The origin of life: a
critique of current scientific models
The origin of life: a
critique of current scientific models
“This article provides an exhaustive discussion of the topics surrounding the origin of life. The discussion ranges from the presence of oxygen in the early atmosphere (despite the fact that it prohibits the formation of organic molecules) to the formation of DNA molecules and the complexity of the genetic code. Numerous evolutionary papers from scientific journals are used as evidence to support the idea that life could not have formed on earth by natural causes.” Exposing Evolution, Second Ed., The origin of life: a critique of current scientific models, Swee-Eng. www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/magazines/TJ/docs/tjv10n3_origin_life.pdf
Response to comment [from a Christian]: "Is this your avocation or vocation? or both?"
No. By the way, one can have an opinion on origins of life without being a scientist (1 Cor 1:27). It is not an intellectual issue. It is a heart issue (Isa 44:18).
"In what way do you find evolution contradicts the activity of God?"
The theory of evolution contradicts the word of God. When people believe Ge 1-11 as historical truth, their faith is strengthened (Ps 124:8; 146:5,6). Satan (and his minions like Alate_One, Gamera [aka PlastikBuddah]) seek to undermine God's word (Ps 11:3). Satan's strategy has not changed much since the garden: Did God really say? Fact is, yes--God really did say (Ge 3:1). We should believe his revelation (Ex 20:11; 31:17) not man's speculation.
Response to comment [from other]: "...[S]erpentdove has absolutely no idea what his sources are talking about.."
I can't understand anything.
Ad hominem.
Any thoughts on the
facts?
Response to comment [from a Catholic]: "(Barbarian notes that it's blasphemous to attribute limitations to God) John disagrees..."
Serpentdove notes that Barbarian is guilty
poisoning the well and accent (a linguistic fallacy, Sophistici Elenchi)--again.
Understand the difference between
observation science and origin science:
"1. Operation science uses the so-called “scientific method” to attempt to
discover truth, performing observable, repeatable experiments in a controlled
environment to find patterns of recurring behavior in the present physical
universe. For example, we can test gravity, study the spread of disease, or
observe speciation in the lab or in the wild. Both creationists and
evolutionists use this kind of science, which has given rise to computers, space
shuttles, and cures for diseases.
2. Origin science attempts to discover truth by examining reliable eyewitness
testimony (if available); and circumstantial evidence, such as pottery, fossils,
and canyons. Because the past cannot be observed directly, assumptions greatly
affect how these scientists interpret what they see...
[T]he debate is not about operation science, which is based in the present. The
debate is about origin science and conflicting assumptions, or beliefs, about
the past... Molecules-to-man evolution is a belief about the past. It assumes,
without observing it, that natural processes and lots of time are sufficient to
explain the origin and diversification of life.
Of course, evolutionary scientists can test their interpretations using
operation science. For instance, evolutionists point to natural selection and
speciation—which are observable today. Creation scientists make these same
observations, but they recognize that the change has limits and has never been
observed to change one kind into another...
These present-day observations help us to consider the possible causes of past
events, such as the formation of the Grand Canyon. But operation science cannot
tell us with certainty what actually happened in the past...
[C]reationists and evolutionists develop totally different reconstructions of
history. But they accept and use the same methods of research in both origin and
operation science. The different conclusions about origins arise from different
starting assumptions, not the research methods themselves.
So, the battle between the Bible and molecules-to-man evolution is not one of
religion versus science. Rather, it is a conflict between worldviews—a
creationist’s starting assumptions (a biblical worldview) and an evolutionist’s
starting assumptions (an antibiblical worldview)...
Accurate knowledge (truth) about physical reality can be discovered by the
methods of both operation science and origin science. But truth claims in both
areas may be false. Many “proven facts” (statements of supposed truth) about how
things operate (in physics, chemistry, medicine, etc.), as well as about how
things originated (in biology, geology, astronomy, etc.) have been or will be
shown to be false. So, as best we can, we must be like the Bereans in Acts 17:11
and examine every truth claim against Scripture and look for faulty logic or
false assumptions...
Which Worldview Is Correct?...
There are many ways to test the accuracy of the biblical worldview against
naturalistic atheism (the worldview that controls most origins research). When
our research is based upon biblical truths about the past, we find that our
interpretations of the biological and geological facts make sense of what we see
in the real world, whereas evolutionary interpretations don’t really fit what we
see.
Let’s look at an example. The Bible says that God created distinct groups of
animals “after their kind” (see Genesis 1). Starting with this truth of the
Bible as one of our assumptions, we would expect to observe animals divided into
distinct groups, or kinds. Creationists postulate that our creative God placed
phenomenal variability in the genes of each kind, so there could be considerable
variety within each kind. But the preprogrammed mechanism for variation within
the kind could never change one kind into a different kind, as evolutionists
claim and their belief system requires...
Can a creationist be a real scientist?...
Both creationist scientists and evolutionist scientists have religious (or
faith) components to their scientific models about origins. Yet both types of
scientists are equally capable of doing both operation science and origin
science.
Operation science, whether done by an evolutionist or a creationist, has
benefited mankind in many ways, particularly through technology. Creationists
have contributed greatly in this area of science, including nineteenth-century
physicists Michael Faraday and James Clerk Maxwell, and more recently Dr.
Raymond Damadian, who invented the MRI imaging used by medical doctors...
In origin science, creationists are discovering many things that honor the
Creator’s wisdom and confirm biblical history. [Visit answersingenesis.org for a
list of creation scientists]...full text:
Science or the Bible.
Response to comment [from a Catholic]: "Your guys don't seem to know what "science" means...Hmm... what creationist invented computers or space shuttles?"
God fearing Bible believers make the best scientists:
Leonardo da Vinci 1452 – 1519 (helped develop science of hydraulics)
Nicolaus Copernicus 1473 – 1543 (formulated a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology)
Francis Bacon 1561 – 1626 (developed the Scientific Method)
Galileo Galilei 1564 – 1642 (contributed to the science of motion / articulated laws of nature / father of modern observational astronomy, physics, science)
Johannes Kepler 1571 – 1630 (helped develop science of physical astronomy / developed the Ephemeris Tables)
Isaac Newton 1643 – 1727 (helped develop science of dynamics and the discipline of calculus / father of the Law of Gravity / invented the reflecting telescope)
Louis Pasteur 1822 – 1895 (helped develop science of bacteriology / discovered the Law of Biogenesis / invented fermentation control / developed vaccinations and immunizations)
Albert Einstein 1879 – 1955 (developed the special theory of relativity / discovered relationship between Energy and Mass (E=MC2) / contributed to Newton’s theory of gravitational pull / explaned the Brownian movement of molecules / laid the foundation of the photon theory of light / contributed the theory of radiation and statistical mechanics / developed the quantum theory of a monatomic gas / accomplished work in connection with atomic transition probabilities and relativistic cosmology)
Same empirical data--different interpretations.
See:
Do real scientists believe in Creation? http://www.christiananswers.net/q-eden/edn-scientists.html
See:
[URL="http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/wow/"] War of Worldviews [/URL]
[URL="http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/wow/what-is-biblical-worldview"]
What is a Biblical Worldview? [/URL]
[URL="http://vananne.com/evolutionvscreation/Can%20an%20Intellectual%20Believe%20in%20God.htm"]Can
an Intellectual Believe in God? [/URL]by Adrienne Rogers
[URL="http://vananne.com/evolutionvscreation/How%20to%20Know%20the%20Bible%20is%20the%20Word%20of%20God.htm"]How
to Know the Bible is the Word of God[/URL] by Adrienne Rogers
[URL="http://vananne.com/evolutionvscreation/"]Evolution vs. Creation [/URL]
Beware lest anyone [SIZE="1"]5[/SIZE]cheat you through
philosophy and empty deceit, according to [SIZE="1"]i[/SIZE]the tradition of
men, according to the [SIZE="1"]j[/SIZE]basic principles of the world, and not
according to Christ.
5 Lit. plunder you or take you captive.
i Gal. 1:14
j Gal. 4:3, 9, 10; Col. 2:20
The New King James Version. Nashville : Thomas Nelson, 1982, S. Col 2:8
Response to comment [from an atheist]: "Einstein...Jewish ancestry..."
"Einstein did not believe in a
personal God. It is however, interesting how he arrived at that conclusion. In
developing the theory of relativity, Einstein realized that the equations led to
the conclusion that the universe had a beginning. He didn't like the idea of a
beginning, because he thought one would have to conclude that the universe was
created by God. So, he added a cosmological constant to the equation to attempt
to get rid of the beginning. He said this was one of the worst mistakes of his
life. Of course, the results of Edwin Hubble confirmed that the universe was
expanding and had a beginning at some point in the past. So, Einstein became a
deist - a believer in an impersonal creator God:
"I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what
exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human
beings."4
However, it would also seem that Einstein was not an atheist, since he also
complained about being put into that camp:
"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human mind, am
able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really
makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views."5
"I'm not an atheist and I don't think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in
the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many
languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not
know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The
child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangements of the books, but
doesn't know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most
intelligent human being toward God."6
Einstein on JesusAlbert Einstein received instruction in both Christianity (at a
Roman Catholic school) and Judaism (his family of origin). When interviewed by
the Saturday Evening Post in 1929, Einstein was asked what he thought of
Christianity.
"To what extent are you influenced by Christianity?"
"As a child I received instruction both in the Bible and in the Talmud. I am a
Jew, but I am enthralled by the luminous figure of the Nazarene."
"Have you read Emil Ludwig’s book on Jesus?"
"Emil Ludwig’s Jesus is shallow. Jesus is too colossal for the pen of
phrasemongers, however artful. No man can dispose of Christianity with a bon
mot!"
"You accept the historical existence of Jesus?"
"Unquestionably! No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence
of Jesus. His personality pulsates in every word. No myth is filled with such
life."7
So, although Einstein was not a Christian, he had a great respect for Jesus, and
recognized that He was an amazing figure in history. Personally having grown up
as an atheist in a non-religious home, I initially saw Jesus as a brilliant
teacher when I read the gospels for the first time at age 32..." Full text:
Did Albert Einstein Believe in a Personal God? http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/einstein.html
"[W]hat was the point of this seemingly pointless list?"
Barbarian claimed that Bible believers did
not know what science is. Forget the fact that Francis Bacon, a young
earth creationist, developed the scientific method.
Response to comment [from a Catholic]: [Barbarian quote: "Your guys don't seem to know what "science" means...Hmm... what creationist invented computers or space shuttles?"] "As usual, Serpent, when embarrassed, lashes out with a lie."
These are your words not mine. http://www.theologyonline.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2364447#post2364447 Those who have a proper fear of the Lord make the best scientists.
"[T]he only ones who didn't specifically endorse evolution were born and died before evolutionary theory...YE creationism was invented in the early 1900s by the Seventh-Day Adventists."
"Charles Darwin thought he could
explain life without God. For 35 years, he was sickly--hating God, hating his
father, hating everybody. He effectively said, how do you have a creation
without a creator?--so he thought. The theory of evolution is the next best
guess of the mind and the man that rejects God.
Charles Darwin was not the first to come up with the theory of evolution.
Aristotle and others toyed with the idea of evolution. Darwin sought to explain
all of life without God..." full text: Can an Intellectual Believe in God?
by Adrienne Rogers
http://vananne.com/evolutionvscreation/Can%20an%20Intellectual%20Believe%20in%20God.htm
"We can believe the word of God (1) because of the scientific accuracy of the Bible. Some say: "Of course the Bible is not scientifically accurate because it was was written thousands of years ago." Before you say that, make sure of two things--make certain that you know science and make certain that you know the word of God. The Bible does not always agree with science--and for that I am infinitely glad. If you've been to Paris, you may have visited the Louvre. There are 3 1/2 miles of books on science and almost every one of them is obsolete. Science is changing. What is scientific fact in one era is not in another era.
In 1861 there was an anti-God French academy of science that gave 51 facts that prove the Bible wrong. Today, more than 100 years later, there is not a reputable scientist who believes one of those 51 facts. Aren't you glad the Bible did not agree with that science? Had the Bible agreed with that science the Bible would have been wrong. Give the scientists enough time, perhaps they'll catch up with the Bible.
The Bible teaches about science:
The earth suspended in space (Job 26:7). How did Job know that?
Ancient Egyptians believed that the earth was supported on five pillars. Greeks believed that the earth was held on the back of a giant named Atlas. Ancient Hindus believed the earth stood on the backs of huge elephants. When the elephants shook that created earthquakes. Someone asked, "What are the elephants standing on?" On the back of a huge tortoise. They asked, "Then, what's the turtle on?" The turtle is on the back huge coiled serpent. They asked, "Then, what is the serpent on?" The serpent is swimming in a cosmic sea.
Earth is a sphere. Isa 40:22. How did Isaiah know that?
By observation you would think that the earth is flat. Columbus sailed west. Men said you'd better be careful or you might fall off the edge. It was not until 1492 that time that men conceded that the earth is round.
The stars are without number (human number, uncountable) [Jer 33:22].
Hipparchus counted stars, the noted astronomer of that day. He said there are 1022 stars. That was the science. 250 years later, another Ptolemy checked up on Hipparchus and he laughed. There are 1026. 1300 years later that Galileo created telescope and gave a gasp--millions and billions of stars in the canopy of space. Now, with the Hubble telescope---stars upon stars. Jeremiah said the host of heaven cannot be known. How did Jeremiah know that?
How did they know? All scripture given by inspiration of God (2 Ti 3:16).
Now move into physiology and biology. Blood is in the life. We that that for granted. It was not until 1615 that William Harvey discovered that blood even circulates in the body--the incredible properties of human blood. In relatively recent times when men got sick they would attribute it to blood. The barber pole represented a bandage. They would bleed men in the hopes that they would get well. The father of our country George Washington got sick and they bled him three times. They bled him to death. Lev 17:14, blood--it is the life of all flesh, an incredible scientific statement.
In the Middle Ages there was a Bubonic Plague, called the Black Plague. 1 out of 4 died. They could not figure out what caused it. It was one of the greatest natural disasters in human history. The word of God was the solution. If a man had the plague quarantine him (Lev 13:46).
1840, in hospitals in Vienna 1 out of 5 mothers were dying of infection. They would go in for inspections and they were getting infected. Doctors did not wash their hands. Dr. Semmelweis said from now on, you will wash your hands before you examine. They would go from the morgue to make examinations. 1 out of 84 died. After this policy 11 out of 12 died. Then he said, you will wash between every examination. Doctors said, no we can't do that. Nu 19:14-19, when men die in a tent they shall be unclean 7 days (time for the bacteria to die) every open vessel is unclean, if you touch one slain, or a dead body or bone or one in the grave, they shall be unclean 7 days. They had no idea about a germ. God says don't contaminate. Edited sermon notes Adrienne Rogers: How to Know the Bible is the Word of God
"The Bible is not a science book but it is scientifically accurate." ~ Adrienne Rogers.." full text: How to Know the Bible is the Word of God by Adrienne Rogers http://vananne.com/evolutionvscreation/How%20to%20Know%20the%20Bible%20is%20the%20Word%20of%20God.htm
Response to comment [from a Catholic]: [Charles Darwin thought he could explain life without God.] "You should be ashamed of yourself, [S]erpent."
Are you claiming he was a stand up guy?
"...[T]he decline of Darwin's faith began when he first started to doubt the truth of the first chapters of Genesis. This unwillingness to accept the Bible as meaning what it said probably started with and certainly was greatly influenced by his shipboard reading matter—the newly published first volume of Charles Lyell's Principles of Geology (the second volume, published after the Beagle left England, was sent on to Darwin in Montevideo)...
Inevitably, the more Darwin convinced himself that species had originated by chance and developed by a long course of gradual modification, the less he could accept not only the Genesis account of creation, but also the rest of the Old Testament as the divinely inspired Word of God. In his Autobiography, Darwin wrote, 'I had gradually come by this time, [i.e. 1836 to 1839] to see that the Old Testament was no more to be trusted than the sacred books of the Hindoos or the beliefs of any barbarian.'
When Darwin came to write up the notes from his scientific investigations he faced a choice. He could interpret what he had seen either as evidence for the Genesis account of supernatural creation, or else as evidence for naturalism, consistent with Lyell's theory of long ages. In the event, he chose the latter—that everything in nature has come about through accidental, unguided purposelessness rather than as the result of divinely guided, meaningful intention, and, after several years, in 1859 his Origin of Species was the result.
On the way, in 1844, he wrote to his
friend, Joseph Hooker, “I am almost convinced... that species are not (it is
like confessing a murder) immutable.” Concerning this, Ian Taylor writes, "Many
commentators have pointed out that the 'murder' he spoke of was in effect the
murder of God."
Having abandoned the Old Testament, Darwin then renounced the Gospels. This loss
of belief was based on several factors, including his rejection of miracles:
"the more we know of the fixed laws of nature, the more incredible do miracles
become"; his rejection of the credibility of the Gospel writers: "the men of
that time were ignorant and credulous to a degree almost incomprehensible to
us"; his rejection of the Gospel chronology: "the Gospels cannot be proved to
have been written simultaneously with the events"; and his rejection of the
Gospel events: "they differ in many important details, far too important, as it
seemed to me, to be admitted as the usual inaccuracies of eye-witnesses."
Summing up the above, he wrote, “by such reflections as these... I gradually
came to disbelieve in Christianity as a divine revelation.”
On another occasion he wrote, “I never gave up Christianity until I was forty
years of age.” He turned 40 in 1849. Commenting on this, Darwin's biographer,
James Moore, says, "... just as his clerical career had died a slow 'natural
death,' so his faith had withered gradually."
One immediate effect of Darwin's rejection of the Bible was his loss of all
comfort from it. The hopeless grief of his later letters to the bereaved,
contrasts sharply with the earlier letter of condolence quoted above. In 1851,
his dearly loved daughter Annie, aged 10, died from what the attending physician
called a "Bilious Fever with typhoid character." Charles was devastated, and
wrote, "Our only consolation is that she passed a short, though joyous life."
Two years later, to a friend who had lost a child, Darwin's only appeal was to
“time,” which "softens and deadens... one's feelings and regrets"
One major factor that contributed to Charles's apostasy is worth noting--the
role model of his father, Robert, and of his grandfather, Erasmus. Both were '
freethinkers', so disbelief was an acceptable trait within the Darwin
family--perceived not as 'a moral crisis or rebellion,' but perhaps even as 'a
filial duty'. Indeed, in 1838, when Charles had become engaged to Emma Wedgwood,
a very devout Unitarian, Robert had felt the need to advise his son to conceal
his religious doubts from his wife--other households did not discuss such
things.
Surrounded as he was by unbelievers, and having soaked his mind in literature
that rejected the concept of divine judgment in earth's history, Charles mused,
I can hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be true; for if so,
the plain language of the text seems to show that the men who do not believe,
and this would include my Father, Brother, and almost all my best friends, will
be everlastingly punished. And this is a damnable doctrine.'
The descent into darkness did not
stop there. In 1876, in his Autobiography, Darwin wrote,
“Formerly I was led... to the firm conviction of the existence of God and the
immortality of the soul. In my Journal I wrote that whilst standing in the midst
of the grandeur of a Brazilian forest, 'it is not possible to give an adequate
idea of the higher feelings of wonder, admiration, and devotion, which fill and
elevate the mind.' I well remember my conviction that there is more in man than
the mere breath of his body. But now the grandest scenes would not cause any
such convictions and feelings to rise in my mind.”
In 1880, in reply to a correspondent, Charles wrote, “I am sorry to have to
inform you that I do not believe in the Bible as a divine revelation, &
therefore not in Jesus Christ as the Son of God.”
In the last year of his life, when the Duke of Argyll suggested to him that
certain purposes seen in nature "were the effect and the expression of mind,"
Charles looked at him very hard and said, "Well, that often comes over me with
overwhelming force; but at other times," and he shook his head vaguely, adding,
"it seems to go away." And about the same time he wrote to his old friend,
Joseph Hooker, “I must look forward to Down graveyard as the sweetest place on
earth..." full text: Was Darwin a Christian? Did he believe in God?
Did he recant evolutionism when he died?
http://www.christiananswers.net/q-aig/darwin.html
