Abiogenesis and evolution: James Tour

@kellyjay said
A chemical reaction doesn't know when to stop it will continue to react till the material is used up, and no target is a big deal, so when it's reached it doesn't know when to stop. The tar substance in the Miller experiment is a prime example of that, you may have trace amounts of required material, but not in the right form, and nowhere near the right concentrations. As ...[text shortened]... he mixing until you get it right, once the material you start with is used up there is no try again.

Of course a chemical reaction doesn’t know when to stop. That’s a ridiculous, meaningless metaphor; it proves nothing at all. Chemical reactions stop; that is the basic fact here. “Targets” are human fantasies projected onto a phenomenon which has none. What’s the target of a sunset? There isn’t one. Does that mean a sunset doesn’t know when to stop? It’s a stupid, meaningless question, whether applied to a sunset or a chemical reaction.

There is also no such thing as ‘try (again)’ for a chemical. This is another figure of speech, an illegitimate anthropomorphism. Only humans try (again). Chemicals simply ARE, there is no try.

@indonesia-phil said
This is just the same infantile nonsense you've been droning on about for years. None of it has any place in the Science Forum, which is intended for intelligent conversation. Once you drift into the realms of 'I believe' it belongs in Spirituality, so take it back there.

The 'why' and the 'how' are really bookends to the same question.

They're often kept on separate bookshelves, which is probably for the best.

@sonhouse said
@moonbus
One of the issues he did mention was about how life started on Earth, he said, it could be from another planet, there is a theory life got kickstarted by a meteorite coming from Mars where presumably a billion years ago the was life there and a meter crash took some of that material to Earth.
So he mentioned that idea or that aliens brought life to Earth, then he ...[text shortened]... out?

Of course THAT issue will never be taken seriously by anyone duped into organized religions.

Where God 'came from' is pretty much above the pay level for humans.

We really don't "need to know".

@indonesia-phil said
This is just the same infantile nonsense you've been droning on about for years. None of it has any place in the Science Forum, which is intended for intelligent conversation. Once you drift into the realms of 'I believe' it belongs in Spirituality, so take it back there.

He brought it up I answered.

@moonbus said
You present a false dichotomy. The same one you’ve been latching onto for years. Either God did it, or random chance, do not exhaust the alternatives. This has been pointed out every time we have reached this point in previous conversations, and you still haven’t registered it. No point in repeating it yet again.

You conveniently left off much of what he said as you tried to debunk him, how false is that?

@moonbus said
Of course a chemical reaction doesn’t know when to stop. That’s a ridiculous, meaningless metaphor; it proves nothing at all. Chemical reactions stop; that is the basic fact here. “Targets” are human fantasies projected onto a phenomenon which has none. What’s the target of a sunset? There isn’t one. Does that mean a sunset doesn’t know when to stop? It’s a stupid, meaningle ...[text shortened]... h, an illegitimate anthropomorphism. Only humans try (again). Chemicals simply ARE, there is no try.

They will continue until the material that is going to react is used up, there isn't a means by which anything will stop once what is required has been found. Unlike sunsets, if you acquire the proper chemical due to a reaction, further reactions will remove what you needed, it isn't a game where once you get what you want, and then you get to keep it indefinitely. Stupid and meaningless is your complaint.

@suzianne said
The 'why' and the 'how' are really bookends to the same question.

They're often kept on separate bookshelves, which is probably for the best.

Indeed, science and religion, oil and water, never the twain shall meet. There's nothing 'wrong' with believing in anything so long as it harms no one, indeed manifestations of belief in higher things can stir my small soul, but to try to make it sound like science is where things go awry. To attribute the as yet inexplicable (although in a very short time we have come a long way toward explaining a lot of it) to supernatural forces is about as far from science as one can get.

@indonesia-phil said
Indeed, science and religion, oil and water, never the twain shall meet. There's nothing 'wrong' with believing in anything so long as it harms no one, indeed manifestations of belief in higher things can stir my small soul, but to try to make it sound like science is where things go awry. To attribute the as yet inexplicable (although in a very short time we have come ...[text shortened]... y toward explaining a lot of it) to supernatural forces is about as far from science as one can get.

The problem with what you just said is that both talk about the same topics from time to time so they do meet. Just because they do talk about the same thing now and then does not automatically mean an atheistic approach to any position is the right one, worldviews aside reality is what it is regardless of our presumptions.

@kellyjay said
The problem with what you just said is that both talk about the same topics from time to time so they do meet. Just because they do talk about the same thing now and then does not automatically mean an atheistic approach to any position is the right one, worldviews aside reality is what it is regardless of our presumptions.

They meet in the same way that oil and water meet, that was my point if you really need it to be explained. The difference between theist and atheist is that theist relies upon presumption, atheist does not. It's a fundamental difference which you have never been able to grasp. Religion relies upon the assumption of supernatural intervention, science does not.

@kellyjay said
The problem with what you just said is that both talk about the same topics from time to time so they do meet. Just because they do talk about the same thing now and then does not automatically mean an atheistic approach to any position is the right one, worldviews aside reality is what it is regardless of our presumptions.

You seem to think science is just another faith with a god-shaped hole in it. This is not so. The methods science and religion employ, the kinds of answers they aspire to, and the validity of the conclusions they arrive at move in totally different universes of discourse. When they seem to talk about the same topic, it might as well be like a chemist talking about the pigments in the Mona Lisa and an art critic talking about its stylistic characteristics. So which one is right, the chemist or the critic? Stupid question.

There is no place for 'God did it' in scientific discourse. Science is not another faith without god; it's not because scientists are all atheists (they aren't all). It's because we don't accept magic as an explanation in science.

@indonesia-phil said
They meet in the same way that oil and water meet, that was my point if you really need it to be explained. The difference between theist and atheist is that theist relies upon presumption, atheist does not. It's a fundamental difference which you have never been able to grasp. Religion relies upon the assumption of supernatural intervention, science does not.

That simply isn't true, an Atheist has starting positions no different than anyone else, and the beginning and subsequent actions are either controlled by an agency (mind) or mindlessness. Without a doubt, there are presumptions in play, none of which can you give evidence for without miracles taking place, something from nothing, instructions guiding processes, with error checking to show up all of which everywhere else we look in our universe a mind is always involved with information driving specified complex functional work.

Tour talked about the material and how we cannot piece it together with all of our intelligence, even though we can order it pure, keep our material in controlled conditions, mix it in what we imagine in the proper conditions, in the proper quantities, attempting to block unwanted reactions at the right times, and we rejoice if we get trace amounts of what we want, as if that proves anything. All of that is because we think we are going to duplicate what some who believe in Abiogenesis think happened under a rock somewhere without a plan purpose or design involved.

Science does not assume anything in or out people do.

@moonbus said
You seem to think science is just another faith with a god-shaped hole in it. This is not so. The methods science and religion employ, the kinds of answers they aspire to, and the validity of the conclusions they arrive at move in totally different universes of discourse. When they seem to talk about the same topic, it might as well be like a chemist talking about the pigment ...[text shortened]... are all atheists (they aren't all). It's because we don't accept magic as an explanation in science.

I think you'd accept any theory to rule out the possibility of God, but that isn't helping the discourse by making that accusation than you saying I want to put God into the equations. What do we see can a mindless process do the things we are looking at or is one required, and I think it's a slam dunk one is required, and an incredibly powerful one at that.

We can look at the Mona Lisa and try to come up with a chemical explanation for the painting by looking at the molecular structures of the paint and canvas as well as using only those things leaving out the human intervention of the painter, that would be an endless discussion if all human activity was ruled out by default and never allowed to be used as a possible reason for the painting.

@suzianne said
The 'why' and the 'how' are really bookends to the same question.

They're often kept on separate bookshelves, which is probably for the best.

Yes. Confusing reasons (targets) and causes leads to nonsense. Unfortunately, even some reputable scientists get confused. The professor KJ linked to fell into that trap and finds himself in a mind cramp.

If a car crashes, it might be due to causes (the brakes failed) or reasons (the driver wasn’t paying attention), and there is no contradiction between these two ‘explanations’ for what happened. But as soon as you try to ‘explain’ it by saying the brakes weren’t paying attention, that’s nonsense. That’s what saying ‘God did it’ amounts to, in answer to the question, ‘how did life get started?’ Genesis doesn’t propose to explain the how; it proposes a WHY, a reason not a cause.

@kellyjay said
They will continue until the material that is going to react is used up, there isn't a means by which anything will stop once what is required has been found

Wrong. Sorry, this is just so simplistic it is factually wrong. A chemical reaction will continue until an equilibrium is reached. Since very few chemical reactions, and very nearly none in nature, happen in isolation, this equilibrium is rarely when one reactant is completely used up.

As for "required" and "found", that's just more infantile anthropomorphising.

@kellyjay said
That simply isn't true, an Atheist has starting positions no different than anyone else, and the beginning and subsequent actions are either controlled by an agency (mind) or mindlessness. Without a doubt, there are presumptions in play, none of which can you give evidence for without miracles taking place, something from nothing, instructions guiding processes, with error c ...[text shortened]... without a plan purpose or design involved.

Science does not assume anything in or out people do.

Which proves my point; you are unable to conceive of any thought process which does not begin with the existence/non existence of your inherited god, and until you do further discourse is pointless. True science takes no account of your god whatsoever.

Anyway, there it is, the Kellyjay all but indecipherable, rambling post, which ends with:

'Science does not assume anything in or out people do.'

I mean, what?