Tuesday 3 March 2009

Like a Brick Through a Window


If any of you reading this are familiar with previous commenters on this blog, you may remember someone by the name of "Bud," who has commented here in the past. Bud recently left a new comment after a long lay-off on my god vs. the Unicorns post. It wasn't extremely long, but as with many creationist comments, it is like a brick through a window in that it creates a huge mess and take a lot more words to clean up all the misperceptions and errors in it. So, I've taken the liberty of making a post out of a point by point response to Bud's brick through the window. It's not anything we haven't all seen before, and warning it's long.

you ask for some evidence of God and His creation, well i would like to examine the evidence for evolution first, if that is ok.


I suppose so, but I hope you aren't going to make a god of the gaps argument...

now we have to consider that there is only 2 possible explanations for the existence of the universe:

it created itself
it was created.


Why do I have to consider that, considering that it's a false dichotomy? There are other options out there, including that this universe is an off-shoot of another universe (many worlds hypothesis) that arose from purely natural means (natural to the other universe and maybe ours), that the universe was always there but that we didn't have a representation for time (remember, the laws of physics break down at the singularity), etc. So, I'm sorry, but your assertion doesn't hold weight, and this has nothing to do with evolution.

scientists, like richard dawkins, admit at one time there was nothing.


There is not a single cosmological model of the origin of the universe that starts with "nothing." Please get your facts straight.

for just one protein to be created (assuming there is something to create it from, since the odds are approximately 1 x 10 to the 40,000th power against it. ( btw 1 x 10 to the 50th power is the longest odds ever observed.)


Yeah, those are long odds, and not at all a realistic interpretation of the latest scientific findings. This is a common error among creationists, however. The odds you cite are estimated, ballpark odds for an event that no one is claiming happened, namely the formation of complex molecules ex nihilo. In reality, what happened was the formation of easier molecules (we happen to know that amino acids can and do self-assemble from the Miller/Urey experiments and the subsequent experiments done based on the original) and that these building blocks then formed into proteins and cells. So, yeah, the odds of a cell simply spontaneously forming from nothing are pretty astronomical, but no one actually posits that that is what happened. Oh, and this still isn't evolution you're talking about.

every cellular mutation causes a loss of information stored in the DNA.


This is trivially false. For example, suppose a point mutation causes a T to change to a G in the genetic code. Would you say that's a loss of information? Now suppose that the G mutates back to a T. Is that a further loss in the information? Yet, this is what you are arguing. It's nonsense. Not only that, but you are relying on conflating definitions of "information." Please also see here:

Mutations and Information

skipping millions of necessary and impossible mutations, we come to humans.


So, you are finally going to talk about evolution?

the eyes alone would have taken over 250 million years to form, according to scientists.


This is actually false, as new studies have shown that eyes have evolved multiple times in shorter timeframes, but even if it were, so what? Life has been around for 4.5 bn years, give or take.

not to mention the nose, legs, arms, mind, and reproductive organs.


I fail to see what your point is. Evolution is a process that has been ongoing for billions of years, thus giving ample time for all the emergent features we see today to have evolved. Are you perhaps arguing that it took X number of years for one feature and Y for another, and so on, and that if you add up all those numbers it is an obscenely large number? This would not make sense, however, as all features are all evolving at the same time.

here is another problem, how did this undirected mutation get the direction to create the extremely complex reproductive system of both genders without guidance?


"Guidance" comes from natural selection. When undirected mutations occur, those that are beneficial are selected and outpace those that are not. This is elementary. Also, sexual selection has been around for a long time. And, it's obvious why it would be a good idea. There much bacteria in your body that can lead to illness and death that you constantly have to fight off. Given a set of genes from 2 parents, the bacteria that they pass you are not accustomed to your genetic makeup and give you a head start in the arms race that is taking place inside your body.

the "self creation" theory is proven by scientists who understand the laws of science, to be impossible.


I would say that your strawman version of what you think scientists say is pretty far fetched.

this takes more faith to believe than i am capable of, so i will stick to the belief that there must be a creator.


I'm so disappointed since you went the route of god of the gaps after all. You didn't present any positive evidence for your god, you simply asserted that evolution couldn't a done it, so god musta done it. This may have worked had you accurately presented a true dichotomy, but you didn't. In fact, you made quite a few false dichotomies in there that I simply haven't pointed out, like the implicit assertion that it's either evolution or god.

note: the idea of the universe being eternal is discounted because it would require no molecular movement, creating a virtual heat death.


Note: the laws of physics break down at the singularity level so we can't really say what was there "before" time, which is a bit meaningless anyway, since "before" time can't be measured by any means that we currently have.

please note that i may a little flippant, but, out of respect, i am not being sarcastic.


Please note that I am also not being disrespectful in pointing out your errors and misperceptions. But, I do suggest that you actually look some of this stuff up in a credible source.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

whatever. jehovah/jesus/holyshit is a god damn fucking cunt whore asswipe son-of-a-bitchin butt fucker who will bend you over and screw you whenever he god damn well wants to. so jehovah/jesus/holyshit, you can suck my god damn dick!!!!!

Tigerboy said...

Why do people who want to dispute evolution always talk about the beginning of the universe?

Evolution by natural selection has nothing to do with how the universe, or life, began.

Evolution is about how life forms change. That's it.

Modusoperandi said...

Tigerboy: but Darwinism can't explain gravity, can it? Ergo, it had to be all done by the Christian God. It's scientifical!