Psych prof concedes, ID is not “absurd”

B.B. Its good to hear you admit that you believe by faith in life from non life as you have no idea how it must have happened , but it must have happened is surely a statement of faith. You say life from non life is not a part of evolution , it may not be a part of the Darwinian paradigm but it must be a part of evolution as a whole as what else would you call a slow step by step process that takes hydrogen gas and over time turns it in to people, and cats and fish, and atheists and everything. But seriously the whole earth and blind processes and time equals life ,good grief that is so anti scientific it is beyond belief how anyone could even in their most dishonest moments believe it. Do some research just see if thats how scientist actually go about trying to make life , as both time and too much stuff are the enemy of the process not the hero , look as some Dr James tour videos you may just get an education. Marfin

The following study states that ‘The bottom part of the cloth (containing the dorsal image) would have born all the weight of the man’s supine body, yet the dorsal image is not encoded with a greater amount of intensity than the frontal image.’

Particle Radiation from the Body – July 2012 – M. Antonacci, A. C. Lind Excerpt: The Shroud’s frontal and dorsal body images are encoded with the same amount of intensity, independent of any pressure or weight from the body. The bottom part of the cloth (containing the dorsal image) would have born all the weight of the man’s supine body, yet the dorsal image is not encoded with a greater amount of intensity than the frontal image. Radiation coming from the body would not only explain this feature, but also the left/right and light/dark reversals found on the cloth’s frontal and dorsal body images. http://www.academicjournals.org/app/webroot/article/article1380798649_Antonacci.pdf

Moreover, besides gravity being dealt with, the shroud also gives us evidence that Quantum Mechanics was dealt with. In the following paper, it was found that it was not possible to describe the image formation on the Shroud in classical terms but they found it necessary to describe the formation of the image on the Shroud in discrete quantum terms.

The absorbed energy in the Shroud body image formation appears as contributed by discrete (quantum) values – Giovanni Fazio, Giuseppe Mandaglio – 2008 Excerpt: This result means that the optical density distribution,, can not be attributed at the absorbed energy described in the framework of the classical physics model. It is, in fact, necessary to hypothesize a absorption by discrete values of the energy where the ‘quantum’ is equal to the one necessary to yellow one fibril. http://cab.unime.it/mus/541/1/c1a0802004.pdf

Kevin Moran, an optical engineer working on the mysterious ‘3D’ nature of the Shroud image, states the ‘supernatural’ explanation this way, “This suggests a quantum event where a finite amount of energy transferred abruptly. The fact that there are images front and back suggests the radiating particles were released along the gravity vector.”

Optically Terminated Image Pixels Observed on Frei 1978 Samples – Kevin E. Moran – 1999 Discussion Pia’s negative photograph, from 1898, showed what looked to be a body that was glowing, but slightly submerged in a bath of cloudy water. This condition is more properly described as an image that is visible, at a distance, but by locally attenuated radiation. The unique front-and-back only image can be best described as gravitationally collimated. The radiation that made the image acted perfectly parallel to gravity. There is no side image. The radiation is parallel to gravity and, if moving at light speed, only lasted about 100 picoseconds. It is particulate in nature, colliding only with some of the fibers. It is not a continuum or spherical-front radiation that made the image, as visible or UV light. It is not the X-ray radiation that obeys the one over R squared law that we are so accustomed to in medicine. It is more unique,,, Theoretical model It is suggested that the image was formed when a high-energy particle struck the fiber and released radiation within the fiber at a speed greater that the local speed of light. Since the fiber acts as a light pipe, this energy moved out through the fiber until it encountered an optical discontinuity, then it slowed to the local speed of light and dispersed. Discussion The fact that the pixels don’t fluoresce suggests that the conversion to their now brittle dehydrated state occurred instantly and completely so no partial products remain to be activated by the ultraviolet light. This suggests a quantum event where a finite amount of energy transferred abruptly. The fact that there are images front and back suggests the radiating particles were released along the gravity vector. The radiation pressure may also help explain why the blood was “lifted cleanly” from the body as it transformed to a resurrected state.” https://www.shroud.com/pdfs/moran.pdf

Moreover, the following article found that it would take 34 Trillion Watts of what is termed VUV (directional) radiation to form the image on the shroud.

Astonishing discovery at Christ’s tomb supports Turin Shroud – NOV 26TH 2016 Excerpt: The first attempts made to reproduce the face on the Shroud by radiation, used a CO2 laser which produced an image on a linen fabric that is similar at a macroscopic level. However, microscopic analysis showed a coloring that is too deep and many charred linen threads, features that are incompatible with the Shroud image. Instead, the results of ENEA “show that a short and intense burst of VUV directional radiation can color a linen cloth so as to reproduce many of the peculiar characteristics of the body image on the Shroud of Turin, including shades of color, the surface color of the fibrils of the outer linen fabric, and the absence of fluorescence”. ‘However, Enea scientists warn, “it should be noted that the total power of VUV radiations required to instantly color the surface of linen that corresponds to a human of average height, body surface area equal to = 2000 MW/cm2 17000 cm2 = 34 thousand billion watts makes it impractical today to reproduce the entire Shroud image using a single laser excimer, since this power cannot be produced by any VUV light source built to date (the most powerful available on the market come only to several billion watts)”. Comment The ENEA study of the Holy Shroud of Turin concluded that it would take 34 Thousand Billion (trillion) Watts of VUV radiation to make the image on the shroud. This output of electromagnetic energy remains beyond human technology. Per predatormasters

Thus, when we rightly let the agent causality of God back into the picture of modern physics, (as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned), and as quantum physics itself now empirically demands with the closing of the free will loophole, (Zeilinger and company), then a empirically backed reconciliation, (via the Shroud of Turin), between Quantum Mechanics, Special Relativity, (i.e. Quantum Electrodynamics), and General Relativity, i.e. the ‘Theory of Everything’, readily pops out for us in Christ’s resurrection from the dead. i.e. The infinite gap between the eternities of special relativity, quantum mechanics (QED), and general relativity was bridged when Christ, via the Agent Causality of God, was resurrected from the dead.

Colossians 1:15-20 The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross. Shroud of Turin: From discovery of Photographic Negative, to 3D Information, to Hologram https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-TL4QOCiis Turin Shroud Hologram Reveals The Words “The Lamb” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Tmka1l8GAQ Supplemental notes defending the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin: https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/viruses-devolve/#comment-674732

Of supplemental note, the overturning of the Copernican Principle by both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics adds considerable weight to the claim that Christ' Resurrection from the dead provides the correct solution for the quote unquote 'theory of everything'

Overturning of the Copernican Principle by both General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics - August 2019 https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/how-many-earth-like-planets-are-there/#comment-682424

bornagain77

The interesting thing about Atheistic Materialists denying miracles, i.e. denying the Agent Causality of God, is that they also end up denying their very own agent causality, i.e. denying their own free will, in the process of denying the Agent Causality of God. As Paul Nelson explains in the following article, “Epistemology — how we know — and ontology — what exists — are both affected by methodological naturalism (MN). If we say, “We cannot know that a mind caused x,” laying down an epistemological boundary defined by MN, then our ontology comprising real causes for x won’t include minds. MN entails an ontology in which minds are the consequence of physics, and thus, can only be placeholders for a more detailed causal account in which physics is the only (ultimate) actor. You didn’t write your email to me. Physics did, and informed (the illusion of) you of that event after the fact. “That’s crazy,” you reply, “I certainly did write my email.” Okay, then — to what does the pronoun “I” in that sentence refer? Your personal agency; your mind. Are you supernatural?,,,

Do You Like SETI? Fine, Then Let’s Dump Methodological Naturalism – Paul Nelson – September 24, 2014 Excerpt: “Epistemology — how we know — and ontology — what exists — are both affected by methodological naturalism (MN). If we say, “We cannot know that a mind caused x,” laying down an epistemological boundary defined by MN, then our ontology comprising real causes for x won’t include minds. MN entails an ontology in which minds are the consequence of physics, and thus, can only be placeholders for a more detailed causal account in which physics is the only (ultimate) actor. You didn’t write your email to me. Physics did, and informed (the illusion of) you of that event after the fact. “That’s crazy,” you reply, “I certainly did write my email.” Okay, then — to what does the pronoun “I” in that sentence refer? Your personal agency; your mind. Are you supernatural?,,, You are certainly an intelligent cause, however, and your intelligence does not collapse into physics. (If it does collapse — i.e., can be reduced without explanatory loss — we haven’t the faintest idea how, which amounts to the same thing.) To explain the effects you bring about in the world — such as your email, a real pattern — we must refer to you as a unique agent.,,, some feature of “intelligence” must be irreducible to physics, because otherwise we’re back to physics versus physics, and there’s nothing for SETI to look for.”,,, http://www.evolutionnews.org/2014/09/do_you_like_set090071.html

And since methodological naturalism rules agent causality, (i.e. free will and consciousness), out of ‘scientific’ bounds before any scientific investigation has even begun then demonstrating a miracle becomes a piece of cake. Dr. Craig Hazen, in the following video at the 12:26 minute mark, relates how he performed, for an audience full of academics at a college, a ‘miracle’ simply by raising his arm,,

The Intersection of Science and Religion – Craig Hazen, PhD – video http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=xVByFjV0qlE#t=746s

Thus, according to the strictures of Methodological Naturalism (MN), every time we exercise our own volition we, by definition of MN, are ‘performing a miracle’. The fact that we are all to be considered ‘miracle workers’ every time we simply raise our arm might come as a surprise to great many Atheistic materialists. Yet the denial of agent causality is precisely what Atheistic Naturalism and/or Methodological Naturalism entails. Moreover, we don’t have to rely on Dr. Craig Hazen ‘performing a miracle’ for a audience of (apparently) clueless academics in order to make our case for the reality of our own ‘miracle working’ agent causality as well as the Agent Causality of God. We can appeal directly to our most powerful theory in science, i.e. Quantum Mechanics: As Steven Weinberg, an atheist himself, states in the following article, In the instrumentalist approach (in quantum mechanics) humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level.,,, the instrumentalist approach turns its back on a vision that became possible after Darwin, of a world governed by impersonal physical laws that control human behavior along with everything else.,,, In quantum mechanics these probabilities do not exist until people choose what to measure,,, Unlike the case of classical physics, a choice must be made,,,

The Trouble with Quantum Mechanics – Steven Weinberg – January 19, 2017 Excerpt: The instrumentalist approach,, (the) wave function,, is merely an instrument that provides predictions of the probabilities of various outcomes when measurements are made.,, In the instrumentalist approach,,, humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level. According to Eugene Wigner, a pioneer of quantum mechanics, “it was not possible to formulate the laws of quantum mechanics in a fully consistent way without reference to the consciousness.”11 Thus the instrumentalist approach turns its back on a vision that became possible after Darwin, of a world governed by impersonal physical laws that control human behavior along with everything else. It is not that we object to thinking about humans. Rather, we want to understand the relation of humans to nature, not just assuming the character of this relation by incorporating it in what we suppose are nature’s fundamental laws, but rather by deduction from laws that make no explicit reference to humans. We may in the end have to give up this goal,,, Some physicists who adopt an instrumentalist approach argue that the probabilities we infer from the wave function are objective probabilities, independent of whether humans are making a measurement. I don’t find this tenable. In quantum mechanics these probabilities do not exist until people choose what to measure, such as the spin in one or another direction. Unlike the case of classical physics, a choice must be made,,, http://quantum.phys.unm.edu/466-17/QuantumMechanicsWeinberg.pdf

In fact Weinberg, again an atheist, rejected the instrumentalist approach precisely because “humans are brought into the laws of nature at the most fundamental level” and because it undermined the Darwinian worldview from within. Yet, regardless of how he and other atheists may prefer the world to behave, quantum mechanics itself could care less how atheists prefer the world to behave. For instance, this recent 2019 experimental confirmation of the “Wigner’s Friend” thought experiment established that “measurement results,, must be understood relative to the observer who performed the measurement”.

More Than One Reality Exists (in Quantum Physics) By Mindy Weisberger – March 20, 2019 Excerpt: “measurement results,, must be understood relative to the observer who performed the measurement”. https://www.livescience.com/65029-dueling-reality-photons.html

Moreover, although there have been several major loopholes in quantum mechanics over the past several decades that atheists have tried to appeal to in order to try to avoid the ‘spooky’ Theistic implications of quantum mechanics, over the past several years each of those major loopholes have each been closed one by one. The last major loophole that was left to be closed was the “setting independence” and/or the ‘free-will’ loophole:

Closing the ‘free will’ loophole: Using distant quasars to test Bell’s theorem – February 20, 2014 Excerpt: Though two major loopholes have since been closed, a third remains; physicists refer to it as “setting independence,” or more provocatively, “free will.” This loophole proposes that a particle detector’s settings may “conspire” with events in the shared causal past of the detectors themselves to determine which properties of the particle to measure — a scenario that, however far-fetched, implies that a physicist running the experiment does not have complete free will in choosing each detector’s setting. Such a scenario would result in biased measurements, suggesting that two particles are correlated more than they actually are, and giving more weight to quantum mechanics than classical physics. “It sounds creepy, but people realized that’s a logical possibility that hasn’t been closed yet,” says MIT’s David Kaiser, the Germeshausen Professor of the History of Science and senior lecturer in the Department of Physics. “Before we make the leap to say the equations of quantum theory tell us the world is inescapably crazy and bizarre, have we closed every conceivable logical loophole, even if they may not seem plausible in the world we know today?” https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140220112515.htm

And now Anton Zeilinger and company have recently, as of 2018, pushed the ‘free will loophole’ back to 7.8 billion years ago, thereby firmly establishing the ‘common sense’ fact that the free will choices of the experimenter in the quantum experiments are truly free and are not determined by any possible causal influences from the past for at least the last 7.8 billion years, and that experimenters themselves are therefore shown to be truly free to choose whatever measurement settings in the experiments that he or she may so desire to choose so as to ‘logically’ probe whatever aspect of reality that he or she may be interested in probing.

Cosmic Bell Test Using Random Measurement Settings from High-Redshift Quasars – Anton Zeilinger – 14 June 2018 Abstract: In this Letter, we present a cosmic Bell experiment with polarization-entangled photons, in which measurement settings were determined based on real-time measurements of the wavelength of photons from high-redshift quasars, whose light was emitted billions of years ago; the experiment simultaneously ensures locality. Assuming fair sampling for all detected photons and that the wavelength of the quasar photons had not been selectively altered or previewed between emission and detection, we observe statistically significant violation of Bell’s inequality by 9.3 standard deviations, corresponding to an estimated p value of ? 7.4 × 10^21. This experiment pushes back to at least ? 7.8 Gyr ago the most recent time by which any local-realist influences could have exploited the “freedom-of-choice” loophole to engineer the observed Bell violation, excluding any such mechanism from 96% of the space-time volume of the past light cone of our experiment, extending from the big bang to today. https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.121.080403

Moreover, allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics, as the Christian founders of modern science originally envisioned,,,, (Isaac Newton, Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell, and Max Planck, to name a few of the Christian founders),,, and as quantum mechanics itself now empirically demands (with the closing of the free will loophole by Anton Zeilinger and company), rightly allowing the Agent causality of God ‘back’ into physics provides us with a very plausible resolution for the much sought after ‘theory of everything’ in that Christ’s resurrection from the dead provides an empirically backed reconciliation, via the Shroud of Turin, between quantum mechanics and general relativity into the much sought after ‘Theory of Everything”. Here are a few posts where I lay out and defend some of the evidence for that claim: As Isabel Piczek and Chuck Missler note in the following video and articles, the Shroud of Turin reveals a strange ‘event horizon’:

“When you look at the image of the shroud, the two bodies next to each other, you feel that it is a flat image. But if you create, for instance, a three dimensional object, as I did, the real body, then you realize that there is a strange dividing element. An interface from which the image is projected up and the image is projected down. The muscles of the body are absolutely not crushed against the stone of the tomb. They are perfect. It means the body is hovering between the two sides of the shroud. What does that mean? It means there is absolutely no gravity. Other strange you discover is that the image is absolutely undistorted. Now if you imagine the clothe was wrinkled, tied, wrapped around the body, and all of the sudden you see a perfect image, which is impossible unless the shroud was made absolutely taut, rigidly taut.” Isabel Piczek – Turin shroud – (Particle Physicist explains event horizon) – video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PIpdIz5Rp3I THE EVENT HORIZON (Space-Time Singularity) OF THE SHROUD OF TURIN. – Isabel Piczek – Particle Physicist Excerpt: We have stated before that the images on the Shroud firmly indicate the total absence of Gravity. Yet they also firmly indicate the presence of the Event Horizon. These two seemingly contradict each other and they necessitate the past presence of something more powerful than Gravity that had the capacity to solve the above paradox. http://shroud3d.com/findings/isabel-piczek-image-formation “You can read the science of the Shroud, such as total lack of gravity, lack of entropy (without gravitational collapse), no time, no space—it conforms to no known law of physics.” The phenomenon of the image brings us to a true event horizon, a moment when all of the laws of physics change drastically. Dame Piczek created a one-fourth size sculpture of the man in the Shroud. When viewed from the side, it appears as if the man is suspended in mid air (see graphic, below), indicating that the image defies previously accepted science. The phenomenon of the image brings us to a true event horizon, a moment when all of the laws of physics change drastically. – Chuck Missler – A Quantum Hologram of Christ’s Resurrection?

bornagain77

Miracles: Raised from the Dead - Craig Keener https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mC8OXGU2QUA Dr. Craig Keener, author of “Miracles: The Credibility of the New Testament Accounts” discusses in this web series some of the trustworthy accounts of people being raised from the dead and people being healed of sicknesses from around the world. – video playlist http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lE6sDPPQ7WA&list=PLC900F8EEB62AE426&feature=plcp&context=C43901d1FDvjVQa1PpcFPmClYI6nDQbdabTL_qw7jCisfOqOmxOyU= Real Raisings from the Dead or Fake News? Falsified resurrection stories should not cause us to discount credible miracle accounts. CRAIG KEENER| MAY 17, 2019 https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2019/june/miracles-resurrections-real-raisings-fake-news-keener-afric.html The Number of Resuscitation Accounts Found in Craig Keener’s Miracles - September 2, 2012 (113 accounts are listed) https://biblicalscholarship.wordpress.com/2012/09/02/the-number-of-resuscitation-accounts-found-in-craig-keeners-miracles/ Craig Keener - Miracle Reports in the Gospels and Today - lecture video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYBnJF2P_WQ Lee Stoneking Addresses UN General Assembly (amazing miracle testimony - clinically dead for 45 minutes, raised back to life by Jesus) - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYt8sv4vzQs Miracles: Can a Scientist Believe in Miracles https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9G8o7JXlbE at the 24:00 minute mark of the preceding video the speaker gives testimony of his son being miraculously healed of an incurable disease Medical Miracles Really Do Happen Excerpt: No one knows exactly how often such cases occur. Approximately 3,500 medically documented cases of seeming miracles -- based on reports from doctors in America and around the world dating to 1967 -- have appeared in 800 peer-reviewed medical journals and cover all major illnesses, including cancer, heart disease, diabetes and arthritis.* http://www.care2.com/news/member/818150751/443473

bornagain77

Woman comes back to life after being dead for 17 hours ET

As I said before, the only correct answer that anyone can provide is “we don’t know”.

And as I said before we know enough to eliminate blind and mindless processes.

Evolution and how life arose are two different things.

And yet how life originated dictates how it subsequently evolved. It is only if blind and mindless processes produced life would we infer they are also responsible for its subsequent diversity.

The evolutionary mechanisms, although incomplete, are well documented.

Umm, the debate is whether or not those evolutionary mechanisms are part of the design or just happen

Other researchers (not evolutionary biologists) are developing hypotheses about how life arose and testing these.

And yet they can't even get nature to produce biologically relevant replicators. So all they are really doing is thinking up some nice sciency narrative.

This is because nature had the entire earth and atmosphere and millions of years to play with.

Yeah, cuz that is the makings of science- not.

Maybe God did do it, but nobody is conducting research on this possibility.

That doesn't even make any sense.

With regard to someone rising from the dead, I did not say whether or not it was believable, only that it has never happened.

Again, that all depends on your definition of being dead. ET

Marfin

Brother Brian – There has never been a single incident of life arising from non life , the greatest minds available cannot make it happen . Now do you believe it happened if so why.?

As I said before, the only correct answer that anyone can provide is "we don't know".

We all know the standard evolutionary belief is that life arose from non life , so is this what you believe, if so why is this more believable than someone raising from the dead why is one miraculous and the other natural.

Evolution and how life arose are two different things. The evolutionary mechanisms, although incomplete, are well documented. Other researchers (not evolutionary biologists) are developing hypotheses about how life arose and testing these. My personal opinion is that it is highly unlikely that any researcher will ever hit on the exact combination of environmental and chemical conditions to have life develop in a laboratory environment. This is because nature had the entire earth and atmosphere and millions of years to play with. Scientists simply don't have those resources. The best we can hope for is a most likely explanation. Maybe God did do it, but nobody is conducting research on this possibility. With regard to someone rising from the dead, I did not say whether or not it was believable, only that it has never happened. Brother Brian

Marfin - According to them nature is smarter than our greatest minds. And if that is true then why would anyone be inclined to listen to them? Nature did it without wanting to nor trying to. But materialism's finest cannot and it isn't for a want of trying. ET

Brother Brian - There has never been a single incident of life arising from non life , the greatest minds available cannot make it happen . Now do you believe it happened if so why.? We all know the standard evolutionary belief is that life arose from non life , so is this what you believe, if so why is this more believable than someone raising from the dead why is one miraculous and the other natural. Marfin

There has never been a single incident of raising someone from the dead...

Would being declared dead, being in that state for 20 minutes and then coming back to life, count?

With regard to how life arose the only answer available is “I don’t know”.

What we do know says that blind and mindless processes are incapable. There isn't even a methodology to test the concept. Blind and mindless processes have never been shown to be capable of producing biologically relevant replicators. So there is a lot that we do know. It just isn't good for materialists. ET

Marfin

Peter Kimbridge, Brother Brian – Can I assume neither of you believe its possible to raise someone from the dead,or walk on water , but you do believe life arose from non life , can either of you please explain why you might hold to one and reject the other.

There has never been a single incident of raising someone from the dead, and we can walk on water when it is frozen. With regard to how life arose the only answer available is "I don't know". Brother Brian

The idea of an unguided origin of the first life has been “sold to us,” he says, but its assumptions are “insane … many, many times impossible.” Dr. Eberlin illustrates from three essential cell features: the cell membrane, protein folding, and molecular chaperones. We’re “further away than ever” from making life in the lab, he says, and it’s time now to “surrender to the data,” Chemist Marcos Eberlin on a Crisis for Chemical Evolution - August 12, 2019 https://www.discovery.org/multimedia/audio/2019/08/chemist-marcos-eberlin-on-a-crisis-for-chemical-evolution/ Origin of Life: Intelligence Required (Science Uprising 05) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ymjlrw6GmKU Marcos Eberlin: Unguided Origin of Life “Sold to Us,” but Its Assumptions Are “Insane” - August 23, 2019 https://evolutionnews.org/2019/08/marcos-eberlin-unguided-origin-of-life-sold-to-us-but-its-assumptions-are-insane/

It is funny that the same law, (i.e. the second law of thermodynamics) , that Bob (and weave) O'Hara must appeal to in order to claim that the "raising from the dead " is impossible is the same exact law that he ignores when it comes to the origin of life (OOL) being possible and claims that "I don’t know of any science that analyses abiogenesis and shows it is impossible."

DID LIFE START BY CHANCE? Excerpt: Molecular biophysicist, Harold Morowitz (Yale University), calculated the odds of life beginning under natural conditions (spontaneous generation). He calculated, if one were to take the simplest living cell and break every chemical bond within it, the odds that the cell would reassemble under ideal natural conditions (the best possible chemical environment) would be one chance in 10^100,000,000,000. You will have probably have trouble imagining a number so large, so Hugh Ross provides us with the following example. If all the matter in the Universe was converted into building blocks of life, and if assembly of these building blocks were attempted once a microsecond for the entire age of the universe. Then instead of the odds being 1 in 10^100,000,000,000, they would be 1 in 10^99,999,999,916 http://members.tripod.com/~Black_J/chance.html Harold Joseph Morowitz was an American biophysicist who studied the application of thermodynamics to living systems. Author of numerous books and articles, his work includes technical monographs as well as essays. The origin of life was his primary research interest for more than fifty years.

bornagain77

LoL! @ Bob O'H- There isn't any science that shows abiogenesis is possible! There isn't any evidence it is feasible. ET

Its great to know now you believe in Resurrection , as you now say (to cover yourself )that the dead can be raised it seems now nothing is impossible any more there is no natural and supernatural as you can get life from non life you can raise the dead .Pick a position stop trying to be so non committal so you cannot be found out. Marfin

Marfin - sorry, I've been busy in the real world. We have science to tell us that walking on water and raising from the dead is not possible (OK, you can walk on water with the right footwear, and I guess it might be possible to raise someone from the dead if they're only mostly dead, so there is no decomposition, but I don't know at what point it would be impossible). I don't know of any science that analyses abiogenesis and shows it is impossible. Bob O'H

I see neither Peter Kimbridge, B.B ,or B o H took a stab at answering my question at 24 now why is that? is the miracle of raising someone from the dead any more miraculous that getting life to arise from non life but why do some people believe one and not the other. I became a christian not because I wanted to but because when questions like this were put to me I was honest enough to change my beliefs , based on the evidence , so I put it to our three friends do you have an answer and if not has you position changed in the slightest or are your worldviews that important to you that even evidence wont change them. Marfin

Dear Bob O'H? Once again, you dodged the question The question was: Why don't you accept the Creationist Law of Biogenesis as a Settled scientific law? I hope you agree that all empirical evidence shows that life comes only from life. That evidence includes the everyday observations of all human beings. And it is powerfully reinforced by the failure of a huge international effort over four generations by the world's top scientists to demonstrate the origin of life from non living chemicals. Yet Pasteur's law, "Life comes only from life" is obviously false. because empirical evidence also shows that the universe once had no life, yet here on earth, it is all around us today. So where did the first life come from? Indeed, that is perhaps the greatest question in science, and one that cries for an explanation. What is the exception to Pasteur's law that answers that question? In the total absence of any evidence of a naturalistic explanation, a supernatural explanation becomes the only rational explanation which is supported by the known facts (e.g. John 2:1-12) . Hence the Creationist Law of Biogenesis: “Absent Divine Intervention, life comes only from life” The Creationist Law certainly meets the requirements of a settled scientific law. 1) It is supported by massive amounts of empirical evidence. 2) It is falsifiable in principle. 3) But it has never been falsified, in spite of serious efforts to do so. Us Creationists, we acknowledge that scientists, some day in the future, may falsify the Creationist Law, by making life out of chemicals. Just as that scientists , some day in the future, may falsify the Second Law of Thermodynamics, by building a perpetual motion machine (and some groups of scientists are trying to do just that). But currently the Second Law is the settled science, and thus logically the Creationist law is currently the settled science too. So once again, could you explain why the Creationist Law is not a settled scientific law? I mean, which of the 3 criteria does it not meet? chris haynes

No Bob, there isn't any evidence that life can spontaneously arise. As a matter of fact your side doesn't have any positive evidence at all. ET

Bob o H - Any chance you might answer the question I proposed at 24 . Marfin

Chris Haynes -

I asked why they don’t the accept the Creationist law of Biogenesis, “Absent Divine Intervention, life comes only from life”, as a settled scientific law. It certainly meets the requirements of a settled scientific law. 1) It is supported by massive amounts of empirical evidence. 2) It is falsifiable in principle. 3) But it has never been falsified, in spite of serious efforts to do so.

What empirical is there? Do we have systems with Divine Intervention where life has spontaneously arisen, and others without where it has not? Bob O'H

Peter Kimbridge, Brother Brian - Can I assume neither of you believe its possible to raise someone from the dead,or walk on water , but you do believe life arose from non life , can either of you please explain why you might hold to one and reject the other. Marfin

Surprise surprise Our naturalist friends dodged the question. I asked why they don't the accept the Creationist law of Biogenesis, "Absent Divine Intervention, life comes only from life", as a settled scientific law. It certainly meets the requirements of a settled scientific law. 1) It is supported by massive amounts of empirical evidence. 2) It is falsifiable in principle. 3) But it has never been falsified, in spite of serious efforts to do so. And of course, they got no answer. Some good smokescreens though. chris haynes

...and then I read the recent (today) Ann Gauger post, where she writes, >'One thing Dr. X said stuck in my brain. He said, “We will find marvelous things in biology because nature is very inventive. But one thing we will never find is a wheel.”' Changed your mind yet, Dr. X? EDTA

Pater @ 16, >Isn’t it dishonest to ask for a demonstration that you know you would not accept? It's a very common debate tactic, to ask the other side a hard question, and then when it is answered, just move on to another objection. EDTA

LoL! @ Pater. You are not even wrong!. As I said, it would be a start and then you whittle away at intelligent agency involvement. And if they succeeded by using purely synthetic parts- ie not taken from existing organisms- it would demonstrate that a basic living organism is indeed reducible to physics and chemistry. That is a prediction borne from your side, not ID. So the experiment would have positive implications for you and negative implications for ID. But I don't expect you to grasp any of that... ET

@ET says "That would be a start, anyway..." Thanks for proving me right. Pater Kimbridge

Pater Kimbridge:

And if they did succeed, you would say “But it took all these scientists mixing chemicals in just the right way to achieve it. That only shows that designers are required.”

That would be a start, anyway. Then you would whittle away scientist involvement. But it is always better to whine instead of having to ante up and support your position's claims.

Isn’t it dishonest to ask for a demonstration that you know you would not accept?

It's definitely dishonest to pretend to know what someone else will or won't accept. But whatever it takes to avoid supporting the claims of your position. And of course Brian would agree with Pater. Brian loves to tell other people what they are thinking. It's pure desperation. ET

PK

Isn’t it dishonest to ask for a demonstration that you know you would not accept?

Thank you Captain Obvious. :) Brother Brian

@Chris Haynes #15 said "To falsify the Creationist Law, all you got to do is make a living organism out of chemicals in a lab. And if they did succeed, you would say "But it took all these scientists mixing chemicals in just the right way to achieve it. That only shows that designers are required." Isn't it dishonest to ask for a demonstration that you know you would not accept? Pater Kimbridge

Want to falsify Creationism? Here's how: Just falsify the Creationist Law of Biogenesis. (It encompasses all empirical evidence regarding the origin of life) "Absent Divine Intervention, life comes only from life." To falsify the Creationist Law, all you got to do is make a living organism out of chemicals in a lab. But, for almost 100 years, the world's top scientists, including several Nobel prize winners, have been trying to falsify the Creationist Law. Their results? Failure. Regarding Scientific Laws..... A statement becomes a "Settled" scientific law (such as the law of conservation of energy) when it is 1)supported by massive amounts of empirical evidence, 2) falsifiable in principle, 3) but has never been falsified, in spite of serious efforts to do so. Now a question for our naturalist friends: Isn't the Creationist Law of Biogenesis a Settled scientific law? And if not, why not? chris haynes

The Darwinists preach with no actual evidence and venomous attacks on anyone that dares move a single toe outside of the cult. There are constants in the universe that they deny are constants. Every mathematical formula that will be discovered is already there. It's just waiting for the right person to come along and discover it. Where did the math come from? BobRyan

>I am referring here, not to a version of intelligent design that claims that the world was created 6000 years ago just as we find it today YECs don't even claim that the world is in the exact same shape today as right after the moment of creation...I find this is a very common misunderstanding among those criticizing ID/creationism/etc. EDTA

ID is based on three premises and the inference that follows (DeWolf et al., Darwinism, Design and Public Education, pg. 92):

1) High information content (or specified complexity) and irreducible complexity constitute strong indicators or hallmarks of (past) intelligent design. 2) Biological systems have a high information content (or specified complexity) and utilize subsystems that manifest irreducible complexity. 3) Naturalistic mechanisms or undirected causes do not suffice to explain the origin of information (specified complexity) or irreducible complexity. 4) Therefore, intelligent design constitutes the best explanations for the origin of information and irreducible complexity in biological systems.

Those are the core concepts of ID and to falsify Intelligent Design all one has to do is demonstrate that natural selection can produce irreducibly complex biological systems and/ or high information content (CSI). You have to be willfully ignorant or very hostile to ID to say that ID is not falsifiable. :razz: ET

seversky:

What we do know is that science in general and biology in particular have been under sustained attack by the ID/creationist movement for decades..

We know that is a lie. It is clear that all the anti-IDists can do is lie and whine. Typical but still pathetic ET

Brother Brian:

This is a false promise as ID is not falsifiable.

Then it is strange that IDists have said exactly what would falsify ID. Who should we believe- ID experts or clueless anti-IDists on an agenda?

Even if we could experimentally show that self-replicating information carrying molecules could be produced without intelligent intervention, that does not falsify ID.

That depends on how much information those replicators contain

Even if we could unequivocally demonstrate that new body forms could be produced by natural selection acting on heritable variation, this wouldn’t falsify ID.

If you could unequivocally demonstrate that natural selection- which includes heritable random variation/ mutation- could produce the genetic toolkit required for developmental biology, ID as we know it, would be falsified. So again Brian offers up lip service without any substance ET

Beyond provability and falsifiability, there is the actual Darwinist vs ID debate. Some ID researchers work to demonstrate the limitations of Darwinian mechanisms (random variation plus natural selection) for generating new features, functions and genetic information. This work does not "falsify" Darwinism, but does serve to severely limit it, and to estimate the level of improbability for anything significantly new arising by it. Other ID researchers examine all the mechanisms that have been conceived for generating vast amounts of coded information, and then argue to the best explanation for its provenance in biology, which then always points to a "mind" of some sort in the absence of other credible candidates, and hence, to ID in some form or other. The combination of a) Darwinism does not work for what is claimed of it, and b) vast amounts of coded information always proceed from an intelligence, taken together then shift the "most likely explanation" from Darwinism (in some form) to intelligent design (in some form). The fact that most Darwinists do not accept this result does not affect the result itself. Fasteddious

I don't see anything objectionable in Bergner's position. We recognize the existence of design in the universe because we do it, Thus far we don't know of any extraterrestrial intelligence that can do the same but neither can we rule them out. We don't know if an intelligent agent of some sort started life on Earth or created the Universe but we can't rule such out either.. What we do know is that science in general and biology in particular have been under sustained attack by the ID/creationist movement for decades.. They have attempted to have some version of ID and/or creationism inserted into high school biology curricula in the US and taught as if they were theories of equal standing in science to evolution. There is evidence from a survey of high school science teachers the some are actually teaching creationism as the preferred explanation for life on Earth in spite of legal and Constitutional impediments. In that context, while I disagree with the critical comments Bergner quotes, I can understand their defensiveness. Seversky

BA77

Falsify Intelligent Design and become a multi-millionaire

This is a false promise as ID is not falsifiable. Even if we could experimentally show that self-replicating information carrying molecules could be produced without intelligent intervention, that does not falsify ID. Even if we could unequivocally demonstrate that new body forms could be produced by natural selection acting on heritable variation, this wouldn’t falsify ID. Brother Brian

bornagain77- that is all some evil Creationist conspiracy. We don't even know if this Perry Marshall exists. Has anyone ever seen him with any of the other guys you mentioned? :) Or wait, it isn't a "real" ten million dollars. Has anyone seen it and counted it? Where is it being held? :) OK if those don't work they will just keep changing the game and the definition of "code". Yeah, that's the ticket. :) So why should anyone even bother? ET

Falsify Intelligent Design and become a multi-millionaire - video - Official Natural Code Prize - Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNF2c3i6eJo And this recent article from the Financial Times - Entrepreneurs offer $10m prize for cracking mystery of DNA - June 2, 2019 Scientists challenged to create genetic code from simple chemicals Excerpt: Wealthy investors are offering a $10m prize to the first scientific team that can create a genetic code from simple chemicals — reproducing the unknown process that led billions of years ago to DNA as the vehicle for transmitting information in life on Earth. The Evolution 2.0 prize is an initiative by Perry Marshall, an online marketing entrepreneur based in Chicago. It will be judged by prominent scientists, including George Church, genetics professor at Harvard university, and Denis Noble, the Oxford university biologist who was the first to model the human heart on a computer.,,, Other backers of the prize include marketing businessman Robert Skrob, investment manager Gary Klopfenstein and serial entrepreneur Jon Correll. Their involvement is not purely altruistic. The full $10m will only be awarded for a patentable coding system, which the prize sponsors will attempt to commercialise in partnership with the winner. https://www.ft.com/content/dcb2ea12-83c8-11e9-9935-ad75bb96c849 bornagain77

Bob O'H:

Indeed. the ID crowd propose that some things are best explained as being intelligantly designed. So why not try to falsify that hypothesis.

Dr. Behe perused the scientific literature trying to falsify the claims of ID. He failed to find any such evidence. It appears no one knows how to test the claim that blind and mindless processes could produce any bacterial flagellum. And to falsify ID all one has to do is demonstrate that blind and mindless processes are capable of producing what ID says was intelligently designed. ET

Seems to me that the choice of design vs random can be given an easy Popper test.

Indeed. the ID crowd propose that some things are best explained as being intelligantly designed. So why not try to falsify that hypothesis. Note that showing that there is an alternative hypothesis is not a falsification (because of overdetermination). Bob O'H

Eminently sensible. Seems to me that the choice of design vs random can be given an easy Popper test. The hypothesis that all this stuff came about randomly is instantly falsifiable. The billions of Both Must Happen First situations disprove randomness easily and logically. The presence of a designing intelligence can't be proved, but Popper doesn't require the other side to be proved. When one side of a binary is falsified, the opposite side is generally considered to be a usable theory. polistra

A good and very fair-minded, objective little essay. I wonder how Bergner's career is doing lately. I hope he has tenure. With his heresies he almost certainly awoke the rage of the Darwinist theocracy. No doubt the Darwinist faithful console themselves that the scientific greats like Newton, Einstein and Maxwell referred to by Bergner were just men of their time, their minds clouded by superstitious religious notions. doubter