible than others. I don't know if we'll ever know for sure how it all specifically happened. But in general, I think it's been shown pretty well that some pathways are very plausible.
I'll go with that. But it still sounds like your assuming evolution happend.
Perhaps this will help clear things up: I don't know if we'll ever know for sure how it all specifically happened. Are you talking about how we got here in general? Or about abiogenesis?
-The Hajman-
Well, "TPain", I am an AMERICAN patriot, to correct just one of the inaccuracies you posied recently. (Though I fully attribute my background to my having a VERRRRRRY short tolerance of atheist/communists). Perhaps you should try out the "VLenin" nick. Might hit closer to gome.
Al
Well, "TPain", I am an AMERICAN patriot, to correct just one of the inaccuracies you posted recently. (Though I fully attribute my background to my having a VERRRRRRY short tolerance of atheist/communists). Perhaps you should try out the "VLenin" nick. Might hit closer to gome.
Al
P.S. "Pain": Reading the TRUTH hurts. Especially so in the case of deluded atheist liberals. (Know anything about that? Hmmmmmmmmmm?) I stand 100% by my above post - human nature is PURE EVIL without God. And that, my friend, can be confirmed by an even cursory review of history.
Cordially,
Al
Hey Mr Moon: You're barking up the wrong tree. I am a Christian who believes that science gives us glimpses into God's mechanism of creation. You can call it whatever you will. If you check the original thread, you will note that it is I who conducted the most thorough "carpet-flaming" of n4sir, the guy who posted a link to that "creationist" website. So, like it or not, we appear to have more in common than you realize ;0)
Al
Jenny: Please accept my apologies. The line quoted above was "over-the-top". I have too much fun with these discussions sometimes. But the philosophical bit I posted about human nature is true.
Cordially,
Al
Jenny: Good post, good points. But I would hasten to add the following:
The collectivist regimes of the 20th century have uniformly been ATHEIST in nature, suppressing all worship and belief in God. One unfortunate sideffect of that was the degradation or even elimination of moral principles, which flow from - The Bible generally and the Ten Commandements specifically. It is impossible to divorce morality from religion without losing morality in the process (as George Washington once pointed out).
Secondly, the ethic of Western individualism - which is the single most important factor in the West's (and America's) rise to world leadership, flows squarely from the Christian religion. More specifically that that, it flows mostly from PROTESTANT Christianity (when I was in school the textbooks still taught about the "Puritan Work Ethic").
So, thanks for adding flesh onto my earlier argument (albeit unintentionally).
Cordially,
Al
Stingray: I bow to your well-thought out eloquence. Jenny has been "stung" by the Stingray. She wants us to be "allies" against totalitarianism, yet it is her philosophy, if fully implemented, that GUARANTEES that totalitarianism will come about.
I don't question her motives, OBTW; I think that she has just not fully thought out the consequences of her reasoning. (Has ANY liberal?)
Cordially,
Al
OK, time for a graphics break. Here's another "vegetarian", according to that web site posted by n4sir with that embarassingly smug mug shot of "Dr" Hovind.
Note the extremely large foot claw; the better to dig up carrots, I bet ;0)
This is a UTAHRAPTOR. Attacking in packs (think: Hyenas), this was probably the most ferocious predator of the mid-Cretacious North America. No animal - no matter how large was completely safe.
Because it still seems to have taken nature a couple hundred million years to get to actual cells.
Another attempt at obfuscation. Nice try. The fact is there is no evidence real or even imagined that random processes created life. I especially like the phrasing of your rebuttal. "Because it still seems to have taken"
seems: to appear to be true without necessarily being so.
So, in other words, scientist have tried and simply cannot create even the basic building blocks of life.
Thanks Jenny for confirming the truth.
W.K.
Jenny: Please accept my apologies. The line quoted above was "over-the-top". I have too much fun with these discussions sometimes. But the philosophical bit I posted about human nature is true.
Apology accepted. (I was afraid for a moment that we had another Stingray here!)
Hey, speak of the devil!
I don't question her motives, OBTW; I think that she has just not fully thought out the consequences of her reasoning. (Has ANY liberal?)
LIBERAL??? Hey, dem's fightin' words! I'm an Objectivist, thank you very much!
Hummm -- 'Human nature is pure evil without god.'
That statement sounds like the work of the devil. And your God sounds like a vengeful, unforgiving God. UnChristian almost?
--- Could you define your God and your devil for us, ---
Al or Arkan or Adroit, or whatever you are calling yourself these days?
Because it still seems to have taken nature a couple hundred million years to get to actual cells.
Another attempt at obfuscation. Nice try. The fact is there is no evidence real or even imagined that random processes created life. I especially like the phrasing of your rebuttal. "Because it still seems to have taken"
"Seems...". As in: "There is evidence that...". As in:
LIFE ON EARTH BEGAN AT LEAST 3.85 BILLION YEARS AGO, 400 MILLION YEARS EARLIER THAN PREVIOUSLY THOUGHT, SCIENTISTS SAY
November 6, 1996
RELEASE: 96-230Life on Earth began at least 3.85 billion years ago, an international team of scientists reports in the cover story of the Nov. 7 issue of the journal Nature.
The scientists, from UC San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UCLA's Department of Earth and Space Sciences, the Australian National University and England's Oxford Brookes University, present evidence that pushes back the emergence of life on Earth by 400 million years.
The evidence comes from a rock formation discovered on Akilia Island in southern West Greenland that is at least 3.85 billion years old. The research -- funded primarily by the National Science Foundation and NASA -- has provocative implications.
"Our evidence establishes beyond reasonable doubt that life emerged on Earth at least 3.85 billion years ago, and this is not the end of the story," said Stephen J. Mojzsis, a graduate student in geochemistry at Scripps and the lead author of the article. "We may well find that life existed even earlier."
(CLICK HERE for the full article)
"So that is what all of you atheists are: would-be Hitlers and Stalins"
Fancy finding you here, Al. While Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Pol Pot, and Mao were undoubted philosophical materialists and atheists, I'm not quite sure that Hitler can be so comfortably shoehorned as an "atheist" or "secular humanist." _Mein Kampf_ makes frequent references to the Creator and to God, the same is the case in Hitler's speeches. Now, it could be that these are for purely rhetorical effect, but the point is that atheism was never a part of official Nazi doctrine. No Communist ever makes references to "God's Plan" because any reference to God is taboo to fanatical Marxist secularism.
Hitler's personal religious beliefs have certainly been subject to debate, the consensus seems to be that he was some kind of pantheist. Other members of the Nazi party, such as Himmler and Rosenberg, seemed to be some kind of pagan mystics, and some of the even more bizarre Nazis were outright Odinists. However, the Nazi rank-and-file were Lutheran Prussians or Catholic Bavarians, by and large.
Al, the horrors of the 20th century have little to do with atheism and everything to do with moral collectivism.
Collectivism that says the individual is helpless to conceive of any "truth" outside that which their group dictates. (In Hegelianism it was the nation, in communism it's the economic class, in Naziism it's the biological race, etc.) In other words, the group is the basic moral actor, not the individual.
====================================
You forgot another big group that fosters moral collectivism/absolutisum. Organized religion.
In fact, it is an arguable point that more human beings have been killed over religion, than over politics.
Life on Earth began at least 3.85 billion years ago, an international team of scientists reports in the cover story of the Nov. 7 issue of the journal Nature.
Jenny, another attempt at changing the subject with a nonsense post. I say it again, you can't nor will you ever be able to create even the basic building blocks of life; nor will science ever be able to prove that life began by any random process. This article deals with neither of these topics. Please try and stay on subject.
For further reference to the actual subject at hand. Try this article.
Stephen C. Meyer, Ph.D. Reprinted from The Intercollegiate Review 31, no. 2 (spring 1996) .... During the last forty years, molecular biology has revealed a complexity and intricacy of design that exceeds anything that was imaginable during the late-nineteenth century. We now know that organisms display any number of distinctive features of intelligently engineered high-tech systems: information storage and transfer capability; functioning codes; sorting and delivery systems; regulatory and feed-back loops; signal transduction circuitry; and everywhere, complex, mutually-interdependent networks of parts. Indeed, the complexity of the biomacromolecules discussed in this essay does not begin to exhaust the full complexity of living systems. As even the staunch materialist Richard Dawkins has allowed, "Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose." Yet the materialistic science we have inherited from the late-nineteenth century, with its exclusive conceptual reliance on matter and energy, could neither envision nor can it now account for the biology of the information age.
Article has been posted on FR.
W.K.
{Whoops -- Almost Forgot}
I fully attribute my background to my having a VERRRRRRY short tolerance of atheist/communists).
Do you know a fella that posts here called - 'Mindbender'- ? He posts vague threats about commies, just like you.
Perhaps you should try out the "VLenin" nick. Might hit closer to gome.
I don't have a clue what this gibberish means. Could you rephrase? Thanks...
How many times must your use of this nonsense be debunked before you stop posting it? Or is it simply that you have no shame?
How many times must your dishonest selective quoting be debunked before you stop posting it? Or is it simply that you have no shame?At least you haven't resorted to posting your dishonest screeds in +4 font size. Progress comes, if slowly. Also I see that after I slapped you silly over your out-of-context quoting the first time, you have included a bit more of the original quotes. This is good. Except you completely ignore the added context & still have this fantasy in your mind that I was somehow contradicting myself. <sigh>
The original discussion, IIRC, had to do with somebody's online book that tried to argue that evolution violated the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics (2LOT). This statement is wrong for several reasons, and one of them is the idea that evolution implies greater complexity in some kind of thermodynamic sense.
Here's the relevant point again for the cognitively impaired (read: Stingray): But the general progression from single-celled to large multicelled organisms stopped hundreds of millions of years ago. By any meaningful chemical metric (which is the only kind that's relevant to the 2LOT), evolution hasn't been working to create more complex species over time."I mean, what is he claiming here? That a T.Rex's body was simpler than an iguana's? That dinosaurs' chromosomes had fewer genes than a modern salamaner? Evolution does NOT proceed towards greater complexity. If anything, it meanders towards fitness within the species' environment. (And of course there's a big question of just how well it does that!) You COULD say that a larger animal is more complex than a smaller one, using different metrics (# of differentiated organs, # of cells, total # of molecules, etc.). And some organisms have more genes than others. But the general progression from single-celled to large multicelled organisms stopped hundreds of millions of years ago. By any meaningful chemical metric (which is the only kind that's relevant to the 2LOT), evolution hasn't been working to create more complex species over time."
130 Posted on 10/30/1999 15:14:23 PDT by jennyp
The first symbiotic metabolic processes occurred around 4 billion years ago. The first true cells, at least 3.8 billion years ago. The largest dinosaurs, a hundred million years ago (give or take a few). And to this day, single-celled bacteria are still the most prevalent type of life on Earth. So what's your problem?
One last question:
Why is it important for evolutionists to believe that human beings are no "better" than bacteria? After all, if we're not better qualitatively - just better suited to our respective environs - have they not dehumanized humanity? And once fully dehumanized, can we not say that what we've seen with two world wars, abortion-on-demand, and eugenics, is precisely what we should expect to see "...if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference?" (Dawkins.)
Geez, do you deny that humans and bacteria are made up of amino acids & nucleic acids? Your flawed conception of where morality comes from is causing you to fight for some really wacky theories. You're gripping on tenaciously to these utterly debunked theories because you think morality can't survive without them.When will you understand that morality is a human survival tool? No human society can flourish without moral individualism. That is the lesson of the 20th Century. Only moral collectivism drives a person to viewing humans as the same as bacteria, since only the lower animals could be said to have "collective guilt" - i.e. only the lower animals cannot rise above their small-brained instincts & make substantive behavioral decisions about their individual lives.
I realize this has been a long post, but it's important to examine the utter illogic and irrationality that lies at the heart of evolution and those who defend it.
I agree the subject is important. It is important that the conservative movement should be based on truth and logic, instead of illogic propped up by desperate spin doctoring. That's why creationism is a dead-end for the conservative movement.
Darwin's "Theory of Evolution" has been scientifically dsiproven and debunked many, many times. Even scientists know it's a faulty pile of crap.
One scientific truth, however, is that where there is "a design"... there has to have been "a designer." Case in point...
...if, indeed, all life evolved by "random natural selection..."
...how is it that virtually every bird, mamal, and reptile has two eyes, two ears, two nostrils and a mouth...?
Using the hyperbole of "natural selection" it is clear that eyes going all the way around the head would have been a far better form of defense...
...you know, as in "survival of the fittest...,"
...yet no creatures "evolved" this way. None.
A design. A designer. God. Praise Him.
Amen.
;-)
Joe: Please handle this PAIN for me. He is working under the delusion that I have posted in the past using the names of some of his heroes. Kindly explain the facts of life to him. I know you'll be more kind than I would.
Thanks
Aloysius
"Former NASA Scientist Says Creation is "Logical"
This wouldn't be the same guy who lost all those Mars probes, would it?
You posted:
"I don't have a clue what this gibberish means. Could you rephrase? Thanks..."
Maybe you'll understand Croatian better:
Idi u picku materinu!
Thank you.(That felt much better)
Your pal, Al
human nature is PURE EVIL without God.
So, because I don't believe in your christian god, and because I wasn't raised to believe in your christian god, I am PURE EVIL? Me? Me, who won't even kill a spider or a wasp but instead catches and releases them? Me, who has always donated my time and money to those who are less fortunate than myself? PURE EVIL? Wow, and here I've been told by so many people what a good person I am! Boy, wait until I tell them that I'm not the nice person they thought I was, I am PURE EVIL! Won't they all be surprised!
Hey, can I claim my PURE EVIL as a dependent on my tax forms?
Whew, talk about broad, sweeping generalizations!!!
Knowledge Is Power
Jesus answered the flattery of the Pharisees thus: "Why do you call me good? There is none good but the Father."
Double meaning there - a. only God is good (take note, Mr "Knowledge"), and b. They inadvertently had it right...because Jesus is God.
All human nature is depraved and evil....that doesn't mean that you will be the next Charles Manson...it DOES, however, mean, that, absent faith in the True God (Jehovah/Jesus), you will ultimately only be serving the false "god" of self.
Your very protestations of goodness give you away, my friend....for Jesus taught that we should do good in secret, that we might not seek the approval of men, but that we may be rewarded by our Father in heaven.
I have news for you....even Billy Graham gets on his knees every morning and humbly asks God to keep him from sinning....while those who loudly beat their chests in a "holier than though" manner are giving themselves away - the defensiveness, you see, arises from your realization, on a spiritual level, of the emptyness of your own life without God, and a desire to thus "bluff" your way out.
It don't work. Been there, done that. No Christian who is steady in his walk boasts of his "goodness", or of his "good acts"; for they know that all of the good they do comes from God, and not from their own frail and sinful nature. Only those seeking justification do that. Unfortunately, the opinions or praise of men do not alter the Truth. They all pass away and are forgotten; His Word shall Never pass away, however.
In Christ,
Al
Sorry about that last post. I got carried away, and used some "common Croat terminology" that, anyhow, wouldn't translate very well into English in any event. However, as I have told you before, I have NEVER used any of those nicks any more than you have used the VLenin one.
Your allusions are truly hilarious - if you read some of my earlier discussions, you will see that I was on the receiving end of some pretty vile stuff for being an "anti-Serb" or "Croatian fascist", or "KLA stooge". So I guess you calling me "Arkan" completes the circle!!!
The fact that I look for individual responsibility and do not assign "collective guilt" appears to be a concept that some folks around here can't understand. Truly a pity.
Al
"All human nature is depraved and evil....that doesn't mean that you will be the next Charles Manson...it DOES, however, mean, that, absent faith in the True God (Jehovah/Jesus), you will ultimately only be serving the false "god" of self."
Good God man.. You have just informed the vast majority of human beings that they are 'evil' for not accepting your faith! What a weirdo... You should go back to the balkans. Someone there would do the right thing and the world would be rid of you. Goodby
"You have just informed the vast majority of human beings that they are 'evil' for not accepting your faith!"
I believe t