You don’t get to claim that an “event happened long before recorded history under entirely different conditions”, because anyone can make that claim. That’s not science, not evidence. I can claim the same thing for intentional creation, for example.

If anybody has a clue how abiogenesis works, then they should prove it by doing it. Manufacture some bacteria out of sand. Claiming “it takes a trillion years of primordial soup” is an another wild unsubstantiated claim that anyone can make. That’s the same thing as saying: ”wait a few centuries and God will show you.”

By the way, evidence for natural evolution does not contradict creationism, because God could’ve created some things through a process of natural evolution — it’s a false dichotomy to assume that evidence for evolution is evidence against creationism; it’s not. Whether or not natural evolution happened is tangential to the claim of creationism.

The epistemological picture for creation is quite sound. Fermi’s paradox is clear evidence we’re special. Logically, we can define God as existence itself, and the existence of “anything” is proof of Him. It simply can’t be any other way. The fact that we have intentionality is also proof that intentionality “exists” and that in turn is proof that Existence is intentional.

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andrewflnr 8 months ago | parent [-]

Still ignoring geology, huh? The long timeline and different conditions at the start of life are clearly readable in the geology. For instance, the banded iron formations.

> If anybody has a clue how abiogenesis works, then they should prove it by doing it. Manufacture some bacteria out of sand.

Naturally the only way to demonstrate "having a clue" is to jump straight to accomplishing your favorite chemically implausible but snappily-phrased challenge, that requires full understanding of life itself as well as advanced experimental manufacturing facilities. This is definitely how science works, and there's no way you would turn around and claim that because it was an orchestrated experiment under controlled conditions, it doesn't actually prove anything about the early earth. Anyway, give them time, they're working on it.

> Claiming “it takes a trillion years of primordial soup” is an another wild unsubstantiated claim that anyone can make. That’s the same thing as saying: ”wait a few centuries and God will show you.”

Good thing no one is actually claiming that then, huh? You should really catch up on the science. You sound like you stopped reading ICR tracts in the 90s.

Moving on, I notice you're already jumping into the classic "the creator could have created things in a way consistent with evolution" brand of special pleading. This is 3/4 of the way to admitting that the evidence clearly favors evolution.

Your last paragraph is too divorced from actual logic and evidence to be worth dissecting. Suffice to say, you fallacy is non sequitur.

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myflash13 8 months ago | parent [-]

> This is 3/4 of the way to admitting that the evidence clearly favors evolution.

I never denied the process of evolution. I made that very clear from the start. The Creator may have indeed created us through a process of evolution. This point is irrelevant to me. My claims were:

1. that abiogenesis is understood or reproducible, and that claim still stands. If you believe it is, that still requires a leap of faith. Anyway we'll just have to wait and see - I wait to meet my creator after death in some form, and you wait for science to resolve the origin of life mechanism. However even if it were resolved, I still say:

2. That even if the Creator created us through a process of evolution (entirely possible), that was intentional, not a series of random mutations. Fermi's paradox is evidence of this, and there is more evidence, like this very article we are commenting on (mystery of life's handedness).

Scientism is the faith that requires you to simply believe that humans are somehow special in their ability to create intentionally, while everything else is random Nature. How does a product of random Nature (you) make any meaningful claim at all? If you’re just a random mutation then everything you say is just random mutations and I don’t see any reason to refute it.

If we use the standard of evidence required in any court of law to establish "intent", evidence such as Fermi's paradox is more than enough to establish that life was "intentionally" created. Again, the points about "how" this creation happened are irrelevant, perhaps by a process of evolution, but certainly not randomly.

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andrewflnr 8 months ago | parent [-]

Interpreting paleontology and biology as implying intent rather than random modification requires more special pleading. When you dig in, it really looks like random changes, dead ends, silly useless changes, stuff that serves one purpose and then gets repurposed for something else, leftover bits and bobs, and constant recycling of ideas. At best, this requires a creator with an odd mindset, and ends up evidentially indistinguishable from randomness.

The Fermi paradox is barely relevant. How much truth do you really think you can extract from an absence of evidence? Really? Because if lack of evidence of communicating technological civilizations (active in the particular tiny timeslice in which we're paying attention) implies lack of existence of any complex life outside of earth (and yes, you seem to need Earth's complex life to be unique for your argument to work), you've got some real thinking to do about the evidence for God or any other creator, especially after you've admitted their actions are, at best, tricky to distinguish from random chance.

Besides my previous point about reading intention into nature, courts of law are not scientific. Among other differences, they operate in a context where intent is much more likely to be actually present. Why would you even bring that up? Except that it's an old creationist talking point, I guess.

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myflash13 7 months ago | parent [-]

Conveniently ignored my main point. Why should I have to take anything you say as meaningful if you are just a random mutation?

	▲	andrewflnr 7 months ago \| parent [-]
		Was that your main point? It's a good question, but I thought we were having a discussion about facts of what happened on Earth. Philosophy about the meaning and worth of truth come after that. Personally I'm still a fan, even if that is just atoms talking.