Showing posts with label Creation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Creation. Show all posts

Thursday, November 20, 2014

Terra Nostra

I recently performed Part I of a newly composed Oratorio called Terra Nostra, by Stacy Garrop. 
She selected an interesting collection of creation myths to introduce her Oratorio:   
(KJB) In the beginning, in the beginning,
The earth was without form and void.
God said, Let there be light, and there was light.
...

(India) This universe existed in the shape of Darkness.
Then the divine Svayambhu appeared, dispelling the darkness.
With a thought, he created the waters, and placed his seed in them.
...

(North America) All the earth was flooded with water.
Inkonmi sent animals to dive for dirt at the bottom of the sea,
....

(Egypt) I am he who was formed as Khepri.
When I formed, only I existed.  Everything was formed after me.
Numerous are the forms that came from my mouth.
....
(Walt Whitman) A blade of grass is the journeywork of the stars.
....

The idea of a creator seems universal. From the old myths from around the world to the atheist Whitman.  Science seems to support Whitman as all the elements needed by a blade of grass were created in the early universe stars and novae.

I found it to be an interesting collection of creation myths.

If, as Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land asks:  What if they are all right? Are we the ultimate creators?  Is Ouroboros the right analogy?

Thursday, March 10, 2011

DNA Argument for a Creator

Post Evidence Here - Beliefnet

From data of molecular biology and from some information theories, we can now argue that an "intelligent force" is the cause of the origen of life, do to the simple analogy that exists between DNA code and any written language. There is not a clear identification from scientific data, neither we can give it a proper name to that intelligent force, and from empirical deduction the only thing we can said is, the intelligent force that produced the first spark of life , is within the cosmos, and off the earth, or perhaps beyond the cosmos as historical theism maintains. We can ponder about all this for ever and the only sure answer will be that humanity might pondered about it until the end of time.
Silverada

This is basically a more sophisticated and intelligent reworking of the Behe's irreducible complexity argument. It has many of the same flaws the main one being where did the super irreducible complex designer come from? The assumption is that some omniscient something arranged the codons in the first DNA and either let it evolve from there or tweaked it as necessary to accomplish its aim of producing the amazing supremely intelligent being in the image of God namely me.

Frankly, I am not that important. The other problem with this argument is that it is assumed that this omniscient creator had some goal in mind when Hesh created that first DNA. If it wasn't me the atheist in God's image, what was it?

It is certainly possible in spite of the difficulties mentioned, but it is far more likely that a totally undirected chemical process that can be guessed at but not defined at this point ended up as that first DNA, and the organisms built by that DNA did their best to stay alive and reproduce more DNA as best they could, but that inevitably errors crept in, some helpful some lethal and by this time a bunch of intelligent people came about that could imagine God in their own image. I think my scenario takes a lot less faith, but you may not think faith is as dysfunctional as I do.

I do think DNA language code is not a selective, random or out of necessity evolutionary happening. Molecular biologists do know now how life came to be, but they don´t know from where that first cause came from or how that language code was introduce into the molecules with the ability to store, transmit and edit information and to use that information to regulate their most fundamental metabolic process. There is nothing under biological research that have had yet an indisputable answer to that. So mysticism findings are still the only answer untill science can otherwise contradict it and make it false forever without any doubt.
Silverada


Like many creator advocates you ignore the brutal power of selection. Any change to the DNA that doesn't work is generally lethal and that change disappears. Some changes don't make any difference and are conserved until they change again and either help or more frequently kill the organism. But there are billions of organisms and even the dead ones are food, that is sources of nucleotides to make new DNA for other organisms. So the fact that most of it doesn't work means very little in the big picture. As long as one strand of DNA works and the zygote lives to reproduce whatever the change is will be conserved. And successful zygotes tend to make lots more. It works even faster for cloning organisms. One successful strand of DNA makes two more, those 2 make 4 and 4 make 8 and you can do the rest of the math till you get a whole pond full of organisms until they run out of food.

Even the simplest form of life, with the store of DNA, are characterized by specified complexity, therefore life itself is "the first evidence" that some form of intelligence was in existence at the time of its origin.
Silverada

You can keep your designer if you wish, but the designer works by trial and error just like most human designers. The designer tried RNA and it was almost good enough but the thiamine introduced too many errors in transcription. So after a bunch of ungodlike expletives the designer tried uracil and finally found the stability in transcription that was necessary to compete in the nucleotide gobbling world of early protolife. A whole lot of errors in programming later the designer finally found a sequence that could wrap a lipid membrane around itself and protect its nucleotide sources.

If this sounds like natural selection to you it does to me as well. I just can't come up with a way to create a designer smart enough to figure out in one shot, that first DNA sequence that used the lipid membrane for protection.

Maybe you are smarter than I am or have more faith that the designer could just poof out of nothing, but in any event you have to explain the origins of the designer. "I believe it, and that settles it" works, but that is not evidence simply belief.

Did I post anything that a certified chemist might find a complete ignorance of the matter? if it is so, please correct me. For sure I do not have a chemist point of view of how DNA works, I only learn about from reading a few things.
Silverada

The major difference between the chemistry of DNA and written language is that DNA chemistry is relatively inflexible. It is similar to low level computer code, in that any minor error generally causes the whole program to crash. As a low level programmer at one time I can assure you that such programming is error and trial over and over again.

Even if your creator had the ability to manipulate individual codons of DNA that is "write" a strand of DNA my guess is that the creator would use up as many combinations as evolution did to finally get a self replicating strand that could encase itself in a cell membrane to create life. The difference is that the creator thought about it, while evolution just kept trying at random until something worked.

I just can't imagine a creator intelligent enough to "write" a strand of DNA that would waste the time it would take to create life, when the creator would presumably be intelligent enough to know that evolution would do the same thing, sooner or later.

Monday, January 25, 2010

Sumerians Look On In Confusion As God Creates World

Sumerians Look On In Confusion As God Creates World | The Onion - America's Finest News Source: "Members of the earth's earliest known civilization, the Sumerians, looked on in shock and confusion some 6,000 years ago as God, the Lord Almighty, created Heaven and Earth.
...
'I do not understand,' reads an ancient line of pictographs depicting the sun, the moon, water, and a Sumerian who appears to be scratching his head. 'A booming voice is saying, 'Let there be light,' but there is already light. It is saying, 'Let the earth bring forth grass,' but I am already standing on grass.'

'Everything is here already,' the pictograph continues. 'We do not need more stars.'
...
According to the cuneiform tablets, Sumerians found God's most puzzling act to be the creation from dust of the first two human beings.

'These two people made in his image do not know how to communicate, lack skills in both mathematics and farming, and have the intellectual capacity of an infant,' one Sumerian philosopher wrote. 'They must be the creation of a complete idiot.'"

Wednesday, March 11, 2009

YEC vs Homo Sapiens.

Thread - where is the apeman??

From Ken : "Young Earth Creationists don't belong to the species Homo sapiens. They believe they were created from 'the dust of the ground' about six thousand years ago. If they're right, they can't be related to those of us who evolved from countless generations of animals during millions upon millions of years. We're Homo sapiens. They're a kind of pottery."

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Creation: 100 words or less.

Was there an "aaaah" moment? - Beliefnet Forums:
"How do you perceive our creation?

What creation? Matter coalesced into stars and planets. On some planets, at least one that we are sure of, self-replicating molecules formed and became more adept at gathering resources for replicating. More complex forms of replicators were more successful in gathering resources for replicating. An ability to respond to input from the environment was valuable to replicators, and sensory systems became common. As sensory systems became more and more complex subtle responses to the environment were useful, and people like me learned to ignore lies of theists no matter how often repeated."