For Danmac - Abiogenesis

[Autodidact]

There are many necessary parts to a complex system. Each part has a necessary function that without would disable the whole system. Take a cell phone for example. It is made up of many parts, and each part is necessary, for the absence of one part will disable the phone. Our universe is a very complex system. There are many parts that must be finely tuned or else the system will not work. When so many parts require such fine tuning for the universe to work we move away from coincidence to that which must have been designed.

Fine-tuned Universe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Evidence for the Fine Tuning of the Universe

We had a thread about evolution, but Danmac only wanted to talk about abiogenesis. And God. Now we have a thread about abiogenesis just for you to discuss it to your heart's content, Danmac. Now you only want to talk about God. Why not make a thread about God? This is is about abiogenesis.

 

[Danmac]

We had a thread about evolution, but Danmac only wanted to talk about abiogenesis. And God. Now we have a thread about abiogenesis just for you to discuss it to your heart's content, Danmac. Now you only want to talk about God. Why not make a thread about God? This is is about abiogenesis.

Because abiogenesis, is about God.

 

[Autodidact]

Because abiogenesis, is about God.

So you did not start this thread to discuss science, but religion? In that case, what is your point?

Are you familiar with the deregatory term, "God of the Gaps?"

You didn't explain to me why you cannot or will not grasp that science is about how, not who. After the tenth time I've laid it out for you in giant colored fonts, I think you owe me an explanation. Because if you don't provide one, I've only got two ideas:

1. You're incredibly stupid.
2. You're totally dishonest.
So if it's neither of those, what is it? Seriously, I want to know.

 

[Danmac]

So you did not start this thread to discuss science, but religion? In that case, what is your point?

I did not start this thread. I see that sometimes you don't pay attention.

Are you familiar with the deregatory term, "God of the Gaps?"

If it's intent is deregatory then I prefer not to waste my time on childish chatter.

You didn't explain to me why you cannot or will not grasp that science is about how, not who. After the tenth time I've laid it out for you in giant colored fonts, I think you owe me an explanation.

No I believe it is about who. Science has no answer for abiogenesis. The bible does. That is my position. I take it on faith.

Because if you don't provide one, I've only got two ideas:

1. You're incredibly stupid.
2. You're totally dishonest.
So if it's neither of those, what is it? Seriously, I want to know.

Where are your manners? Do you have any?

 

[McBell]

Where are your manners? Do you have any?

I knew you would not be answering that question.
I have been asking it for quite some time and your avoidance of it is most revealing.

 

[JustWondering2]

I once knew a country bumpkin named Dan. When asked which was closer New York City or the Sun his response was: "Any Damn fool knows that! The Sun is closer than New York, Hell I can see the Sun, but I cant see New York City!" Sound anywhere near familiar?

OBTW this is a true story! The guy was about 30 years old and fully believed the Earth was flat and that NASA was a movie maker.

 

[DeitySlayer]

I once knew a country bumpkin named Dan. When asked which was closer New York City or the Sun his response was: "Any Damn fool knows that! The Sun is closer than New York, Hell I can see the Sun, but I cant see New York City!" Sound anywhere near familiar?

OBTW this is a true story! The guy was about 30 years old and fully believed the Earth was flat and that NASA was a movie maker.

My emotions at this point are as follows, not necessarily in any order:

:biglaugh:
:run:


:thud:

 

[David M]

My head is spinning. Now can you break all of this down into laymans terms for me?

In layman's terms: The steps required for the formation of the first self-replicating proteins and the first proto-cells (self-replicating proteins enclosed in lipid spheres) have been demonstrated to be entirely possible by solely natural processes.

DNA itself has been shown to be an evolvable structure arising from chemistry.

 

[David M]

1} Miller had to isolate the amino acids from the environment he created them in or else it would have destroyed them. No such system could have existed in a primative Earth.

Not true. He isolated them so that they could be identified. When the original mixture was recently analysed it was found to contain additional amino acids due to more sensitive modern equipment.

12)The atmosphere they created was an oxygen free atmosphere. It would be impossible in an oxygen environment. There is no evidence to support an oxygen free primitive Earth. In fact, Earth's oldest rocks contain evidence of being formed in an atmosphere that contained oxygen.

Not true. The oldest rocks contain formations that cannot form if there is free oxygen in the atmosphere in any significant quantity.

1 3)The ozone is made of oxygen. Without it the suns ultraviolet rays would have destroyed any biological molecules.

Not true. Life started in the sea, water gives reasonable protection from UV, the lowest depth at which UV irradiance is reduced to 1% of surface values is 26m for Photosynthetically active radiation (400-700 nm) in clear ocean waters, at just 5m the irradiance was down to 12%.

http://www.int-res.com/articles/meps/144/m144p109.pdf

Only Creationsts seem to think that life is proposed to have arisen in some muddy puddle on land.

 

[David M]

Aminos cannot bond in water.

Source? Considering the prevalence of water in all living organisms (excluding viruses and prions if you consider these as life) I'm confident that this statement is just not true.

 

[Autodidact]

I did not start this thread. I see that sometimes you don't pay attention.

Pardon me--request that the thread be started. In any case, are we here to discuss religion or science?

If religion, what is your point?

If it's intent is deregatory then I prefer not to waste my time on childish chatter.

Well, it's a theological term first used by a Christian evangelist, Henry Drummond, and it's an idea you might want to brush up on.

No I believe it is about who. Science has no answer for abiogenesis. The bible does. That is my position. I take it on faith.

O.K. that's what I feared. This is God-of-the-gaps, and it's bad theology. Drummond chastises those Christians who point to the things that science can not yet explain — "gaps which they will fill up with God" — and urges them to embrace all nature as God's, as the work of "... an immanent God, which is the God of Evolution, is infinitely grander than the occasional wonder-worker, who is the God of an old theology. [wiki]

Here's more:

Bonhoeffer wrote, for example: "...how wrong it is to use God as a stop-gap for the incompleteness of our knowledge. If in fact the frontiers of knowledge are being pushed further and further back (and that is bound to be the case), then God is being pushed back with them, and is therefore continually in retreat. We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don't know."[4] The term gained some attention when it was used in the 1955 book Science and Christian Belief by Charles Alfred Coulson, where Coulson states: "There is no 'God of the gaps' to take over at those strategic places where science fails; and the reason is that gaps of this sort have the unpreventable habit of shrinking."[5]
The term was used again in a 1971 book and a 1978 article, both by Richard Bube. He articulated the concept in greater detail, most notably in Man Come Of Age: Bonhoeffer’s Response To The God-Of-The-Gaps (1971). Bube attributed modern crises in religious faith in part to the inexorable shrinking of the God-of-the-gaps as scientific knowledge progressed. As humans progressively increased their understanding of nature, the previous "realm" of God seemed to many persons and religions to be getting smaller and smaller by comparison. Bube maintained that Darwin's Origin of Species was the "death knell" of the God-of-the-gaps. Bube also maintained that the God-of-the-gaps was not the same as the God of the Bible (that is, he was not making an argument against God per se, but rather asserting there was a fundamental problem with the perception of God as existing in the gaps of present-day knowledge).
[all wiki]

In other words, if your God is the God of where science leaves off, then the more we learn from science, the smaller the space for your God. Far better to argue for a God who set forth the very laws of science, who does not depend on ignorance, a grand God of all things, known and unknown. That's the God you want.

That way to you don't have to argue in favor of scientific ignorance to advance your God. You can endorse and accept science, without feeling your God threatened.

That includes research into abiogenesis, the shape of the earth, the origin of lighting, origin of disease and yes, (wait for it) diversity of species. Science can research all these things without threatening God, if you jettison your God-of-the-gaps theology.

Where are your manners? Do you have any?

I'm sorry, I don't understand. I'm politely trying to ask you for an alternative explanation, other than stupidity or dishonesty, for me having to explain the same simple concept to you twenty times. Do you have one, or must I have recourse to those?

 

[Danmac]

Pardon me--request that the thread be started. In any case, are we here to discuss religion or science?

If religion, what is your point?
Well, it's a theological term first used by a Christian evangelist, Henry Drummond, and it's an idea you might want to brush up on.

O.K. that's what I feared. This is God-of-the-gaps, and it's bad theology. Drummond chastises those Christians who point to the things that science can not yet explain — "gaps which they will fill up with God" — and urges them to embrace all nature as God's, as the work of "... an immanent God, which is the God of Evolution, is infinitely grander than the occasional wonder-worker, who is the God of an old theology. [wiki]

Here's more:

Bonhoeffer wrote, for example: "...how wrong it is to use God as a stop-gap for the incompleteness of our knowledge. If in fact the frontiers of knowledge are being pushed further and further back (and that is bound to be the case), then God is being pushed back with them, and is therefore continually in retreat. We are to find God in what we know, not in what we don't know."[4] The term gained some attention when it was used in the 1955 book Science and Christian Belief by Charles Alfred Coulson, where Coulson states: "There is no 'God of the gaps' to take over at those strategic places where science fails; and the reason is that gaps of this sort have the unpreventable habit of shrinking."[5]
The term was used again in a 1971 book and a 1978 article, both by Richard Bube. He articulated the concept in greater detail, most notably in Man Come Of Age: Bonhoeffer’s Response To The God-Of-The-Gaps (1971). Bube attributed modern crises in religious faith in part to the inexorable shrinking of the God-of-the-gaps as scientific knowledge progressed. As humans progressively increased their understanding of nature, the previous "realm" of God seemed to many persons and religions to be getting smaller and smaller by comparison. Bube maintained that Darwin's Origin of Species was the "death knell" of the God-of-the-gaps. Bube also maintained that the God-of-the-gaps was not the same as the God of the Bible (that is, he was not making an argument against God per se, but rather asserting there was a fundamental problem with the perception of God as existing in the gaps of present-day knowledge).
[all wiki]

In other words, if your God is the God of where science leaves off, then the more we learn from science, the smaller the space for your God. Far better to argue for a God who set forth the very laws of science, who does not depend on ignorance, a grand God of all things, known and unknown. That's the God you want.

That way to you don't have to argue in favor of scientific ignorance to advance your God. You can endorse and accept science, without feeling your God threatened.

That includes research into abiogenesis, the shape of the earth, the origin of lighting, origin of disease and yes, (wait for it) diversity of species. Science can research all these things without threatening God, if you jettison your God-of-the-gaps theology.

I'm sorry, I don't understand. I'm politely trying to ask you for an alternative explanation, other than stupidity or dishonesty, for me having to explain the same simple concept to you twenty times. Do you have one, or must I have recourse to those?

Religion has nothing to fear from true science, and the minister of the gospel is not exhorted to dread that. Real science, in all its advances, contributes to the support of religion; and just in proportion as that is promoted will it be found to sustain the Bible, and to confirm the claims of religion to the faith of mankind. It is only false or pretended science that religion has to dread, and which the friend of Christianity is to avoid.

Albert Barnes

 

[McBell]

Religion has nothing to fear from true science, and the minister of the gospel is not exhorted to dread that. Real science, in all its advances, contributes to the support of religion; and just in proportion as that is promoted will it be found to sustain the Bible, and to confirm the claims of religion to the faith of mankind. It is only false or pretended science that religion has to dread, and which the friend of Christianity is to avoid.

Albert Barnes

What a load of bull ****...

 

[Tristesse]

Religion has nothing to fear from true science, and the minister of the gospel is not exhorted to dread that. Real science, in all its advances, contributes to the support of religion; and just in proportion as that is promoted will it be found to sustain the Bible, and to confirm the claims of religion to the faith of mankind. It is only false or pretended science that religion has to dread, and which the friend of Christianity is to avoid.

Albert Barnes

Danmac, when you see a muslim on here posting about how the qur'an holds up to scientific scrutiny and has made scientific predictions. Does that merit any validity with you? If so, do you accept the qur'an as equally valid as the bible on these issues? If not, could you please explain your reasons for accepting the bible as valid and not the qur'an, or any ancient holy text for that matter. If it's the latter, it looks like there is a bit of special pleading going on here.

 

[Autodidact]

Religion has nothing to fear from true science, and the minister of the gospel is not exhorted to dread that. Real science, in all its advances, contributes to the support of religion; and just in proportion as that is promoted will it be found to sustain the Bible, and to confirm the claims of religion to the faith of mankind. It is only false or pretended science that religion has to dread, and which the friend of Christianity is to avoid.

Albert Barnes

Exactly, Danmac. You have nothing to fear from science, and should stop fighting it. Seriously. Setting up a theology that's based on science being wrong or not figuring things out is just plain bad theology. The better position is that God set up all the laws of nature, and you can learn about God's creation through science.

 

[tumbleweed41]

Religion has nothing to fear from true science, and the minister of the gospel is not exhorted to dread that. Real science, in all its advances, contributes to the support of religion; and just in proportion as that is promoted will it be found to sustain the Bible, and to confirm the claims of religion to the faith of mankind. It is only false or pretended science that religion has to dread, and which the friend of Christianity is to avoid.

Albert Barnes

Interesting quote Danmac.
Were you aware that one of the reasons Albert Barnes was tried by the Presbyterian Church was his favorable attitude towards naturalism and pre-Darwinian ideas of evolution? He once speculated that the ostrich was “the connecting link between quadrupeds and fowls.”. (Yes, he was wrong, but he was heading in the right direction.)
He also rejected the idea of "original sin" and was a supporter of the old Earth idea of "Gap Creationism". (Accepting scientific evidence and inserting God into any gaps yet to be explained.) That is what he meant in the quote you posted. Not ignoring evidence in favor of dogmatic literalism.
You should really pay attention to who you are quoting.

 

[Danmac]

Interesting quote Danmac.
Were you aware that one of the reasons Albert Barnes was tried by the Presbyterian Church was his favorable attitude towards naturalism and pre-Darwinian ideas of evolution? He once speculated that the ostrich was “the connecting link between quadrupeds and fowls.”. (Yes, he was wrong, but he was heading in the right direction.)
He also rejected the idea of "original sin" and was a supporter of the old Earth idea of "Gap Creationism". (Accepting scientific evidence and inserting God into any gaps yet to be explained.) That is what he meant in the quote you posted. Not ignoring evidence in favor of dogmatic literalism.
You should really pay attention to who you are quoting.

Yes and Einstein was wrong about the cosmological constant. Barnes was a theologian.

 

[Autodidact]

Yes and Einstein was wrong about the cosmological constant. Barnes was a theologian.

You missed the point. The point is that the guy you're quoting, Barnes, disagrees with you. By quoting him, you're contradicting yourself.

 

[Noaidi]

Danmac.
I posted this question to you recently:

Danmac. I have a question: is the reason for your reluctance to look at the evidence solely to do with your religious beliefs, or is there another legitimate reason for your refusal?
Don't let your religion get in the way of your understanding. It's all very well digging your heels in, but it makes you publicly appear rather ill-informed.

Any thoughts about this? You talk about viewing the same evidence as a biologist would, but the difference is in the interpretation of that evidence. The bible offers no interpretation of the evidence, so why are you so resolute in your views?

 

[Danmac]

Danmac.
I posted this question to you recently:



Any thoughts about this? You talk about viewing the same evidence as a biologist would, but the difference is in the interpretation of that evidence. The bible offers no interpretation of the evidence, so why are you so resolute in your views?

Which evidence are you speaking of?