(A) God and/or/in Science

[TAKODA]

I asked this question in another thread, and I don't think it was answered, or if it was I missed it.

 

How could random "organic compounds" or "molecules" coalesce in such a way that they form ultra-complex organized and useful information? If I understand correctly, in the primal Earth simple molecules came together to form RNA, the most basic information of pre-life. RNA then combined in chains, forming nucleotides, which were just more complex forms of information.

 

The necessary first step was that these molecular chains of information gained the ability to reproduce themselves. I'm wracking my brain to think of an analogy in the observable world but I can't come up with one that seems to fit. Maybe a wave, in that a wave propagates another wave, and another, but that's not a good analogy.

 

I'm down with molecules ganging up to form more complex molecules. I'm down with certain environments making many kinds of these molecules. We see that in volcanoes, stars, all over the place.

 

Where I go wonky is in the sheer volume of information even the most basic, simplest forms of life contain. Even presuming in that magic primordial pool we found the right environment for the nucleotides to form, forming in just the right way, with just the right characteristics and just the right abilities stemming from that formation is nearly impossible to comprehend.

 

I once read, but cannot find, a quote that said if the human genome were typed out in 12-point type and put into books of 11 1/2 x 8 inch paper, it would occupy something like 27 yards of bookshelf. I found this cartoon roughly illustrating something similar:

 

 

Wikipedia reading tells me that a single chromosome in an Archaea, one of the simplest, most basic forms of life, and a very basic, simple form of Archaea for arguments' sake, contains nearly 500,000 base pairs. The human chromosome contains 6×10⁹ base pairs (6,000,000,000) in a diploid cell. The ramp-up of information from the simplest life form to ours is staggering.

 

I don't know where I'm going with this, maybe. All I know is, it doesn't seem logical that even ultra-ultra-primitive life could have just popped up from the muck. Even really comfy, homey muck.

 

 

BOOM or is the proper term here BANG! ha ~ and I loved the bong comment NUance; hehe! +1 to both you and knapp!

[JJ Husker]

Good topic LoMS. I just happen to approach this issue with much simpler thoughts. The two big ones for me are "why?" and "for what purpose?". I think science and observable phenomenon are woefully incapable of providing these answers. As far as knapp's impressive laundry list of purported deities or possible creators, we have to keep in mind that all these names came from mere humans and/or ancient books. I understand that when the discussion turns toward the validity of any specific God or specific religion, then which of these thousand names becomes pertinent. But in a discussion that focuses on random chance or creator, I don't see where it matters. But I have no problem saying the God I believe in is the one and only true God, the creator of heaven and earth.

 

I will try to help this topic to the typical stalemate. People who believe in God (any creator) cannot prove it in any scientifically acceptable way. People who don't believe can't disprove we were created in any scientifically acceptable manner. So, going through the motions of attempting to discuss, using science as a basis for any point, while entertaining, is a waste of time.

[JJ Husker]

If a person is not willing to or is incapable of putting aside their insistence on proof, then this will fail. Additionally a person has to be open to thinking outside the box. You cannot place limits on the idea of an all powerful supernatural being. As an example, the God I believe in knows the number of hairs on your head. Everyones head. He is completely responsible for all scientific evidence that has ever been discovered. He could easily make evidence that is only 4000a years old appear to our scientific methods to be millions or billions of years old. (to prevent disrailment, I am not saying he has done this) My only point is, if you can accept the idea of an all powerful creator, then you probably need to accept that anything is possible and he is in full control. If you can't accept that premise, you will become extremely frustrated with people who do. You will probably refer to them as crazy and acting irrationally. You'll probably want to mock them and make fun of them and may make up some goofy entity of your own, like a flying spaghetti monster.

[knapplc]

@Junior - thanks for the response. I suppose a large reason for why I don't know where I'm going with that is that I don't know how to formulate the question. The subject is so complex, so utterly utterly complex that, even in its most basic form (like archaea) we're talking about volumes and volumes of information. It's the old Swiss watch analogy, and aside from RNA, DNA, chromosomes & the like, there's nothing nearly so complex to be found in nature as a volume of information (like a naturally occurring dictionary).

 

I would presume most everyone is familiar with the Infinite Monkey Theorem. There are 884,421 words in the combined works of Shakespeare. That's a little more than 1.5x the number of base pairs of chromosomes in the most basic form of life we know about. One source says that in 2,737,850 million billion billion billion monkey years the record for completion is that the first 24 characters from Henry IV part 2 were produced by the simulator. Not words, but characters.

 

That's the kind of complexity we're talking about here. So it's a reasonable question to ask - how could even simple genes form from base nucleotides, when the time frame we're talking about here is about 3.5 billion years, and considering the Earth is, at our best guess, about 4.4 billion years old.

 

Even dumbing it down so that some ignorant clod like me can understand the mechanics of this stuff, there's still a "magic happens" transition from chemicals to life.

 

In that "magic happens" gap is where my question lies. And I don't even know how to form the question.

[knapplc]

If a person is not willing to or is incapable of putting aside their insistence on proof, then this will fail. Additionally a person has to be open to thinking outside the box. You cannot place limits on the idea of an all powerful supernatural being. As an example, the God I believe in knows the number of hairs on your head. Everyones head. He is completely responsible for all scientific evidence that has ever been discovered. He could easily make evidence that is only 4000a years old appear to our scientific methods to be millions or billions of years old. (to prevent disrailment, I am not saying he has done this) My only point is, if you can accept the idea of an all powerful creator, then you probably need to accept that anything is possible and he is in full control. If you can't accept that premise, you will become extremely frustrated with people who do. You will probably refer to them as crazy and acting irrationally. You'll probably want to mock them and make fun of them and may make up some goofy entity of your own, like a flying spaghetti monster.

 

I don't believe in the god you believe in, but I did for quite a while. I understand fully where you're coming from, and could probably help along the argument for God.

 

It's just that having the pieces to the puzzle in front of me, even though I don't know how to put them together, makes more sense to me than a mystical all-powerful being whose existence, documented behavior and expectations defy logic.

[tschu]

The earliest life forms would have been far, far simpler than the simplest archaea.

[JJ Husker]

Knapp- I can accept that and appreciate it. I understand that it can defy logic much like it can defy logic that this all happened by chance. I just really get stuck on the why. Logically or illogically I have to believe we have some higher purpose. If we don't, then we have to consider what brb alluded to; why do we care? Why and how have we made determinations on right and wrong? If random chance, evolution, and survival of the fittest is really all there is, I have to believe this world would be an even much more violent and hurtful place. Beings with no purpose would not consistently choose to try to make things better.

[knapplc]

The earliest life forms would have been far, far simpler than the simplest archaea.

 

Would they have been 24 characters of Henry IV Part 2 simple? I'm pretty certain not, since a single chromosome contains far more information, arranged far more complexly, than all of Shakespeare's works combined.

 

That's the thing. Even describing it as "far, far simpler" drastically minimizes the fiendish amount of data in even simple DNA & RNA.

[knapplc]

Knapp- I can accept that and appreciate it. I understand that it can defy logic much like it can defy logic that this all happened by chance. I just really get stuck on the why. Logically or illogically I have to believe we have some higher purpose. If we don't, then we have to consider what brb alluded to; why do we care? Why and how have we made determinations on right and wrong? If random chance, evolution, and survival of the fittest is really all there is, I have to believe this world would be an even much more violent and hurtful place. Beings with no purpose would not consistently choose to try to make things better.

 

That's actually pretty easily explained by the chemical reactions in the brain that we describe as love. Propagation of the species, the brazillion secondary things which make the genes comprising you recognize and shelter the genes comprising your offspring, which would be a Darwinian necessity if the gene sequence that created you was to survive. That kind of thing makes perfect sense to me.

[Excel]

The earliest life forms would have been far, far simpler than the simplest archaea.

 

Are we going to talk about theories of Abiogenesis and its/their validity? Please tell me we're going down that road. Would actually like to see some discussion on that. It's one of two remaining "gaps" I feel are left to really be filled...at least for me. They are:

 

- The Origin of Life

- The Origin of the Universe

 

If I understand knapp correctly I think we're in the same boat. I don't understand that transition from proteins/chemicals to poof: LIFE! Men smarter than me surely do but I'm just too dumb.

 

The other question, the origin of all matter and the universe, can never be sufficiently answered by science or religion. It just involves moving goal posts and wheels of circular logic. God did it! leads one to ask, and who or what created God? ...and the "Big Bang" theory doesn't really answer it either though it isn't meant to. I'm of the thinking that humans will never be able to answer that question and if we were we would never truly comprehend it.

 

Anyhow, it's those two gaps, not Pascal's Wager, that have kept me from making the jump into Atheism.

[BigRedBuster]

Knapp- I can accept that and appreciate it. I understand that it can defy logic much like it can defy logic that this all happened by chance. I just really get stuck on the why. Logically or illogically I have to believe we have some higher purpose. If we don't, then we have to consider what brb alluded to; why do we care? Why and how have we made determinations on right and wrong? If random chance, evolution, and survival of the fittest is really all there is, I have to believe this world would be an even much more violent and hurtful place. Beings with no purpose would not consistently choose to try to make things better.

 

That's actually pretty easily explained by the chemical reactions in the brain that we describe as love. Propagation of the species, the brazillion secondary things which make the genes comprising you recognize and shelter the genes comprising your offspring, which would be a Darwinian necessity if the gene sequence that created you was to survive. That kind of thing makes perfect sense to me.

 

Ok....so now we are smart enough that our sadness and emotional pain is really just chemical reactions and you child I just ran over is really meaningless.

 

If we are that smart then why do the smartest people who believe this not just convince themselves that it's meaningless.

 

Why do we care if the world continues or we destroy it tomorrow.

[Excel]

Knapp- I can accept that and appreciate it. I understand that it can defy logic much like it can defy logic that this all happened by chance. I just really get stuck on the why. Logically or illogically I have to believe we have some higher purpose. If we don't, then we have to consider what brb alluded to; why do we care? Why and how have we made determinations on right and wrong? If random chance, evolution, and survival of the fittest is really all there is, I have to believe this world would be an even much more violent and hurtful place. Beings with no purpose would not consistently choose to try to make things better.

 

That's actually pretty easily explained by the chemical reactions in the brain that we describe as love. Propagation of the species, the brazillion secondary things which make the genes comprising you recognize and shelter the genes comprising your offspring, which would be a Darwinian necessity if the gene sequence that created you was to survive. That kind of thing makes perfect sense to me.

 

Ok....so now we are smart enough that our sadness and emotional pain is really just chemical reactions and you child I just ran over is really meaningless.

 

If we are that smart then why do the smartest people who believe this not just convince themselves that it's meaningless.

 

Why do we care if the world continues or we destroy it tomorrow.

 

Those are good questions. Why not just commit suicide? That's what Camus pondered. Camus and Sarte. Both good reads on this kind of thing.

 

"There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy." - Albert Camus.

[HuskerShark]

Gotta love Huskerboard religion discussions - where the conversation/argument is more over semantics than the topic itself. *sigh*

[JJ Husker]

 

That's actually pretty easily explained by the chemical reactions in the brain that we describe as love. Propagation of the species, the brazillion secondary things which make the genes comprising you recognize and shelter the genes comprising your offspring, which would be a Darwinian necessity if the gene sequence that created you was to survive. That kind of thing makes perfect sense to me.

 

Well it also makes perfect sense if you attribute the reason for it to a higher being. God caused us to be able to love and there is some evidence of the chemical reaction that helps explain how. The missing component once again is why.

 

I will bail out of this discussion and simply follow along silently (as I can resist). I realize this discussion has merit and it doesn't need me constantly interjecting how I feel God could be ultimately responsible for all the points that may be made. Just one favor to ask- If y'all come across something that you don't feel can be attributed to an all powerful supernatural being, let me know. I don't mean that in a mocking fashion. I probably have many/most of the same doubts you did before switching teams. It is relatively easy to have doubts about religion but the big thing keeping me on the other team is my steadfast belief in a creator. Try to shoot holes in that all you want.

[Junior]

The earliest life forms would have been far, far simpler than the simplest archaea.

 

Clearly this is true. The first cell like structures probably had a membrane made of alcohols or other similar molecules that basically were shells to hold in a few energetically favorable chemical reactions.