I think you have overcomplicated it.
Again, improbable based on YOUR assumptions. When I ask specifically about different assumptions, you repeatedly admit that given different assumptions, your theory starts to break down. (the "yes, but..." answers)More like by "my interpretation of Phenomanul's comment...." -- I didn't suggest what you just wrote, I said people in your camp would irrelevantly shout with glee... The number I gave you was still extremely 'improbable' --
Ok, great. It's not a self-replicating ribozyme. The exact mechanism isn't central to my point.Back to the point though, finding a smaller self-replicating ribozyme is irrelevant considering the fact that all the ones we have found interact with proteins and DNA in order to subsist (much like everything else - imagine that).
Is it a reasonable assumption that given the fact that we know that organisms have gotten more and more complex over time, that the first "organism" had to be pretty simple?
Good. I just wanted to make sure that you hadn't tied your faith to any particular theory of how we came to be.... nothing would diminish my faith.
Does it diminish God's power to think that he is "the perpetrator of an accident"? If anything it manifies it.Why? First of all, my faith is not placed on Science. Second of all, I fully understand that Science will not explain everything (the purpose of life, consciousness, sentience of past-present-future etc...). I understand that there is more to this life than the understanding of our natural world. Wishing to diminish GOD's power then, by reducing His Creator role with one suggesting that He was the 'perpetrator of an accident' really serves no purpose.
Gotta go.
I had to pull this line out of your post, once I saw it in RG's reply.
If you follow RG's thought experiment, that would require God to construct a universe in such a way that his entire will for man for all of history be executed in such a way that it appears to us to be random probabilities.
I fail to see how that would diminish God. If anything, it would be a triumphant demonstration of his omniscience.
hmmmm.... like what? There are about 15 disciplines that I actively incorporate and reconcile with my whole belief structure whereas you only seem to 'see' one: statistical probability... When did you decide that said field trumped everything else? Does this mean that my beliefs are full-proof or flawless? No... far from it; they are however supported by theories from many fields and not hinged on any one.
Who then, is ignoring more?
Last edited by Phenomanul; 09-19-2006 at 05:14 PM.
Nothing can diminish Him, other than our own incredulence. When we belittle GOD He cannot interact with us. Is he able? Most definitely. Will He? Not when we have made that choice.
RG's view is that GOD is simply a spectator.
My personal experience with GOD would dictate otherwise. And so if He participates now, why would that preclude Him from having participated from the get-go?
GOD participates in a more personal manner than RG is willing to accept. All of creation cries 'purpose,' a facet that would be in complete disconnect from anything implied by random chance.
GOD knows us from before we were born. While we were yet in our mothers' wombs. That to me is more amazing than suggesting I just 'showed up', and that GOD had to find out another creature had entered His domain.
Life is complicated; certainly not defined by probability alone.
I disagree; everything around you disagrees....
That you interpret my responses that way is your problem. A "yes, but..." answer implied your question was not the right one or adequate. Did you consider that? No... in fact you became more and more and more stubborn. Posting the same question over and over again, even though it had already been addressed. You've yet to admit that the kinetically limited formation of biological molecules does not conform to the 'poker model' that you keep trying to subject them to. But suddenly you're suggesting it's my model that is falling apart......
The only thing I admitted was that your model only works if you factor in infinite universes, and time -- a notion that is not widely accepted by most astronomers and physicists today. But that was hardly a concession to the argument; in fact, it showed your numbers relied heavily on that suggestion.
Prove it.
It's far more magnificent to know that the GOD who created the universe loves me enough, this insignificant spec of matter in the time/space continuum, to care for my every need; be it physical, emotional, and above all: spiritual. To know that I and everyone else was created for a purpose. Moreso, that our 'purpose' is magnified when GOD is behind it; when we attribute the manifest Glory to Him... how is He magnified when the glory is being stripped away from Him?Good. I just wanted to make sure that you hadn't tied your faith to any particular theory of how we came to be.
Does it diminish God's power to think that he is "the perpetrator of an accident"? If anything it manifies it.
Last edited by Phenomanul; 09-19-2006 at 05:12 PM.
It is left, then, for RG to clarify this statement below:
RG, was that statement meant to regard just the act of creation, or do you deny the idea of God personally involved in people's lives?
If it is the former, then Phenom is misrepresenting your position. If it is the latter, then you are a Deist.
With everything else I wrote in response to the original post I forgot to address this part:
Umm actually... not one transitional species has been found. Not one. Evolution would have it that millions of these fossilized species would have been found by now... and yet the reality is that none have.
After a century and a half of claims by evolutionary proponents that just a little more time would produce the necessary fossil evidence and the missing links between species that would confirm the theory of evolution, we find there is an astonishing and total lack of fossil evidence to confirm any indisputable transitional forms (missing links) that must exist if the theory of evolution were actually true. However, in over one hundred and fifty years of a massive global search by scientists that has catalogued over one hundred million fossil specimens, they have failed to discover a single ''missing link'' fossil.
In 1859, Darwin acknowledged that the utter lack of fossil evidence for these missing links between one species and another provided 'an unanswerable objection' to the theory of evolution. However, Darwin assumed that the search for fossils that would establish the truth of evolution was just beginning and that, given sufficient time and effort, scientists would soon discover the millions of transitional fossils required to prove that one species gradually transformed itself by natural selection into a new species.
To date, though... every species discovered in the fossil record appears perfectly formed. Paleontologists have never discovered a fossil showing a partially formed species. When the entire fossil record is carefully examined, we find that is reveals both extinct species and existing organisms with clearly defined gaps between them and no transitional forms.
As far as our supposed lineage goes... I've done some more research there...
Why are paleontologists trying to decieve people?
As far as some of the other animals? Ever heard of the duck billed platypus or even whales?
The platypus is clearly a mammal and has no relationship with birds...
Whales are not fish, but have been around as long as they have.... how so?
We are constantly being told to accept the fact that because the Archaeopteryx fossil contained teeth that somehow it was a transitional form between reptiles and birds... Yet everything else about the fossil reveals that it is a true bird, complete with fully developed (and hollow-boned) wings and feathers. Although the presence of the teeth is unusual, this in no way proves that this fossil was partly a bird and partly a reptile -- as most school textbooks now proudly declare. Some other fossil birds display teeth and some reptiles have no teeth at all.
ooooh also, the punctuated evolution theory is a far stretch.... so let's not even discuss that despairing attempt to reconcile evolutionary theory with the fossil record.
Anyways.... don't believe everything you read in your school textbooks when you were in high-school.
edit: forgot to place the quotes around the published material
Last edited by Phenomanul; 09-20-2006 at 05:55 PM.
That was true... back in like 1900.
But I'll start with one... Osteolepsis.
Umm no.
Link an article that shows a full fledged hominid fossil that would suggest our ape ancestry...
Not just bone fragments...
OK... let's start with the data.... Just how many of these fossils were found?
But let's not let the fact that modern day Coelacanths are still around get in the way....
Gaps in the fossil record prove that the gaps will never be filled because there's nothing to fill the gaps.
Gaps in the fossil disprove definitively that evolution is total bull . The only other possible explanation is 6-day Genesis.
Gaps in the fossil record prove that the only possible way life arrived on earth was from God creating fully mature species in 6 days. Adam from clay or dust, Eve from Adam's rib, then He blew in their noses to bring them to life.
Gaps in the fossil record prove there were multiple, repeated Genesis, separated by 1000s, 100s of 1000s, milions of years, witn God in each separate Geneis producing a new set of fauna and flora. oops! Which Bible version has Genesis repeated many times?
Gaps in the fossil record just prove ('indicate' would be a better word than your absolutist trend above) that evolution just doesn't cut it.... it isn't as sound and full-proof as everyone is led to believe. Darwin himself admitted his theories hinged on the premise that millions of transitional species would be found... I don't see them.
That I believe GOD created the Universe and Life itself is irrelevant... don't confuse the two arguments.
Last edited by Phenomanul; 09-20-2006 at 08:04 PM.
So all the evidence for evolution, the explanatory/predictive power of the theory of eveolution, is what? To be ignored as entertaining, ridiculous curiousities?
And if you are so sure that evolution is bull , do you have any alternative scientfic explanation?
re-read my post.... I was following your trend when I realized your word choice was too absolutist.
But if you really care for my answer:
GOD created diversity as a demonstrative power of His creativity. That many animals share similar features doesn't necessarily follow they had to share a common ancestor... that would just be one explanation. It sounds logical, but that doesn't necessarily make it correct.
Furthermore, I believe organisms adapt... but they do so within the genetic wealth already contained by that species.
Not everything needs a naturalistic explanation you know (i.e. consciousness).
"GOD created diversity as a demonstrative power of His creativity."
A statement faith, cannot be proven or disproven, beyond the realm of science. I personally don't think God needs to aggrandize Himself by impressing a bunch of nervous systems on a one planet among millions of planets and nervous systems with dog-and-pony show of "diversity".
"That many animals share similar features doesn't necessarily follow they had to share a common ancestor."
When humans and other simians have 98+% commonality in DNA, the simplest explanation is very often the correct one. It at least is the best working hypothesis.
Consciousness is clearly dependent on complexity of a certain type in a nervous system, esp in the brain. Remove that complexity and I think most people would say you remove consciousness, and remove the humanity. That much of consciousness remains a mystery doesn't mean we can locate its naturalistic, physiological origin.
OK... that is your opinion.
Full genomes have been mapped for how many species? Yeah... we can count them with our hands, and even then half of them belong to E. Coli and Drosophilia fly variants.
The published accounts of genomic matches are all wrong in the sense that splicing methods don't factor where the codes are found; a highly important facet of the code itself. We will have to wait, who knows how long before we can begin conducting true 'genetic match' experiments.
Again though, it is a logical explanation but it doesn't make it correct.
Yet consciousness is also a spiritual attribute that remains even when the 'body' is not alive. I don't know that a scientific endeavor could even study such a phenomena.
It looks as though the best specimens they have are skulls, rather than full skeletons.
But that's not what I was arguing. You said there were no "transitional" fossils in the record, a common creationist argument stemming from Darwin's observations in Origin of Species. That was 150 years ago, and obviously since then the fossil record has been filled in a great deal.
There have been quite many of that particular one found in Scotland.
Your point about Coelacanths makes the false assumption that evolution teaches that species A turns into species B and then into species C, and so on. What it actually teaches is that species diverge over time, but can still coexist contemporaneously.
Getting back into hominid fossils, that is why evolutionists have no problem saying, based upon the most recent evidence, that the austrolopithecines are not direct human ancestors.
Yup. It can be likened a bit to modern business.
Successful adaptations tend to spawn "me too"s.
Upright-walking tool users became fairly successful, and produced offshoots that lived concurrently.
I know that... my point was focusing on the fact that we don't have a single complete fossil specimen to base our assumption that it is a transitional species to begin with. Inconclusive data cannot be used to make such a definitive claim.
If Mini-me's fossilized remains were found... It wouldn't be a correct suggestion to conclude that he was one of our ancestral species. Yet we make those conclusions all the time. These assessments aren't science any more than me proclaiming GOD created the Universe is.
Where are our decendants???
Anyhow, just so my stance is made perfectly clear... I wouldn't reject the notion that GOD created animals with a 'fast-forward' evolutionary model.... And when the time was right... He created humans. There's no way that this can be proven or disproven however.
And yet I will, reject the notion that humans were part of that model. Be it literal or poetic, Genesis makes a transcendent pause to address the creation of man. We were made in GOD's image.
"We were made in GOD's image."
so your intepretation is that God is a human?
It's impossible with you OT-Bible-obsessed-thumpers to know when you're strictly literal with 6-day, 144-hour creation, or when you pick-and-chose what is literal and what is not.
It's interesting, and revealing, that the evangelical Christian seem to be more obssessed with the OT and its literalness, while Christ introduced a whole new set of concepts, without really insisting on a cosmology or obsessing over the OT.
Here is another question:
What happens to the "infintesmally small" theory of life, if we find evidence of life on Mars?
...or for that matter, life on one or more of Jupiter or Saturn's moons?
I guess it would be "God did that too"?
I guess that would make it an "infinitessmally small" chance times two? or three or four?
(contemplates infinity times 4)
This is exactly what I was talking about. We have filled in the gaps and yet the ID-types want the sub-types of the types and when the sub-types have been found, they will say, "well you need the sub-sub-sub types".[Extra Stout]
It looks as though the best specimens they have are skulls, rather than full skeletons.
But that's not what I was arguing. You said there were no "transitional" fossils in the record, a common creationist argument stemming from Darwin's observations in Origin of Species. That was 150 years ago, and obviously since then the fossil record has been filled in a great deal.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Phenom
OK... let's start with the data.... Just how many of these fossils were found?
But let's not let the fact that modern day Coelacanths are still around get in the way....
There have been quite many of that particular one found in Scotland.
Your point about Coelacanths makes the false assumption that evolution teaches that species A turns into species B and then into species C, and so on. What it actually teaches is that species diverge over time, but can still coexist contemporaneously.
At least some of them admit that they ignore proof to keep faith in a theory which conforms to their belief system. Good for them.
bot alert bot alert.....
So just ignore my concern right RG???
If you want to accept the fact that a transitional species exists simply from a tooth... (a single tooth!!!!!) you go ahead and get duped. I won't buy it.
As an aside, whenever full genomes are completed for multiple species you will see just how distinct every species is from the others. Meaning I can't get a toucan from a flamingo just by tweaking a couple 100 DNA bases here and there.... I would need to tweak millions of bases for this to occur. And said iterations would have to produce 1000's of species between a flamingo and a toucan. Instead species we have found either look like one species or the other.... but not like a species that is mixture of both (i.e. transitional).
Last edited by Phenomanul; 09-21-2006 at 01:17 PM.
Still stuck on your statistical probability premise... I guess you will never be able to see it any different than a game of numbers...Here is another question:
What happens to the "infintesmally small" theory of life, if we find evidence of life on Mars?
...or for that matter, life on one or more of Jupiter or Saturn's moons?
I guess it would be "God did that too"?
I guess that would make it an "infinitessmally small" chance times two? or three or four?
(contemplates infinity times 4)
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