Fine Tuning

[Eight Foot Manchild]

Spontaneous generation (fully formed organisms) seems to fit the fossil record better than your description of abiogenesis (slow-plodding, unintelligent, incremental evolution), This is textbook Darwin, which has been found to be far short of fossil reality.

The Devonian explosion put thousands of fully developed plants on the earth and some fully developed bony fish. This is what the fossil record indicates. Not a lot of slow, methodical, incremental development. Some of these fully formed plants still exist today, in their same form.

The Cambrian explosion put thousands of fully developed animals of all kinds on the earth. The fossil record does not indicate a slow, methodical, incremental evolution. Many of these animals still exist today in the exact same form.

You don't have the slightest ghost of a clue what you're talking about. None whatsoever. You are so abjectly, abysmally ignorant of the subjects you are attempting to critique, you can't even define them in a manner that any learned person would recognize.

There is not a single scientific concept you touched on here - abiogenesis, biological evolution, the fossil record, the Devonian explosion, the Cambrian explosion - that you have even correctly identified, let alone addressed in any meaningful manner whatsoever.

Put down the creationist propaganda for a few hours and read what actual scientists have written about this topic. I recommend starting here,

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html#CB

And here,

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html#CC

Then maybe you can come back with something resembling an informed critique.

 

[Peter1000]

You don't have the slightest ghost of a clue what you're talking about. None whatsoever. You are so abjectly, abysmally ignorant of the subjects you are attempting to critique, you can't even define them in a manner that any learned person would recognize.

There is not a single scientific concept you touched on here - abiogenesis, biological evolution, the fossil record, the Devonian explosion, the Cambrian explosion - that you have even correctly identified, let alone addressed in any meaningful manner whatsoever.

Put down the creationist propaganda for a few hours and read what actual scientists have written about this topic. I recommend starting here,

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html#CB

And here,

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html#CC

Then maybe you can come back with something resembling an informed critique.

In order for you to be able to talk to me, you need to point me to an experiment that proves beyond a ghost of a clue that the scientific THEORY of abiogenesis is true.

I, an illiterate scientist says to you, who must have several phD's behind your name, I do not think that abiogenesis is a true theory. What would you say to assure me that it is true?
When you answer me, you are forbidden to use verbiage like:
1) it is assumed...
2) it implies...
3) the inference is...
4) all things being equal...
5) and so on and so forth...
6) it is a simple step to...
7) well everyone knows that...

Well, you see what I mean.

Good luck with that assignment. Oh, and keep it to 5 parapraphs.

 

[Peter1000]

Um, have you by any chance read the parts of the Bible where God commands to kill people in other tribes, enslave people who aren't Hebrews, and kill everyone in a town except the virgins to keep as war spoils? Those aren't exactly keeping the Golden Rule commandments and are much worse than committing adultery.

If God commanded.....
Would you obey, or would you be more like Saul?

Remember, before you answer that, what God commands He stands behind. For instance, if God commands you to go into a city and kill all its inhabitants, would that be murder?
If God tells you to kill all but the women and children and take those back home and keep them as wives or find homes for them, is that adultry, or kidnapping?

What God says is clean is not unclean, even if there is 1,000 years of written scripture that says it is unclean.

God determines if it is clean and that can change as God wishes it. For instance, from approximately 2,000 - 500 BC God said having more than 1 wife was clean.
By 33 AD God said that having more than 1 wife was a not clean.
From approximately 2,000 BC - 33 AD God said that the children of Israel were clean and all other peoples were unclean. At 33 AD God said all people are clean now. Confusing isn't it.

So we go with what God commands, even if it goes against what books and history says.

 

[Eight Foot Manchild]

In order for you to be able to talk to me, you need to point me to an experiment that proves beyond a ghost of a clue that the scientific THEORY of abiogenesis is true.

I, an illiterate scientist says to you, who must have several phD's behind your name, I do not think that abiogenesis is a true theory. What would you say to assure me that it is true?
When you answer me, you are forbidden to use verbiage like:
1) it is assumed...
2) it implies...
3) the inference is...
4) all things being equal...
5) and so on and so forth...
6) it is a simple step to...
7) well everyone knows that...

Well, you see what I mean.

Good luck with that assignment. Oh, and keep it to 5 parapraphs.

It's not my job to educate you. If you want to engage in serious minded, informed debate on this subject, as with any subject, you need to demonstrate at least a rudimentary understanding of it.

You don't have that. You don't have the most basic grasp of the concepts you're attempting to critique. In fact, your 'challenge' here belies the fact that you have not even a grasp of what the word 'theory' means, in a scientific context. You're not even at square one. You are at square zero.

It's 2016. You are on the internet. There are free educational resources literally at your fingertips. Your ignorance is without excuse.

I've already provided you with two places to begin your education, which will clarify the numerous and basic misunderstandings you have of this subject, all of it sourced to primary scientific literature. That should do for a start.

 

[CrystalDragon]

If God commanded.....
Would you obey, or would you be more like Saul?

Remember, before you answer that, what God commands He stands behind. For instance, if God commands you to go into a city and kill all its inhabitants, would that be murder?
If God tells you to kill all but the women and children and take those back home and keep them as wives or find homes for them, is that adultry, or kidnapping?

What God says is clean is not unclean, even if there is 1,000 years of written scripture that says it is unclean.

God determines if it is clean and that can change as God wishes it. For instance, from approximately 2,000 - 500 BC God said having more than 1 wife was clean.
By 33 AD God said that having more than 1 wife was a not clean.
From approximately 2,000 BC - 33 AD God said that the children of Israel were clean and all other peoples were unclean. At 33 AD God said all people are clean now. Confusing isn't it.

So we go with what God commands, even if it goes against what books and history says.

I wouldn't obey something that goes against the moral code that most humans have of "do no harm, or "do unto others as you would have them do unto you". I could never kill all the men, women, and children in a city without pity or remorse unless I was brainwashed into doing it.

And peoples that God is unchanging, and yet you made it clear in your post that he does change his mind on things. Indicating that God's word and law isn't eternal and unchanging, it's wishy-washy and whatever he decides it wants to be at the time. If he sudden;y seemed to tell people that murder was okay, would you do it?

 

[Peter1000]

Hi Nihilist Virus,

This is an interesting thread. I remember reading something (I think it's by Krauss but I can't be sure) which shows why fine-tuning is a poor argument for God. I can't remember all the points now but one of them has something to do with the fact that there could have been an infinite number of misses and nothing happened and then finally one singularity takes place with all the right conditions and aeons later we evolve into what we are and we sit back and say there must be a God because of fine-tuning.

The other point has something to do with the misses may not be all that bleak. The misses may not produce particles as we know it today but there's no telling what they might produce. They might very well produce realities that we can't possibly have any notion of because it didn't happen in our current universe. And if we had existed in this alternative reality, we'd sit back and talk about fine-tuning and imagine that only those particular conditions that produced our alternative reality were the "fine" conditions that could support existence.

I'm not sure if I've expressed myself properly but basically, that convinced me that fine-tuning isn't such a good argument for us Christians after all.

Cheers,

StTruth

Good going StTruth, you just gave it all up without a whimper. Hope you are not on my side, when the bullets start flying.

Do you have any idea what the chance of 1 singularity taking place with all the right conditions? Make a dot on a piece of paper and behind that dot make 200 zeros and then put a 1 behind the last zero. What that means is that the chance happening of that 1 singularity happening is zero.

Now take that same piece of paper and put another dot on it and then behind it put 200 zeros and then after the last zero put a 1. That is the chance happening that life began on earth by abiogenesis. That chance is zero.

Zero chance for a singular happening to come along with all the right conditions to explode into a universe.
Zeot chance that 2 or 3 chemicals get together with a little electricity and this creates 1 extremely complex cell.
Zero possibility of a chance happening like these 2 events.

So you ask: Well, here we are on earth and in the universe, so apparently that 1 singularity did take place and those chemicals did get together, cause we're hear.

Well no, not exactly. There is another way, the way a Catholic would think it happened. This was all provided by a Superior Being, who made the universe and set the constants with such precision that the earth could actually maintain advanced life. You.

The faith necessary to believe in an impossible 'chance happening', is far more than the faith required to believe that a Superioir Being made it happen. So get some faith and get back in the game.

 

[Peter1000]

I wouldn't obey something that goes against the moral code that most humans have of "do no harm, or "do unto others as you would have them do unto you". I could never kill all the men, women, and children in a city without pity or remorse unless I was brainwashed into doing it.

And peoples that God is unchanging, and yet you made it clear in your post that he does change his mind on things. Indicating that God's word and law isn't eternal and unchanging, it's wishy-washy and whatever he decides it wants to be at the time. If he sudden;y seemed to tell people that murder was okay, would you do it?

Yes, I would kill if God commanded me to, just like Samuel did when Saul came back from defeating the Amalekites and was told to kill every person and every animal and bring nothing home.

When Saul came back he had spared Agag the king and the sheep and oxen. Samuel went to meet him and told him he had not done as God had commanded and Samuel brought Agag the king forward and said, because of all the women you have left childless, your mother this day will be childless and he hewed him to pieces before the Lord. (Read 1 Samuel 15) God was revenging the lives of thousands of people that Agag had murdered, so was it murder for Samuel to kill him?
The answer is no.
Read especially the last verse of chapter 15. It says that the Lord repented that he made Saul the king of Israel. Interesting that the Lord would repent of doing something.

The moral code is set up by God. If God says to do something against that moral code, you would say no and you would probably be put away, outside the presence of God. Especially if he told you face-to-face to do something against His moral code. Get a grip.
God was cleansing the land for Israel to come into it.
If you lived in that day and you went into one of these disgusting cities you would know why God killed and burned the cities, you would know. They did things unspeakable to their citizens, especially women. So do not council God. We do as He commands.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

You can say all you want about what abiogenesis is. But after all the dust settles and the clouds lift, it still boils down to a very simple definition of: 'life from non-life'.

No, it doesn't.

Both abiogenesis and spontanous generation are models that attempt to explain how life originated.

Life DID originate. That is a fact. Life wasn't always present. It arose somehow, somewhere, at some point.

Both models propose DIFFERENT answers to those questions. Disproving one doesn't disprove the other.

Consider plate tectonic theory.

That continents move around, was an accepted fact. The question was HOW.
Various models were proposed to explain this fact. The model of plate tectonics was the one that turned out correct. The model of continental drift, did not.

Both models attempted to explain the same phenomena.

For 300 years, science has tried to prove that life can come from non-living matter and they have not been able to do it. I believe some biology books no longer talk about abiogenesis because it is such a descredited hypothesis.

Abiogenesis is not biology. Biology is the science of already LIVING things.
Abiogenesis is chemistry. Bio-chemistry at best.

Biogenesis is still the only credible way that life came about on earth, life from living matter. Wow that even sounds sensible. How difficult would it have been for a superior intelligence to place already existing 1 celled life on earth?

If a being creates life, then that first life came from non-life.

As I said, life DID originate at some point, in some way, in some place.
If life only comes from life, then you end up with an infinite regress of generations of life. I shouldn't have to explain what that isn't sensible.

How difficult would it have been for a superior intelligence to put multi celled life on earth.

About as dificult as for undetectable graviton pixies to exert gravity forces.

Your 'faith' in abiogenesis has to be 100 times more than the 'faith' required to believe in an intelligent being with superior knowledge to make the universe come into reality, and to provide for a life-bearing earth.

I don't have any "faith" in any scientific model.

The precisional nature of the universal constants and the hundreds of goldilock conditions about our galaxy, solar system, and earth, point directly to a superior intelligence that designed and rolled into existence this life giving theatre.

Why?

Your challenge too, is to use your talents and your intellect to prove how an intelligent designer brought life to this earth and allowed it to grow in a naturalistic way. Persue this course and you will answer 2 big questions: 1) is there a God: yes. 2) how did life begin on earth: nature, with the help from God.

Just assuming things and pretending them to be true, does not result in valid answers to questions.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

In order for you to be able to talk to me, you need to point me to an experiment that proves beyond a ghost of a clue that the scientific THEORY of abiogenesis is true.

Capitalizing the word "theory" in such a manner, only exposes further how ignorant you are about science and the scientific method in general.

I, an illiterate scientist says to you, who must have several phD's behind your name, I do not think that abiogenesis is a true theory.

When you are talking about evolution, you are not talking about abiogenesis. The two are different models, dealing with different phenomena.

What would you say to assure me that it is true?

I don't think anyone here ever said that abiogenesis is "true".
I'ld expect most of your "opponents" here, to have no problems at all with saying that it's a work in progress. That includes me as well.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

For instance, if God commands you to go into a city and kill all its inhabitants, would that be murder?

Yes. Mass-murder, to be exact. Perhaps even genocide.

If God tells you to kill all but the women and children and take those back home and keep them as wives or find homes for them, is that adultry, or kidnapping?

Both. Not to mention slavery.

God determines if it is clean and that can change as God wishes it.

Something is either clean or it isn't. If this god changes his mind then either he was lying before, or it's just an opinion and not objective truth.

Either way, it calls into question quite a few things concerning this god.

For instance, from approximately 2,000 - 500 BC God said having more than 1 wife was clean.
By 33 AD God said that having more than 1 wife was a not clean.
From approximately 2,000 BC - 33 AD God said that the children of Israel were clean and all other peoples were unclean. At 33 AD God said all people are clean now. Confusing isn't it.

Not to mention, self-contradicting.

So we go with what God commands, even if it goes against what books and history says.

Yep... so you have no actual moral compass. You just have a sense of obedience to a perceived authority. That is the morality of psychopaths.

 

[Larniavc]

Yep... so you have no actual moral compass. You just have a sense of obedience to a perceived authority. That is the morality of psychopaths.

Very well said.

It's like the soldier who says 'I was just following orders' as he guides families into the showers.

Damn. I just Godwyned it, didn't I?

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

Very well said.

It's like the soldier who says 'I was just following orders' as he guides families into the showers.

Damn. I just Godwyned it, didn't I?

Yes you did.

But it's spot on, so that's fine.

 

[Nihilist Virus]

We are not talking about my religion, we are talking about who or what created the universe and the earth that you live on.

The idea that the universe and earth simply happened by an unintelligent chance is so small that you have to have much more faith than to believe that an intelligent being with superior knowledge designed and brought forth the universe and earth in a orderly manner. The precision of the constants bear record of this surety.

The real challenge is to connect the dots, and find out how this superior being was able to bring the universe and earth into existence in a natural way.

Use your extensive talents to prove that hypothesis and you will find the answers you are looking for.

Mormonism comes later.

You are constantly asserting fine tuning and doing nothing to demonstrate it. Your contributions to the discussion are minimal and you are stalling us post after post. Don't tell me to "look it up." I'm on the Internet right now asking about it. If none of you theists can actually explain what is finely tuned, then you all believe it simply as sheep.

 

[Peter1000]

It's not my job to educate you. If you want to engage in serious minded, informed debate on this subject, as with any subject, you need to demonstrate at least a rudimentary understanding of it.

You don't have that. You don't have the most basic grasp of the concepts you're attempting to critique. In fact, your 'challenge' here belies the fact that you have not even a grasp of what the word 'theory' means, in a scientific context. You're not even at square one. You are at square zero.

It's 2016. You are on the internet. There are free educational resources literally at your fingertips. Your ignorance is without excuse.

I've already provided you with two places to begin your education, which will clarify the numerous and basic misunderstandings you have of this subject, all of it sourced to primary scientific literature. That should do for a start.

You, on the other hand have dodged the 1 simple question that I asked. In fact a simpleton could ask this question. So here it is again:

What scientific experiment or scientific observation has confirmed the ability for random, unintelligent, non-living chemicals to swirl around in a soup-like solution and eventually produce 1 simple living cell with the capability to reproduce itself?

Simple question, give me a simple answer, if you can.

 

[Eight Foot Manchild]

You, on the other hand have dodged the 1 simple question that I asked. In fact a simpleton could ask this question. So here it is again:

What scientific experiment or scientific observation has confirmed the ability for random, unintelligent, non-living chemicals to swirl around in a soup-like solution and eventually produce 1 simple living cell with the capability to reproduce itself?

Simple question, give me a simple answer, if you can.

It's not a 'simple question'. It's a loaded question that belies the fact that you have never once studied this subject to any meaningful degree whatsoever.

Suppose for a second we weren't talking about abiogenesis, but powered flight, and you said,

I have one simple question: What scientific experiment or scientific observation has confirmed that airplanes can flap their wings up and down in order to fly?

That is exactly what you sound like. Your 'simple question' isn't even pertinent to the subject you're attempting to critique, because you don't even know what the subject is.

Put down the creationist propaganda for a few hours, learn what abiogenesis is and read what scientists from relevant fields of study have written on the subject. Then maybe you can come back with something resembling an informed critique, instead of what you're doing right now - riding into battle on your broomstick horse with a wooden sword and your pants around your ankles, charging in the opposite direction from where the battle actually is.

 

[Larniavc]

You, on the other hand have dodged the 1 simple question that I asked. In fact a simpleton could ask this question. So here it is again:

What scientific experiment or scientific observation has confirmed the ability for random, unintelligent, non-living chemicals to swirl around in a soup-like solution and eventually produce 1 simple living cell with the capability to reproduce itself?

Simple question, give me a simple answer, if you can.

This has been none.

What is your point?

 

[Peter1000]

You are constantly asserting fine tuning and doing nothing to demonstrate it. Your contributions to the discussion are minimal and you are stalling us post after post. Don't tell me to "look it up." I'm on the Internet right now asking about it. If none of you theists can actually explain what is finely tuned, then you all believe it simply as sheep.

Let me once again demonstrate what I mean by fine-tuning:
The mass of the proton divided by the mass of the electron is 1836.15267245.

This important scientific ratio has its own symbol (u) and is considered a miraculous constant because it has held to be true since the beginning of time and in all quadrants of the universe.

Science cannot explain how this ratio came into existence and they cannot explain how all protons and electrons ever existing can maintain this constant ratio.

Science does know this: this ratio is so miraculous that if it were larger or smaller by 1 in 10^37 THERE WOULD BE NO LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE.

Here is one more:
The neutron (n) weighs 1.00137841870 times greater than a proton (p).

This exact weight difference, allows the neutron to decay readily into protons, electrons, and neutrinos, a process that assures the relative abundances of hydrogen and helium and gave us a universe that is dominated by hydrogen.

If this weight ratio between neutron and proton were just slightly larger, we would be living in a universe with far too much helium, in which stars would have burned out too quickly for life to come forth.

If this weight ratio was just slightly smaller, protons would decay into neutrons, leaving the universe without atoms.

The result of a smaller or larger ratio would mean NO LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE.

Now that I, the simpleton have demonstrated 2 of hundreds of universal constants, I ask you, who must have a phD in Quantum theory to explain:
1) how these constants came into existence?
2) how they have maintained themselves over billions of years?

In your answer you cannot use the concept of a 'random chance happening', because there is a zero possiblility that a random, unintelligent force has performed such a precise creation, and has maintained this precise condition for billions of years.
Remember: random, unintelligent nature has a tendency to decay, rot, go out of sync, etc.

 

[Larniavc]

Science does know this: this ratio is so miraculous that if it were larger or smaller by 1 in 10^37 THERE WOULD BE NO LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE.

Do you have evidence of this?

 

[Peter1000]

It's not a 'simple question'. It's a loaded question that belies the fact that you have never once studied this subject to any meaningful degree whatsoever.

Suppose for a second we weren't talking about abiogenesis, but powered flight, and you said,

I have one simple question: What scientific experiment or scientific observation has confirmed that airplanes can flap their wings up and down in order to fly?

That is exactly what you sound like. Your 'simple question' isn't even pertinent to the subject you're attempting to critique, because you don't even know what the subject is.

Put down the creationist propaganda for a few hours, learn what abiogenesis is and read what scientists from relevant fields of study have written on the subject. Then maybe you can come back with something resembling an informed critique, instead of what you're doing right now - riding into battle on your broomstick horse with a wooden sword and your pants around your ankles, charging in the opposite direction from where the battle actually is.

If I were asked this airplane question, I would be able to respond to the simpleton's question intelligently.
I would say: You are mistaken to think that an airplane has to flap its wings in order to fly. We know that because in 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright built a plane and flew it off the ground with a gasoline engine. The plane went around 100 ft. in the air, and in subsequent tests, they flew further and further. These experiments were also observed by many people and reporters and a picture was taken to prove the first flight. Seems that if you have enough power to push the plane forward, and the fixed wings are finely tuned for aerodynamic lift, the air can lift the plane right into the air and flight can be created.

Notice that my answer referred the questioner to a specific experiment and those that did the experiment and that there was also observers of the experiment and proof of the success of the experiment is available too. Not tough, unless there is in fact no such thing as air flight, then it gets tougher.

So now that we have answered the airplane question with success, lets get back to abiogenesis, and I will make the question even more simple:

Has there been an experiment or an observation that has proven that the 'first part' of abiogenesis is anything but a theory? (The 'first part' meaning that a living cell is produced from non-living material.)

Abiogenesis may cover a wide range of topics, so lets focus our attention on the 'first part', or 'the beginning' of abiogenesis. To me, that is the most important part.

I am not here to critique abiogenesis, I am just asking an important question about 1 part of the theory. If I were critiquing the subject, I would need to study up a lot more, but I am not, so stop with the avoidance tactic and answer my simple question.

If you believe it is not a simple question, you are mistaken, or you are sure that the answer to my question is NO, there has not been an experiment or observation that proves that the 'first part' of abiogenesis is anything but a theory. Remember, the 'first part' of the theory is stated roughly: life on earth started from non-living material.

Thanks for the conversation.

 

[Peter1000]

Do you have evidence of this?

See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proton-to-electron_mass_ratio