Get it Straight

[OpenMind5]

Ok, I have read a few post that talk about big bang and other jazz like that and i wanted to post somthing might might clear a few gray areas up or might begin a mass riot or angry mob...ether is fine as long as u don't kill me... This is just a collection of ideas and thoughts that has helped me understand the scientific view point of creation. (I am Christian) But science clams that the first life must have come from nonlife. "The big bang." All matter, living and nonliving, is made up of chemicals. The smalles chemical units are atoms which bond togeather into molecules. This we all know. I thinkit comes down to some random inorganic chemical interactions produced molecules that had the remarkable property of acting as a template to form similar molecules. Some of the chemical involved may have come toearth from space. (I believe this is called "chemical evolution") But the info stored in the simple molecules enabled the synthesis of larger molecules with complex and reativly stable shapes. Because they were both complex and stable these molecules could participate in increasing numbers and kinds of chem. reactions.

I hope this long post makes sense and I am not just randomly spouting off. But this is how cells where formed.

Op5

[CraigD]

I think you’ve written a fair summation of the modern scientific idea of abiogenesis – life from non-life.

I’m not sure I understand what point you’re making. Do you believe, or disbelieve that this idea is a accurate description of the origin of life?

While many Christians, among them the most vocal and activistic, strongly deny the possibility of abiogenesis, I’ve known many (I’m not myself a theist, though I was raised in the Christian tradition) who were perfectly willing to accept scientific theories such as the Big Bang as consistent with their beliefs. Several modern Bishops or Rome have made statement to the effect that scientifically revelation cannot conflict with Christian faith. The gist of this position is that the Supreme Creator is certainly capable of having created a Big Bang from which all matter and energy emerged to produce the universe we now observe, including biological life in agreement with the theory of evolution. Therefore, if the soundest application of rational thought concludes the Big Bang and evolution to true, then, to the best of our knowledge, they are. Less soundly reasoned objections, including arguments based on scripture and doctrine, are assumed to be due to human fallibility.

[OpenMind5]

Ahhh, now we get back into beliefe. Does it really matter what I believe? Will it honestly change the way YOU think.

Science can tell us how the world works, but it does not form basis for establishing meaning and values.

Op5

[Boerseun]

Originally Posted by OpenMind5

Science can tell us how the world works, but it does not form basis for establishing meaning and values.

...and does 'meaning and values' have any meaning or value if it ignores the way the world works?

I think not.

Science can predict.
Science can verify/falsify depending on the data.
Science is an evolving discipline.
Science is self-correcting.
Science rules.

[OpenMind5]

Originally Posted by Boerseun

...and does 'meaning and values' have any meaning or value if it ignores the way the world works?

I think not.

I think so. Your meanings and values can mean more to you than any science. Look a organised religion. Science and religion does not go hand in hand. When I first joined Hypography, I thought they could. I was wrong. This is why i said in my first post of this thread this is the scientific veiw. Meanings and vaules only have as much value or meaning to the person who sets them anyways.

Originally Posted by Boerseun

Science can predict.
Science can verify/falsify depending on the data.
Science is an evolving discipline.
Science is self-correcting.
Science rules.

Very amusing. But science is not the answer to all problems.

Open your mind.
Op5

[Boerseun]

Originally Posted by OpenMind5

I think so. Your meanings and values can mean more to you than any science. Look a organised religion. Science and religion does not go hand in hand. When I first joined Hypography, I thought they could. I was wrong. This is why i said in my first post of this thread this is the scientific veiw. Meanings and vaules only have as much value or meaning to the person who sets them anyways.

Meanings and values are subjective, and therefore only applicable to the individual they belong to.

Originally Posted by OpenMind5

Very amusing. But science is not the answer to all problems.

Open your mind.
Op5

Hahaha

Depends on your problem, squire. If you need to build a bridge across a gulley, build a steam engine, build a rocket, send someone to the moon, call a scientist.
If your problem is of a more personal nature like "Why", call a philosophist. If you're feeling depressed, call a psychologist. Oh - heck - these are ALL scientists!
However, if you feel you've got too much pocket-change on a lazy Sunday morning, call a pastor.

Open your wallet
Boerseun

[CraigD]

Originally Posted by OpenMind5

… Science can tell us how the world works, but it does not form basis for establishing meaning and values. …

I respectfully disagree.

I believe that many moral values usually considered within the domain of religion can be explained in scientific frameworks. For example, in the terms of evolutionary biology, the chances of survival of a species who’s members embrace the value, “thou shalt not kill (one of your own species)”, is enhanced. This value, essentially the Golden Rule, is both a common religious doctrine, and an obvious species survival-enhancing strategy.

Paraphrasing liberally, Rabi Hillel is reputed to have said that the Golden Rule is the key moral value. It also appears to be the key to the evolutionary survival of the more advanced biological species.

[OpenMind5]

If you wish to keep taking about my science line...go to "recent debate" in the Lounge. Otyher wise stay focused on my original topic please.

Thank You.
OP5

[infamous]

Originally Posted by CraigD

The gist of this position is that the Supreme Creator is certainly capable of having created a Big Bang from which all matter and energy emerged to produce the universe we now observe, including biological life in agreement with the theory of evolution..

This all boils down to a question on semantics. It is quite possible , as you state, for a Christain to believe in both evolution and creation in the context of a creater God manufacturing the Big Bang and stepping back and allowing evolution to do it's work. I think it is safe to say that, most scientists hold to the Bing Bang Theory. This therefore raises a question of, can we attach a consciousness to this act. My goodness, there are reputable scientists speculating about theories titled "Quantum Consciousness". If these same scientists can ponder the question of quantum consciousness, why can't they also ponder Big Bang consciousness. It has, afterall, been suggested by a few that the Big Bang was the result of a Quantum Fluctuation. Taking all this in to account, we should remember that human beings are constructed of a collection of particles we call atoms. And we claim the sole distinction for the possession of consciousness? I would ask this simple question: What makes us so special that we possess something that nothing else in nature can obtain? I view this as a very self-centered point of view, and the mindset that a higher consciousness than ours, being out of the question, demonstrates the highest of conceit.

[niviene]

Op5, I want to reply to your thread here but I'm not sure exactly what you are saying or asking. Sooo I'll just write what I think! I think the thing a lot of people don't know about evolution is that when chromosomes split to form gametes, and re-unite with the other parent's to form a zygote, the combination possibilities for each one are in the trillions. It's not like one day we wake up and bam, we have thumbs... we are the results of a countless number of possibilities. Once in awhile a weird combination happens between the two gametes, and something weird shows up - brachydatyly, or something. When DNA forms, a variation in a single base can form a life threatening disease - sickle cell anemia is a real common one. Some variations make us more or less able to reproduce (or likely to reproduce) and these things cause certain variations to be passed on... obviously if they are more in favor of us reproducing, those variations will become more pronounced within the population... and will continue to separate and reconnect with other variations ad nauseum. The problem that I feel now exists is that many of those things that before would have stopped a "bad" variation from being passed on, we have found ways to allow that person to live and reproduce. Thus there are a lot more "bad" or "counterproductive" genes floating around today than there were before (I say it in this way because I'm still dazed from a horrible night of non-sleep and I can't think of a better way to describe it.. sorry). Things which would have been sorted out by natural selection in the past. Now it seems that natural selection AND technology (and society) have a big say in gene pools, rather than just the former... so evolution today and from now on will always be different than it was in the past. That's something I think about a lot.

I often wonder where the variations come from, however. I mean, it's easy to look at something like a plant and see how you can have a homozygous "pure line" without variation - but when you get into people, it's a whole new ball game. I know that a tiny, tiny variation in one single base in the formation of DNA can have a huge consequence - but something so complex as the human body, everything works perfectly in tune (most of the time) - was there ever a time when any organism did not have any variations? I mean, if that were the case, do you think it might have meant we wouldn't be here? Is the purpose of DNA to "mess up" once in awhile so that we have variations?