I don't understand this critique at all.

- We know this can happen through process A.

- Really smart people have thought a lot about it and don't see other ways that it reasonably happened in this scenario.

- This is pointing us to the conclusion that it happened through process A.

Is a perfectly reasonable logic chain for a scientific paper and their conclusion literally says "we need more data."

> compelling them to gather more data before reaching a conclusion as to the presence or absence of life”.

▲

awesome_dude 2 days ago | parent [-]

What's not to understand - it's precisely the argument theists have put forward for millenia

"We couldn't find anything to show it wasn't a god, so it must be a god"

Calling one group "smart" doesn't change the process or the outcome - the absence of data is not data, it's just that we couldn't yet find the full explanation.

One day we might, it might actually be life, but we don't have that right now, so, actual science demands that we withhold any wild speculation.

▲

eightysixfour a day ago | parent | next [-]

No, because theism is missing the first premise. The equivalent would be:

- We have observably seen and reproduced god bringing someone back from the dead - We can find no other explanation for this thing coming back from the dead - It was likely god who brought this thing back from the dead, but we want more data

The first premise has never happened, there is not any equivalence...

▲

tim333 2 days ago | parent | prev [-]

"- We know this can happen through process A."

doesn't really apply to theism. "We know worlds can be created by gods" was never really a thing.

▲

awesome_dude a day ago | parent [-]

We don't actually know.

We suspect that it's rubbish, but we don't have enough evidence to conclusively say one way or another.

	▲	awesome_dude 19 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Actually (It's too late to edit) we do have this curious thing Aliens - we claim/recognise that statistically the size of the (at least observable, if not entire) universe and number of habitable planets with all the right ingredients for life that there must be life out there... somewhere But we don't have an ounce of evidence (neither for nor against) God(s) - we don't have any evidence one way or the other, atheists just say "It's impossible", theists say "It's the only answer", but, as already mentioned, there isn't any actual evidence that can lead us to a conclusion. (This will be misread as an argument for god(s), but it isn't. And even if it were, there's still a massive step between that and the Abrahamic God being the dude) Which takes me right back to where this started. The supposition that the features of mars are signatures of life, we don't know at this point, all we actually know is... we haven't found anything else that we can say they are. The reporting of science is causing so much grief (I mentioned it here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45190544 but was voted down for some reason)