Abiogenesis

[Ouroboros]

You are validating my point. I said you want to separate the two and that is what you are trying to doing. You want creation without a creator.

 

If you are going to argue the absence of a creator, how can you seperate evolution from abiogenesis?

 

Without a creator, explain to me exactly how you can have evolution without abiogenesis?

 

God doesn’t talk to our hearts.

God doesn’t do miracles around us on a daily basis.

God has not revealed his existence to us through natural events.

God does not intervene with natural caused events on a daily basis.

God has not revealed his face or his purpose.

God did not start life.

God did not create the universe.

 

If we have unanswered questions in science, we have to accept the above statements. That’s the only way we can investigate and research for natural physical laws to explain the events in life.

 

If we don’t understand why life started or how it started, we don’t accept a black box as an answer, we continue to search, and one day we will have an answer.

 

The problem with a religionist is that he wouldn’t’ look for natural and physical explanations when he already has accepted the default answer: “God”.

 

God is just a Black Box answer when no other explanation yet has been found.

 

If you want to know how abiogenesis works, you have to drop your belief before you can research it. You can’t believe “goddidit” and at the same time research a natural cause.

 

You are a believer, that’s why you can’t see this. You are blinded, just like Jesus said. There is a blindfold over your eyes, and you can’t see the truth, because you’re hiding behind your faith.

[Skankboy]

The Theory of Evolution makes absolutely no judgment on the origins of life. Indeed, you can be a theist in regards to creation and still believe that the mechanism of evolution is valid.

 

In short, your argument tries to create an issue where there is none...

[Ouroboros]

It's funny to see how different approaches we all have in the discussion.

 

That’s the beauty of this site!

 

[Mr. Neil]

I'm serious, Invictus. I'm tired of the contemptuous bullshit, and I'm tired of people putting words in my mouth or accusing me of "trying" to do something that I'm not doing.

 

If you come back with another accusation saying that I'm "trying" to separate evolution from abiogenesis, the difference of which I just demonstrated, then I'm going to get a mod, and I'll make you address my points, or you can leave.

 

This is a debate forum; not a heckling arena.

[Ouroboros]

You are validating my point. I said you want to separate the two and that is what you are trying to doing. You want creation without a creator.

 

If you are going to argue the absence of a creator, how can you seperate evolution from abiogenesis?

 

Without a creator, explain to me exactly how you can have evolution without abiogenesis?

 

So you agree that Evolution works, but its just abiogenesis that holds you back from believing in Evolution? Or is it that you have a problem with evolution over all?

 

Do you believe God created the world in six days?

Do you believe that God created the world by saying the world “Light”?

Do you believe he molded Adam from the dirt?

How do you explain that we have more water in our bodies than dirt, if our bodies are made out of dirt?

Explain why we have a tail bone.

Explain why men have nipples.

 

I could go on with so many questions that you don’t have any good answers for either, but we believe in a system that researches, develops and is modified by new input. Your system requires locked in, fixed, static system. You’re not going to change your view even if the truth exploded in your face. Science does change when it makes mistakes. Maybe you’re right that evolution doesn’t work, but eventually science can find that out and even prove it. But religion doesn’t prove it wrong. Religion only makes an unfounded postulate based on missing explanations of natural phenomenon.

 

The creation is not a creation so there’s nothing to separate.

The world is because it is, and it works because it works.

God doesn’t exist, because he doesn’t exist.

But the world exists, just because it exists.

 

A scientist doesn’t proclaim to have all answers, but he has working models and tests them and refines them.

 

A religionist proclaims to have all answers, and then refute any contradictory evidence.

 

It is better to not believe if you want the answers and the truth, and modify your opinion while you’re walking.

[invictus1967]

Please, go get the modorator. I beg you to show me where I have strayed form the topic of this thread.

 

I am not saying evolution works or it doesn’t work. I am just asking a very simple question.

 

If you remove a creator, how can you have evolution without abiogenesis?

[MrSpooky]

The matter of abiogenesis is a perfectly legitimate question.

 

However, it still has nothing to do with evolutionary biology, which works within the context of existing life.

[MrSpooky]

If you remove a creator, how can you have evolution without abiogenesis?

 

Now you're wandering into the realm of philosophy and natural theology. These are perfectly legitimate fields and are quite important in the modern popular conception of Theism, but it still has nothing to do with how modern models of abiogenesis work.

[Mr. Neil]

I am not saying evolution works or it doesn’t work. I am just asking a very simple question.

 

If you remove a creator, how can you have evolution without abiogenesis?

What do you mean by "remove the creator"? Did we ever have one?

 

Dude, I know what you're asking, but they're still not the same thing. Don't associate abiogenesis with evolution. If you have a problem with abiogenesis, then address abiogenesis. If you have a problem with evolution, then address evolution. Don't put them under the same category, though, because that's where people get confused.

 

They're not the same thing. They're two completely different processes, and they don't even belong to the same field of science.

 

You're basically doing the same annoying thing that Hovind does, only Hovind likes to also throw in the big bang as well. Hovind rejects the big bang, so he lumps it with "evolutionism", which is annoying!!!

 

Imagine your question structured from Hovind's point of view...

 

"How can you have abiogenesis and evolution without the big bang?"

 

That question sounds nonsensical, right? Exactly! Because cosmology has nothing to do with biology or biochemistry. He's just lumping them together because he thinks of them as atheistic theories.

 

Your expectation is unfair, because you want the atheists to have an all-encompassing theory of everything that is equivelant to creationism's across-the-board way of thinking, but science simply doesn't have anything like that. It has a group of smaller theories, which individually address different phenomena.

 

You can't just take all of the theories that you find antagonistic toward theism, lump them all together, and expect us to acknowledge that they now fit under one nontheistic banner. That's not how it works.

 

Abiogenesis and evolution are two different theories of science. Treat them that way, and you'll find that the questions you want answered will be answered.

[Ouroboros]

I think Invictus argument is more to the point that evolutionists are cheating by removing the discussion of how life started by placing it under a different theory of science, instead of including it in the theory of evolution. I don’t agree to that it is a way of dodging the question, it just more practical to see it as two different systems.

 

Abiogenesis is nothing more than an attempt by evolutionists to dodge a tough question that seemingly deals a fatal blow to their theory- “Where did the life come from that began the evolutionary process?”

[Mr. Neil]

That's true.

 

That pisses me off, though, because we're not taking anything out of evolution, because it's not that kind of theory. It was never that kind of theory. It's like he thinks that since creationism has such a broad focus of design theory, therefore the secularists should have one big field of science that does the same thing.

 

There never was such a theory. The three fields of science commonly attacked by creationists are evolutionary biology, biochemistry (abiogenesis), and cosmology.

 

But what he's trying to do is he's trying to make evolution equivelent to atheism. If you read his post, he's using the term "evolutionist" as a synonym for "atheist". His opening salvo was against "evolutionists" and now in his latest diatribes, he's blathering on about accounting for life without God.

 

I mean, what the fuck?! Is he arguing against evolution or atheism? Does he know the difference? Does he even want to know the difference?!

 

I'm tired of him doing that. He just ignores what we say.

[Ouroboros]

Yeah, I've noticed that he doesn't reply to the tough questions!

 

He's the one doing the dodging.

 

Could it be John under a different name? He argues the same way...

[Mr. Neil]

Nah... Invictus has been around before. Definitely not the same person.

 

Just the same kind of thinking.

[invictus1967]

I don't respond??????

 

"Hello pot, this is the kittle calling"

 

Moving right along....

 

------------------------------

 

Because Darwin’s theory was based on an assumed universe without a Creator his theory of evolution would be completely invalid without abiogenesis. My point is that Darwin’s theory is completely dependant on abiogenesis. Both theories were produced to explain life within our universe without the presence of God. They are not only connected, they are dependant on each other.

 

Evolution without abiogenesis is essentially the theory of Intelligent Design.

 

Not that I believe the ID theories, but if Intelligent Design is what you believe, I agree that it is in no way related to or dependant on abiogenesis.

 

But if you want to examine abiogenesis alone, consider this-

 

In order for abiogenesis to be a valid theory for the origin of life, one must assume billions and billions of years were available to the elements that were to form these earliest life forms.

 

But-

 

Biogenic carbon has been found in the earliest rocks that have yet to be discovered on the earth. That means there is NO record of a time when life was not present. The origin of life by means of abiogenesis has to be pushed back to a time when there is no data available to restrict the theory.

[Mr. Neil]

I don't respond??????

 

"Hello pot, this is the kittle calling"

 

Moving right along....

I've refuted every claim you've made.

 

 

Because Darwin’s theory was based on an assumed universe without a Creator his theory of evolution would be completely invalid without abiogenesis. My point is that Darwin’s theory is completely dependant on abiogenesis. Both theories were produced to explain life within our universe without the presence of God. They are not only connected, they are dependant on each other.

Two things.

 

1. Darwin's theory was meant to to explain similarities that he observed while visiting the Galapagos.

 

2. Darwin's theory was mostly based on morphology. Modern biology relies much more on molecular evidences of changes in gene frequencies called alleles.

 

In case no one told you... Darwin is not a modern biologist. Just thought you'd like to know.

 

 

Evolution without abiogenesis is essentially the theory of Intelligent Design.

Evolution without abiogenesis is just evolution. It's you who keeps overlaying this anti-theistic connotation on it. Evolution is completely compatible with theism. Maybe just not your brand of theism.

 

Evolution is a biological process of change in biology. It is not a theory to explain the beginning of life. It's never been that kind of a theory, and I defy you to find one reference in which Darwin explicitely says that it is.

 

I've explained to you why it has nothing to do with abiogenesis. If you're just going to keep ignoring my rebuttal, I'll assume that you're being unreasonably antagonistic and let the forum mods take care of you. I've had it with you ignoring things I say.

 

 

In order for abiogenesis to be a valid theory for the origin of life, one must assume billions and billions of years were available to the elements that were to form these earliest life forms.

According to whom? Reference?

 

 

But-

 

Biogenic carbon has been found in the earliest rocks that have yet to be discovered on the earth. That means there is NO record of a time when life was not present. The origin of life by means of abiogenesis has to be pushed back to a time when there is no data available to restrict the theory.

So basically, scientists don't know when life originated.

 

So? Does theism win by default then? What's your point?

[MrSpooky]

Biogenic carbon has been found in the earliest rocks that have yet to be discovered on the earth. That means there is NO record of a time when life was not present. The origin of life by means of abiogenesis has to be pushed back to a time when there is no data available to restrict the theory.

 

Uh... what EXACTLY do you mean by "biogenic carbon?"

[MrSpooky]

It's entirely 100% true that without the existence of life (and by extension without the beginning of the existence of life) biological evolution wouldn't exist. Furthermore, both fields are under the restrictions of natural law. It is in this way that the two fields are related, and it is this thin but important thread that ties the two.

 

However, HOW abiogenesis came about and HOW evolution works are entirely different questions. Disproving the former doesn't disprove the latter, proving the former doesn't prove the latter, and vice versa. This is because evolution is a matter of how recognizably living things adapt... abiogenesis is about how recognizably non-living matter becomes recognizably living things. The former belongs to the field we call biology. The latter belongs to the field we call biochemistry.

 

Think about it this way... the first computer, ENIAC was built with vacuum tubes and crude mechanics: it is a feat of physical mechanical engineering. Modern computer programming is a field of abstract concepts and quantifications. While there is a thin thread that ties the two together (mechanical engineering to electronic engineering to circuitry to primitive processes to machine language to computer programming) the two fields behave in entirely different ways.

 

So suppose the way the engineers of old built the first computer is utterly different from how we thought they built it... sure, that's a legitimate issue to address. But does this affect modern computer science? Not at all. Modern computer science works within the context of existing modern computers. The "ENIAC issue" is a matter of how one constructs a computer in the first place. The two are distantly related due to the fact that they both contribute to an overall function (that is, the workings of computers) but they are two different fields entirely.

 

On the same token, abiogenesis and evolution are distantly related due to the fact that they both contribute to an overall function (that is, LIFE), but they are two different fields entirely.

[Ouroboros]

To play the devils advocate for a second here, just because I’m curious.

How far has field of abiogenesis managed to figure things out?

Are there a lot of unanswered questions?

[MrSpooky]

Yes. Yes there are.

 

Unfortunately things are primarily hypothetical right now, however, we DO have a recognizably intelligible model that underlies the basics of abiogenesis.

 

The matter is a problem of the details, not of the overall process. We're quite sure that the ancestral forms must have been self-catalyzing polymers, likely a construct that we call a "hypercycle."

[♦ ficino ♦]

I've figured it out! The poster who goes under the name Mr. Spooky is really God masquerading as a guy at Berkeley. (Not some old graybeard god wanting to be told "no, that robe doesn't make you look fat," either, but a hot one of the Apollo or Hermes type.)

 

Heh heh.

 

Dude, I never stop learning from you.

[invictus1967]

How does evolution without abiogenesis differ from Intelligent Design?

 

Your point of Darwin not being a modern biologist is a GREAT point. He had no clue what went into the make up of a cell. Why does anyone still cling to his theory?

 

The term “missing link” is misleading. It implies a single link is missing. In truth, there are so many “missing links” that one has to wonder how anyone ever thought there was a chain to begin with.

 

Of all the “missing links”, abiogenesis is the biggest. Science has yet to show that it is even remotely possible.

 

The very first link is missing; and without it, Darwin’s theory is invalid.

[Mr. Neil]

How does evolution without abiogenesis differ from Intelligent Design?

You have to get it out of your head that scientific theories are implying things by not mentioning certain events. If evolution doesn't address origins, then it doesn't address origins. There's nothing implicitly stated by not mentioning the beginning of life.

 

That's because the origin of life is part of a different field of science. Evolution is not like the Bible. It was never meant to address all the things that you think it needs to address. It simply doesn't do that, and it's an unwarranted expectation for you to continue pounding your fists about it.

 

If you want to learn about how life changes, you go to one field of science. If you want to learn about the origin of life, you go to another. Honestly, I don't know why you're having such difficulty understanding this.

 

 

Your point of Darwin not being a modern biologist is a GREAT point. He had no clue what went into the make up of a cell. Why does anyone still cling to his theory?

This is a non sequitur. What the cell does and how the cell is made of are two different inquiries that need to be approached in different ways but are not dependant upon each other. You don't need to know the origin of cellular structure to infer that alleles change.

 

 

The term “missing link” is misleading. It implies a single link is missing. In truth, there are so many “missing links” that one has to wonder how anyone ever thought there was a chain to begin with.

Again, misleading. The term "missing link". only really refers to gap between lineages which makes it difficult to bridge ancestory. Science is never going to fins all of the species, so if they went by your logic, then there'd always be missing links.

 

But like I stated earlier, morphology (the study of anotomical similarities) is not as important to evolution as molecular biology. The evidence for evolution is so damning when you look at genetics. You really need to catch up with modern science here. These's criticisms that you have are of little relevence.

 

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

 

 

Of all the “missing links”, abiogenesis is the biggest. Science has yet to show that it is even remotely possible.

 

The very first link is missing; and without it, Darwin’s theory is invalid.

I already explained why abiogenesis is not part of evolution. That's not to say that it's not part of science. Again, it's just another field of science. Since Spook knows more about it than I do, I'll let him tackle this.

 

You're just pounding your fists over something that evolution never claimed it could state.

 

And didn't I tell you? Didn't I say that you wouldn't be able to find a single reference in which Darwin states that evolution is a theory to defeat God? Despite all of your implicit comments, there simply is no such connotation in Darwin's work, nor any work done in the field of biologic science.

 

You knew you wouldn't be able to find it, so you didn't even try.

[crazy-tiger]

How does evolution without abiogenesis differ from Intelligent Design?

ID states that life was created "as is", yet evolution (which only depends on life being formed) does not state that abiogenesis is required.

What if God only created simple one-celled organisms? Would that invalidate evolution?

 

Your insistence on defining evolution as an Atheistic theory only shows in your denial that evolution is also accepted by Theists.

Your point of Darwin not being a modern biologist is a GREAT point. He had no clue what went into the make up of a cell. Why does anyone still cling to his theory?

Well, the fact that all the discoveries that have been made in biology in the last 150 years CONFIRM Darwins theory might have something to do with it...

 

Of course, you'd need to do some research to discover this, rather than viewing reality through your Jesus Glasses©

Try it... take off your Jesus Glasses© and do some research. Show you're not just an argumentative little sod who's here to be a pain in the neck...

The term “missing link” is misleading. It implies a single link is missing. In truth, there are so many “missing links” that one has to wonder how anyone ever thought there was a chain to begin with.

Ho boy... the Missing Links game®

 

What a boring tactic... Let me demonstrate.

 

The alphabet... 26 letters, a chain from start to finish.

The Missing Links game® is played by asking what links the letters.

What links O to Q? There's a missing link.

Now, someone can discover the letter P, which links them together, but then you're stuck with 2 missing links... What links O to P and what links P to Q?

If you find anything that links them, you need to find what links the new links and so on and so forth...

 

There's only so many "missing links" because twerps like you demand levels of evidence from us that you refuse to give to anyone else. (you're usual answer is "God did it" as though that's all the evidence needed )

Of all the “missing links”, abiogenesis is the biggest. Science has yet to show that it is even remotely possible.

It's not the only thing that is yet to be shown as remotely possible...

 

God has never been shown as remotely possible.

The very first link is missing; and without it, Darwin’s theory is invalid.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

The choices at the moment are... Abiogenesis or God.

 

Either one of them could be the first link, either one of them could be how life was formed.

Only someone who is unable to accept the fact that evolution ONLY DEPENDS ON LIFE FORMING, NOT HOW IT WAS FORMED, would assume that evolution is dependant on abiogenesis. (and I catagorise someone like that as a pratt...)

[Mr. Neil]

I was wondering how long it was going to take you to detect scientific abuse, CT. Welcome to another round of "Trounce The Unyielding Theist".

[crazy-tiger]

I was wondering how long it was going to take you to detect scientific abuse, CT.  Welcome to another round of "Trounce The Unyielding Theist".

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I've been "busy" since the wife came back from holiday...

 

Do you need to ask which was more fun? Pounding the Theist or