Originally posted by LivingForJesus Abiogenesis that word
It's the use of the prefix 'a' to a word to produce an opposite.
Biogenesis would be the formation of life from other life.
Abiogenesis is the formation of life from non-living materials.
Originally posted by LivingForJesus can you explain a little better!!!!!!
Sure. The dirty little secret is that there are unprovable phenomenon/occurences in the universe. One such problem is the existence of matter. Where did it come from? Is it eternal? All we know is that we can look as far back as the Big Bang but no further in terms of the material universe. Thus the beginning of the universe or birth of the universe was the Big Bang. But what existed before the Big Bang? This we can never see and will never know in this lifetime because we are only able to see as far back as the Big Bang and no further. You then have the option of saying that God was the source or some other abstract conceptualized theory that matter is eternal. Either way, however both beliefs are unprovable and end up being a belief system. In the end all we know is that matter exists but how?
The other occurence is the existence of life. Where did it come from? How did it come about? Science only deals with the material world thus science only points to the building blocks of life and say that we must have derived from such building blocks. However, the Bible says something similiar in that we were created from the dust of the earth. The big question, however, is how? Did it happen through dumb luck or was it brought about by the power of God? Atheists would say that we simply came about from nonliving matter known as abiogenesis, however, this has never been observed and has never been duplicated. All observable life is and has been derived from other living life forms, thus abiogenesis is unprovable in this regard. The Creationist view is that God is the life form that initiated the first life in a long chain of evolutionary and/or continued spontaneous bursts of creation leading to life forms we see today. This too, however, is not provable because God is not provable. At the end of the day all we know is that life exists but how? You are then faced with a decision as to what you want to believe.
An atheist has no intellectual obligation to provide an answer to questions like "Where did the universe come from?" or "Why is there something rather than nothing?" The atheist often exhibits a sufficent humility to admit that he isn't able to answer such a difficult question.
Ironically, it is often atheists who exhibit humility on ultimate questions that theists claim to have figured all out.
Originally posted by whodey Sure. The dirty little secret is that there are unprovable phenomenon/occurences in the universe. One such problem is the existence of matter. Where did it come from? Is it eternal? All we know is that we can look as far back as the Big Bang but no further in terms of the material universe. Thus the beginning of the universe or birth of the universe was ...[text shortened]... is that life exists but how? You are then faced with a decision as to what you want to believe.
It's hardly a secret.
Science is not a claim to know everything but simply a process to find answers to how things work.
We can never know or see?
This sort of absolutist claim is not appropriate as a scientific response. Much progress has been made on understanding conditions close to the big bang and many suggestions are on the table for how we might expand our knowledge in this area.
I would be very careful before using the 'never' word.
I'm interested in the way you have the dichotomy of atheists and creationists. Atheism does not equate with abiogenesis. Abiogenesis is not comparable to creationism since it is a scientific model and therefore subject to the scrutiny and falsifiability of any such concept. Creationism is subject to no such scrutiny - you can either believe it or not.
Originally posted by whodey Sure. The dirty little secret is that there are unprovable phenomenon/occurences in the universe. One such problem is the existence of matter. Where did it come from? Is it eternal? All we know is that we can look as far back as the Big Bang but no further in terms of the material universe. Thus the beginning of the universe or birth of the universe was ...[text shortened]... is that life exists but how? You are then faced with a decision as to what you want to believe.
Originally posted by LivingForJesus God is proveable!!!
In the realm of science he is not provable because God is a spirit and not from this material world from which science derives its field of study. It is akin to trying to prove how a particular chemical reaction occurs by studying philosophy. Just because you cannot arrive at the truth regarding the chemical reaction in question by studying philosophy in no way detracts from the possibility that it can and does occur, rather, it only means you are in the wrong field of study for such phenomenon.
Originally posted by amannion Atheism does not equate with abiogenesis. Abiogenesis is not comparable to creationism since it is a scientific model and therefore subject to the scrutiny and falsifiability of any such concept. Creationism is subject to no such scrutiny - you can either believe it or not.[/b]
Although abiogenesis is a scientific model and "creationism" is not a model per sey, it does not change the fact that if one is an atheist one must adhere to the abiogenesis model. If not, what else is there?
Again, I will not deny that there is some truth to the abiogenesis model because I believe God formed man out of the dust of the earth just as those who embrace abiogenesis think man was formed from the dust of the earth minus a God. In this regard I can embrace such a model. The only difference really is that abiogenesis believes life can come from nonlife. Nothing could be further from the truth in regards to what we observe in the natural world. So really, it is not the model of abiogenesis we are arguing about is it, rather, we are arguing over whether life can originate from nonlife?
Originally posted by whodey Athiesm does not have a belief system that reflects a creation myth? What of abiogenesis? One way or another we were formed/created. The only question is was this accomplished via a higher power or dumb luck?
Athiesm is not a religion. It is merely a label that is often given to people who do not believe in God. To say anything about athiesm as if it was a religion is equivalent to saying something about the group of people who don't like swimming. For example to say "Those who don't like swimming are scared of sharks" is just stupid because the only thing that people who don't like swimming actually have in common is that they don't like swimming (and they are people.)
Abiogenesis is a scientific theory and is actually accepted as fact by more than 50% of Christians (officially that is, nobody knows what everyone really believes) and probably a lot of atheists and members of other religions too.
Originally posted by LivingForJesus God is proveable!!!
Would you care to explain what you mean by that? Or are you just upset and feel the need to shout nice sounding words? Did you mean "the existence of God is provable"? What do you mean by 'provable' in that context? Do you mean a mathematical or logical proof? Do you mean there is overwhelming scientific evidence?
Originally posted by whodey Although abiogenesis is a scientific model and "creationism" is not a model per sey, it does not change the fact that if one is an atheist one must adhere to the abiogenesis model. If not, what else is there?
An atheist does not have to adhere to anything he doesn't want to or doesn't like. Most educated atheists would probably 'adhere' to abiogenesis but there are surely plenty of uneducated atheists who have never even heard the term.
Nothing could be further from the truth in regards to what we observe in the natural world. What did you observe in the natural world? Please elaborate.
So really, it is not the model of abiogenesis we are arguing about is it, rather, we are arguing over whether life can originate from nonlife? Actually I thought that it had been pointed out in another thread that this has actually been done in the lab.
Originally posted by LivingForJesus okay but athiesm usally belives in the Big Bang!
The first propponent of the big bang theory was lemaitre. You know what he was? He was a priest, besides being a mathematical physicist. At his time the number one cientists, Einstein included, didn't like his ideas very much because the Big Bang reminded them to much of creation and a God. Lemaitre himself thought the his new idea could prove God existence but retracted of writing that in the final form of his original article. Slowly the Big Bang scenario gained strenght among scientists and now it is our best theory to explain how everything started but a strange phenomenom ocurred. Nowadays people think that thew Big Bang and God are mutually exclusive and that's just stupid!
Another side note is that the Big Bang name was origanally a depreciative name given by a scientist that didn't believed in the theory: Fred Hoyle.
So people please knock some sense into you and try to know things before making up your mind.
Originally posted by LivingForJesus okay but athiesm usally belives in the Big Bang!
no, no, no , no, NO
IT IS NOT a belief.
It's only a theory, and not a proven one. Probably it is wrong. It has many faults. But to date, it's one of the best and it helps explain a lot of stuff, although it poses many unanswered questions.
Originally posted by whodey Sure. The dirty little secret is that there are unprovable phenomenon/occurences in the universe. One such problem is the existence of matter. Where did it come from? Is it eternal? All we know is that we can look as far back as the Big Bang but no further in terms of the material universe. Thus the beginning of the universe or birth of the universe was ...[text shortened]... is that life exists but how? You are then faced with a decision as to what you want to believe.
You obvisouly never studied the big bang theory, or if you did, you didn't understand a word. Matter creation IS explained by big bang. You are seeing the world 3-dimensions and isotropic (space is the same size everywhere). You are seeing time as something linear.
THEY ARE NOT!
You can't understand the basics of physics to discuss validity of big bang. You are trying to fit it in the model of the world you believe it exists, and BIg Bang doesn't fit. THAT is not a surprise!
If you belive in the Big Bang therory can you p...
18 Sep '07 01:47
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