Your Thoughts on Creation & Evolution

[mark kennedy]

Where does he claim that we will get a 'recapitulation of the origin of life?'

In an interview on his bio page at Harvard.

What people are working on most of all is to find plausible explanations for the origin of life. Clearly people would like to know how life actually got started on Earth, but it is entirely possible that we will never find that out because too much evidence has not been preserved.

Well the RNA world hypothesis isn't plausible, because it would have had to survive in the primordial seas, temperatures were far too high. There was no Darwinian warm little pond and certainly nothing like catalytic RNA. You can't just look at how life works and call that an explanation for how life originated. Recapitulation has always been a logical fallacy, it begs the question of proof.

How close are we to finding plausible explanations of how life started? I'd say reasonably close. We have explanations at a high level of detail. We just need to be able to create more detailed versions of them.

I'd say it's little more then a popular fantasy:

“I, for one, have never subscribed to this view of the origin of life, and I am by no means alone. The RNA world hypothesis is driven almost entirely by the flow of data from very high technology combinatorial libraries, whose relationship to the prebiotic world is anything but worthy of “unanimous support”. There are several serious problems associated with it, and I view it as little more than a popular fantasy” (reviewer's report in [Primordial soup or vinaigrette: did the RNA world evolve at acidic pH?] The RNA world hypothesis: the worst theory of the early evolution of life (except for all the others) Biol Direct. 2012.​

 

[AnotherAtheist]

In an interview on his bio page at Harvard.

Really? How about a link as the page I found doesn't say this.

Well the RNA world hypothesis isn't plausible, because it would have had to survive in the primordial seas, temperatures were far too high. There was no Darwinian warm little pond and certainly nothing like catalytic RNA. You can't just look at how life works and call that an explanation for how life originated. Recapitulation has always been a logical fallacy, it begs the question of proof.

There is no requirement that life would have had to have started in warm parts of the seas. See: Research Spotlight: Jack Szostak

Life was probably born in a small pond or lake, Szostak believes, not in an ocean, as many people think. Rain-fed pools provide a fresh water environment, compatible with the delicate cell membranes formed from simple fatty acids, which would be destroyed instantly in the salty oceans. Some such pond was the place where crucial elements were mixed, heated and cooled in the right sequence to become life. Inanimate molecules, congregated together inside a fatty skin, somehow became capable of replication, and of evolution: the definition of life, as Szostak sees it.

There are also theories that life could have started in icy regions. So, you've raised an objection against one particular interpretation of the RNA world hypothesis, not against the hypothesis in general.

I'd say it's little more then a popular fantasy:

“I, for one, have never subscribed to this view of the origin of life, and I am by no means alone. The RNA world hypothesis is driven almost entirely by the flow of data from very high technology combinatorial libraries, whose relationship to the prebiotic world is anything but worthy of “unanimous support”. There are several serious problems associated with it, and I view it as little more than a popular fantasy” (reviewer's report in [Primordial soup or vinaigrette: did the RNA world evolve at acidic pH?] The RNA world hypothesis: the worst theory of the early evolution of life (except for all the others) Biol Direct. 2012.​

If people claim that the RNA world is 'popular fantasy', then by those standards what is creationism?

BTW: Do you have any objections to the 'proteins first' model proposed in the link you gave? The link you gave does not argue against abiogenesis; it just proposes one hypothesis of abiogenesis as being more plausible than another.

As what I see when I look at papers referencing the above is a normal and healthy scientific debate. With people raising issues of certain models, and others saying why those objections are or are not reasonable. E.g. people who support the RNA world hypothesis do not propose that life started in environments that were too warm.

 

[mark kennedy]

Really? How about a link as the page I found doesn't say this.

"The key thing," Szostak says, "is to get started: to go from zero genes to one gene." This moment of "getting started" is the focus of Szostak's research: to discover the first "living chemistry", or, as Szostak puts it, "that transition from chemistry to biology": when a clump of molecules first became a living thing. (Biochemist Jack Szostak's Search for the First Cell, 2012. Harvard)​

As far as the temperature of the primordial seas look it up, it's been in every paper I've read on the subject.

 

[KWCrazy]

What science tells me:
Matter or energy cannot be created or destroyed. The universe could not come into existence without an external force.
The universe is in a constant state of increasing entropy; it's winding down; aging; dying.
In the absence of heat/matter/energy, nothing happens.
Benevolent mutations are too rare to be the driving force of anything.
If all species are designed to advance through mutations, then radiating fruit flies would have caused them to advance. It did not.
The Big Bang happened as described on day Four of creation; that it came from a single source and expanded in much the same formations as exist now. This does not happen without a designer. Such a blast would always have a chaotic blast pattern emanating from the beginning.

What the word of God tells me.
God is real. He is the creator of the universe and stands ready to forgive my sins and accept me to His kingdom.
The Scriptures are God's word, and we need not only food and water to live but every word the comes from the mouth of God.
God created the universe in six days. Sin and death came to the world through the sins of one man and can be forgiven only through the sacrifice of one man; the son of God.
God created man from the dust of the earth and to dust we will return.

Evolution is not scientifically logical and is precluded by by the observed mechanisms of the physical world as well as the world of God. Therefore, evolution as taught is untrue.

 

[DogmaHunter]

What science tells me:
Matter or energy cannot be created or destroyed. The universe could not come into existence without an external force.
The universe is in a constant state of increasing entropy; it's winding down; aging; dying.
In the absence of heat/matter/energy, nothing happens.
Benevolent mutations are too rare to be the driving force of anything.
If all species are designed to advance through mutations, then radiating fruit flies would have caused them to advance. It did not.
The Big Bang happened as described on day Four of creation; that it came from a single source and expanded in much the same formations as exist now. This does not happen without a designer. Such a blast would always have a chaotic blast pattern emanating from the beginning.

Science doesn't tell you any such thing.
That's just what you believe.

For example, science actually tells us that mutation + natural selection is sufficient to produce the bio-diversity that we observe on this planet.

What the word of God tells me.
God is real. He is the creator of the universe and stands ready to forgive my sins and accept me to His kingdom.
The Scriptures are God's word, and we need not only food and water to live but every word the comes from the mouth of God.
God created the universe in six days. Sin and death came to the world through the sins of one man and can be forgiven only through the sacrifice of one man; the son of God.
God created man from the dust of the earth and to dust we will return.

That's what your particular religion says. Other religions, will tell you very different stories.

One thing all those religions, including yours, have in common: all of them lack supportive evidence. And in case of creationistic claims, it also flies in the face of what science tells us based on actual evidence.

You are free to believe whatever you want off course.
But why must you defend this belief, by lying about what science actually says?
And yes, I get to call it lying, because I'm 110% positivie that you know that science does NOT say about evolution, what you claim it says.

That's what lying is: saying X, while knowing that it isn't true.
By all means, you can scream off the rooftops that you don't believe what science says about evolution, but please.... don't lie.

Evolution is not scientifically logical

Genetic algorithms (the modeling the evolution process in software to use as an optimization module, machine-learning, search heuristic,...) are pretty logical.................

and is precluded by by the observed mechanisms of the physical world as well as the world of God. Therefore, evolution as taught is untrue.

Translation: my religious beliefs aren't compatible with that particular scientific field, so because of what I believe religiously, I am required to deny that particular scientific field.

Your problem with evolution is not the science. It is your religion.

 

[xianghua]

Universal common ancestry is a reasonable inference from that theory.

no its not since we have no scientific evidence for a common descent.

 

[xianghua]

So, do you actually genuinly believe yourself that you just made a valid point here?

why not? you say that small changes+time= big change. so what is the difference?

 

[DogmaHunter]

no its not since we have no scientific evidence for a common descent.

Except for all the evidence that points to exactly that, off course.

 

[DogmaHunter]

why not?

Maybe, just maybe, because grains of sand aren't living biological organisms that reproduce with variation which are in competition with peers over limited resources??????

you say that small changes+time= big change. so what is the difference?

Inheritance of those changes from one generation to the next, through the act of biological reproduction, which allows for accumulation of those changes over generations.

Tell me, do grains of sand (or cars, or robotic pinguins) engage in biological reproduction with heritability of traits and mutations? No?

Well, how about that......

 

[AnotherAtheist]

"The key thing," Szostak says, "is to get started: to go from zero genes to one gene." This moment of "getting started" is the focus of Szostak's research: to discover the first "living chemistry", or, as Szostak puts it, "that transition from chemistry to biology": when a clump of molecules first became a living thing. (Biochemist Jack Szostak's Search for the First Cell, 2012. Harvard)​

This doesn't conflict with what I'm saying which is that it's more about finding plausible pathways from life to non-life. You used the word 'recapitulation' which does not match the content of the page you quote. Hence, your reference does not answer my question, and it appears that you have no source to support what you say. In fact, what you say is a straw man.

As far as the temperature of the primordial seas look it up, it's been in every paper I've read on the subject.

As I pointed out, the temperature of the primordial seas does not conflict with the RNA world hypothesis. It just limits the places where a RNA world could have gotten started. Hence, I'm not sure why you have responded to my post like this.

And, even when I do look it up, what I found STILL doesn't agree with what you say: https://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/november9/ancient-sea-temperature-111109.html

I note that you haven't responded to my questions about your reference discussing which of several competing theories of abiogenesis are more plausible, not arguing against abiogenesis at all. (Quite the opposite.)

So: you can only respond to abiogenesis by stating that one particular theory could not have explained abiogenesis happening in one particular environment, which environment may not have existed, and don't have anything to address the plausibility of that process happening in a different environment or abiogenesis happening by a different process?

 

[xianghua]

There’s still no evidence for creationism

incorrect:

(image from Is God Real? The Bacterial Flagellum and the Divine Design Inference | Cold Case Christianity)

 

[OldWiseGuy]

The Big Bang has been confirmed by physicists and so has inflation. This isn’t my field so... As far as life starting from chemicals there has been enough evidence in the decades since miller Urey to support that as well . Jack Szostak has been doing a lot of work on this and I’m seeing new research about it almost every month . There’s still no evidence for creationism

But you have just described attempts to 'create' life. There is little difference between creating chemicals in order to produce life, and using existing chemicals to (attempt) to create life. The difference of course being that God was successful and man is not. Only God can 'breathe' life into an organism or substance.

 

[xianghua]

Except for all the evidence that points to exactly that, off course.

like what? give me an evidence that a dog and a banana are related.

 

[xianghua]

which allows for accumulation of those changes over generations.

accumulation is also possible with sand grains you know.

 

[DogmaHunter]

like what? give me an evidence that a dog and a banana are related.

iTOL: Interactive Tree Of Life

You'll find banana's under the genus "musa" in the kingdom of Plantae.
You'll find dogs under "canis" in the kingdom of Animalia.

You'll also find that Animalia and Plantea share genetic ancestry in the domain Eukaryota.

That interactive tree? The result of completely sequenced genomes.


EDIT: Here's another fun one.... TimeTree :: The Timescale of Life

You can type in 2 taxa names and the site will then look up in a database with sequenced genomes, what the common ancestral link between both is, as well as give an approximation about how long ago that common ancestor lived.


However, I know all this is in vain, because for some weird reason you seem to assume that geneticists don't understand how genetics works.

 

[xianghua]

iTOL: Interactive Tree Of Life

so you evidence is similarity between a banana and a dog (this is why they are a part of the tree of life). but similarity can also be evidence for a common designer. that is why many cars are so similar.

 

[DogmaHunter]

accumulation is also possible with sand grains you know.

grains of sand don't reproduce with variation and thus don't inherit (mutated) traits from their ancestors.

so, no.

 

[DogmaHunter]

so you evidence is similarity between a banana and a dog

No.

(this is why they are a part of the tree of life)

no.

but similarity can also be evidence for a common designer

Sure. But mere "similarity" is not what this is about.

. that is why many cars are so similar.

It's also why those similarities don't fall into the pattern of nested hierarchies, like life does.
Manufacturing doesn't produce nested hierarchies.

Reproducing things that evolve due to inheriting (mutated) traits and competing for limited resources, do produce nested hierarchies.


It's not like none of this has ever been explained to you, off course.
But I don't expect intellectual honesty from you.

 

[tas8831]

Such as? Do you know that in the granite around the world are found polonium halos trapped in the granite. In order for this fast decaying isotope to be captured in the rock it would have had to cool within minutes or the decaying uranium would have escaped to atmosphere. How long does evolutionary theory say the planet cooled? What evidence?

So you've not read the refutation of the Po halo tall tales?

Here is a debunking referred to on an Old Earth Creation website:

Creation Science Rebuttals, Polonium Halos Refuted

"Young earth creation science advocates have made a mountain out of a molehill in their use of radioactive halos to support their cause. However, when you look at the truth behind their claims, you see major problems.

Geologist Tom Bailleul takes a look at the main proponent of these claims, Robert Gentry, and his website, halos.com. He shows that for the claimed polonium haloes there is no good evidence they are the result of polonium decay as opposed to any other radioactive isotope, or even that they are caused by radioactivity at all. Gentry is taken to task for selective use of evidence, faulty experiment design, mistakes in geology and physics, and unscientific principles of investigation and argument style...."

That is just one of many, many evidences showing Creation science has empirical proof and evolution only has theories or suppositions.

Just one of many creationist claims that have been debunked, yes.

Have you ever looked at the intricate workings of a DNA strands and how it replicates and repairs itself? Chance or random in the making?... statistically impossible.

Statistically? Why didn't you say so!

Let's see the math please!

Before you provide the math, can you explain to us what happens during DNA 'repair'?

You would have to be a fool to come up with that idea after seeing how impossibly complex the smallest particle is designed.

Argument from awe is so impressive.

 

[tas8831]

Completely agree. The main premise for evolution is continual improvement upward in biological complexity and refinement. Problem is, there's a beautiful actual scientific standard called the second law of thermodynamics that obliterates the evolution farce cold.

What other PRATTS are you going to toss out?

Besides the obvious strawman, that is?