Was at least the first life form created?

[Eilonnwy]

It does and it makes sense to me. Thank you. Within what you said, it seems to me, then, that the wording of what one says also makes a big difference. For example compare:

Possible statements from a Christian: "I believe in God. " with "There is a God."
Possible statements from an atheist: "I do not belive in gods." with "There are no gods."

The first statement in each set invokes no burden of proof since they are essentially self-verifying, i.e., they are only stating what one believes and nobody could/should reasonably conclude otherwise (with the possible exception of when the hearer has evidence that the sayer is a habitual lier). The second statement in each set is positively saying something that is beyond what the sayer believes and, therefore, invokes the initial burden of proof. Am I correct here?

Ehhh, you are very close to the mark, but I would make a tiny distinction. When you say you believe something, it still can be construed as a truth claim that needs to meet the burden of proof. The "Burden of Proof" is for claims, so the claim that does not invoke burden of proof would be "I do not accept your claim that there is a God". or "I do not accept your claim that there is no God." Or as in the case of the argument you proposed "I do not accept your claim that life cannot come from non-life" or "I do not accept your claim abiogenesis is entirely disproven".

It's a tiny niggling distinction, but essentially you're getting it. This is why many atheists will make the important distinction that atheism is not "belief in no god", but a "lack of believe in god", a "disbelief". Therefore atheism is a rejection of the God claim which encompasses those that simply lack belief as well as those that assert positively that there is not god. It's best not to assume all atheists positively believe there is no god.

It is always interesting to me how people can look at the same things an come to polar opposite conclusions. I think I am coming to the conclusion that this results from the presuppositions we have. For example, I believe in God. One of the reasons why is that I look around and see the complexity of life and I conclude that it could not haved just "happened" and, therefore, God did it. This is a simplification of why I still believe in God but it is quite accurate in describing how I first came to believe in God many years ago.

Atheists don't think "this" just "happened". We have a good reliable explanation for how humans came into existence via evolution. We do not know specifically how the first living organism came into existence. Science has a good idea, and abiogenesis is becoming more and more promising, and the Urey-Miller experiment, while not a slam dunk, shows it's possible. Truth be told, I do not know how the first living organism came into existence and that's okay. I'm comfortable with claiming "I don't know". It's intellectual honesty. Saying "God did it" is essentially a non-answer. Claiming a God started it all says nothing of how, why, where, when, etc... It's just an answer that makes people feel like they know the answer, but they know just as much as I do, or possibly even less, since when people leave it at "God did it" they stop looking towards science and learning about all it's discoveries. It can stunt intellectual growth.

Also, even if Science proved tomorrow a God had to have created the first living organism, it does nothing to prove that the god is a personal god (Deist vs theist god) and so without the ability to prove it's a personal god, we cannot make the leap from the creator God to being the Christian god. So maybe it may make you feel better to imagine God created life because you can't imagine another way, but that does not make it true.

Anyway, because of this belief (my presuppositions) I conclude that the scientific evidence provided by Miller as well as the evidence of "self-replicating" RNA does not provide sufficient proof of abiogenesis (at least for me). To me the actions of "self-replicating" RNA is more analogous to the actions of seed crystals in replicating their crystal structure in the process of crystal formation rather than the kind of "self-replication" that occurs in living things. Furthermore, even if someone did produce life in the laboratory, I would (as you suggested in a previous post) argue that such evidence is not conclusive that that is how life began because there are still other possibilities (creation) or alternatively, that this is evidence of creation because it took many scientists many years with a lot of creative intellect to be able to do it.

As I said, the experiment was not a slam dunk, but it doesn't rule it out either. It shows abiogensis is possible and we have a lot of work to do.

I think with better science it is possible to prove abiogenesis true (If it in fact is). We've already done that with evolution. It is an incontrovertible fact that evolution is true, no God needed. The so called "controversy" is completely contrived by theists.

Furthermore, if you can come up with a workable hypothesis that creation is true and we can test it and the test is repeatable, the hypthesis falsifiable, then I'd be willing to consider it. Scientists creating life in a laboratory would not prove creation in any way. Humans have evolved organisms in their own way, doesn't prove God evolved us, just that human intervention is possible.

So now I am trying to understand how atheist's presuppositions would result in their conclusions regarding the evidence if, in fact, they do. In looking into this I ran across the following: Secular Humanism which says in part

God is a theoretical entity that is postulated by theists to explain various phenomena, such as the origin of the universe, the design of the universe, and the origin of living things. Modern science, however, can explain all of these phenomena without postulating the existence of God.1 In the words of Laplace, science has no need of that hypothesis.2 By demonstrating that God is not needed to explain anything, science has proven that there is no more reason to believe in the existence of God than to believe in the existence of phlogiston, the luminiferous ether, or Vulcan. This may explain why more than 90% of the world's top scientists disbelieve or doubt the existence of God

Now I can certainly see that if one is an atheist (does not believe in gods) and uses this as reasoning for that belief (a possible atheistic presupposition) how he/she would tend to look at this kind of evidence and conclude that it is sufficient evidence to conclude that a god is not necessary. So in an attempt to try to understand your thinking on this, I was wondering if you would tell me whether you agree with the quote or, if not, what your presuppositions are (presupposing you have them ). This would go a long way in helping me to understand your perspective which is what I want to do. (I am not here to argue or try to convince anyone to change their minds because I don't think I could; nor do I think anything anyone says here will change my mind. I do, however, think it is helpful to understand the position of those who do not think like me. So that is the basis for my request.)

Yeah, I would agree with the quote. I was raised Catholic and luckily the Catholics don't refuse to teach evolution. I came to the conclusion a long time ago that science was the best method for explaining what is true about the world. In essence, science brings the goods. It provides the most reliable evidence and proof of what is true about this world. Is that the only reason I disbelieve? No. I also saw how religion crumbles under scrutiny, especially the Bible. Science plays a large, but not the only, part in my atheism.