Help

[HeSpokeit]

Hey, I am dealing with a professor or mathematics on another forum who is an evolutionist. Anybody have anything to say to her regarding the mathematical impossibility of evolution?

 

[Self Improvement]

Yes, I do in fact have something you should tell your professor: the mathematical chance of life evolving is 1/1.

 

[Chalnoth]

Hey, I am dealing with a professor or mathematics on another forum who is an evolutionist. Anybody have anything to say to her regarding the mathematical impossibility of evolution?

There is no help to be obtained, here or anywhere. Evolution is a solid, well-evidenced theory, and there are no valid arguments as to its mathematical impossibility.

That said, what you've probably heard that relates to this is Dembski's attempts to use information theory to disprove evolution:
http://www.arn.org/docs/dembski/wd_idtheory.htm

You might possibly link to him the above article, and if he takes the time, he can tell you exactly why it's just plain wrong. The short of it is basically that this is just a recasting of the old 2nd law of thermodynamics arguments (since entropy and information have a one-to-one correspondence), which are invalid since life is not a closed system. Anyway, here is a post I made on the subject of information and evolution:
http://www.christianforums.com/t385...-mutations-add-information-to-the-genome.html

Finally, and most importantly, one cannot ever use pure logic or mathematics to prove or disprove anything related to reality. One always has to bow to observation to test and see whether or not reality agrees. Every time we have tested, for the past 150 years or so, reality has come back with a resounding Yes! in support of evolution.

 

[TheBellman]

Not quite the help he was hoping for, methinks.

 

[Chalnoth]

Not quite the help he was hoping for, methinks.

Well, hey, at least I linked him straight to the source of the nonsense

 

[TheBellman]

But on a bigger issue...here's guy who comes and posts to a Christian forum (no doubt believing those who will respond to him will be Christian) and he ASSUMES everyone (ie., all Christians) will join him in wanting to show this 'evolutionist' the error of her ways. A Christian who thinks all Christians reject evilution.

Hovind, AIG, all of them...they've got a lot to answer for. If the Christian God does exist, I'd hate to be in their shoes come judgement day...deceiving God's children for so long? Not good.

 

[Dannager]

Hey, I am dealing with a professor or mathematics on another forum who is an evolutionist. Anybody have anything to say to her regarding the mathematical impossibility of evolution?

Yes, I suggest you tell her "I will listen respectfully and with an open mind while you explain your standpoint to me." Your professor of mathematics is correct about evolution, in all likelihood. Not only is it extremely well-evidenced, there is no such "mathematical impossibility", as you put it.

 

[TheBellman]

Hey, I am dealing with a professor or mathematics on another forum who is an evolutionist. Anybody have anything to say to her regarding the mathematical impossibility of evolution?

I'd also suggest that given that she's a professor of mathematics and you're (presumably) not, she's likely to know far more than you about the probability of virtually anything. Probability is, after all, math...you know, that thing she's a professor of?

 

[dad]

Hey, I am dealing with a professor or mathematics on another forum who is an evolutionist. Anybody have anything to say to her regarding the mathematical impossibility of evolution?

I would assume that the math comes from the set up to the so called first ancestor, then, all the things that had to go just right for that virus, or bacteria, or whatever the dream is, to go about producing like on earth.
All we have to do, is stick the entire known universe inside a little hot soup. Then, we arrange, with no supervision, to have it start expanding. Next thing you know, here we are, voila, a universe. Now all we need is life to appear on earth. Dream up enough time, and slop some chemicals, ingredients, sunlight, water, etc, in just the right happenstance mix, and behold, there in the pond, sits life. Just rarin to go, and fore you know it, we got plants, worms, fish, and uname it.

The thing is, that no numbers can help that joke, only one number is needed, and it needs to be a real big one!
0

 

[AV1611VET]

Hey, I am dealing with a professor or mathematics on another forum who is an evolutionist. Anybody have anything to say to her regarding the mathematical impossibility of evolution?

Here's a quote from The Case for a Creator, by Lee Strobel, quoting Stephen C. Meyer, p. 229:

• "There's a minimal complexity threshold," he replied. "There's a certain level of folding that a protein has to have, called tertiary structure, that is necessary for it to perform a function. You don't get tertiary structure in a protein unless you have at least seventy-five amino acids or so. That may be conservative. Now consider what you'd need for a protein molecule to form by chance."
• "First, you need the right bonds between the amino acids. Second, amino acids come in right-handed and left-handed versions, and you've got to get only left-handed ones. Third, the amino acids must link up in a specified sequence, like letters in a sentence."
• "Run the odds of these things falling into place on their own and you find that the probabilities of forming a rather short functional protein at random would be one chance in a hundred thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion. That's a ten with 125 zeroes after it!" *
• "And that would only be one protein molecule - a minimally complex cell would need between three hundred and five hundred protein molecules."

* Anything 1/10[sup]50th[/sup] or less is considered a mathematical impossibility.

 

[Chalnoth]

AV1611VET, finding a mechanism that can't have led to life finds just that: a mechanism that can't have led to life. It doesn't preclude the existence of a mechanism that could have naturally led to life.

That said, abiogenesis isn't a problem in the least. We don't yet know how abiogenesis occurred, this is true, but we have a great number of quite plausible explanations. Anyway, for more on the ridiculousness of the above argument, consider talkorigin's take on it:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/abioprob.html

 

[AV1611VET]

...consider talkorigin's take on it:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/abioprob.html

No, thanks --- I couldn't care less what talkorigins has to say about it.

That's all scientists do, is contradict each other.

Then you wonder why we Christians don't swallow this stuff lock, stock, and barrel.

 

[GoSeminoles!]

Then you wonder why we Christians don't swallow this stuff lock, stock, and barrel.

Then why do Baptist universities such as Baylor, Mercer, and Wheaton feature evolution prominently in their biology curriculum?

 

[MrGoodBytes]

No, thanks --- I couldn't care less what talkorigins has to say about it.

...lest your arguments be soundly refuted, eh?

That's all scientists do, is contradict each other.

Huh? Where in this thread did that happen, exactly? You posted an argument by a man whose sole qualification is a journalism degree , chalnoth gave you a link to show why the argument is demonstrably flawed. Now where is the scientific contradiction?

Then you wonder why we Christians don't swallow this stuff lock, stock, and barrel.

The Pope swallowed.

 

[shernren]

Here's a quote from The Case for a Creator, by Lee Strobel, quoting Stephen C. Meyer, p. 229:

• "There's a minimal complexity threshold," he replied. "There's a certain level of folding that a protein has to have, called tertiary structure, that is necessary for it to perform a function. You don't get tertiary structure in a protein unless you have at least seventy-five amino acids or so. That may be conservative. Now consider what you'd need for a protein molecule to form by chance."
• "First, you need the right bonds between the amino acids. Second, amino acids come in right-handed and left-handed versions, and you've got to get only left-handed ones. Third, the amino acids must link up in a specified sequence, like letters in a sentence."
• "Run the odds of these things falling into place on their own and you find that the probabilities of forming a rather short functional protein at random would be one chance in a hundred thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion. That's a ten with 125 zeroes after it!" *
• "And that would only be one protein molecule - a minimally complex cell would need between three hundred and five hundred protein molecules."

* Anything 1/10[sup]50th[/sup] or less is considered a mathematical impossibility.

If a lottery has 10^50 people in it, the chances of a particular person winning that lottery is 10^-50.

So if a lottery has more than 10^50 people in it, nobody will ever win it?

 

[Psudopod]

No, thanks --- I couldn't care less what talkorigins has to say about it.

That's all scientists do, is contradict each other.

Then you wonder why we Christians don't swallow this stuff lock, stock, and barrel.

And you wonder why people get fed up with arguing with you. You don't have to belive anything Talkorgins says. But you can look at their references and see why they say what they say.

Science is based on evidence. If you want to convince someone you are right, you show them that evidence. Chances are the first time a new idea is brought out, few people buy inot it. But as more people look at the calcualations, repeat the experiments etc, then the idea gains more credit. Or the oposite happened, and the idea is shown to be wrong at it is falsified.

And no, Christians don't "swallow it", but most of them do look at the evidence and except it, because it makes sense.

 

[AnEmpiricalAgnostic]

No, thanks --- I couldn't care less what talkorigins has to say about it.

 

[MrGoodBytes]

I was more thinking along the line of the "hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing" monkeys, but then I realized that he says quite a lot.

 

[Edx]

No, thanks --- I couldn't care less what talkorigins has to say about it. .

AV you dont care what anyone says. You dont even care about what you can learn from the oldest versions of the Bible becuase you believe only the KJV is correct.

we Christians don't swallow this stuff lock, stock, and barrel

Since theres a lot of Christians that do, you must mean "real" Christians. Christians that believe what you believe.

 

[Edx]

• "Run the odds of these things falling into place on their own and you find that the probabilities of forming a rather short functional protein at random would be one chance in a hundred thousand trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion trillion. That's a ten with 125 zeroes after it!" *
• "And that would only be one protein molecule - a minimally complex cell would need between three hundred and five hundred protein molecules."

* Anything 1/10[sup]50th[/sup] or less is considered a mathematical impossibility.

And perchance AV you can tell us where Strobels got this interestingly large figure from? Considering how has practically nothing to base the mathematics on, its quite specific.

And its nothing to do with Evolution, its abiogenesis. The OP is talking about Evolution, which doesnt rely on abiogenesis being true.