Does God exist? (14 Viewers)

[youBROKEmyLIFE]

I saw that peanut butter thing on ur blog... fucking hilarious. Can fundies come up with any more hilarious demonstrations of God's wonder?

 

[BradCube]

I would argue that DNA is rather simple and the processes of Enzyme digestion are rather simple. Nature and Evolution developing a simple and codifiable system in order to benefit its own ends (given that Evolution states all organisms came from a single organism) seems to be to be no great feat.

The actual language of the DNA may be simple enough since it only consists of four letters, but this does not mean that what it describes is simple at all. I won't presume to know all that much about DNA (everything that I am talking about is only what has been mentioned in my reading) but I don't think a person specializing in this field would describe the descriptions in DNA as simple. At least, they certainly wouldn't stipulate that such a complex set of instructions formed itself by chance.

I am also confused by your mention of Evolution. I fail to see how evolution could be applicable to this at all since it relies on natural selection - that implies that something must have been living in the first place.

I think we're doing in this situation the same as an individual does where he sees luck in the series of events that happens to someone. We're ascribing more meaning to a rather simplistic method of progression than it deserves.

Hardly because it is only with that combination of information that that life would have been able to form.

Given that DNA is broken down so simplistically into codified enzymes, and is such a simple process (Admittedly the Checksumming and other elements of it do show how wonderful a process it is), how can you possibly argue that it has an omniscient designer?

I'm not currently arguing that the designer is omniscient - only that intelligence must have been involved to start this process of information in DNA.

Were the designer truly omniscient then the utter redundancies of the evolutionary process would be discarded and, I might add, theoretically, DNA would be unable to be codified by inquisitive minds, as the mind that created it would be utterly incomprehensible, and as such, so would the chemical product.

Maybe, maybe not. The fact that there is information encoded in DNA does not tell us of the intellectual ability of the intelligence. It only tells us that there was intelligence.

Personally I believe that God designed the world for both our existance and his own discoverability (as well as the discoverability of things he has created).

 

[BradCube]

Prove that the universe (as a larger concept than our known universe, I'm talking about all existence) ever 'began'.
There's background radiation which proves that our known universe had a beginning, but beyond that there's no real certainty at all, it's possible that the meta universe from which ours spawned has no beginning.

The current and most scientifically followed model of the universe still remains as the big bang theory - beyond this I think that you are moving into a realm that requires equal if not more faith than the belief in an intelligent creator. Pseudoscience.

Please put forward your particular model which you feel hold better grounds than the big bang model alone. I would be more than happy to investigate them with you.

 

[Captain Gh3y]

Bananas > The Sun

bananas have been artificially selected
the wild banana does not fit into your hand

and

PINEAPPLES - THE XTIAN'S NIGHTMARE!

 

[youBROKEmyLIFE]

The big bang model explains attempts to explain what happened when our known universe came into existence. I'm talking about the meta-universe/reality beyond that. Of course it's pseudo-science, for the most part I think all we can say is WE DON'T KNOW, but since you want to try to 'prove' gods existence by throwing out there that something MUST have began everything and that thing must not have a beginning its self, I'm going to show you that it's not at all necessary that it be some intelligent being.

 

[BradCube]

Yeah and entropy means evolution is a lie.

Fallacy after fallacy and constructing illogical non-sequiturs inside defensible frameworks does not do either of us any logical good.

Rather than just denying what I am saying would you be able to contribute to my knowledge by pointing out exactly where the problems lie in what I have stated?

Intelligence is required for us to have a particularly biased interpretation of what we see. We have our own interpretation and join our own dots.

So what your saying then is that what I have said doesn't count because I have intelligence and therefore bias?

 

[HalcyonSky]

Please put forward your particular model which you feel hold better grounds than the big bang model alone. I would be more than happy to investigate them with you.

erm, saying that the universe had no beginning and is just an endless process of expansions and contractions does not contradict the big bang theory, it simply builds upon it.

And brad, your idea on dna really solves alot of problems for me. I understand now why theres so much disease, poverty, war, violence and famine in the world, and why that christian guy that prayed and prayed for a miracle still died of some horrendous rectal cancer: god's too busy fucking with our DNA, thats what it is. God created the world in 6 days, then spent the next 4 billion years turning stromatolites into humans. Top effort, god.

 

[BradCube]

But aren't you "Moving the goalposts" to use a rather odd term?

I don't feel that I am. In regards to what specifically?

Surely God designed the world and we formed around it, as part of his inerrant design?

I don't know what you mean by formed around it (earth) here. Do you simply mean that we have populated the entire earth or that we gradually built up from nothing as an unguided processes around the world? If it is the second, then no, I don't agree with that assumption.

I don't think you can discover God in the physical world or in the animal kingdom.

Maybe not discover as in prove 100% but I would think I can discover enough to maintain a reasonable faith.

I feel that information could not be present in the creation of DNA and the randomness of the evolution of DNA due to the fact that it is part of an inherently natural process (excluding the whole creator aspect), which is the creation of amino acids and the digestion of said amino acids.

Kind of lost here. It seems that you are saying that information in DNA is not required for life to exist or begin? How does that work?

Would it not be logical to say that were life to have been initially generated by chance (And basic chemical deduction states that is is), that this life would have some form of structure to it?

I don't know that I agree that life could be formed simply on random chance. It was my understanding that this theory of random chance over time was no longer accepted scientifically.

Just because DNA expanded to a great level, does not imply that there is a creator, just as flagellum does not imply a mechanical engineer for a God.

But the beginning of life requires an extremely large amount of information in DNA does it not?

Seeing God in the cracks of science (Which are constantly paved over with the logic of reason) seems to be a self-defeating concept.

Just as trusting in sciences ability to eventually solve everything unquestionably also seems a little self defeating in my opinion.

With that I'm off to bed. Thanks for the discussion though lads. It's always a pleasure

 

[HalcyonSky]

I don't feel that I am. In regards to what specifically?

Kind of lost here. It seems that you are saying that information is DNA is not required for life to exist or begin? How does that work?

I don't know that I agree that life could be formed simply on random chance. It was my understanding that this theory of random chance over time was no longer accapted scientifically.

But the beginning of life requires an extremely large amount of information in DNA does it not?

that post was painful, u obviously have not read anything about the scientific theories on the origins of life. Even 2 minutes of wikipedia could make someone more informed than you.

 

[BradCube]

How about positively contributing something to the discussion that would enlighten me?

 

[HalcyonSky]

how about you do a google search instead? or read a book written by someone other than fred phelps?

Even if i presented you with irrefutable evidence that RNA and DNA can in fact be formed through random processes in ideal conditions, youd still come back at me with "god did it"

 

[boris]

i dont think anybody can tell you the exact process for formation of life on earth, but that doesnt mean "random chance" was not responsible for it. its difficult to calculate the probability of such an event happening*, as no one knows accurately, for example, how many planets in our universe have life supporting conditions, however either way, putting faith in a supernatural initiation, seems to me just another god of the gaps.

*http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/abioprob.html

I think you will find the underlying argument against advanced lifeforms on planets we have the capacity to study, is the lack of water.
Unless somewhere in the universe there are organisms higher than a prokaryote that can survive without water, the chances of there being life in our immediate universe seems slim.

http://www.astrobiology.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=24969

http://www.astrobiology.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=24964

 

[advanced sam]

as combover guy said, theyve ruled out life forms on mars and other planets. but in another universe thats another story...

 

[youBROKEmyLIFE]

The big bang model explains attempts to explain what happened when our known universe came into existence. I'm talking about the meta-universe/reality beyond that. Of course it's pseudo-science, for the most part I think all we can say is WE DON'T KNOW, but since you want to try to 'prove' gods existence by throwing out there that something MUST have began everything and that thing must not have a beginning its self, I'm going to show you that it's not at all necessary that it be some intelligent being.

Do you concede the point or did you just not see my post? If you like analogies, I think looking at the universe and assuming it must have been some intelligence that created it (an assumption humans make, as eloquently explained in Dan's Douglas Adams quote) seems to be to be analogous to the ancients looking at a quaking volcano and assuming God's making it quake.

Unless somewhere in the universe there are organisms higher than a prokaryote that can survive without water, the chances of there being life in our immediate universe seems slim.

Our immediate 'universe' ?

 

[boris]

Do you concede the point or did you just not see my post? If you like analogies, I think looking at the universe and assuming it must have been some intelligence that created it (an assumption humans make, as eloquently explained in Dan's Douglas Adams quote) seems to be to be analogous to the ancients looking at a quaking volcano and assuming God's making it quake.



Our immediate 'universe' ?

Yeah so immediate wasn't the correct word, but you know what I mean. As far as being able to study planets near us, I think it's easy to argue that because water hasn't been found on any with close proximity to earth, it's easy to assume there probably isn't anything higher than a unicellular lifeform atleast in our solar system.

 

[youBROKEmyLIFE]

Yea for sure, I doubt there's any intelligent life we'll have physical contact with but eh? maybe.

A further problem I have with Brad's argument is that he's saying whenever we see "information added" it is the result of intelligence... Now if I were to give examples of natural processes which "add information" he would say "ah but how did it do that" until we came back to the questions regarding the origin of the universe. The same can essentially be done for humans though, so it kinda destroys his analogy.

I mean I could say the only reason humans "information add" is the result of natural processes if I want to stretch the argument as far as I'm sure proponents of his argument would.

 

[boris]

The how do these elements come together to be stable enough? Ever asked that question?

Who or what decides how stable an atom is?

I think this was one of the more idiotic arguments.

 

[BradCube]

The big bang model explains attempts to explain what happened when our known universe came into existence. I'm talking about the meta-universe/reality beyond that. Of course it's pseudo-science, for the most part I think all we can say is WE DON'T KNOW, but since you want to try to 'prove' gods existence by throwing out there that something MUST have began everything and that thing must not have a beginning its self, I'm going to show you that it's not at all necessary that it be some intelligent being.

Okay, so moving into this style of argument you realize you are promoting an agnostic stance and not an atheistic one? You are promoting the fact that we do not know rather than we do know that God doesn't exist.

Even so, my argument for intelligence in a creator is not currently stemming from the fact that the universe had a beginning. My only point was to point out that there must have been a cause to the universe (just as there must be a cause for information in DNA).

The reason for suggesting intelligence stems from the analogy that all information we currently see stems from intelligence - hence why would not this follow also for nature?

Apart from the intelligence argument, the reason I put my faith in a God rather than in some multi verse theory is because most of these arguments don't seem to hold all that much weight when analyzed (at least from the research I have seen)

Do you concede the point or did you just not see my post? If you like analogies, I think looking at the universe and assuming it must have been some intelligence that created it (an assumption humans make, as eloquently explained in Dan's Douglas Adams quote) seems to be to be analogous to the ancients looking at a quaking volcano and assuming God's making it quake.

Not sure if this was directed at me or not. If it was then yes I did read it, I hadn't replied because I went to bed and had work all day today

If not then

 

[youBROKEmyLIFE]

Okay, so moving into this style of argument you realize you are promoting an agnostic stance and not an atheistic one? You are promoting the fact that we do not know rather than we do know that God doesn't exist.

What I am proposing is that we do not know a lot of things, yet in most circumstances I'm willing to (for all practical purpose) dismiss supernatural explanations. I wouldn't say I'm agnostic about pixies shooting magic arrows into people's butts to make them fall in love, nor will I say I am about some intelligent being creating the universe.

It seems to me that the non-existence of supernatural entities is about the truest thing we CAN know. If the supernatural is something we're going to reasonably consider in our reality, then that calls into question any other truths we may claim to know.

The reason for suggesting intelligence stems from the analogy that all information we currently see stems from intelligence - hence why would not this follow also for nature?

To which I've said the following:

a) What created the creator? Your only way out of this is to say that the creator already existed, which is about as good as saying the universe has just always existed.

b) I actually have examples of 'information adding in nature':

A further problem I have with Brad's argument is that he's saying whenever we see "information added" it is the result of intelligence... Now if I were to give examples of natural processes which "add information" he would say "ah but how did it do that" until we came back to the questions regarding the origin of the universe. The same can essentially be done for humans though, so it kinda destroys his analogy.

I mean I could say the only reason humans "information add" is the result of natural processes if I want to stretch the argument as far as I'm sure proponents of his argument would.

Apart from the intelligence argument, the reason I put my faith in a God rather than in some multi verse theory is because most of these arguments don't seem to hold all that much weight when analyzed (at least from the research I have seen)

I don't put my faith in some multi-verse theory (beyond day to day deductions, I really have little faith)... As I've said, I just believe I don't have an answer. It does seem to at least be somewhat supported by some research results though.

 

[BradCube]

i believe its certainly a possibility, however the analogy argument is not a proof; rather an observation used to formulate hypothesis; something we can base a premise on. in this case, it just leads us back to discussing what we think supports the existence of god, and our premise.

Yup, so the Argument from analogy can only be used to make something probable rather than certain. Even with this is mind (and knowing that I will never be able prove the existance of God 100%) I am quite happy to maintain my faith in an idea that it is probable if not certain.

complexity of dna i believe however, is more likely to be accounted for by simple processes of evolution, and that this is more or less a form of the irreducible complexity argument. if one is able to show that dna is just a result of "unintelligent" random processes, then the argument wouldnt really hold. my understanding is that some of these steps of how dna formed is already known.

I don't agree that evolution is applicable to the complexity of DNA information. Surely the first living cell (which could not be subject to natural selection) must have had complex DNA information instructing it how to rebuild, sustain and replicate itself?

Could you please share some of the theories that currently seek to explain where information in DNA came from that exclude intelligence? The ideas that I have seen put forward so far haven't been substantial enough for me to switch beliefs.