(2023-05-12, 05:57 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]Which is fine, I just find myself the opposite "side" in terms of which arguments I like but ultimately it leads to the same "place" - that RM + NS cannot fully account for the existence of consciousness...
Even more importantly, RM+NS can't possibly account for life itself in all its complexity, as shown by all the evolutionary biology/genetics arguments against Darwinism.
(2023-05-12, 07:55 PM)nbtruthman Wrote: [ -> ]Even more importantly, RM+NS can't possibly account for life itself in all its complexity, as shown by all the evolutionary biology/genetics arguments for ID.
Assuming these arguments hold any water - sure.
(2023-05-12, 07:58 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]Assuming these arguments hold any water - sure.
The mechanism that allows DNA to code for protein etc is extremely complex. While it is probably more complicated now than it was originally (e.g. the need for two encodings DNA and RNA might not be necessary) it is pretty obvious that even the simplified version will still be far too complex to have got going by chance, but no argument that it evolved is possible because we are talking about the first self-replicating molecules.
Try asking a chemist to reproduce that mechanism de-novo, and then remember that it has to happen by chance in a mud pool! Watch any of the videos on this subject by James Tour:
https://peacefulscience.org/articles/tou...greements/
That guy is famous for producing working molecular machines, so he knows what he is talking about. Again he ties the argument to Christianity, but that is totally unnecessary.
David
(2023-05-12, 08:28 PM)David001 Wrote: [ -> ]The mechanism that allows DNA to code for protein etc is extremely complex. While it is probably more complicated now than it was originally (e.g. the need for two encodings DNA and RNA might not be necessary) it is pretty obvious that even the simplified version will still be far too complex to have got going by chance, but no argument that it evolved is possible because we are talking about the first self-replicating molecules.
Try asking a chemist to reproduce that mechanism de-novo, and then remember that it has to happen by chance in a mud pool! Watch any of the videos on this subject by James Tour:
https://peacefulscience.org/articles/tou...greements/
That guy is famous for producing working molecular machines, so he knows what he is talking about. Again he ties the argument to Christianity, but that is totally unnecessary.
David
I've seen some of Tour's stuff before. I can only repeat myself that I don't personally find it all that convincing. Maybe if I dug through my old textbooks on statistics and did a deep dive into biology & chemistry I would be completely convinced...but given the variety of naysayers that include Christians and other theists I have doubts.
OTOH I do realize that accomplished scientists like Nobel winning physicist Brian Josephson are fans of ID so I get that maybe it's me who is being overly skeptical.
Ultimately when it comes to questioning RM + NS I prefer arguments that can [be] followed from simpler applications of observation & reason, like the one in the Opening Post of this thread, than probabilistic arguments that fail to even convince some members of the Christian community most IDers are a part of.
(2023-05-12, 08:35 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]I've seen some of Tour's stuff before. I can only repeat myself that I don't personally find it all that convincing. Maybe if I dug through my old textbooks on statistics and did a deep dive into biology & chemistry I would be completely convinced...but given the variety of naysayers that include Christians and other theists I have doubts.
OTOH I do realize that accomplished scientists like Nobel winning physicist Brian Josephson are fans of ID so I get that maybe it's me who is being overly skeptical.
Ultimately when it comes to questioning RM + NS I prefer arguments that can [be] followed from simpler applications of observation & reason, like the one in the Opening Post of this thread, than probabilistic arguments that fail to even convince some members of the Christian community most IDers are a part of.
As I said before, the essence of the argument is statistical. If you had two groups of animals, one of which had a gene to produce an enzyme that could digest vegetables, and another did not, then obviously over time the group with the gene would prevail if they could not access any other form of food.
I got a feeling for what Tour is saying as an early postgraduate. I needed to make an organometalic compound for subsequent experiments. The chemical had been made before, a synthesis was there in the literature, and it was stable at room temperature. How hard could that be? Answer - very hard - because while it was wet, even tiny traces of oxygen destroyed it. It took me four tries before I got the reaction to work using various tips and suggestions from other people. The synthesis took about a week to do, so I was pretty damn despondent after the first three failures!
That molecule was minute compared to the chemicals Tour is talking about that provide the mechanism for self-reproducing life.
Do I think that chemistry went on in mud - no I don't!
Another big factor is that chemists purify everything at most steps. If you don't you end up with a vast mixture of products that interact with each other and generally polymerise to produce what chemists refer to as 'tar'. Chemicals produced in mud aren't going to be pure.
The real point is that mutation isn't about swapping whole genes - as Darwin envisaged - it is about making changes on a much smaller scale.
Remember, all that is needed before you get a working gene and a way to reproduce it, and transcribe it into proteins.
David
(2023-05-13, 08:43 AM)David001 Wrote: [ -> ]Remember, all that is needed before you get a working gene and a way to reproduce it, and transcribe it into proteins.
David
Well I can't remember because my study of chemistry and biology ended in highschool.
This is why I don't really like these arguments because they are at a level the layperson isn't going to easily grasp.
(2023-05-13, 04:42 PM)Sciborg_S_Patel Wrote: [ -> ]Well I can't remember because my study of chemistry and biology ended in highschool.
This is why I don't really like these arguments because they are at a level the layperson isn't going to easily grasp.
Well my ordinary biology - drawing the muscles in a frog's leg etc. was awful because I am very bad at drawing. That meant by the sixth form I was doing chemistry, physics, and maths. At university I had to take several different subjects in the early part of the degree, and I selected "biology of cells" once I realised that in practice it was nothing like high school biology! I don't have a suitable book in mind, but I reckon you could find something that would relate to how cells work and DNA/RNA etc - or just let Wikipedia teach you - because the basics aren't really contentious.
Even the chemistry is incredibly abstracted, for example the four nucleotides that compose DNA are mostly discussed in terms of their initial letters C,G,T,A.
If you are at all curious about the whole subject of RM+NS and how it fits into the big picture, I'd really encourage you to discover! As I say, this is a big part of why I am convinced materialism is false.
As for what James Tour says, you would really need some hands on experience of organic chemistry to really appreciate what he is saying, but I can assure you, he is only saying what others know but prefer not to think about!
David
(2023-05-14, 10:00 AM)David001 Wrote: [ -> ]As for what James Tour says, you would really need some hands on experience of organic chemistry to really appreciate what he is saying, but I can assure you, he is only saying what others know but prefer not to think about!
David
Entirely possible...I look at this stuff akin to the varied interpretations of QM - as a layperson I can read about the varied options but I also think as a non-physicist I can only go so far in deciding which interpretations are good or bad.
Perhaps the lack of chemists and biologists being more open about the possibility of ID is b/c the advocates of ID are clearly hoping to keep the door open toward their particular beliefs after Creationism went out of style, but at the same time probabilistic arguments about events in "Deep Time" are always going to be questionable.
Then add in Dembski saying the evidence of ID may not even need a designer...
I came across this excellent lecture by James Tour about abiogenesis.
I hope it has not ben posted before.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bss0RXPsBuQ
It is a bit technical, but I hope the message comes across that even very simple life is vastly too complicated to have got here randomly.
Btw if you want to understand the concept of enantiomers, think of shoes or gloves. There is a left glove and a right glove.
The video also illustrates the way that various scientists have lied to the general public while admitting these problems in more specialised discussions.
David