Science—religion at war—the battle for a stable world-view

[Mikal]

This prevailing war between Creation and Evolution/Natural Selection is being fought on all sides of religion and Science—Biologists, the Clergy, Evolutionists, anti-creationists, Medical Doctors, Molecular Biologists, Physicists and others.
This thread is to record the direction of the battle and the flow of information. The beginning here, concerns the Design Issue.


Living Things Show Evidence of Design!
“In man is a three-pound brain which, as far as we know, is the most complex and orderly arrangement of matter in the universe.”5 Isaac Asimov-- In the game of energy and thermodynamics you can’t even break even, Smithsonian, June 1970
It is the sheer universality of perfection, the fact that everywhere we look, to whatever depth we look, we find an elegance and ingenuity of an absolutely transcending quality, which so mitigates against the idea of chance. Alongside the level of ingenuity and complexity exhibited by the molecular machinery of life, even our most advanced artifacts appear clumsy. We feel humbled, as Neolithic man would in the presence of twentieth century technology. It would be an illusion to think that what we are aware of at present is any more than a fraction of the full extent of biological design. In practically every field of fundamental biological research ever-increasing levels of design and complexity are being revealed at an ever-accelerating rate.6 DR. MICHAEL DENTON-- EVOLUTION: A THEORY IN CRISIS, ADLER & ADLER PUBLISHERS, BETHESDA, MARYLAND, 1986


“WE HAVE SEEN THAT LIVING THINGS ARE TOO IMPROBABLE AND TOO BEAUTIFULLY ‘DESIGNED’ TO HAVE COME INTO EXISTENCE BY CHANCE.”7

“THE MORE STATISTICALLY IMPROBABLE A THING IS, THE LESS CAN WE BELIEVE THAT IT JUST HAPPENED BY BLIND CHANCE. SUPERFICIALLY THE OBVIOUS ALTERNATIVE TO CHANCE IS AN INTELLIGENT DESIGNER.”10 7 DR. RICHARD DAWKINS-- THE BLIND WATCHMAKER, W.W. NORTON & CO., NEW YORK, 1987



Does Natural Selection Produce Design?
Life is built on information. A great amount of this information is contained in that molecule of heredity, DNA, which makes up the genes of an organism. Therefore, to argue that natural selection and mutations are the basic mechanisms of the evolutionary process, one must show that these processes produce the information responsible for the design that is evident in living things.
Anyone who understands basic biology recognizes, of course, as Darwin did, that natural selection is a logical process that one can observe. However, natural selection only operates on the information that is already contained in the genes—it does not produce new information.14 -- L.P. Lester and R.G.Bohlin, The Natural Limits to Biological Change, Probe Books, Dallas, 1989
It cannot be stressed enough that evolution by natural selection is analogous to problem solving without any intelligent guidance, without any intelligent input whatsoever. No activity which involves an intelligent input can possibly be analogous to evolution by natural selection.16 Dr. Michael Denton-- Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, 317.
Can Mutations Produce New Information?
In this chapter I’ll bring several examples of evolution, particularly mutations, and show that information is not increased. ... But in all the reading I’ve done in the life-sciences literature, I’ve never found a mutation that added information.17 DR. LEE SPETNER, NOT BY CHANCE

All point mutations that have been studied on the molecular level turn out to reduce the genetic information and not to increase it.18 DR. LEE SPETNER, NOT BY CHANCE

The NDT [neo-Darwinian theory] is supposed to explain how information of life has been built up by evolution. The essential biological difference between a human and a bacterium is in the information they contain. All other biological differences follow from that. The human genome has much more information than does the bacterial genome. Information cannot be built up by mutations that lose it..19 DR. LEE SPETNER, NOT BY CHANCE


The neo-Darwinians would like us to believe that large evolutionary changes can result from a series of small events if there are enough of them. But if these events all lose information they can’t be the steps in the kind of evolution the NDT is supposed to explain, no matter how many mutations there are. Whoever thinks macroevolution can be made by mutations that lose information is like the merchant who lost a little money on
every sale but thought he could make it up in volume.... Not even one mutation has been observed that adds a little information to the genome. That surely shows that there are not the millions upon millions of potential mutations the theory demands. There may well not be any. The failure to observe even one mutation that adds information is more than just a failure to find support for the theory. It is evidence against the theory...20-- DR. LEE SPETNER, NOT BY CHANCE

Continued below….

[Mikal]

This is also confirmed by Dr. Werner Gitt, a director and professor at the German Federal Institute of Physics and Technology. In answering the question, “Can new information originate through mutations?” he said:
This idea is central in representations of evolution, but mutations can only cause changes in existing information. There can be no increase in information, and in general the results are injurious. New blueprints for new functions or new organs cannot arise; mutations cannot be the source of new (creative) information [emphasis added].21- IN THE BEGINNING WAS INFORMATION, MASTER BOOKS, GREEN FOREST, ARKANSAS, 2006, 127
Evolution from chemicals to a living system is impossible. Scientists now know that life is built on these “tiny biochemical machines.” Dr. Michael Behe, Associate Professor of Biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, describes these “biochemical machines” as examples of “irreducible complexity”:
Now it’s the turn of the fundamental science of life, modern biochemistry, to disturb. The simplicity that was once expected to be the foundation of life has proven to be a phantom; instead, systems of horrendous, irreducible complexity inhabit the cell. The resulting realization that life was designed by intelligence is a shock to us in the twentieth century who have gotten used to thinking of life as the result of simple natural laws. But other centuries have had their shocks.22-- M.J. BEHE, DARWIN’S BLACK BOX, THE FREE PRESS, NEW YORK, 1996, 252–253

EVOLUTIONIST DAWKINS RECOGNIZES THIS PROBLEM OF NEEDING “MACHINERY” TO START WITH WHEN HE STATES:

A Xerox machine is capable of copying its own blueprints, but it is not capable of springing spontaneously into existence. Biomorphs readily replicate in the environment provided by a suitably written computer program, but they can’t write their own program or build a computer to run it. The theory of the blind watchmaker is extremely powerful given that we are allowed to assume replication and hence cumulative selection. But if replication needs complex machinery, since the only way we know for complex machinery ultimately to come into existence is cumulative selection, we have a problem.23-- DAWKINS, THE BLIND WATCHMAKER, 139–140
Life is built upon information. In fact, in just one of the trillions of cells that make up the human body, the amount of information in its genes would fill at least 1,000 books of 500 pages of typewritten information. Scientists now think this is hugely underestimated.
Information cannot arise from disorder by chance. It always takes (greater) information to produce information, and ultimately information is the result of intelligence:
A code system is always the result of a mental process (it requires an intelligent origin or inventor).... It should be emphasized that matter as such is unable to generate any code. All experiences indicate that a thinking being voluntarily exercising his own free will, cognition, and creativity, is required.24-- GITT, IN THE BEGINNING WAS INFORMATION, 64–67

There is no known natural law through which matter can give rise to information, neither is any physical process or material phenomenon known that can do this.25-- GITT, IN THE BEGINNING WAS INFORMATION, 64–67

“There is no known law of nature, no known process and no known sequence of events which can cause information to originate by itself in matter.26-- GITT, IN THE BEGINNING WAS INFORMATION, 64–67

The fourth and most powerful reason for science’s reluctance to embrace a theory of intelligent design is also based on philosophical considerations. Many people, including many important and well-respected scientists, just don’t want there to be anything beyond nature. They don’t want a supernatural being to affect nature, no matter how brief or constructive the interaction may have been. In other words ... they bring an a priori philosophical commitment to their science that restricts what kinds of explanations they will accept about the physical world. Sometimes this leads to rather odd behavior.29 MICHAEL BEHE-- DARWIN’S BLACK BOX, 243

Research compiled by Ken Ham & Jason Lisle--August 9, 2007

[austintorn@aol.com]

Seems to be saying by analogy that the ultimate intelligence of God would be even all the more impossible, but rather than get into that, along with strong belief being invariant and resistant to it, I'll save a whole lot of time by just confirming that there is indeed an epic battle for the heavens raging.

[Graybeard]

“WE HAVE SEEN THAT LIVING THINGS ARE TOO IMPROBABLE AND TOO BEAUTIFULLY ‘DESIGNED’ TO HAVE COME INTO EXISTENCE BY CHANCE.”

Outta the mouths of babes ....

It cannot be stressed enough that evolution by natural selection is analogous to problem solving without any intelligent guidance, without any intelligent input whatsoever. No activity which involves an intelligent input can possibly be analogous to evolution by natural selection.

At last, Possum, you see the light

By the way, didn't Git write a book called 'In the beginning there was nothing' ... or have I got the title slightly incorrect ?

cool bananas ... greg

[Mikal]

Seems to be saying by analogy that the ultimate intelligence of God would be even all the more impossible, but rather than get into that, along with strong belief being invariant and resistant to it, I'll save a whole lot of time by just confirming that there is indeed an epic battle for the heavens raging.

I think the axe they are grinding here is the ‘coded information’ in DNA and the importance of information. I think the stopgap is the issue of information coded in, where everyone has had to pause and think more intensely about how it got there.

I think Behe may have been on to something with his ‘tiny bio-chemicals’ in
the cell and stating that it is an example of ‘irreducible complexity.’

Believe it or not this series of quotes is from a Genesis site where they are working on the issue themselves. They seem to be taking a fair base of equal players on both sides of the issue and examining the quotes in a way that allows the information to flow together.

I know Austin that you saw all these quotes flowing in the direction your beliefs lie in but quite honestly the site was using the quotes to reveal the importance of Behe’s study into the working engines in the cell. They saw the collection of quotes as showing evidence of intelligent design.

Yes I do agree it’s a widespread battle!

Regards Mikal

[Mikal]

Outta the mouths of babes ....



At last, Possum, you see the light

By the way, didn't Git write a book called 'In the beginning there was nothing' ... or have I got the title slightly incorrect ?

cool bananas ... greg

Well sugarbear....although I understand evolution, I am certainly seeing no light in 'natural selection.' Like many others I see alot wrong with it and so I keep studying and trying to flow with all the research out there.

From what I know Gitt wrote several books. He just happened to be in this slew of quotes I happened upon and collected.

Regards Mikal

[Graybeard]

Well sugarbear....although I understand evolution, I am certainly seeing no light in 'natural selection.'

Hi Possum, isn't this a bit like saying I know nothing about Art, but I know what I like.

I doubt I'd ever want to hang a Blanche painting upon my wall but his overly ornate Durer-influenced style works wonderfully well for the Warhammer world as it was in the 1980s - modern day Games Workshop artwork is all too clean, too designed and approved by committee to actually work well in my eyes.


cool bananas ... greg

[austintorn@aol.com]

I don’t see the answer as to posit a higher intelligence to make a lessor one, for it’s just a larger question instead. Why would some just stop there as an ‘answer’? Perhaps, because God is God, able to spring into His own and ultimate complexity all at once? And so there we go off again into the assertions of strong belief… a useless endeavor and a time-wasting non-point of going against.

Not sure anyway how there could be an intelligence behind something that took a numbingly slow and plodding time of billions of years to progress. I guess the tiny accumulations add up, each new one atop an already stable platform, awaiting the dire need for it.

Dawkins states cumulative natural selection as the alternative to Intelligent Design, not chance, and certainly not chances all in a row at once.

[Graybeard]

Dawkins states cumulative natural selection as the alternative to Intelligent Design, not chance, and certainly not chances all in a row at once.

Well said dude ... not many appreciate what you have posted here

greg

[austintorn@aol.com]

Well said dude ... not many appreciate what you have posted here

greg

We are like-minded thinkers who have learned about evolution, with no strong beliefs in invisibles inhibiting us to make us shy away or neglect the subject.