Wouldn't Alien Life Undermine Atheism?

[Chesterton]

A question I've seen before around CF is something like “if extraterrestrial life were found would it undermine your theism?” I've also seen people with non-theistic icons express happiness about the idea that extraterrestrial life might be found. I've seen two people who said they couldn't wait for alien life to be found because it would mean the end of Christianity. I don't understand the thinking behind this; it seems the opposite of the actual situation.

Do we agree that mindless chemicals arranging themselves so that life is created, is/was an extremely unlikely event? (I've never heard anyone, atheist or otherwise, claim that it such a thing would be mathematically likely, or probable, or expected.)

If the same unlikely event were to take place more than once, a rational person would understand that it is less likely that those events were “natural” or happenstance. For me to win the state lottery is extremely unlikely but not impossible. But if I won the lottery twice within a year, and a close relative of mine also won twice within a year, those events would be investigated by the authorities because they would conclude that it is not possible that these events occurred naturally; that there had to be design and planning (cheating) involved, right? The same is true for a one-time event: if I tossed a shuffled deck of cards in the air, and they all fell aligned left to right by rank and suit, a person would have to be pretty gullible to believe that I had not somehow “rigged” the event's outcome.

So the question is, wouldn't the discovery of alien life undermine your atheism? How could it not? To be an atheist one has to accept that a one-in-a-googolplex event accidentally happened on Earth; to continue as an atheist after the discovery of extraterrestrial life one would have to believe the same virtual impossibility happened at least twice.

Thoughts?

 

[Nathan45]

Do we agree that mindless chemicals arranging themselves so that life is created, is/was an extremely unlikely event?

No. There currently is no good way of calculating the probability of life arising from non-life. You are correct that the probability could well be infinitesimally small, it could also be fairly common (relatively speaking) on a galactic scale.

(I've never heard anyone, atheist or otherwise, claim that it such a thing would be mathematically likely, or probable, or expected.)

people do not like to speak from ignorance. Nobody, at this time, knows what the odds are of life arising from non-life. Creationists often claim they know and put out large estimates (based on bad assumptions and mathematical errors), but that shouldn't be taken to mean anything.

 

[Ectezus]

To be an atheist one has to accept that a one-in-a-googolplex event accidentally happened on Earth; to continue as an atheist after the discovery of extraterrestrial life one would have to believe the same virtual impossibility happened at least twice.

Here's where your assumption goes wrong. The chance for life to occur is unknown. It's not about a single lightning bolt in a small puddle of mud.
There are billions of years for it to take place *AND* an enormous scale: the entire Earth.

Basically evolution says we humans aren't necessarily special, unlike Religion that fulfills your wishful dreams of being created in the image of a god. According to evolution however we're just part of the animal kingdom. Finding life on another planet would reinforce this type of thought and to a degree contradicts with religion.

Oh and chance arguments, are, as always; weak arguments. Especially without showing the chance calculation to begin with.

- Ectezus

 

[Chesterton]

No. There currently is no good way of calculating the probability of life arising from non-life. You are correct that the probability could well be infinitesimally small, it could also be fairly common (relatively speaking) on a galactic scale.

Well, either I'm correct or I'm not. Do you believe I'm not? Do you believe life from non-life is "fairly common"? If so, what do you base that belief on?

people do not like to speak from ignorance. Nobody, at this time, knows what the odds are of life arising from non-life.

It's incomplete to say we don't know what the odds are of life arising from non-life; it'd be more accurate to say the odds are completely nil, since we've never known it to happen, and we cannot conceive of any means whereby it could happen. The only way we can imagine it happening is to do just that - imagine it - in some very vague, dreamy way, not unlike how some people imagine God.

Creationists often claim they know and put out large estimates (based on bad assumptions and mathematical errors), but that shouldn't be taken to mean anything.

Saying that implies that there are "good" assumptions and "correct" mathematics. I'd like to know what they are - do you know?

 

[Chesterton]

Here's where your assumption goes wrong. The chance for life to occur is unknown.

So you're saying the probability could be high? Same question I asked Nathan: what do you base that on? Anything? Or is it just something you find it comforting to believe?

Oh and chance arguments, are, as always; weak arguments. Especially without showing the chance calculation to begin with.

Agreed. That's one reason I'm not an atheist.

 

[towelly]

It's incomplete to say we don't know what the odds are of life arising from non-life; it'd be more accurate to say the odds are completely nil, since we've never known it to happen, and we cannot conceive of any means whereby it could happen.

Id just ask you to reread this and really think about it. Think back in history things that we were not sure about and now know. Is saying the chance of an event=0 really the right thing to do when we dont know much about it?

 

[Nathan45]

Well, either I'm correct or I'm not. Do you believe I'm not? Do you believe life from non-life is "fairly common"? If so, what do you base that belief on?

I do not have an opinion on this issue, there is not enough information to come to a conclusion. is saying "I don't know, and neither do you." not a good enough answer?

It's incomplete to say we don't know what the odds are of life arising from non-life; it'd be more accurate to say the odds are completely nil,

Why don't you apply this (fallicious) argument to your God?

since we've never known it to happen, and we cannot conceive of any means whereby it could happen.

Biochemistry is very very com plicated stuff, they're working out models of how it could occur in a way that would be thermodynamically favored. In all seriousness, as a programmer this kind of bleeding-edge chemistry stuff is way out of my league.

The only way we can imagine it happening is to do just that - imagine it - in some very vague, dreamy way, not unlike how some people imagine God.

The problem is that the universe does not conform to the limits of your imagination. But scientists can observe a couple things:

1) There is now life, and presumably life did not always exist. (not sure how you could square "life always existed" with the what we know about the formation of the solar system)
2) Life is basically made out of the same raw materials-- carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, at a lower level, protons, neutrons, electrons-- as non-life.

Therefore, the hypothesis that life arose spontaneously from non-life at one time in the distant past, is not really an absurd proposition, and as has been mentioned we don't really know enough about chemistry to say exactly how it could have happened.

Saying that implies that there are "good" assumptions and "correct" mathematics. I'd like to know what they are - do you know?

No. I can give try to give you a rough analysis of what would be reqiured to do a complete calculation:

1) You'd need to have a complete list of all possible molecules below a certain scale.

2) You'd need to know how they interact with all other possible molecules.

3) Put that in a database. Each molecule could be classified as "living" or "non-living". Living molecules would have the following property: ability to catalyze their own formation, and/or the formation of very similar molecules. To boot, You'd actually have to know whether any molecule had any particular property.

4) Note that the above is dependent on context, in some environments ( environments are just a bunch of other molecules and can be extremely complex, there's really hardly any limit to what can be in an "environment", even remains of other self-replicators can be an environment. ). So you'd have to take that into account in your database.

5) Construct every possible step by step process from non-life to life, for every possible molecule, in every possible environment. Add up the numbers, multiply by the time and the amount of territory where the life could have arisen at, there's your probability. Actually i'm probably missing a few factors, but there's your framework for an estimate.

...

this is quite a bit different from the creationists estimates which are usually derived from measuring the complexity of any particular feature of life and then dividing 1 by that. That's of course, ridiculous because it assumes that life can't appear in stages, it can. It also assumes that (certain types of) complexity can't appear spontaneously from very simple interactions, but that can happen too.

eitherway i think it's safe to say that the probability of life arising from non-life will not be calculated anytime soon, however it is conceivable that in the near future, scientists may discover one or more step by step processes from non-life to life with a reasonable probability.

 

[Nathan45]

Same question I asked Nathan: what do you base that on? Anything? Or is it just something you find it comforting to believe?

believe what? i don't KNOW the answer to the question, not knowing doesn't involve believing anything.

 

[JediMobius]

Firstly, only the discovery of carbon-based life would affect probability. Secondly, although your reasoning makes sense to me, anyone who accepts a multiverse to account for the existence of our universe would say that in an infinite number of universes, anything that can happen will happen in at least one of them. We would just happen to be in the right universe.

Oh well, I seriously doubt there's any other intelligent life out there. Space cats wouldn't really alter my understanding of creation. I would only be thrown for a loop if alien life somewhere had its own culture and society n whatnot. Then again, wouldn't they just be like a graduated category of gentile? We could just preach the gospel to them if they exist.

 

[Bombila]

Chesterton, my impression, as I read more concerning recent abiogenesis research is that life arising from chemical processes is probably not that unusual. Where scientists used to think it must have been a rare and unlikely event, some are coming around to thinking it may be the inevitable result of the way some chemistry progresses.

For example, among other hypotheses (see Wikipedia for a list) I rather like the ideas explained in this video:

YouTube - Abiogenesis Explained

The ideas in that video may prove to be in error, but they make sense to me. Such ideas imply that life is probably common where such chemical and physical environments exist, which is likely, even in places within our solar system - maybe deep within Mars, maybe on Europa.

If life is possible on other bodies in our own solar system, then it might be possible, and even likely, on any planetary body.

So no, life somewhere else would not challenge most atheist stances.

Then again, I've never proposed that extraterrrestrial life would challenge most belief systems. Some fundamentalist belief systems might be challenged, but in the face of reality even they might reinterpret their belief set. Some already believe that UFOs are demonic devices, so they might conclude extraterrestrial life was demonic. Most believers, however, are not that superstitious.

 

[Ectezus]

So you're saying the probability could be high? Same question I asked Nathan: what do you base that on? Anything? Or is it just something you find it comforting to believe?

The answer was right in the quote you responded to:
"The chance for life to occur is unknown"

Scientists don't know it yet, and you certainly don't. Show us any calculation that the chance IS small like you suggest it is and we'll be able to talk further.
Untill then your argument is weak because you base your opinion on the assumption that the chance for life to form over billions of years on an enormous scale (Earth) is small.
We don't claim the chance is high. You claim it's low. Show us your calculation!

- Ectezus

 

[JediMobius]

I was curious about the actual math on this, so I pulled up a couple pages.

Probability of Life-Support Planets for Extraterrestrials & SETI Success

Is Earth home to "Rare Intelligent Life"?

The first deals with the probability of life anywhere in the observed universe, but this is of course subject to change based on however huge the unobserved universe may be where light hasn't reached us yet.

The second only takes the milky way galaxy into account. I personally disagree with how some of the factors are presented, but many of the intricacies involved in providing a hospitable planet should put the probability of life in the universe into perspective, even without an actual number.

Both of these links really only take carbon based life as we know it into account, but chemistry should apparently be consistent throughout the universe. I'm very interested what anyone thinks about the accuracy of the math in the first link.

I recently listened to "The Language of God" on audiobook, by Francis Collins, head biologist of the human genome project. In it, he made many claims about the ridiculously small probability for the universe to have progressed as it did, from the big bang to the creation of our solar system to life on our planet. His observational claim throughout is that 'the universe seems to be [optimized] for human life.'

 

[Naraoia]

I think part of the reasoning has less to do with abiogenesis and more with the idea that life, the universe and everything were supposedly created for humans Dunno, I don't use this argument anyway.

Do we agree that mindless chemicals arranging themselves so that life is created, is/was an extremely unlikely event? (I've never heard anyone, atheist or otherwise, claim that it such a thing would be mathematically likely, or probable, or expected.)

What nathan45 said. We don't know how likely it is, not least because we don't know how many ways it can happen, nor how common the right conditions (be they earth-like or a wider range of conditions) are in the universe.

But if you want calculations, someone over at TalkOrigins calculated how long it'd take a reasonable prebiotic earth to generate a specific self-replicating polypeptide by random polymerisation of pre-existing amino acids. The result is surprisingly small.

So the question is, wouldn't the discovery of alien life undermine your atheism? How could it not? To be an atheist one has to accept that a one-in-a-googolplex event accidentally happened on Earth; to continue as an atheist after the discovery of extraterrestrial life one would have to believe the same virtual impossibility happened at least twice.

I don't think it's a virtual impossibility

Well, either I'm correct or I'm not. Do you believe I'm not? Do you believe life from non-life is "fairly common"? If so, what do you base that belief on?

The fact that amino acids and nucleobases can be synthesised under presumed prebiotic earth-like conditions (how those bases end up in nucleotides is a tougher problem). The fact that there are plausible ways in which nucleotides could polymerise without the help of enzymes (e.g. on clay). The fact that RNA is a very versatile catalyst that can do a lot of things without the help of other complex biomolecules. And that "lot of things" now includes indefinite self-replication (or more precisely, cross-replication between two ribozymes), although not yet from single nucleotides. These are just a few things off the top of my head.

N.B. I don't really "believe" that abiogenesis is fairly common; I don't know nearly enough to have a firm belief like that - but I know enough to suspect that it is very far from impossible.

It's incomplete to say we don't know what the odds are of life arising from non-life; it'd be more accurate to say the odds are completely nil, since we've never known it to happen, and we cannot conceive of any means whereby it could happen.

First, we've never known it to happen, but life undoubtedly is here, so it must have originated in some way. I don't see why, given that, the answer must be supernatural.

Second, we (well, abiogenesis researchers) can see at least part of the picture with regards to ways it could happen.

Third, we can't conceive of any means whereby life could be created either, other than some "vague, dreamy" mechanism (what does creation by deity X involve???) that hasn't ever been verifiably observed. That hardly makes creation a more likely candidate than abiogenesis.

The only way we can imagine it happening is to do just that - imagine it - in some very vague, dreamy way, not unlike how some people imagine God.

And, I'm sure, completely unlike how Jack Szostak, Leslie Orgel and other experts who work(ed) on this subject imagine(d) abiogenesis.

(I didn't know that the "specified complexity" I've seen ID advocates wave around is actually Orgel's invention. Witness another term coined by scientists hijacked for creationist purposes.)

 

[towelly]

I'm very interested what anyone thinks about the accuracy of the math in the first link.

Ive only read the part where he narrows down the probablity to just our galaxy, but this seems seriously flawed to me. Cant we look into the sky and see galaxies that are very similar to our own? Ive looked at that deep field picture and I was always under the impression that there were ones that were about as dense as ours, about the same size, spirals, located in a similar area. etc etc. Am I wrong? Doesnt that prove his math is bunk and hes just making up numbers?

 

[Bombila]

I was curious about the actual math on this, so I pulled up a couple pages.

Probability of Life-Support Planets for Extraterrestrials & SETI Success

Is Earth home to "Rare Intelligent Life"?

The first deals with the probability of life anywhere in the observed universe, but this is of course subject to change based on however huge the unobserved universe may be where light hasn't reached us yet.

The second only takes the milky way galaxy into account. I personally disagree with how some of the factors are presented, but many of the intricacies involved in providing a hospitable planet should put the probability of life in the universe into perspective, even without an actual number.

Both of these links really only take carbon based life as we know it into account, but chemistry should apparently be consistent throughout the universe. I'm very interested what anyone thinks about the accuracy of the math in the first link.

I recently listened to "The Language of God" on audiobook, by Francis Collins, head biologist of the human genome project. In it, he made many claims about the ridiculously small probability for the universe to have progressed as it did, from the big bang to the creation of our solar system to life on our planet. His observational claim throughout is that 'the universe seems to be [optimized] for human life.'

Far more likely is that human life has optimized to the demands of the existing universe. If the universe was different, we wouldn't exist to sit around talking about it. Something else might be, though.

If, for example, some trick of evolution had allowed the octopus a longer life span - say fifty years instead of the distressingly short two or three to ten - those clever beasties might be the dominant life form.

Collins has an intensely anthropomorphic view, which doesn't stand up well to reality. Our environment has never been optimal for humans - animals may kill us, bacteria and viruses may make us ill, many plants which appear edible are full of poison, the bulk of the planet's surface is hostile to human life.

Bad job of optimizing the creator's done, given the facts.

 

[Nathan45]

Ive only read the part where he narrows down the probablity to just our galaxy, but this seems seriously flawed to me.

I think you're missing the fundamental point of the project. the SETI project is all about finding extraterrestrial life. If that's your goal there's really no point in discussing anything past your own galaxy. he's not denying the existence of life in other galaxies he's just categorizing it as irrelevant for the time being.

 

[towelly]

I think you're missing the fundamental point of the project. the SETI project is all about finding extraterrestrial life. If that's your goal there's really no point in discussing anything past your own galaxy. he's not denying the existence of life in other galaxies he's just categorizing it as irrelevant for the time being.

Are we talking about the same thing? I was talking about the first that Thelowlytortoise posted(it wont let me post links as i dont have enough posts). He only breifly mentions SETI.

 

[JediMobius]

Far more likely is that human life has optimized to the demands of the existing universe. If the universe was different, we wouldn't exist to sit around talking about it. Something else might be, though.

If, for example, some trick of evolution had allowed the octopus a longer life span - say fifty years instead of the distressingly short two or three to ten - those clever beasties might be the dominant life form.

Collins has an intensely anthropomorphic view, which doesn't stand up well to reality. Our environment has never been optimal for humans - animals may kill us, bacteria and viruses may make us ill, many plants which appear edible are full of poison, the bulk of the planet's surface is hostile to human life.

Bad job of optimizing the creator's done, given the facts.

Oh you're just being pessimistic and really, what's the point of saying 'if we weren't here we wouldn't be here to talk about it'? I put 'optimized' in brackets because I couldn't remember the more accurate word. I didn't mean to say that it all came out perfect in any way, it just seems remarkable that we even exist, let alone that we exist so intricate and unique. If it's true that the big bang, singularity that it was, defied probability in the way matter and anti-matter came out of the event asymmetrically, (whereas a symmetrical model should have likely happened, which would have resulted in the matter and anti-matter largely canceling out) that's just the first of many events that needed to happen for a universe to form in a way to produce any kind of the stability necessary for ongoing life. I'm not even saying the process screams creation, just that it's pretty uncanny. I mean, I'm talking about the universe, not just evolution on earth.

As for the slight obstacles of nature's hostility toward us, it doesn't really seem to have hindered mankind much if at all. Most significantly, all of these apparent weaknesses we're subject to from our environment makes us what we are. Without adversity, there would be no need for society, no inspiration for art, no real need to communicate at all, no good, no bad. There would be no concept of beauty, for instance, because there would be no ugliness to contrast. So, if this planet weren't hostile in any way, there would be no cause I can think of for intelligent life in the first place. Is the universe so chaotic that we just happened? To me, with all the universe's mechanics, it seems to be pretty organized.

 

[JediMobius]

Ive only read the part where he narrows down the probablity to just our galaxy, but this seems seriously flawed to me. Cant we look into the sky and see galaxies that are very similar to our own? Ive looked at that deep field picture and I was always under the impression that there were ones that were about as dense as ours, about the same size, spirals, located in a similar area. etc etc. Am I wrong? Doesnt that prove his math is bunk and hes just making up numbers?

Did you really read the steps? Visual similarity doesn't say much about a galaxy's capacity to produce life. What I was really wondering is if any particular steps are off in a certain way, or wouldn't be likely to affect just any galaxy. If he did include a step or so that he shouldn't have, that wouldn't make the entire math bunk, it would just increase the probability.

 

[Nathan45]

Are we talking about the same thing? I was talking about the first that Thelowlytortoise posted(it wont let me post links as i dont have enough posts). He only breifly mentions SETI.

nevermind. lol. sorry i was misreading your post.