Why Something Rather Than Nothing?

[Heywood]

The problem is that you're arguing from the false premise that all atheists believe abiogenesis to have occurred. Personally, my position is that I don't know how life began on Earth, and I'm willing to bet that a lot of the atheists here will join me in that, which immediately demonstrates that your argument is working from a faulty foundation.

The reason why the folks here are defending abiogenesis, before you cut in with the "oh yeah? Well why are they all posting evidence for it, then?" crap, is that at least we have some indications that abiogenesis is possible and can happen. At the moment, it is the best supported theory for how life could have arisen. That doesn't afford it automatic certain belief, but it is a fact that requires recognition; this is where the smart money goes.

If pressed most atheist would claim that abiogenesis happens or has happened somewhere. At least that is my experience after countless discussion with them. Maybe I am wrong...maybe atheists secretly believe there is an intelligent agent out there somewhere....that creates life.

Anyways all you have regarding abiogenesis is an unproven hypothesis. If you believe it happened, you believe in something which has not be shown to be true. Surgenator's claim that atheists don't believe things which are not shown to be true is clearly false. Why you want to defend a claim which is clearly wrong is perplexing.

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I have read tons about abiogenesis. It hasn't been shown to be true. It has never been observed. Yet it is believed as fact by atheists everywhere.

Well I admit I believe it to the same extent I believe in the existence of other minds. There is no cold hard proof but the alternative would be so fantastically absurd that I have no qualms in dismissing it. I mean, here we are and yet any reasonable account of our planet's formation would hold that there was an earlier period when it was not capable of supporting any life. So of course life had to have come from non life. You believe that too, you just think there was a magic bunny who turned non life to live life.

If you insist life did not come from non-life, what do you think it did come from? Positing a magic bunny doesn't change the fact that you think the live bits came from something that was not life.

First, there is nothing wrong with believing something which is not proven to be true. Even God has to believe somethings which are not proven to be true. If God is all powerful God can create a lessor being and trick that lessor being into thinking it is God. God knowing that He can do this has to wonder if He is not some lessor being being tricked by a covert superior being. God can't really know with absolute certainty....if He is God. It is a necessary truth that a world view must contain at least one assertion.

Second, I don't insist that abiogenesis is not true. God could have created the universe in such as fashion as to insure abiogenesis would happen. I just note that creation via intellect as a means to bring lineages of life into this world has been proven while abiogenesis has not.

[Surgenator]

This discussion has been fun!

I thank everyone who contributed; I have learned a lot and have hopefully given you something to think about, as well.

I hope to be checking out this forum periodically and possibly even participating.

Later guys.

I'll be interested to hear what you learned from this experience.

[AceBoogie]

The assumptions that some theists make on here are so interesting. Unfortunately it leads to a lot of miscommunication and misunderstanding between people. Oh well.

Atheists make false assumptions and claims too sometimes I'm sure.

[Surgenator]

Anyways all you have regarding abiogenesis is an unproven hypothesis. If you believe it happened, you believe in something which has not be shown to be true. Surgenator's claim that atheists don't believe things which are not shown to be true is clearly false. Why you want to defend a claim which is clearly wrong is perplexing.

After reading more about abiogenesis, I did realize not all the steps have been shown. So you have me there. However, given a two possible scenerios, life arose from an intelligent being or through natural process (I realize this might be a false dictomy, but for the sake of argument I'll assume these are my only two optons), the intelligent being scenerio has two main flaws.

One, it doesn't answer how the intelligent being came to be. Even if the life begain on Earth by some alien race, you still need to explain how the alien race came to be. An always existent being has never been observed and goes against everything we know about our natural world that everything dies.

Two, the intelligent being isn't very intelligent. Our bodies are filled with stupid designs. If an intelligent being (be it alien race or god) started life on earth, it did it in a very haphazard way.

When I consider the abiogenesis scenerio, each step is based on well know physics and chemistry. So to imagine each step doesn't require any leap of faith. The hardest part to believe is the getting the environments for these processes to exist. However, abiogenesis has billions of years to get it right.

So out of the two hypothesis, abiogenesis makes the least amount of assumptions.

[bennyboy]

Anyways all you have regarding abiogenesis is an unproven hypothesis. If you believe it happened, you believe in something which has not be shown to be true.

It's one thing to prove an idea, and another to at least ensure that it conforms to observable fact.

On the one hand, given that all our studies into biology are based on physical observations, and that we observe chemicals and compounds in various stages of organization, the position that the complex interactions among chemicals progressively led to simple life forms is a sensible one.

The idea that God created life, which is also unproven, and probably uprovable, has the disadvantage of being based on absolutely nothing that we can observe in the universe. It does not conform with any of the other things we have learned or observed, and therefore instantly fails as an academic position.

Is it possible that some kind of intelligent creative energy or force was involved in the creation of the universe and life? Yes, I think it's a possibility. Is this creation, as a theory of biogenesis, comparable to abiogenesis? No. They are not peers. They are not two of a line up of sensible attempts. We do not need to consider abiogenesis along with God, with the balance of four mystical psychic winds, with the hoofy will of an invisible pink unicorn, or with the delicious desires of a flying spaghetti monster. All those ideas are based on fantasy, where as abiogenesis is based on a single philosophical assumption: that the things we find in the universe, including living things, are a natural expression of the interaction of matter according to physical laws, in the arena of statistical interactions of many parts over time.

[datc]

abiogenesis is based on a single philosophical assumption: that the things we find in the universe, including living things, are a natural expression of the interaction of matter according to physical laws, in the arena of statistical interactions of many parts over time.

Abiogenesis then is "based" on a metaphysic, in this case a materialistic one.

If this philosophical assumption were to be proven false, would you accept that abiogenesis may be impossible, and that no amount of future scientific research will demonstrate it?

[Whateverist]

Abiogenesis then is "based" on a metaphysic, in this case a materialistic one.

If this philosophical assumption were to be proven false, would you accept that abiogenesis may be impossible, and that no amount of future scientific research will demonstrate it?

Is your premise even something that could be proven false? You could never rule out abiogenesis. All you could do is rule out various formulations based on attempts at simulation.

So sure, a proof -if valid- is an excellent reason to believe something. The trouble is proofs rarely succeed outside of math and logic.

But lets ignore that and assume somehow we could 'prove' abiogenesis impossible. What would you then assume about the beginnings of life?

[bennyboy]

If this philosophical assumption were to be proven false, would you accept that abiogenesis may be impossible, and that no amount of future scientific research will demonstrate it?

Of course. If it were proven false, then I would reject it. But to nip this in the bud, let me say this: the weak ideas that Christians keep throwing into the mix are not sufficient to make this proof. I suppose the scientists will strive to put organic molecules together, or to develop nanotechnology capable of sequencing DNA artificially or something. But what will you do? Pray for God to create life out of empty space to disprove the doubters? I think you are unlikely to be able to furnish this kind of proof.

My own hunch is that scientists will in fact create simple life forms in the lab, assembled out of lab-designed organic parts, and that Christians will claim that God made them do it.

[datc]

If this philosophical assumption were to be proven false, would you accept that abiogenesis may be impossible, and that no amount of future scientific research will demonstrate it?

Of course. If it were proven false, then I would reject it. But to nip this in the bud, let me say this: the weak ideas that Christians keep throwing into the mix are not sufficient to make this proof.

Dualism has nothing to do with Christianity. To affirm dualism, we do not need theology; all we need is correct anthropology.

In other words, that there are souls and spirits, and that human nature is something sui generis, differing from matter, can be accepted even by an atheist.

Theology is a divine science; economics, ethics are human social / moral sciences; physics, chemistry are natural sciences. These three are on completely different "levels."

Dualism does not entail theism. For example, philosophically, it is possible that humans, like the material universe, have always existed. There is an endless cycle of deaths and rebirths. Each individual upon death goes to some sort of afterlife where he might linger for a few years or a few billion years, until he is reborn unto this world anew. As a result, humans were never "created."

Matter has existed forever, but it is possible that so have, under dualism, spirits. Hence, the conclusion that God created life and human beings does not follow even if abiogenesis is false.

[Surgenator]

Theology is a divine science;

I want to see how the testing is done in "divine science."