Origin of the species, where do you stand?

[Lucky... 0]

Quote

The possibility of life creating itself has about the same chance as iron ore, under its own power, becoming a locomotive.

If you understand a lot about biology you might think differently. For example, viruses are dormant and hijack host cell's DNA to make copies of itself. They can lay dormant in dirt for billions of years and still inject its DNA into the host cell's nucleus. With that, a lot is possible.

[billvon 2,433]

> The possibility of life creating itself has about the same chance as
>iron ore, under its own power, becoming a locomotive.

Problem with that analogy is that no one has ever claimed that life made the leap from basic compounds to human in one step. (i.e. from iron ore to locomotive.)

Iron ore can, with the help of some water and sulfur, form iron pyrite crystals, which are amazingly regular (and can even grow and reproduce!) Yet no God is required; just physics and chemistry.

A better example would be that iron ore, over five billion years, eventually forming a chunk of iron pyrite in the rough shape of a wheel. If natural selection got into the act, you would then see a rudimentary axle jutting out the side (would allow it to roll in a circle) then a second wheel, then a few wheels/axles, then a wheel/axle assembly that could nudge itself in some direction - and eventually you'd have a whole panoply of iron ore based life. But on our world, carbon compounds figured out the trick to reproduction first - and here we are.

If you don't believe that simple minerals can form complex structures, google Giant's Causeway.

[Royd 0]

Quote

They can lay dormant in dirt for billions of years and still inject its DNA into the host cell's nucleus. With that, a lot is possible.

And you can prove this beyond all doubt, how?

[Royd 0]

Quote

A better example would be that iron ore, over five billion years, eventually forming a chunk of iron pyrite in the rough shape of a wheel. If natural selection got into the act, you would then see a rudimentary axle jutting out the side (would allow it to roll in a circle) then a second wheel, then a few wheels/axles, then a wheel/axle assembly that could nudge itself in some direction - and eventually you'd have a whole panoply of iron ore based life. But on our world, carbon compounds figured out the trick to reproduction first - and here we are.

At least, we're not all serious here in SC. I love it.Maybe it should be changed to BSC.

[happythoughts 0]

Quote

However... I do believe God had a role in some of the creation. Life is VERY complex for just random chance to have created.

I disagree with the "prime mover" argument.
Just because something is complex, it does not require a creator.

The existence of God is a handy explanation for complex questions.
"What causes thunder and lighting?"
"Thors hammer striking the anvil."

"What causes insanity?"
"Possession by demons."

[billvon 2,433]

>And you can prove this beyond all doubt, how?

Take a very old virus. Put it in solution with a host cell. It will infect it. Pretty simple.

[Royd 0]

>And you can prove this beyond all doubt, how?

Quote

Take a very old virus. Put it in solution with a host cell. It will infect it. Pretty simple.

Yea, but can you prove that it's a billion years old. My main beef.

[Samurai136 0]

Quote

>And you can prove this beyond all doubt, how?

Quote

Take a very old virus. Put it in solution with a host cell. It will infect it. Pretty simple.

Yea, but can you prove that it's a billion years old. My main beef.

Found some critters that were frozen for 32,000 years. http://www.livescience.com/othernews/050223_arctic_life.html

Quote

A new type of organism discovered in an Arctic tunnel came to life in the lab after being frozen for 32,000 years.

Bacteria in their spore stage are nearly immortal.

"Buttons aren't toys." - Trillian
Ken

[Lucky... 0]

Quote

Quote

They can lay dormant in dirt for billions of years and still inject its DNA into the host cell's nucleus. With that, a lot is possible.

And you can prove this beyond all doubt, how?

Wait, wait, this standard of beyond all doubt is utopian; no such thing. We are so naive that we go with the best info we have. The long earth theory is just that, a theory. They use carbon dating for shorter times, as in a little over 5k years for 1/2 life, but use isotopes and others for longer ones. They say around 4 billion years the earth has been here andI think microbiologists think that some viruses have been here for a good chunk of that.

I don't have to prove anything, just go off the data and knowledge of those that spend their lives studying these things. Microbiologists conclude that viruses are VERY old.

[Lucky... 0]

Quote

>And you can prove this beyond all doubt, how?

Quote

Take a very old virus. Put it in solution with a host cell. It will infect it. Pretty simple.

Yea, but can you prove that it's a billion years old. My main beef.

Last virus I saw under a microscope had at least a million candles on its cake, had a hell of a time blowing them out. I think his friends were playing a joke and used those trick candles.

Hey man, lighten up, we don;t know much compared to what's out there, I'm just using what we (think we) know. Then it changes, just like with eggs in female humans, we used to think it was a finite #, now they're changing it. Jesus must be at work again

[Lucky... 0]

Quote

Bacteria in their spore stage are nearly immortal

Yea, look at strom Thurmond.

[GrabGrass 0]

Quote

Quote

Bacteria in their spore stage are nearly immortal

Yea, look at strom Thurmond.

And hey, whats this roaring sound, wooshing past what I'm suddenly gonna call my head? Wind! Is that a good name? It'll do. Yeah, this is really exciting. I'm dizzy with anticipation! Or is it the wind? There's an awful lot of that now isn't it? And whats this thing coming toward me very fast? So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like 'Ow', 'Ownge', 'Round', 'Ground'! Thats it! Ground! Ha! I wonder if it'll be friends with me? Hello Ground!

~ "Pack Fast, Pull Low... and Date Your Riggers WIFE!" ~

[Lucky... 0]

Quote

Quote

Quote

Bacteria in their spore stage are nearly immortal

Yea, look at strom Thurmond.

And hey, whats this roaring sound, wooshing past what I'm suddenly gonna call my head? Wind! Is that a good name? It'll do. Yeah, this is really exciting. I'm dizzy with anticipation! Or is it the wind? There's an awful lot of that now isn't it? And whats this thing coming toward me very fast? So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like 'Ow', 'Ownge', 'Round', 'Ground'! Thats it! Ground! Ha! I wonder if it'll be friends with me? Hello Ground!

OK..... distraction from the pun????

[NCclimber 0]

It is amusing to watch so many of the evolutionists act like their theory is absolute, indisputable fact.

[jakee 1,259]

Quote

Again, thsi country was founded on Christian principles, slavery, classism, etc.,.... so they had their foot inthe door first, hence get a bigger nod from the norm.

See, there we go. You refuse to write off the possibility of god not because of any scientific issues, but simply because it's culturally popular. There are no end of things that can't be strictly disproven, but only the really big ones get a pass.

BTW, just so we're on the same page - I really don't believe in magic

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[jakee 1,259]

Quote

Quote

Quote

Bacteria in their spore stage are nearly immortal

Yea, look at strom Thurmond.

And hey, whats this roaring sound, wooshing past what I'm suddenly gonna call my head? Wind! Is that a good name? It'll do. Yeah, this is really exciting. I'm dizzy with anticipation! Or is it the wind? There's an awful lot of that now isn't it? And whats this thing coming toward me very fast? So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like 'Ow', 'Ownge', 'Round', 'Ground'! Thats it! Ground! Ha! I wonder if it'll be friends with me? Hello Ground!

Oddly enough, the only thing the bowl of Petunias thought was "Oh no, not again!"

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[Royd 0]

Quote

It is amusing to watch so many of the evolutionists act like their theory is absolute, indisputable fact.

You take someone in the position of authority[ college professor], put them in front of a bunch of ignorant students, then throw a bunch of big numbers at them, and they take it for fact.

The problem is that ten different authorities have ten different sets of numbers, but noone seems to be bothered by this fact.

Example: We just heard about something 1 billion years old coming back to life.

Sam Champion of ABC news is in Iceland today. He just talked about organisisms being frozen in the ice for 25,000 yrs.

I'm so impressed with the authority with which he delivered that number, that I just can't help but believe him!

Isn't it ironic that "scientists" can question everything and are considered" cutting edge", but if we question them, we are considered to be blindly ignorant.

[NCclimber 0]

Quote

Isn't it ironic that "scientists" can question everything and are considered" cutting edge", but if we question them, we are considered to be blindly ignorant.

Yes. Very.

[wmw999 2,148]

Sometimes those "disagreements on numbers" are on the order of:

8 guys each say "this is really really old, and seems to confirm (x) stage in evolutionary theory." Then when they state just how "really old" it is, the answers vary from (for example) 1 to 4.5 million years.

Does that lessen the fact that it seems to confirm some of the theory of evolution? No reputable scientist has laid out a map of exactly when whatever happened. There are ideas, and scientists being people, sometimes they overstate. I, of course, have never overstated anything at all to make my point sound more convincing .

The layers of ice are actually pretty good indicators of age. By correlating with known years of volcanic explosions and the like, and by correlating with layers in ice on other continents, they can figure out which layers map to the same general period. Then if you count the formations in between, it's kind of like counting macro tree rings.

The fact that there isn't a guidebook that shows exactly where the missing link is doesn't mean that it's all wrong. Just incomplete. It's easy to denigrate an incomplete roadmap, but a complete one would be intellectually dishonest.

And saying "God did it, so I don't need to figure anything out" is just as dishonest. Also, if God specifically, and knowingly, gave us the intelligence to question this kind of thing, wouldn't it be wasting what he gave us not to question and look?

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Andy9o8 0]

Quote

It is amusing to watch so many of the evolutionists act like their theory is absolute, indisputable fact.

It's almost painful to read stuff like this in the 21st Century.

[jakee 1,259]

Quote

Isn't it ironic that "scientists" can question everything and are considered" cutting edge", but if we question them, we are considered to be blindly ignorant.

Actually scientific theories are questioned and modified every day. Modern evolutionary theory does not strictly follow Darwin's Origin of the Species. Newton's Principia Mathematica is not the be all and end all of physics.

The thing is - are you questioning theories from a position of knowledge or of ignorance? When you (and you have) post things like "How do scientists possibly know the earth is 10 billion years old?" No-one takes you seriously. Why? Because you haven't even bothered to do the most basic research into how old the earth is believed to be.

Ditto when you say "How can a horse decide to grow a long neck and become a giraffe?" No-one takes you seriously. Why? Because you don't have even the most basic understanding of how natural selection actually works.

When you argue from a position of ignorance, you will be thought of as ignorant.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[Royd 0]

Quote

The fact that there isn't a guidebook that shows exactly where the missing link is doesn't mean that it's all wrong. Just incomplete. It's easy to denigrate an incomplete roadmap, but a complete one would be intellectually dishonest.

For some reason this doesn't seem to be a two way street.

[wmw999 2,148]

Are you arguing for Biblical inerrancy? Young-earth or old-earth? And besides the Bible, what evidence supports your theory.

That's the thing about evolution. Most of what we find can fit into it, because it's a loosely-woven set of theories that seem to fit together. It doesn't exclude the possibility of intelligent design, it just doesn't consider it. Because, well, if it can't be understood and studied, then it's not part of the study.

There are plenty of evolutionary biologists who believe in God. There probably aren't a whole lot who believe in a literal Adam and Eve.

And you are welcome to believe in whatever you wish to. However, if you want to have a two-way discussion, you need to bring more evidence than "I believe it" or "the Bible says so." Those are not evidence based. And "it's too complex, I can't understand it, so God must have done it" is also not evidence-based.

Evolutionists are more than willing to be wrong. But they would prefer evidence over assertions.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[Royd 0]

Quote

Ditto when you say "How can a horse decide to grow a long neck and become a giraffe?" No-one takes you seriously.

It's called using the absurd to point out the absurd.

Quote

Why? Because you don't have even the most basic understanding of how natural selection actually works.

Actually, I do understand, but change is so miniscule that it can't be measured or observed.

Once again, everything has its seed within itself[think DNA ]. A blue whale has never had legs and walked on the land. A seal, on the other hand, has the best of both worlds, but it's flippers have always be flippers.

[jakee 1,259]

Quote

Quote

Ditto when you say "How can a horse decide to grow a long neck and become a giraffe?" No-one takes you seriously.

"It's called using the absurd to point out the absurd. "

No, its completely bloody unrelated! Its like me saying 'God can't exist because I don't know how to levitate.' It has no bearing on the discussion.

Quote

Why? Because you don't have even the most basic understanding of how natural selection actually works.

Actually, I do understand, but change is so miniscule that it can't be measured or observed.

Once again, everything has its seed within itself[think DNA ]. A blue whale has never had legs and walked on the land. A seal, on the other hand, has the best of both worlds, but it's flippers have always be flippers.

I wonder why a Blue Whale has hips then? Keep digging dude, keep digging.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?