The real problem is that abiogenesis is the only one of these that Ray does even a half-passable job with. As he notes, there isn't any detailed theory of abiogenesis. Thus there's so much less for him to get wrong. Yet he does his best to get wrong what he can. He quotes Fred Hoyle's calculations for the likelihood of abiogenesis, without considering, first, that abiogenesis does not imply the assembly of a complete living cell from simple chemical precursors. He considers neither Jack Szostak's theories on "RNA world" nor the success of University of Lancaster researchers in synthesizing RNA from simple molecules nor the success of Scripps Institute researchers in assembling strands of RNA that can self-replicate without the aid of other complex molecules. He doesn't consider that there may be many possible combinations of amino acids that can do the job of a particular enzyme, or part of that job: Hoyle was computing the odds of getting a particular sort of modern cell, rather than any self-replicating system whose complexity could increase through reproduction, mutation, and natural selection.
Now, all of the above points that Ray fails to consider don't constitute, put together, a theory of abiogenesis or proof that it is possible. So even if Ray had considered them, his conclusion would not have been affected, since, as in the previous chapter, Ray wants to prove God by finding gaps God could hide in. Ray, confusing certainty with evidence, assumes that every question has an obvious answer, and have it today, and if the obvious answer isn't "naturalistic," it must be supernatural creation. And again, one must wonder why today is so much more special than past times when scientists could not explain, e.g. how embryonic development occurred, or why it rained. "Science doesn't know (yet)" is not "scientific proof of God."
Just finished Chapter 3, and the only thing intriguing I found in Ray's argument against Evolution is that, for some reason, he decided to add a correct, although simplistic, description of Evolution ("How we got such diversity of life") along with his typical incorrect assertions that Evolution explains either cosmological or biological origins. Maybe a "Even a broken clock is right twice a day"-type of honesty?
ReplyDeleteI also found this chapter's Darwin quote claiming he accepted the complexity of the Universe as evidence it couldn't "create itself" hilarious, since Ray didn't seem to notice that even with his mined version, one can tell that Darwin is describing the apparent chief argument for God, not accepting it, and that if the argument were true, it still leaves a logical gap of "Who created the creator?". Especially in full context, Darwin implies the complete opposite of what Ray wanted to assert:
"But I may say that the impossibility of conceiving that this grand and wondrous universe, with our conscious selves, arose through chance, seems to me the chief argument for the existence of God; but whether this is an argument of real value, I have never been able to decide. I am aware that if we admit a first cause, the mind still craves to know whence it came and how it arose. Nor can I overlook the difficulty from the immense amount of suffering through the world. I am, also, induced to defer to a certain extent to the judgment of the many able men who have fully believed in God; but here again I see how poor an argument this is. The safest conclusion seems to be that the whole subject is beyond the scope of man’s intellect; but man can do his duty."
- Charles Darwin to Nicolaas Doedes; April 2, 1873
I find it curious that Comfort appropriates Hoyle's statistics to validate his strawman of evolution (origin of universe, origin of life, and diversity of life), when Hoyle clearly understood and accepted evolution.
ReplyDelete"We are inescapably the result of a long heritage of learning, adaptation, mutation and evolution, the product of a history which predates our birth as a biological species and stretches back over many thousand millennia.... Going further back, we share a common ancestry with our fellow primates; and going still further back, we share a common ancestry with all other living creatures and plants down to the simplest microbe. The further back we go, the greater the difference from external appearances and behavior patterns which we observe today.... Darwin's theory, which is now accepted without dissent, is the cornerstone of modern biology. Our own links with the simplest forms of microbial life are well-nigh proven."
--Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe, Lifecloud: The Origin of Life in the Universe (1978), p.15-16
"He considers neither Jack Szostak's theories on "RNA world" nor the success of University of Lancaster researchers in synthesizing RNA from simple molecules nor the success of Scripps Institute researchers in assembling strands of RNA that can self-replicate without the aid of other complex molecules. He doesn't consider that there may be many possible combinations of amino acids that can do the job of a particular enzyme, or part of that job:"
ReplyDeleteHowever, Jack's "theories" are just that: theories (and a theory does not a proof make). Further, I'm lost as to how Scripps researchers "assembling strands of RNA that can replicate" shows how they first began - wouldn't this be simplified as "RNA, once "first caused", went on from there"? I can start my car, put it in drive, and it will continue down the road, unaccompanied.
Somehow this fact is always (purposefully?) forgotten.
That there "may be many possible combinations of amino acids that can do the job of a particular enzyme, or part of that job" is still a "maybe."
JRM, a good "maybe" is sufficient to refute an "Impossible!"
ReplyDeleteJeffrey,
ReplyDeleteBy "impossible" I assume that you mean a "Creator." Is this your intent, and if so, how is the existence of a Creator impossible?
"Maybe" can be posited all day long, as well as a stream of "theories", all the while researchers are giving their first "nudge" by "assembling" RNA strands, and calling it "evidence" for Evolution when they (RNA) then begin doing what they do! Further, how did the MATERIAL for the RNA strands come about in the first place"? Did the Scripps researchers first create from nothing those strands? Either way, they are merely proving the fact that there first MUST have been a "first cause."
Do you really not get this?
JRM,
ReplyDeleteNo, you misunderstood my (admittedly elliptical) comment. I mean that if party A (e.g. Comfort citing Hoyle) is claiming "atheists believe in something IMPOSSIBLE, abiogenesis," then all party B (e.g. Steven citing 'RNA world') has to do in order to refute A's claim is to show that this was a definite maybe. He doesn't have to prove that it must have happened, let alone that it must have happened the particular way one theory suggests it happened.
The question of whether there needs to be a conscious cause for the universe and everything is separate from the question of whether there has to be a conscious creator of life. Comfort/Steven have already gotten past the first question and are talking about the latter one here.
JRM replied to me:
ReplyDeleteHowever, Jack's "theories" are just that: theories (and a theory does not a proof make).
As Jeffrey points out, a "God of the gaps" argument depends on showing that there is an actual gap, and that there is no naturalistic way to span it. Ray argues God can explain abiogenesis. Jack Szostak argues that biochemistry can explain abiogenesis. Szostak has a lot more observed, repeatable examples of biochemistry causing things than Ray has of God causing things.
Further, I'm lost as to how Scripps researchers "assembling strands of RNA that can replicate" shows how they first began - wouldn't this be simplified as "RNA, once "first caused", went on from there"? I can start my car, put it in drive, and it will continue down the road, unaccompanied.
I'd bet fairly heavily that the first self-replicating molecules were not assembled by teams of scientists working on Earth four billion years ago. But my point is that different teams of researchers have shown that two steps in the process are possible. The University of Lancaster researchers show that RNA can form spontaneously (in the right conditions), without intelligent direction. The strands they got this way do not copy themselves. But the Scripps Institute researchers showed that some RNA sequences can copy themselves without other complex molecules to help; if enough strands of RNA form spontaneously, there's a good chance that some will form with such self-replicating sequences.
That there "may be many possible combinations of amino acids that can do the job of a particular enzyme, or part of that job" is still a "maybe."
Not really. Take cytochrome-c, a vital enzyme that is fairly stable, as most mutations that change it make it work worse and hence tend to kill the mutant. Yet there are many variant forms of cytochrome-c in different species, showing that many different forms can do the same job. For some proteins, such as fibrins (structural proteins that do little except be long and stringy), there are demonstrably myriad different forms that all work more or less identically; many forms of the same protein can exist in the same species.
Hi Steven,
ReplyDeleteThe problem with all of this, if we boil it down is this: Without the first (and absolutely) crucial step, which is abiogenesis, being clearly understood to be able to happen unaided, the rest of E.T. fails.
Abiogenesis, as I understand it, pretty much follows this basic M.W. def.:
"the supposed spontaneous origination of living organisms directly from lifeless matter" - taken from Mirriam-Webster Online (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/abiogenesis)
"...from lifeless matter" is the statement I would like to zero in on. No scientist, no layperson, no...nobody (to my knowledge) has ever observed non-living matter produce life on it's own - unaided. This is not just some small hurdle, and people who propose E.T. carry on with the rest of the Theory as if this is a minor detail - it is not. Without 'life' begetting 'life' we have stagnant deadness - a point that A.E. Wilder-Smith points out very eloquently.