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Artificial Life Created
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I did say on its own. I said without "any form of being creating it or guiding it".
It appears that you did take liberties with my posts.
Taking liberties, I quoted one of them word for word
It's not my fault if you said "wihout any form of being" one minute and "without god" the next. Looks to me like you slipped from the arguably reasonable deistic position that you were attempting to defend (some form of being did it) to the one you actually hold (Jewish guy from 2000 years ago did it). And the rest of my post went on to deal with the "without any form of being...." argument so no I really didn't take any liberties whatsoever.
edit: look, nowadays we're privy to a lot of scientific advancements. We know how life developed to such a complex level and we're getting there on the whole universe creation thing but if we didn't have any of that I would still be an atheist. I don't have to have any theory or belief about anything in or outside nature to be an atheist, all I have to know is that the god of the gaps is a fallacious concept no matter how big the gaps may be. Our inability to explain something should never cause us to make up supernatural beings complete with hundreds of unverifiable attributes and stick them in that gap in our knowledge. I do not believe that "the universe came from nothing", I have no idea where the universe came from, all I know is that "I don't know so it must be god" is an unsatisfying answer.0 -
Epic thread fail.
Impartiality would be a fine thing.....So the odds are now down from "impossible" to "winning the euro millions every week for centuries". Thats an improvement.
Twist and squirm all you like but this is a serious breakthrough. They've shown its possible. Complex? Yes, no one was ever arguing it isnt complex. But moving from the impossible to the merely "highly improbable" is not something you can pooh pooh and belittle. They created life and you are telling me that that has no theological implications?
DeV.
No theological implications?
- A decided air of unease hovers over the tabernacle
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StealthRolex wrote: »To the best of my knowledge the theory of evolution is still, well, a theory.
http://wilstar.com/theories.htm
The law of gravity - Stuff falls down.
The theory of gravity (Relativity) - Explains how.
The fact of evolution - Changes in trait or gene frequency in a population of organisms from one generation to the next.
Theory of evolution - Explains how.
A fact is hypothesis that is so firmly supported by evidence that we assume it is true, and act as if it were true. —Douglas Futyuma
"Scientists most often use the word "fact" to describe an observation. But scientists can also use fact to mean something that has been tested or observed so many times that there is no longer a compelling reason to keep testing or looking for examples. The occurrence of evolution in this sense is fact. Scientists no longer question whether descent with modification occurred because the evidence is so strong." - National Academy of Science (U.S.)
Theories explain facts/laws. Theories are the highest 'level' in science. A theory does not become a fact/law, a theory explains facts/laws.Evolution did not produce DNA
Yes, it most likely did. We don't know it did but scientists have shown its possible.Evolution did not produce life
Evolution doesn't claim to have produced life.You seem to be working under the misapprehension that there exists in science proof the God is not required and that humans except for atheists are innately stupid.
It is proven beyond any reasonable doubt that a deity was not required from single-celled organisms to the life we have today.
Maybe he kick started the whole thing, we don't know. But he was not necessary from point B (single celled organisms) to now.0 -
Taking liberties, I quoted one of them word for word
You said this of me:Sam Vimes wrote:So not only did you not say "on it's own", you didn't even say "a god", you said just "God", meaning the specific god you believe in.
That's the point, you quoted one of them word for word. The other of which pointing out that it was the lack of any form of being involved that was difficult.We are still very far from reaching the conclusion, that life could exist without any form of being creating it or guiding it, which would have to be the case in the absence of God. It is still incredibly unlikely that things just happened to fall into place chemically, and physically to allow for life to begin.
I did basically say "on it's own" by saying that I find it difficult that life could exist without any form of being creating it or guiding it. I.E On its own accord, or on its own. I kind of wish that we didn't have to do this every time, holding up the discussion from progressing.
That is correct, we are still very far from seeing how life could form in and of itself. It requires other prerequisites for it to be able to do this.0 -
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Morbert, these theories are relevant and the very best that we can do, considering the conditions necessary to test them aren't available to us anymore. Chemical laws have to be turned on their head in order to do so..
They are the best theories...However, the problem still arises when you place mathematical probability to the conditions necessary and all the prerequisites required to make those theories possible, for life to spring up from a primordial soup of sorts, and even take hold....
It's the maths that shows how truely special this little planet is in the vast scheme of things. Of course, they could be right and we are a universal accident, but some people don't think so...What of it? I really don't think science can at present give a universally satisfying answer that gets away from the 'chance' problems...
At the very least, we should realise how precious it is to be here at all and be spectators and investigators of this cosmic play...As far as we know so far, we are it's only spectators, how lucky for us
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Morbert, these theories are relevant and the very best that we can do, considering the conditions necessary to test them aren't available to us anymore. Chemical laws have to be turned on their head in order to do so..
They are the best theories...However, the problem still arises when you place mathematical probability to the conditions necessary and all the prerequisites required to make those theories possible, for life to spring up from a primordial soup of sorts, and even take hold....
Many people have come up with huge improbabilities when calculating the emergence of life. They are rightly huge, but what is important is what we infer from these probabilities. What scientists do when they come across a huge improbability is investigate ways in which nature can overcome such improbabilities. Evolution is the classic example. It is highly improbable that a lung, or a brain, could spring up randomly and spontaneously. But if natural mechanisms like darwinian evolution are considered, these probabilities become unimportant when deciding whether or not a lung or brain could develop naturally. Similarly, it is highly improbable that DNA emerged spontaneously from a bath of chemicals, so scientists have investigated the possible evolution of DNA by looking at the behaviour of simpler chemicals (like RNA) that have the ability to self-replicate.It's the maths that shows how truely special this little planet is in the vast scheme of things. Of course, they could be right and we are a universal accident, but some people don't think so...What of it? I really don't think science can at present give a universally satisfying answer that gets away from the 'chance' problems...
At the very least, we should realise how precious it is to be here at all and be spectators and investigators of this cosmic play...As far as we know so far, we are it's only spectators, how lucky for us
There is another problem with probability calculations, and that is we only have one side of the picture. Winning the lottery may be very difficult, but if a lot of people are playing, then it is inevitable. Similarly, the chances of a planet like earth forming are very very very very very slim. But we don't know how many planets are out there. The 13 billion lightyear size of the universe is only the observable universe. Who knows what sort of exotic topologies or 'experimental' solar-systems are out there.antiskeptic wrote:Would I be correct in supposing that there is a certain reliance on the word "might" in such scientific activity? I'm not that well read on things but have read somewhat around it and was struck by the rather speculative tones - direct and indirect - involved.
This speculativeness might arise from the fact that there is much reaching and assumption to be done about the conditions existing at the purported time of lifes arising naturalistically.
But if agreeing that the science is ultimately speculative, why would you suppose that Christians should suppose them contradicting such science - given that it isn't so much science as it is using science to see what might have been.
It's a bit like the SETI project: folk getting worked up about water on Mars because they assume that means life could arise on Mars because of the presence of water. When they don't know that it can arise at all (spontaneously I mean)
Abiogenesis is a very difficult subject to study compared to evolutionary biology. Earth has not been kind enough to leave us a record of conditions in the past, so scientists must tread much much more carefully, and the speculative language reflects our poor understanding at the moment.
So why would I say such a young field contradicts the belief that life cannot emerge without an intelligent influence (I would hesitate to call it a Christian belief, as it is not Biblical)? There are two reasons. The first (and less important) is that, if the current progress in abiogenesis and evolution has taught us anything, it is that nature finds a way. The history of science is essentially "How the hell did nature manage to produce that? Oh, that's how." The second (and more important) is that, while abiogenesis is certainly new, progress is being made which allows us to say things about chemical behaviour which is more than just speculative. So while the exact nature of the beginning of the earth isn't known, the chemical processes studied by scientists are revealing to us that the complex chemicals associated with life, while still largely not understood, can and do emerge from chemical and physical laws.0 -
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