Darwinian Debating Device #11: “The Straw Man”
| October 17, 2014 | Posted by Barry Arrington under Darwinian Debating Devices |
Update: We are republishing this post under the Darwinian Debating Devices series
The Straw Man tactic is especially reprehensible, because it is fundamentally dishonest. Wikipedia describes the tactic as follows
A straw man is a common type of argument and is an informal fallacy based on the misrepresentation of an opponent’s argument. To be successful, a straw man argument requires that the audience be ignorant or uninformed of the original argument. The so-called typical “attacking a straw man” argument creates the illusion of having completely refuted or defeated an opponent’s proposition by covertly replacing it with a different proposition (i.e., “stand up a straw man”) and then to refute or defeat that false argument (“knock down a straw man”) instead of the original proposition
In this post we took down a straw man argument by a self-described “biochemist.” Note how he misrepresents ID theory and knocks over his misrepresentation instead of the real thing.
I want to thank okfanriffic for participating here at UD, not because he has advanced the ID/Materialist debate one iota, but because his behavior is a classic example of a social pathology I have observed many times over the years and gives me an opportunity to comment on it.
Okfanriffic describes himself as a “biochemist.” I am willing to take him at his word. I assume one does not become a biochemist without a firm grounding in science in general and biology in particular. Great! Here’s someone who can challenge us I thought. Sadly, I was mistaken. Far from presenting the least challenge, okfanriffic’s posts have never risen above the “ID is religion in disguise” red herring, and he did not even advance that trope very well. His level of debate never rises above the condescending, mocking and sloganeering/talking point level, as these examples demonstrate:
all science is doing is uncovering how your god did its magic
If it is successful we will understand biochemistry at a fundamental level. If it isn’t then it is evidence for your gods
there is no thunder god and yahweh didn’t put the rainbow in the sky nor is it a bridge to valhalla
Either we are here because of natural processes or because of magic
you are all super special and yahweh/allah/krishna etc loves you
your god loves you and that is all that matters or do you have something to say on the chemical basis of life?
nothing you ####wits say supports belief in magic. is there anyone out there who thinks that “then the lord god formed a man from the dust of the ground” etc Is that the origin of life?
So is it magic or nature.? If it is magic which magician is it? Allah, brahma or jahweh (or maybe odin pr lugh?)
did a god form man from dust or can life be explained by natural processes? is anyone out there brave enough to defend the biblical account of creation
so what is it? natural processes or god magic?
i’m still waiting for someone to admit their belief in magic. . . . come on guys did your god form us from dust or is it chemistry and evolution?
Anybody willing to admit their belief in magic? Go on guys, defend the biblical story
you love jesus and you don’t want to live in a universe where you can’t go to heaven and see grandma and grandpa
Sigh. Okfanriffic, you might as well have said “neener neener neener you poopyheads!” The level of maturity is about the same. I expected more from a “biochemist.” Commentator Barb mirrored my own feelings when she wrote:
Here I was hoping you’d actually drop some science on me and show me where evolution comes into play. But instead you hide back under your bridge. Disappointing, really. I expected better from you.
This is all so disappointing, because all okfanriffic has to do to utterly destroy the ID movement in one fell swoop is demonstrate (or point us to someone who has demonstrated) how unguided natural forces could have generated the information systems and irreducibly complex nano-structures inside every cell. Go ahead OK — drop that science bomb on us. Put us out of our misguided blinkered misery.
Presumably, as a biochemist he, of all people, would know how to make (or point to) such a demonstration if it existed. You would think he would drop a science bomb on us, but you’d be wrong. All he seems capable of is mocking, scoffing and condescending. He apparently fails to realize that he is actually strengthening the ID case. It just occurred to me that perhaps he is a fundamentalist Christian shilling as a Darwinist in order to bring dispute on it.
Be that as it may, I will address his three most fundamental errors.
A. False Dichotomy/Straw Man 1
Okfanriffic’s first false dichotomy is represented by the following: “did a god form man from dust or can life be explained by natural processes? is anyone out there brave enough to defend the biblical account of creation.”
It should be obvious to anyone with the least grounding in ID theory that ID as such does not address scripture, much less attempt to defend a particular interpretation of Genesis. Accordingly, one of two things appears to be true: (1) okfanriffic does not have the least grounding in ID theory, and his false dichotomy is the result of ignorance; (2) okfanriffic does have a grounding in ID theory, and he had mendaciously misrepresented the theory and erected a straw man in its stead.
Nether (1) nor (2) reflects well on okfanriffic.
B. False Dichotomy/Straw Man 2
Over and over like a mantra (which often, as in this case, seems to substitute for critical thought) okfanriffic asks: “Which is it, God magic or natural forces?” Let me demonstrate how even okfanriffic should admit this is a false dichotomy through several statements he should agree with.
1. Materialists believe that unguided natural forces can account for the origin of life (OOL).
2. Therefore, no designer was necessary to initiate the information systems and irreducibly complex nano-structures inside every cell.
3. Life can be reduced to chemistry and physics.
4. No intelligent guidance, much less a miracle, is necessary to explain life.
5. In principle, sufficiently advanced technology can replicate the creation of life.
6. If sufficiently advanced technology were to replicate the creation of life, it would not involve God or magic.
Now if okfanriffic agrees with these six statements, it follows as a matter of simple logic that his “God/magic or natural forces” dichotomy – the underlying premise of which is that those are the only two choices – is a false dichotomy. There is a least one more choice – advanced technology. So his allusion to “magic” is exposed as a strawman caricature of ID.
C. Category Error
In his scornful mocking okfanriffic mentions the following: thunder god, Yahweh, allah, Krishna, brahma, odin, prlugh
He has made a glaring category error by lumping the God of the three great monotheistic faiths in with other “gods.” As David Bentley Hart explains in The Experience of God: Being, Consciousness, Bliss
according to the classical metaphysical traditions of both the East and West, God is the unconditioned cause of reality – of absolutely everything that is – from the beginning to the end of time. Understood in this way, one can’t even say that God “exists” in the sense that my car or Mount Everest or electrons exist. God is what grounds the existence of every contingent thing, making it possible, sustaining it through time, unifying it, giving it actuality. God is the condition of the possibility of anything existing at all.
Properly understood, the God of the monotheistic faiths is not like the gods in the Greek, Norse or Indian pantheons – contingent creatures all. He is pure being that is the source of all being. To lump him in with Odin demonstrates that you understand neither God nor Odin. Let me leave you with some advice okfanriffic. Before you comment in a subject area you should make some effort to understand it; otherwise you run a great risk of looking like a buffoon (a risk that has, sadly, fallen in on you in the comments quoted above). All I’m asking you to do okfanriffic is read a book. Your displays of ignorance and bigotry are embarrassing.
31 Responses to Darwinian Debating Device #11: “The Straw Man”
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Reading some of the comments from the “biochemist”, couldn’t help but notice that the “biochemist” displayed some emotional biochemical reactions when challenged by the big minds at UD.
UD-Said this before, will say it again, you have excellent posts here along with some great minds like KF,BA77,Q,BA,VJT and others like them that comment here. Their conversations are intellectually stimulating, always, every time. Kudos!
Thank you Joe and BA, not for advancing any intelligent conversations one iota, but for solidifying my conception of UD and the idea it supports as a complete joke. Your behavior is a classic example of the ignorance and misunderstanding I have observed many times over the years. Its unfortunate that people actually believe the stuff you post, but oh well, the world needs ditch-diggers too I guess.
Sayonara guys, it’s been fun. <3
It is interesting that atheists/materialists, such as AVS, would appeal to a ‘decrease in entropy’ as the creator of all life on Earth since a ‘decrease in entropy’ is, by far, the most finely tuned of initial conditions of the universe that gives overwhelming evidence for God:
This number is simply gargantuan beyond comprehension. If this number were written out in its entirety, 1 with 10^123 zeros to the right, it could not be written on a piece of paper the size of the entire visible universe, even if a number were written down on each sub-atomic particle in the entire universe, since the universe only has 10^80 sub-atomic particles in it. Contemplating what is possible with such a gargantuan 1 in 10^10^123 possibility, we find that it is immensely more likely that a brain would ‘spontaneously fluctuate into existence’ than it is that we have parents and exist in an orderly universe with a 13.7 billion-year history.
Thus, when atheists/materialists appeal to a ‘decrease in entropy’ to explain the origin of life, they are unwittingly appealing to something that is one of the most powerful evidences for the existence of God. OOPS 🙂
It is also very interesting to note that Ludwig Boltzmann, an atheist, when he linked entropy and probability, did not, as Max Planck, a Christian Theist, points out in the following link, think to look for a constant for entropy:
I hold that the primary reason why Boltzmann, an atheist, never thought to carry out, or even propose, a precise measurement for the constant on entropy is that he, as an atheist, had thought he had arrived at the ultimate ‘random’ explanation for how everything in the universe operates and originated when he had link probability with entropy. i.e. In linking entropy with probability, Boltzmann, again an atheist, thought he had explained everything that happens in the universe to a ‘random’ chance basis. To him, as an atheist, I hold that it would simply be unfathomable for him to conceive that the ‘random chance’ (probabilistic) events of entropy in the universe should ever be constrained by a constant that would limit their effects. Whereas on the contrary, to a Christian Theist, such as Planck, it is expected that even these seemingly random entropic events of the universe should be bounded by a constant. In fact modern science was born out of such thinking:
Verse and Music:
Supplemental notes:
That consciousness did not ‘emerge’ from the entropic forces of the universe is perhaps most easily demonstrated by the ‘Quantum Zeno effect:
i.e. Why in blue blazes should conscious observation put a freeze on entropic decay, unless consciousness was/is more foundational to reality than entropy is? And seeing that entropy is VERY foundational to explaining events within space-time, I think the implications are fairly obvious that consciousness precedes the 1 in 10^10^123 entropy of the universe!
Wow, BA, I knew you’d humor me with a response. You’re not even coming out of left field with that one though, you’re coming out of the parking lot and going in the opposite direction. I didn’t attribute a decrease in entropy as “the creator of life on Earth,” I was simply referring to the decrease in entropy as the first steps toward the generation of life. And this, as I said was driven by the constant energy input by the sun. Earth provided the right conditions and the sun provided the energy, the decrease in entropy that is the generation of life was inevitable.
Just another of example of you completely misunderstanding, misrepresenting, or completely missing the point.
Oh well, back to the real world for me, toodaloo.
Reductionist Paradox for biochemist:
1.) Actions of the mind (i.e. – psychology, reason, philosophy, analysis, cognition, etc.) are explained by biology
2.) Biology is explained by chemistry
3.) Chemistry is explained by physics
4.) Physics is explained by its constituent laws and particles
5.) Laws and particles are explained by actions of the mind
6.) repeat 1-5
There is no fundamental basic, as even our hopeful reductionism, whether employed by Randian Objectivists or Naturalists, runs circles unresolved. It is a vexing annoyance, but real. Labeling the mind as illusory does not untie this knot.
In fact, no matter how many times I run through this, it seems that intelligence must be the most basic fundamental in the universe, not matter.
The mischaracterization of “naturalist versus mystic” must be replaced by “panbosonist versus intelligentist.”
AVS:
Hmmm . . . This sounds a lot like the old “open system” red herring. Also, presumably you aren’t really suggesting that the “generation of life was inevitable”?
AVS @2:
LOL. Your opinion matters because of what again?
PS. Please, don’t say goodbye. We know you can’t resist the pleasure of throwing feces over the fence.
Eric @ 6: “presumably you aren’t really suggesting that the ‘generation of life was inevitable’?”
No, that is exactly what AVS is suggesting. In the prior post AVS said:
Gobsmacking I know. But there ya go. AVS’s formula for life: Take one measure of lifeless matter; add lots and lots of energy from the sun, and, voilà, life. It’s just that easy. Don’t bother him by asking him for any of those pesky details. It’s as easy as making sun tea.
I think a repost of Dr. Sewell’s new video is fitting, seeing as how much pain he has endured from atheists for refusing to back down from the ‘common sense law of physics’:
New video based on Granville Sewell’s 2013 Biocomplexity paper
Evolution and Entropy – Granville Sewell – video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMHzFoOcdFA
Barry @8:
I see.
Take the failed “open system” argument and then push it to its most outrageous and logical extrapolation. OOL solved!
ROFLMAO!
Barry, what is your definition of a “fundamentalist” Christian?
People throw around this word a lot and I’m interested to know how you would actually define this word.
So, since you used it, what exactly do you mean by it?
And why is it that you particularly think a FUNDAMENTALIST Christian, as opposed to any other person/Christian might possibly be behind this?
Thanks.
tjguy writes:
Fair questions all, TJ. Astoundingly, given its oft-noted leftist bias, Wikipedia has a fairly decent article describing North American Christian Fundamentalism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.....ristianity
I don’t necessarily agree with everything in the article, but it hits the high points fairly well.
Why did I use it in this context? Based on what he has written on these pages, I would surmise that okfanriffic hates theists in general, Christians in particular, and fundamentalists especially, because their worldview is diametrical to his. So I was going for irony when I suggested he might be one.
OK, thanks Barry. I guess I was more interested in how you were using the word than what Wikipedia thinks it is. You said you were using it for irony so I guess that means you were not really serious.
OKF & AVS:
The fundamental challenge remains: show, based on empirical observation, the blind watchmaker forces — chance plus mechanical necessity — origin of functionally specific complex organisation and/or associated information (FSCO/I).
OKF, let’s specifically focus on the biochem nodes and arcs framework involved in metabolic activity in the cell, e.g. cf. here. The empirically backed account of its spontaneous origin is _______, achieved by ___________, and it is widely acknowledged to be sound because ________ .
AVS, let’s specifically focus on the origin of a metabolising, von Neumann self-replicating living cell, e.g. cf. the outline I raise here in context. The empirically backed account of its spontaneous origin is _______, achieved by ___________, and it is widely acknowledged to be sound because ________ .
Likewise AVS, in light of considerations outlined here and onwards, just how does open system thermodynamics in a warm little pond or the like enable and empirically ground — as in, passing the vera causa test of showing actual capability on credible current observations — the claim that:
KF
Re OKF, 83 prev:
Let’s start with a light switch in a circuit. (Cf. my basic intro to computers here, part of an under development intro to computing course.)
It can be observed to have two states, leading to the conclusion that its info storage capacity is 1 binary digit, one bit for short. Chain eight of these or equivalent two-state elements, and the number of possible states is now 2 * 2 * . . .* 2 = 2^8, hence using Shannon’s basic log metric, eight bits. This stores the quantity of info in one line of a typical memory register, and is often used to store one ASCII character (which strictly uses seven bits, but a parity check leads to eight).
In short, it can be fairly easily shown that info carrying capacity is objective, observable and measurable, indeed this is foundational to the ICT era we are now embarked upon.
As for the difference between functionally specific, complex info and that which fails to function, there are many ways to show that such is observable and/or measurable too. As a simple exercise, create a blank Word 97, .doc, document. Inspect it with a suitable application, and at whim change or delete a character or few at random. Close same, leaving its .doc format alone. Try to re-open as a Word file, almost certainly a change in that seemingly emptily repetitious string of characters will cause functional failure.
And so forth.
In short, OKF, with all due respect to what you may know of Biochemistry, you are here quite plainly publicly exhibiting ill informed sophomoric dismissiveness based on want of basic familiarity with what I would teach in a first class or two in digital electronics or intro to computers, much less info theory. This is not advisable. I suggest you get a copy of Taub and Schilling on Principles of Communication Systems, or F R Connor’s wonderful series of short works on T/comms topics [which I so fondly recall enjoying learning from], or the like.
I need not go into the blatant contempt and bigotry targetting Christians, save to point here on in context, to see a 101 level grounding on what it is that is so viscerally despised.
KF
We can thank AVS for being a clueless moron and for not not understanding science. He is a classic example of bloviation, cowardicr and ignorance only seen in evolutionists.
Unfortunately, Okfanriffic’s making fun of the spiritual side of life is all too common among atheists. Although not nearly as overt as Okfanriffic’s comments that Mr. Arrington highlighted in the OP, many atheists I have encountered have just about the same attitude as Okfanriffic expressed so bluntly. Perhaps they think if they just make fun of the spiritual side of life that it will go away?!? Is this irrational reaction born out of fear of the unknown or some other cause? Perhaps a bad encounter with a religious type? I don’t exactly know what it is that drives such irrational and immature reactions from atheists, but I do know, after much study, that this is not a game! i.e. There truly is a ‘spiritual side of life’ that needs to be taken seriously. Very Seriously! Ignoring it and making fun of it certainly will not make it go away as atheists pretend that it will.
Perhaps, the easiest way to get the reality of this ‘spiritual side of life’ across to the ‘scientific atheist’ is to show him that he himself could not practice science unless he had a spiritual nature that is transcendent of his material nature:
Science, indeed rational thought itself, is dependent on a perspective outside the material order! This is certainly VERY strong evidence that man has within himself a ‘mind/soul’ that is not the same thing as his temporal material body. In keeping with this line of thought, here are six properties of the mind that are not properties of the brain. Thus, in keeping with the law of identity, the mind is not same thing as the brain:
Alvin Plantinga has a humorous way of getting this point across
Though not nearly as ‘logical’ as the preceding proof for the existence of the mind/soul, the following video is none-the-less very effective for highlighting the reality of ‘the spiritual side of life’. Although the girl in the video was written off as hopelessly retarded by almost everyone who saw her except by her loving father who somehow knew that his little girl was trapped inside that dysfunctional body, reveals that there was/is indeed a gentle intelligence, a “me”, a “soul’, within the girl that was/is unable to express herself properly to others because of her neurological disorder.
Almost as moving are the cases of hemispherectomy where, due to incurable epileptic conditions, half of the brain is removed from a child:
And of course then there are the millions of reported cases of Near Death Experiences:
There is now even ‘scientific’ evidence for a transcendent component to man that is not reducible to a material basis:
All in all, there is a very compelling case that man indeed has a transcendent component to his makeup that is very real and is not part of his material makeup. A ‘spiritual’ component to himself that certainly will not ‘go away’ simply by making fun of it and ridiculing it as many atheists seem to think it will.
But to drive the seriousness of this ‘spiritual’ situation home, and to hopefully get some ‘scientific atheists’ to stop trying to ignore this very important aspect of their lives, it is important to note that modern science has revealed two very different eternities to us.
In Theism, particularly Christian Theism, it is held there are two ultimate destinies for our eternal souls. Heaven or Hell! And in physics we find two very different ‘eternities’ just as Theism has held for millenia. One eternity in physics is found ‘if’ a hypothetical observer were to accelerate to the speed of light. In this scenario time, as we understand it, would come to a complete stop for the hypothetical observer. To grasp the whole ‘time coming to a complete stop at the speed of light’ concept a little more easily, imagine moving away from the face of a clock at the speed of light. Would not the hands on the clock stay stationary as you moved away from the face of the clock at the speed of light? Moving away from the face of a clock at the speed of light happens to be the same ‘thought experiment’ that gave Einstein his breakthrough insight into e=mc2.
Some may think that time, as we understand it, coming to a complete stop at the speed of light is pure science fiction, but, as incredible as it sounds, Einstein’s infamous thought experiment has many lines of evidence now supporting it.
This following confirmation of time dilation is my favorite since they have actually caught time dilation on film
(of note: light travels approximately 1 foot in a nanosecond (billionth of a second) whilst the camera used in the experiment takes a trillion pictures a second):
This higher dimension, ‘eternal’, inference for the time framework of light is also warranted, by logic, because light is not ‘frozen within time’, i.e. light appears to move to us in our temporal framework of time, yet it is shown that time, as we understand it, does not pass for light. The only way this is possible is if light is indeed of a higher dimensional value of time than our temporal time is otherwise it would simply be ‘frozen in time’. Another line of evidence that supports the inference that ‘tomorrow can exist simultaneously with today and yesterday’, at the ‘eternal’ speed of light, is visualizing what would happen if a hypothetical observer were to approach the speed of light. Please note, at the 3:22 minute mark of the following video, when the 3-Dimensional world ‘folds and collapses’ into a tunnel shape as a ‘hypothetical’ observer moves towards the ‘higher dimension’ of the speed of light, (Of note: This following video was made by two Australian University Physics Professors with a supercomputer.).
Moreover, we have ‘observational’ evidence that corroborates what our physics is telling us in that people who have had deep Judeo-Christian Near Death Experiences (NDEs) report both ‘eternity’ and traveling through the tunnel to a higher dimension:
Moreover, as with special relativity, in General Relativity we find that temporal time slows down the further down in a gravitational well a person is:
As well, as with any observer accelerating to the speed of light, it is found that for any ‘hypothetical’ observer falling to the event horizon of a black hole, that time, as we understand it, will come to a complete stop for them. This is because the accelerative force of gravity at black holes is so intense that not even light can escape its grip:
But of particular interest to the ‘eternal framework’ found for General Relativity at black holes;… It is interesting to note that entropic decay (Randomness/Chaos), which is the primary reason why things grow old and eventually die in this universe, is found to be greatest at black holes. Thus the ‘eternity of time’ at black holes can rightly be described as ‘eternities of decay and/or eternities of destruction’.
i.e. Black Holes are found to be ‘timeless’ singularities of destruction and disorder rather than singularities of creation and order such as the extreme order we see at the creation event of the Big Bang. Needless to say, the implications of this ‘eternity of destruction’ should be fairly disturbing for those of us who are of a ‘spiritually minded’ persuasion!
Moreover, Gravity, despite intense effort by many brilliant minds,,,,
,,,despite all this effort, Gravity still refuses to be unified with Quantum Mechanics (which should not be all that surprising given Godel’s incompleteness theorem). In light of this dilemma that the two very different eternities present to us spiritually minded people, and the fact that Gravity is, in so far as we can tell, completely incompatible with Quantum Mechanics, it is interesting to point out a subtle nuance on the Shroud of Turin. Namely that Gravity was overcome in the resurrection event of Christ:
Moreover, as would be expected if Gravity and Quantum Mechanics were truly unified in the resurrection event of Jesus Christ, the image on the Shroud of Turin was formed by a quantum process not by a classical process:
Verse and Music:
I like KF’s challenge @14. Here’s the one I’ve offered on more than one occasion, in case AVS comes back calling or wants to engage substantively on OOL, rather than just trolling. Note that AVS has referred vaguely to but one aspect (energy), without taking into account any other requirements (and this is by no means a comprehensive list).
—–
I’m willing to grant you all the amino acids you want. I’ll even give them all to you in a non-racemic mixture. You want them all left-handed? No problem. I’ll also grant you the exact relative mixture of the specific amino acids you want (what percentage do you want of glycine, alanine, arganine, etc.?). I’ll further give you just the right concentration to encourage optimum reaction. I’m also willing to give you the most benign and hospitable environment you can possibly imagine for your fledgling structures to form (take your pick of the popular ideas: volcanic vents, hydrothermal pools, mud globules, tide pools, deep sea hydrothermal vents, cometary clouds in space . . . whichever environment you want). I’ll even throw in whatever type of energy source you want in true Goldilocks fashion: just the right amount to facilitate the chemical reactions; not too much to destroy the nascent formations. I’ll further spot you that all these critical conditions occur in the same location spatially. And at the same time temporally. Shoot, as a massive bonus I’ll even step in to prevent contaminating cross reactions. I’ll also miraculously make your fledgling chemical structures immune from their natural rate of breakdown so you can keep them around as long as you want.
Every single one of the foregoing items represents a huge challenge and a significant open question to the formation of life, but I’m willing to grant them all.
Now, with all these concessions, what do you think the next step is?
Go ahead, what is your theory about how life forms?
‘All in all, there is a very compelling case that man indeed has a transcendent component to his makeup that is very real and is not part of his material makeup.’
That’s a more important distinction than perhaps you intended, BA, since you’ve been explaining for a good while now, how all matter has a transcendant component – those non-local photons!
Nicely stated all. Here’s my perspective:
The issue with OKF and AVS is not one of knowledge or interpretation, although AVS seems to have much more than OKF. The issue is the apparent petrification of their thought processes. They cannot seem to use reason and intellectual flexibility to evaluate new information.
This is not meant to be disrespectful, but in a research or academic environment where the rate of discovery seems to be accelerating, all they offer is a sort of bureaucratic rigidity that’s antithetical to scientific progress.
It’s a pity, and something that they could remedy if they wanted to.
The arrogant, vituperative, and dismissive attitude is another, more spiritual matter that reflects poorly on anyone regardless of their beliefs.
-Q
I agree with Eric and KF.
I was once debating a materialist much like AVS, and he kept hitting me with how it had been shown that this particular compound could come into existence, or that particular compound could be found … in a prebiotic environment, or on the head of a comet, or available at a deep thermal vent, etc.
So I granted every single compound he was so breathlessly excited to argue “could be found” in order to jump start life.
Then I asked much the same question Eric does – What now?
Given stones materialistic processes can’t build Stonehenge(s). I bet the macromolecules capable of replication and evolution are more complex than Stonehenge.
What now? Well, they would look for the next step, perhaps another compound that could be shown is not impossible and therefore “musta” happened.
All you need to do is show two or three of these steps, and then you can extrapolate the next billion billion of them to form the first self-reproducing, self-sustaining life as we know it.
Of course, that the same logic could be used to rationalize the natural origin of a bicycle doesn’t seem to bother them.
It would be fun to create an OOL mythology involving hot volcanic pools, iron ore, cracks in crystalline joints forming natural molds into which the molten metal could flow. Of course, the process would stop at the point of internal metabolism and self replication, but the bicycle is profoundly simpler than a living cell, so there must have been some naturally occurring bicycles formed at the same time as the first cells! If they haven’t been discovered yet, it’s because most of the original rock on the planet is inaccessible. 😉
-Q
Upright Biped asks: Now what?
Geez UB, Mike Elzinga told ya- condensing. All the differing charges started doing their thing- repelling some and bringing others together.
From there replicators appeared. And once that happened living organisms were inevitable.
Sheesh. 😉
Ahh yes.
Our friend, Benito Elzinga.
You may not know this, but Mike has been on the front, saving the world from creationists for 50 years. Just imagine what would have happended to us if he hadn’t done his part.
Querius @25:
I love the idea. I imagine a Star Trek-like show where our intrepid explorers stumble upon a primitive culture that deeply (and irrationally) worships a materialistic OOL scenario for something obviously designed (say, an alien ship that crash landed on their planet millennia before). Could be a fun episode to show many of the wildly irrational ideas and improbably scenarios underlying a materialistic OOL mindset.
I think the thing that bothers me more than the unconvincing materialistic arguments in support of Darwinism is the attempt by many atheist to create doubt in the minds of believers and bully those who have found hope and strength in the spiritual.
When I was a child there was much abuse in my family. My father is an agnostic who believes in purposeless unguided evolution. I was not brought up believing in God and had not a shred of hope about why I even existed. I bought into the theory of evolution as taught by my dad and others. But, when I discovered that there was a higher power who cared for me and loved me, I experienced, hope, peace and joy for the first time in my life. I mattered because I mattered to God. I am aware that people have done horrible things in the name of religion and I understand why some people get angry at God. I believe that resentment toward God has more to do with the thinking that goes on in the mind of an atheist than anything else (more than “science”). That was my father’s experience. I love my dad and he has shown me love, but I always felt alone in this world until I experienced the supernatural love of God (my Lord, Jesus Christ). But, what I do not understand is why atheist go out of their way to prey upon anyone who has found hope in an intimate creator God who cares deeply for his creation. I have a friend who even planned on killing himself until he found out that he does matter in this world. He found hope and unconditional love in his Father, God – The very thing that all men and woman long for. A God who promises to carry the weight of our burdens and neediness when no one else will. I had one Darwinist say to me, “well, mindless and unguided evolution may be depressing, but it is true”. Thank God, that He has left His signature within his creation to remind us everyday that there is hope and that we are not alone int his world!!!
Gobsmacking I know. But there ya go. AVS’s formula for life: Take one measure of lifeless matter; add lots and lots of energy from the sun, and, voilà, life. It’s just that easy. Don’t bother him by asking him for any of those pesky details. It’s as easy as making sun tea.
I beg to differ. IMHO, what’s suggested are just a hint at the prerequisites for abiogenesis. With the right “ingredients”, the luxury of millions of years of time and environmental diversity and all the things going on both on and in the vicinity of the planet, there is an almost limitless amount of things that could happen, about which we can only guess. But the verdict is not yet out, there is, AFAIK, nothing yet on the scientific agenda that says a natural origins of life is impossible.
We know all the necessary ingredients have been available, what remains is to discover how it could have happened.
A designer would have been faced with the same problems and would have to find similar solutions, unless he did it by magic. But that’s not what ID is about, is it?
BTW, I’ve read books on the subject and the are chock full of details, much of stuf well above my head. But it sure looks like they know what they are talking about.
I have a book by Iris Fry laying around here somewhere, I suppose it still is available in print or used on the marked.
Try Amazon. Listening to the horse’s mouth sometimes gets you more than mer guesswork.
Sorry, my blockquote didn’t work.