Primitive life on Earth

[cathy]

Not proven is probably the fairest way to describe the hypothesis that life arises spontaneously from chemicals.
Until there is a mechanism it remains an unproven hypothesis.

Life is here. I assume even you accept at some point it wasn't. Therefore 'life had a begiining' is hardly an unproven hypothesis unless you're buying into some weird notion that we're all the figments of the imagination of the cookie monster.

However you may wish to deny it arose spontaneously from chemicals - even tho that is what life and everything else on Earth is, chemicals. If so you need to propose an alternative. As we know early life was simple photosynthesising bacteria and as we know it then evolved to give the diversity of life and as we know pre life involved the generation of elements in stars and the formation of our solar system and Earth - chemical evolution either here or elsewhere in the universe is the most highly likely hypothesis. What is your alternative version? A version that is scientifically testable and clearly stated?

And to date there is no evidence that it is possible. In fact all attempts to find a mechanism have failed, so to be strictly accuarate it is the various theories about mechanisms that have been falsified.

How on Earth did you reach that conclusion? Please explain how each theory has been conclusively falsified. Cos as far as I can see even Miller Ureys experiment, tho from right, showed something was possible and generated further research. Even they did not falsify the notion that in certain conditions you get organic molecules. You need to go through all the literature and falsify each piece totally to say that with conviction.

And then there remain the avenues not yet tested or avenues that it is not yet possible to test or things we have not yet even thought of like inorganic chemistry routes. It is a complex multi step process that we are at the very start of trying to unravel. It is something we know happened, even you know life had a beginning, so it is not as if it is a pointless exercise like say looking for pixies. It happened by some means or other. That is the excitement of science, with pieces giving clues to where to next look or surprises or new findings opening up new possibilities. Your scientific curiorisity must be completely absent not to get excited by that!

The analogy with the structure of DNA is misleading. Yes, DNA and its structure was of course unknown until it was discovered. But it was discovered and a structure was determined.

Not really, DNA and indeed all science was at some point where we are now with abiogenesis! 200 years ago you could have made exactly the same duh lets give up statements about pre DNA attempts to look for a mechanism of passing traits to offspring. First you had to get Mendalian genetics and it was still a very long way from a plausible notion that it was DNA. There was a time when nobody would have even had a clue where to look - would not even have been aware of the cell. If they'd had your attitude they'd have said all attempts have failed so they've been falsified lets give up and just say God must wave a magic wand at each conception and magic a new person, cow, slug etc.

The hypothesis that live arose spontaneously is just that, an unproven hypothesis, based on a naturalistic paradigm.

From that I can only assume you wish to shove God into that gap in knowledge and that is fair enough, please do. You keep refusing to state clearly that it is but everything you say about information etc and the fact it is difficult to know what other possible explanation there could be at this point if you've rejected chemical evolution. If that is the case what are you doing to research or prove the supernatural alternative? What are your hypothesis and predictions? Or is it just sit there and say Goddidit. From where I'm sitting your hypothesis is far weaker than anything in real science but there you go.

However I'd think very hard about what shoving God into that gap entails for God. Someone whose overall plan from big bang to evolved intelligent life over billions of years really messed up on the chemistry to life front and had to come down to put a patch on the whole show by waving his magic wand to create the first cell or DNA strand or whatever. And when that gap is closed, as it will be at some point, God is squeezed out of yet another area. Is that really your aim?

And be aware, that shoving god into that gap does not mean genesis is correct at all. It does not effect evolution at all. Nor pre life. And while you and your friends continue to suggest otherwise you're lying.

[cathy]

That is like saying that we do not where the program comes from but we have floppy discs, compact discs, hard drives, flash drives, DVDs .. to store that information

You are talking about programs and God as programmer? That analogy can only bring you to somewhere around the ideas of Collins etc and sort of the beliefs I used to hold only on some more awesome less simplistic level. The analogy doesn't work for yours and your pals YECism I'm afraid. That sort of programmers approach does not need invidually designed and made cells or systems. Not if they're remotely competent. That analogy still requires science and evolution as we understand it to work on a meaningful level.

[cathy]

The cell is a (living) machine made up of 1000 of other (biomolecular) machines.

Yeah and like all machines it came from simpler precursors in the past and is made up of simpler components. All humanly engineered, designed machines can be ultimately be traced back over millenia via tiny cumulative steps and co opting of different technologies to the wheel and fire! Stupid analogy that does not work.

Behe was idiotic to make it and IDers are idiotic to still use it. Go look around at what has been written. Go think about it.

[marcsurtees]

The cell is a (living) machine made up of 1000 of other (biomolecular) machines.

Yeah and like all machines it came from simpler precursors in the past and is made up of simpler components. All humanly engineered, designed machines can be ultimately be traced back over millenia via tiny cumulative steps and co opting of different technologies to the wheel and fire! Stupid analogy that does not work.

Behe was idiotic to make it and IDers are idiotic to still use it. Go look around at what has been written. Go think about it.

Actually to get all the humanly engineered machines you need the human engineer to design and assemble them. Who designed and assembled the living cell?

[marcsurtees]

Not proven is probably the fairest way to describe the hypothesis that life arises spontaneously from chemicals.
Until there is a mechanism it remains an unproven hypothesis.

However you may wish to deny it arose spontaneously from chemicals - even tho that is what life and everything else on Earth is, chemicals. If so you need to propose an alternative. As we know early life was simple photosynthesising bacteria and as we know it then evolved to give the diversity of life and as we know pre life involved the generation of elements in stars and the formation of our solar system and Earth - chemical evolution either here or elsewhere in the universe is the most highly likely hypothesis. What is your alternative version? A version that is scientifically testable and clearly stated?

The alternative to spontaneous appearance of life is engineered life, which requires a designer.
So the alternative scientfic hypothesis is that someone has to make life. That is intelligent design.
If and when we are able to construct life from the raw materials then we will have proved that it is possible for an intelligent agent to construct life.
It is possible that the same thing could happen by chance but until we have a mechanism that works we can't test that hypothesis.

[Michael]

The cell is a (living) machine made up of 1000 of other (biomolecular) machines.

Yeah and like all machines it came from simpler precursors in the past and is made up of simpler components. All humanly engineered, designed machines can be ultimately be traced back over millenia via tiny cumulative steps and co opting of different technologies to the wheel and fire! Stupid analogy that does not work.

Behe was idiotic to make it and IDers are idiotic to still use it. Go look around at what has been written. Go think about it.

Actually to get all the humanly engineered machines you need the human engineer to design and assemble them. Who designed and assembled the living cell?

God was so clever that He could write it into creation that these machines could design and assemble slightly different machines. And so we have increaising complexity

With apologies to Rev Charles Kingsley, one of the first Christians to a ccept evolution in 1860

[Michael]

Not proven is probably the fairest way to describe the hypothesis that life arises spontaneously from chemicals.
Until there is a mechanism it remains an unproven hypothesis.

However you may wish to deny it arose spontaneously from chemicals - even tho that is what life and everything else on Earth is, chemicals. If so you need to propose an alternative. As we know early life was simple photosynthesising bacteria and as we know it then evolved to give the diversity of life and as we know pre life involved the generation of elements in stars and the formation of our solar system and Earth - chemical evolution either here or elsewhere in the universe is the most highly likely hypothesis. What is your alternative version? A version that is scientifically testable and clearly stated?

The alternative to spontaneous appearance of life is engineered life, which requires a designer.
So the alternative scientfic hypothesis is that someone has to make life. That is intelligent design.
If and when we are able to construct life from the raw materials then we will have proved that it is possible for an intelligent agent to construct life.
It is possible that the same thing could happen by chance but until we have a mechanism that works we can't test that hypothesis.

How does intelligent design actually work?

[cathy]

The alternative to spontaneous appearance of life is engineered life, which requires a designer.
So the alternative scientfic hypothesis is that someone has to make life. That is intelligent design.
If and when we are able to construct life from the raw materials then we will have proved that it is possible for an intelligent agent to construct life.
It is possible that the same thing could happen by chance but until we have a mechanism that works we can't test that hypothesis.

What utter nonsense. Marc you clearly haven't understood a single thing that has been said to you! Even the most intelligent of human designers moves us forward in technology and knowledge just a tiny smidgeon - far more akin to evolution. Nobody today capable of getting close to constructing life is doing so from scratch and from zero. 2000+ years of technology have got them here.

And no it will not prove ID. You need to demonstrate that some how. How is beyond me but its your problem.

Actually to get all the humanly engineered machines you need the human engineer to design and assemble them. Who designed and assembled the living cell

Yeah and show me where the first human engineers, tens of thousands of years ago with nothing to build upon, designed and assembled a Ford Focus or space shuttle? After all they were just as intelligent as designers as us! So where was it? Why did we wait so long?

It doesn't work like that does it!!!!!!!!!!!!It is a rubbish analogy. Fire and wheel discovered, probably by chance! All else in technology evolved painfully slowly from there.

It is possible that the same thing could happen by chance but until we have a mechanism that works we can't test that hypothesis.

You keep harping on about chance, ignoring both natural selection and the fact that chance doesn't make sense in retrospect. Life did not have to arise so there are no odds to calculate! It did, but it could have been one of many things that happened including nothing at all. It only looks miraculous in retrospect cos that is what happened. And to point out some other things you've ignored.

Firstly in the latest areas in electronics, software and drug design human designers are mimicking evolution - chance + natural selection. As for chance, natural selection works on chance and changes it from chance. Which is why you lot lie, lie and lie again about blind random chance ignoring facts left right and centre.

And at the very end of the day chemistry doesn't really operate by chance it follows rules! It may be that in certain circumstances/conditions life is an inevitable consequence of that or it may be that it was a much rarer thing where the conditions had to be just right and it happened. But once something like life happens it changes what goes on around it, so the degrees of freedom start closing and the chance of 'anything' reduce. Saying what are the chances of life in retrospect is as stupid as pulling a three of hearts out of a pack of cards and saying wow what on Earth are the chances of that.

Secondly research into early life often looks at getting something going and then watching it evolve. It always does. Nobody is expecting chance alone to get to complex cells (and you've ignored many features of cells in that statement which I can't be bothered to deal with yet again).

Thirdly you are saying God is too thick to be as sophisticated as above and therefore not capable of understanding natural selection? Or as Michael says above.

Fourthly - inserting magic/ID into that gap STILL does not make Genesis true, it does not change the fact that evolution happened ONE IOTA. Nor does it make the Earth 6000 years old.

At best all you can argue is you've got God making simple photosynthesising bacteria, NOT bacterial flagella or clotting mechanisms or plants of the field or males and females, cos they can and did evolve. If so why did God intervene there? Why did he not make the whole lot or alternatively get the chemistry to bacteria right the first time round without needing to tinker?

So can you clarify what you are saying ID is now? Are you claiming God engineered the earliest life of which we are aware, simple photosynthesising bacteria or a precursor, then cleared off? ID is now a brief spell of magic 3,8 billion yers ago then we move back to science and evolve? Is that what ID has been reduced to? And what will the religious creationists at C4ID, BCS etc make of that claim?

Fifthly don't think I haven't noticed your crafty ploy to reword the 'abiogenesis hasn't been demonstrated yet therefore is impossible' line to 'if abiogenesis is shown we can then point to the fact a human researcher found it as evidence for ID' line. More devious creationist dishonesty and shifting tactics. You must be getting a tad worried for that subtle shift in word play to be emerging in the ID propaganda machine?

[marcsurtees]

How does intelligent design actually work?

If you are asking me how God manipulated the material that he created on day one, the answer is I do not know. The closest analogy that we have is when humans design and build something. Human technology is getting close to manipulating atoms and molecules, if we can do it, then I see no reason why God cannot do it.
The miracle of water into wine, seems to be a good illustration. Jesus was able to turn water into wine. (Compare with Genesis which could be understood as meaning that God made things from water.) We call the process a miracle which is another way of saying that it was done very quickly and we do not know how it was done.

[Dagsannr]

If you are asking me how God manipulated the material that he created on day one, the answer is I do not know. The closest analogy that we have is when humans design and build something. Human technology is getting close to manipulating atoms and molecules, if we can do it, then I see no reason why God cannot do it.

So how come if science can't explain something, then god did it, but if you can't think of how god did something, god still did it?

Human technology is getting close to re-creating the conditions on primeval Earth and several lines of enquiry are coming close solving the issue of abiogenesis. Why can't you accept science might be right here and your god is wrong?

You're being highly disingenuous here and bordering on the hypocritical. It's fairly clear you have a set of beliefs and will not alter them, even when the balance of evidence you demand for the opposing side is met with regards your own.

Give it up, accept your beliefs are just that and leave science alone.

[marcsurtees]

What utter nonsense. Marc you clearly haven't understood a single thing that has been said to you! Even the most intelligent of human designers moves us forward in technology and knowledge just a tiny smidgeon - far more akin to evolution. Nobody today capable of getting close to constructing life is doing so from scratch and from zero. 2000+ years of technology have got them here.

And no it will not prove ID. You need to demonstrate that some how. How is beyond me but its your problem.

You keep trying to use the work of humans designers to prove designers are not needed

You keep harping on about chance, ignoring both natural selection

Please explain how natural selection operates in your hypothesis of abiogenesis... I thought it was nothng to do with evolution and now you are invoking "natural selection" (Natural selection of the gaps!).

Firstly in the latest areas in electronics, software and drug design human designers are mimicking evolution - chance + natural selection.

Oh dear more human designers involved in evolution (you sound like a believer in ID)

And at the very end of the day chemistry doesn't really operate by chance it follows rules!

Whose rules!!!

Secondly research into early life often looks at getting something going and then watching it evolve. It always does. Nobody is expecting chance alone to get to complex cells (and you've ignored many features of cells in that statement which I can't be bothered to deal with yet again).

Now do the features of living cells solve the problem of their own origin?

So can you clarify what you are saying ID is now? Are you claiming God engineered the earliest life of which we are aware, simple photosynthesising bacteria or a precursor, then cleared off? ID is now a brief spell of magic 3,8 billion yers ago then we move back to science and evolve? Is that what ID has been reduced to? And what will the religious creationists at C4ID, BCS etc make of that claim?

You should check with the ID guys... But if I understand correctly the basic thesis is very simply. Design can be detected in the natural world and therefore there must be a designer. This includes the design of the universe, the world, life, organs, body plans...

Fifthly don't think I haven't noticed your crafty ploy to reword the 'abiogenesis hasn't been demonstrated yet therefore is impossible' line to 'if abiogenesis is shown we can then point to the fact a human researcher found it as evidence for ID' line. More devious creationist dishonesty and shifting tactics. You must be getting a tad worried for that subtle shift in word play to be emerging in the ID propaganda machine?

If any creationist organisation quote mined you in the way you have quoted mined me then you would cut them to pieces and jump up and down on the bits....

[cathy]

You keep trying to use the work of humans designers to prove designers are not needed

No Marc, I'm responding to the use of human designers by IDers to prove designers are needed to design complex things rather than complex things evolving. It is Behe and his pals that brought human design in for their 'design is intuitive' nonsense. And you are just parroting it in one form or another. I'm just pointing out it is crap.

You should check with the ID guys... But if I understand correctly the basic thesis is very simply. Design can be detected in the natural world and therefore there must be a designer. This includes the design of the universe, the world, life, organs, body plans...

The ID guys basic thesis lacks any reasonable mechanism for detecting design. Evolution on the other hand provides a mechanism, hypotheses, predictions and evidenec. Can you please provide us with a method by which design can be detected in the real world? Irreducible complexity and dodgy maths by preachers have been found sadly lacking by science and the courts.

I've asked lots of times, I'll ask again - how are you detecting design in the natural world?

If any creationist organisation quote mined you in the way you have quoted mined me then you would cut them to pieces and jump up and down on the bits....

I've taken the essence of every comment you've ever made. In the past it has boiled down in some form or another to evolution can't be true cos abiogenesis is unknown. Known chemistry precludes abiogenesis, abiogenesis hasn't provided anything and this is a sign it is impossible, and the newest one - if abiogenesis research comes up with anything it will be because of a research by researchers hence proving you need a designer. Please correct me where I'm mistaken if I'm wrong, using relevant quotes from this forum.

[marcsurtees]

So how come if science can't explain something, then god did it, but if you can't think of how god did something, god still did it?

As I have tried to explain I do not believe in the god-of-the-gaps.
God does all of it, the stuff we understand and the stuff we do not.
The easiest way to explain it is to ask, "what would happen if God ceased to exist?"
The answer (for someone who believes in the God of the Bible) is that the universe would disappear as well. But I have to stop there as this is the "Science only thread" and God is not allowed here.

[cathy]

As I have tried to explain I do not believe in the god-of-the-gaps.
God does all of it, the stuff we understand and the stuff we do not.

You've just spent ages trying to shove God into the gap of abiogenesis! Likewise in the past your pals have tried to shove him into gaps all over the place.

And as you don't accept or believe a hell of a lot of the stuff we undestand how on Earth could God could have done it? Why don't you believe in it if god did it? Do you think God only did the silly things made up by creationists and not the ones discovered by science? And isn't that a bit weird?

The easiest way to explain it is to ask, "what would happen if God ceased to exist?"

Ah I can answer that one. I believed firmly once that God existed, and I still have a lot of respect for any honest non creationist/ID believer that still does and can fully understand how they can hold that belief as well - as I think my reasons were pretty sound.

Now I don't believe God exists - hence for me God has ceased to exist, so to all intents and purposes I'm in the position to answer that.

The answer (for someone who believes in the God of the Bible) is that the universe would disappear as well. But I have to stop there as this is the "Science only thread" and God is not allowed here.

No! Wrong. The answer is nothing about the universe changes at all. The comfort you might get sometimes when, for example, somebodys life is taken away before they've had a chance to live it may go (v common in schools - partly cos teenagers are given driving licences far too young) but nothing else changes at all.

Whose rules!!!

Careful, almost veering to the simpler end of theistic evolution there Marc. That is almost akin to the argument used by my 14 year old - tho hers is a bit more sophisticated. Shes the only member of the family who still believes but she is very much NOT a creationist or IDer and more than happy reconciling evolution and her belief. Should I wish to turn her to atheism I'll introduce her to your ideas shall I? After all she is clearly wrong by your reckoning.

[Michael]

How does intelligent design actually work?

If you are asking me how God manipulated the material that he created on day one, the answer is I do not know. The closest analogy that we have is when humans design and build something. Human technology is getting close to manipulating atoms and molecules, if we can do it, then I see no reason why God cannot do it.
The miracle of water into wine, seems to be a good illustration. Jesus was able to turn water into wine. (Compare with Genesis which could be understood as meaning that God made things from water.) We call the process a miracle which is another way of saying that it was done very quickly and we do not know how it was done.

Are you an agnostic , I KNOW God can do it as God as creator is a central aprt of my faith