How the Smallest Cells Give Big Evidence for a Creator

[pitabread]

Isn't this whole thread from the creationists point of view, one big "god of the gaps" argument - you can't prove how the universe started, therefore god.

In a nutshell, yes. Unfortunately it seems this is the best argument creationists and ID proponents still have.

 

[tyke]

But it is still tedious and gets them absolutely nowhere.

 

[Haipule]

@Haipule
Can you put that in simpler language? I'm not a scientist and didn't understand a great deal of the piece you quoted. In particular, can you clear up for me what is meant by an "immortal cell"? I'd be surprised if it means what you think it means. Cheers!

And Cheers to you!

To answer your question--no! I can't! I had to read that several times just to get a jist. And I have no idea what they mean by "immortal". I just thought it was interesting.

I was contemplating the relationship to life that hair and trees have in common. Studying hair, I learned that hair follicles produce stems cells for the growth of the hair as well as to heal wounds. Whereas, trees also have stem cells for growth but they bypass/cover wounds.

I was answering my own question: how do wounds heal? Most people say the brain but, trees don't have a brain! And if you look at a cross-section of both a tree and a hair: they are remarkably alike even the bark!

That research was motivated while studying zero point energy.

 

[tyke]

To answer your question--no! I can't! I had to read that several times just to get a jist. And I have no idea what they mean by "immortal". I just thought it was interesting.

Thanks for your honest reply! As I say, I'm no scientist but I was intrigued by the piece you quoted. I'll try to find out what is meant by "immortal cell" and do a bit of homework.

 

[Subduction Zone]

And Cheers to you!

To answer your question--no! I can't! I had to read that several times just to get a jist. And I have no idea what they mean by "immortal". I just thought it was interesting.

I was contemplating the relationship to life that hair and trees have in common. Studying hair, I learned that hair follicles produce stems cells for the growth of the hair as well as to heal wounds. Whereas, trees also have stem cells for growth but they bypass/cover wounds.

I was answering my own question: how do wounds heal? Most people say the brain but, trees don't have a brain! And if you look at a cross-section of both a tree and a hair: they are remarkably alike even the bark!

That research was motivated while studying zero point energy.

When I hear the phrase "zero point energy" coming from someone that has an admittedly low science education level my fraud alert alarm goes off. Many scam artists try to take people in on over unity devices that run on "zero point energy". Zero point energy is just the base state of an atom or molecule. It can't get any lower in energy. There is no energy to harvest from it any longer.

Let's take a hydrogen atom for example. It has various levels of excitation that the electron orbiting it can be occupy. It jumps from one state to another by absorbing or emitting a photon, a "particle" of light.

Once it gets to its base state its electron could be said to still be moving around. It can't get into the center, it is kicked out every time that it gets in the nucleus. And it can't leave, the proton attracts the electron too strongly. So it is constantly here, there or somewhere else random around the nucleus. You can't stop it. It would take energy to do so. You can't pull it away. That would take energy. It just sits there.

If someone is trying to sell something just laugh and run away.

 

[Gene2memE]

"How great is our God indeed!"

I read recently that plant stem cells are immortal.

Immortal in this context doesn't not mean 'lives forever'. Immortal in this context basically means 'keeps dividing itself for the life of the organism'.

Specifically, it means the cell is not subject to the Hayflick Limit - which is the normal number of times that a cell can divide itself before cell division stops. Prior to the discovery of this limit, the assumption was that all cells were 'immortal'.

So, when you refer to a plant stem cell as 'immortal', what it really means is that the cell will continue making copies of itself until the organism it resides in dies. Then the cell dies along with the rest of the organism.

The bible says Adam was made from the dust of the earth! How many immortal plant stem cells are in dust?

None.

I once read about the pluripotent stem cells contained in the human rib. And that rib bones grow back if the surgeon leaves the sheath housing it intact.

Pluripotent stem cells are contained in human ribs. That's because they are contained in human hematopoietic bone marrow (along with multipotent and unipotent stem cells).

So, there's nothing special about ribs containing pluripotent stem cells.

As for ribs "growing back", its a sort of no, sort of yes kind of answer. What happens is that some cartilage - not bone - can regrow over time (a couple of months), if the sheath (known as the perichondrium) is left intact. There was an interesting study published in 2015: Natural large-scale regeneration of rib cartilage in a mouse model. - PubMed - NCBI

So, no the rib bone themselves don't grow back, but rib cartilage does.

And mitochondrial DNA cannot precede the first mother.

Well, it can, and did, given that mitochondrial DNA preceded the development of sexual reproduction by roughly 300 to 400 million years.

Mothers simply didn't exist when mitochondrial DNA developed. There was no male or female at that time.

 

[tyke]

Immortal in this context doesn't not mean 'lives forever'. Immortal in this context basically means 'keeps dividing itself for the life of the organism'.

I had a suspicion of how he was using this phrase- to most lay people "immortal cell" does mean a cell that lives forever thus endowing cells with a supernatural like life. Thanks for clearing that up!

Many happy returns btw!!

 

[Jimmy D]

I feel like many evolutionists simply find it incredible that a Great Being could exist who brought the world into being and dismiss evidence in His favor.

You seem like a nice chap Mark, but this is really starting to irk me..... EVOLUTIONIST DOES NOT MEAN ATHEIST, I repeat, EVOLUTIONIST DOES NOT MEAN ATHEIST.

Many "evolutionists" are Christian. If evolution was miraculously proven wrong, it wouldn't affect my atheism. They are two different things, I repeat EVOLUTIONIST DOES NOT MEAN ATHEIST.

2. The argument from complexity has much more to it than merely saying "It's complex, therefore a designer did it." That description is not merely a simplification, it's an over-simplification. A more accurate summary would go like this:
a. There are certain types of complex objects which consistently require intelligence to design and produce them.
b. These objects have identifiable characteristics such as large amounts of specified, functional, information, and/or highly specific interacting parts which form an irreducibly complex whole.
c. Life has the same characteristics as other things which require intelligent design.
d. Alternative explanations (unguided evolution) fall way short of being able to explain the origin of life without intelligent design.
e. Therefore, the best explanation is that life was created by an Intelligent Designer.

Any evidence of a designer? It doesn't sound like it.

"a. There are certain types of complex objects which consistently require intelligence to design and produce them."

In the natural world? What are they then?

b. These objects have identifiable characteristics such as large amounts of specified, functional, information, and/or highly specific interacting parts which form an irreducibly complex whole.

Irreducible complexity?

c. Life has the same characteristics as other things which require intelligent design.

Yeah, and I've got the characteristics of an ape, and the characteristics of a cat, and the characteristics of a fish.

d. Alternative explanations (unguided evolution) fall way short of being able to explain the origin of life without intelligent design.

Do you think "unguided evolution" even attempts to explain the origin of life?

 

[quatona]

Thanks for bringing up the "incredulity" objection again. It was on my list of things to reply to from the other thread. Here's a few thoughts:

1. The "incredulity" argument is a two-edged sword. It cuts both ways. I feel like many evolutionists simply find it incredible that a Great Being could exist who brought the world into being

No, I don´t find that incredulous - it´s perfectly possible (notwithstanding the fact that this would just raise the questions to a different level: What is the explanation for the existence of such an incredibly complex "Great Being"? etc.) . I just see no good reason to believe so.

and dismiss evidence in His favor.

Keep the evidence coming so I can evaluate it.
An argument from incredulity isn´t evidence though, sorry.

a. There are certain types of complex objects which consistently require intelligence to design and produce them.

Sorry for interrupting you already here: This premise smells strongly like question begging.

 

[Mark Corbett]

In the Miller Urey experiment they used the atmosphere that they thought existed at the time that life first arose. That was later found not to be the case. Since then it has been repeated many times with different atmospheres. They continually found that the "building blocks of life" were naturally produced. .

Miller-Urey type experiments have shown some mechanisms which may have produced some of the relatively simple building blocks of life, specifically including the amino acids which are used to build proteins. There are problems with these experiments in terms of them providing evidence that the first life forms could have arisen without intelligent design. Two articles which address these problems are here and here.

I will summarize what I see as perhaps the biggest problem. The main argument and lines of evidence in the OP are not affected (or affected in an extremely minimal way) even if it is allowed that all the amino acids needed to produce a biological functional protein could have been present in the same place on the earth before life existed without intervention by a Creator.

This is because the amino acids must be joined together in a highly specific sequence. The chains of amino acids which produce proteins are long and exceedingly rare. Not rare like one in a thousand or one in a billion. Rare like one in 10^53. This is MANY orders of magnitude greater than the total number of all the bacterial cells which have ever lived on earth. And you don't need just one specific, functional protein to produce life. You need many. All at the same time. In the same place. And even if they are all in the same place at the same time you are a long way from a working, living cell. A dead cell has all the needed proteins. But it will not spontaneously come back to life.

So even if we accept the success of Urey-Miller inspired experiments in producing the needed amino acids and some other chemicals, this is nowhere remotely close to what is needed to produce life and does not even address the strongest evidence and arguments given in the OP.

 

[Mark Corbett]

You seem like a nice chap Mark, but this is really starting to irk me..... EVOLUTIONIST DOES NOT MEAN ATHEIST, I repeat, EVOLUTIONIST DOES NOT MEAN ATHEIST.

Many "evolutionists" are Christian. If evolution was miraculously proven wrong, it wouldn't affect my atheism. They are two different things, I repeat EVOLUTIONIST DOES NOT MEAN ATHEIST.

I'm not sure why you are irked. I have never stated that evolutionist = atheist.

However, I can see how you might feel like that is true since in this thread many (probably most) of the people arguing against Intelligent Design identify themselves as atheists. But that is not the same as me saying evolutionist = atheist. Also, unguided evolution is the by far the most common account of the origin of life given by atheists. However, it is true that many theists also believe in evolution, and in some cases they even believe in unguided evolution.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Miller-Urey type experiments have shown some mechanisms which may have produced some of the relatively simple building blocks of life, specifically including the amino acids which are used to build proteins. There are problems with these experiments in terms of them providing evidence that the first life forms could have arisen without intelligent design. Two articles which address these problems are here and here.

You just admitted that you were wrong by using bogus sources. The first actually requires their workers not to use the scientific method. They have to swear that the following is true:

What we believe - creation.com

The second is that equally as bad Discovery Institute. If you forgot them they wee behind the losing side in the Dover trial. If you can't find any valid sources you might as well give up now.

https://evolutionnews.org/2012/12/top_five_probl/
I will summarize what I see as perhaps the biggest problem. The main argument and lines of evidence in the OP are not affected (or affected in an extremely minimal way) even if it is allowed that all the amino acids needed to produce a biological functional protein could have been present in the same place on the earth before life existed without intervention by a Creator.

How many times do you need to be told that mere assertion is worthless?

This is because the amino acids must be joined together in a highly specific sequence. The chains of amino acids which produce proteins are long and exceedingly rare. Not rare like one in a thousand or one in a billion. Rare like one in 10^53. This is MANY orders of magnitude greater than the total number of all the bacterial cells which have ever lived on earth. And you don't need just one specific, functional protein to produce life. You need many. All at the same time. In the same place. And even if they are all in the same place at the same time you are a long way from a working, living cell. A dead cell has all the needed proteins. But it will not spontaneously come back to life.

Oops, you made two errors. One that there was a goal, the second, that there was only one path to life. And you are assuming that DNA was needed for life. The earliest of cells were not even technically alive. They were probably merely cell membranes with complex molecules inside. You are making the error of trying to make complex life. In other words you are jumping too far ahead.

So even if we accept the success of Urey-Miller inspired experiments in producing the needed amino acids and some other chemicals, this is nowhere remotely close to what is needed to produce life and does not even address the strongest evidence and arguments given in the OP.

Don't give me any "ifs". They were. But you are somewhat right. That was only one of the steps for life. But the rest of your argument was just unsubstantiated nonsense.

 

[dmmesdale]

Except you have no basis for that claim.

You have no evidential basis for life from nonlife. Evidence-free guesses based on dogmatic atheistic assumptions (atheistic creation myths) not science in the first place. If it is living, then its source is living. That is what the biological science tells us. Common descent and blind watchmaker evolution or origin of life rejects certain living sources from the get go. That is their start and substitutes self assembling watches as a valid alternative when it is nonsense. Watches do not self assemble and life does not self assemble based on chemical reactions which are redundant. Chemical reactions are great for baking a cake because the results are always the same if the recipe is followed. A cake.

Quote


Darwinism rejects all supernatural phenomena and causations. The
theory of evolution by natural selection explains the adaptedness and diver-
sity of the world solely materialistically. It no longer requires God as creator
or designer (although one is certainly free to believe in God even if one ac-
cepts evolution). Darwin pointed out that creation, as described in the Bible
and the origin accounts of other cultures, was contradicted by almost any
aspect of the natural world. Every aspect of the “wonderful design” so ad-
mired by natural theologians could be explained by natural selection.
13

Again, you'd have to define every single possible biochemical pathway for non-life to life and then rule them all out.

No i do not. What you have to do is come up with an evidential basis for any of them. There are none that do not involve living. If it involves life from nonlife, then they are all eliminated in favor of life from a living source since that has mountains of empirical evidence and precedent.

But since we can't even define every single biochemical pathway for non-life to life, then you have no way to demonstrate what you claim. It's just a base assertion. And not a particularly compelling one.

A biochemical pathway for nonlife to life is nonsense since bio means living. You are asserting a chemical cause (living ruled out) for a bio result.

I never said infinite. But when we're talking about biochemical origins for life, there are multiple pathways that we have to explore. And we have yet to exhaust all of them or even define all them to begin with.

150 years of failure with no evidential basis what so ever is what you got and exactly what the argument from design predicts. Nature will not cause a car to self-assemble, and the moon will not cause the starship Enterprise to self-assemble. If they find Enterprise on the Moon, then its cause would be intelligent and extrinsic of the moon. They would be looking for ET, not how the moondidit.

But again, it's not A or B.

Now you refuse to answer. Nonliving or the intervention of a living source as the first cause of all bio life here, which is it? Nonliving includes all the possibilities. Since you are stuck with a nonliving first cause then produce an empirical evidence basis for your default. Otherwise it can be dismissed as evidence free guesses no more valid then the guesses of the garbage man.

When we're talking about the possibilities for non-life to arise via biochemical origins, we are dealing with multiple hypothesis and possible methods. So it's hypothesis A versus B versus C versus D versus E... etc...

They are all atheistic variations on the same thing. Life from nonlife. They cannot come up with an evidential basis for any of them. We cannot rule out the moon creating the Starship Enterprise because we have multiple hypos on how the moon could have done it and they all have to be eliminated before we consider ET as its source? The simplest life forms are as complicated as a jumbo jet that splits off into two jumbo jets.

You're trying to boil this down to an overly simple dichotomy and that's where the mistake lies.

You are trying to boil it down to two possibilities for the starship Enterprise on the Moon, and it does not work since there are multiple evidence free hypos on how the moon caused Enterprise to self assemble and that is where the mistake lies.

Assertion is not evidence.

It is a multiple evidence based statement. Not an assertion. Big difference which you ignore. If it is living, then its source is living unless you wish to assert a rock gave birth to you absent your parents.

Again, if you want to prove the existence of a divine, supernatural being as the origin of life on Earth, then you've got your work cut out for you. Go get your evidence, then come back when you're ready. I'll wait.

That is not a science or investigative standard. It is unscientific. An ad-hoc rescue selectively applied because of your dogmatic commitment to atheism which is psychological, not rational. Certainly, not following the evidence which is clear and convincing to any reasonable, rational person. The simplest life is bacteria and it is very complicated. There is no such thing as simple life or precursors to bacteria. They are all imaginary. If you want to prove the existence of simpler precursors to bacteria, then you have your work cut out for you. Since it is easier to go from bacteria to a person then to go from chemical goo to bacteria.

You are selectively moving the goalposts to near impossible standards. If you want to prove how life can self-assemble absent the intervention of a living source, then you got your work cut out for you. You exempt your standards from your impositions. Do as you say and not as you do. Double standards.

 

[quatona]

Also, unguided evolution is the by far the most common account of the origin of life given by atheists.

Evolution theory isn´t about the origin of life, and atheists typically are aware of this.

 

[Nithavela]

So many PRATTs.

Why are you people still chasing your tails every time a new guy posts an essay like that? It's been this way for a decade.

At least in politics, there are new people to laugh at.

 

[Jimmy D]

So even if we accept the success of Urey-Miller inspired experiments in producing the needed amino acids and some other chemicals, this is nowhere remotely close to what is needed to produce life and does not even address the strongest evidence and arguments given in the OP.

I believe research has moved on since the fifties Mark....

Abiogenesis - RationalWiki

In 2001 Louis Allamandola demonstrated that organic material can be synthesized in deep space using a "Chill vacuum chamber"--a lot of biomolecules: nitriles, ethers, alcohols, ring-like hydrocarbons, and others.[8] [9]

In a complementary experiment, Jennifer Blank at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory reported: "Through subsequent chemical analysis, the team discovered that the initial amino acids in the mixture had linked together to form peptides, from which proteins can be formed."[10]

In 2010 Craig Venter and his colleagues inserted a wholly artificial chromosome into a bacterial cell and produced the first artificial life form (a.k.a. "dial-a-genome").[11] While it may seem like artificial abiogenesis, it nevertheless involved some major cheating: the artificial chromosome was constructed using gene sequences of an existing organism.

As of 2011, Lee Cronin at the University of Glasgow is trying to start an evolutionary process in polyoxometalate-based "cells".[12]

In 2014 a group of researchers managed to produce all four components of RNA by simulating an asteroid impact in primordial conditions.[13]

A 2015 paper showed that the chemical precursors for the synthesis of amino acids, lipids and nucleotides, which would be required in a primitive cell, could have all arisen simultaneously through reactions driven by ultraviolet light. [14]

In 2015 the lander Philae discovered 16 organic compounds, four of which had never been detected on a comet before, on the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Many of the organic compounds are important building-blocks of life.[15] [16][17]

In 2015, NASA scientists studying the origin of life managed to reproduce uracil, cytosine, and thymine from an ice sample containing pyrimidine under conditions found in space.[18][19]

A 2016 study showed that the building blocks of life can be replicated in deep-sea vents. These experiments have for the first time demonstrated that RNA molecules can form in alkaline hydrothermal chimneys.[20][21]


Maybe have a read of this one:

https://phys.org/news/2015-06-evidence-emerges-life.html

 

[pitabread]

You have no evidential basis for life from nonlife.

Uh-huh. Given that you appear to be long on assertion and short on anything else, and have just started repeating yourself endlessly, I'm going to end this here.

If you want to prove how life can self-assemble absent the intervention of a living source, then you got your work cut out for you.

Which is exactly what scientists have been working on for the last 50+ years.

If you want to read up on some of the research into life from non-life, you can start here: Szostak Lab: Home

Or y'know, you can hit up Google Scholar and see what else is out there: "origin of life" - Google Scholar

But this continued "nuh-uh!" scthick of yours is neither interesting nor productive in this discussion.

 

[bhsmte]

I'm not sure why you are irked. I have never stated that evolutionist = atheist.

However, I can see how you might feel like that is true since in this thread many (probably most) of the people arguing against Intelligent Design identify themselves as atheists. But that is not the same as me saying evolutionist = atheist. Also, unguided evolution is the by far the most common account of the origin of life given by atheists. However, it is true that many theists also believe in evolution, and in some cases they even believe in unguided evolution.

Mark, many, many and i do mean many more christians agree with evolution, compared to atheists, by raw numbers. And indeed, some of those christians also believe, evolution is unguided.

 

[dmmesdale]

Uh-huh. Given that you appear to be long on assertion and short on anything else, and have just started repeating yourself endlessly, I'm going to end this here.

What you do have is a dogmatic conviction to atheism which ignores actual evidence and science method in favor of unscientific ad hoc rescues when the going get rough.

Which is exactly what scientists have been working on for the last 50+ years.

150 yrs and counting. Repeated tested and failed. Again and again.

If you want to read up on some of the research into life from non-life, you can start here: Szostak Lab: Home

If he has anything then he can claim his origin of life prize here.
If he has anything then he can claim his origin of life prize here.
"Origin of Life Prize - Life Origins - Abiogenesis"
Since he has not he has nothing.

Or y'know, you can hit up Google Scholar and see what else is out there: "origin of life" - Google Scholar

But this continued "nuh-uh!" scthick of yours is neither interesting nor productive in this discussion.

Exposing duplicity and double standards only harms your atheistic convictions. Your arguments are gas bag pontificating that falls apart under scrutiny. Produce the evidential basis for any of it since it does not matter what they believe, only what they can prove via science method employing science standard. Evidence free rosey scenarios involving state of the art labs for the purpose of funding not compelling.

 

[Jimmy D]

What you do have is a dogmatic conviction to atheism which ignores actual evidence and science method in favor of unscientific ad hoc rescues when the going get rough.

150 yrs and counting. Repeated tested and failed. Again and again.
If he has anything then he can claim his origin of life prize here.
If he has anything then he can claim his origin of life prize here.
"Origin of Life Prize - Life Origins - Abiogenesis"
Since he has not he has nothing.

Exposing duplicity and double standards only harms your atheistic convictions. Your arguments are gas bag pontificating that falls apart under scrutiny. Produce the evidential basis for any of it since it does not matter what they believe, only what they can prove via science method employing science standard. Evidence free rosey scenarios involving state of the art labs for the purpose of funding not compelling.

Not convinced abiogenisis is the answer, eh? What alternative are you proposing?