Most atheists do not know what science says about our origins

[JEROME DA GNOME]

There's two problems with this concern.

1. Democracy.
2. Human Ego.

Is science a democratic institution? If so, than this is the antithesis of science.

You are discounting that the human ego will stifle a questioning of the accepted.

 

[Worm]

The Big Bang violates the laws of physics and math at t=0.

Repeating this many times doesn't make it so.

No matter how many time you repeat it, you still won't be correct.

First of all, the Big Bang Theory doesn't even go back to t=0, it only extends to the Planck time (10^-43 seconds)

Even if you assert that it does in fact go back to t=0, it is simply not the case that it violates the laws of physics - as you have been told many times. The laws of physics as we know them simply don't make sense for t=0. This is a limitation with our understanding of the laws rather than with the theory.

It's like trying to understand the graph of y=1/x at the point x=0.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikibooks/en/3/3d/Y%3D1divided_by_x.PNG

The function doesn't 'violate' the laws of maths at x=0, it is simply undefined.

 

[Paulhoff]

Well not perhaps, he is.

Paul

 

[RandFan]

Is science a democratic institution? If so, than this is the antithesis of science.

You misunderstand my point. In a Democracy scientists are free to advance competing theories which would severely invalidate your CT.

You are discounting that the human ego will stifle a questioning of the accepted.

Of course. Damn straight. How do you think we got to the moon? Split the atom, discovered the structure of DNA, germ theory, Newtonian Physics, Euclidean Geometry, quantum mechanics, Relativity, etc., etc., etc..

We've come so far. So far. It's really beyond our comprehension as to just how far we've come in the understanding of how our natural world works. And if you are reasonable and fair you would have to recognize that most new ideas were met with skepticism and often rejected at first. There can only be one answer as to how they became the dominant theories...

Human Ego. Their proponents simply would not give up and kept hammering home the arguments.

It's a damn cool thing.

 

[Upchurch]

What we do know from science is that life only comes from life.

Um, no, we do not know that.

Evidence life coming from non-life.

That's not the way it works, Jerome. You made a claim that life only comes from life. It is your responsibility to provide the evidence for your claim. It is not Ichneumonwasp's responsibility to provide counter-evidence against your claim.

Can you support your claim: life only comes from life? Alternatively, I take that to be equivalent to the claim: abiogenesis is impossible.

What is your evidence for this claim?

 

[DOC]

Now, would you be so kind as to withdraw your assertion in the OP, and explain exactly why you think anyone (atheist or not) would change their mind about evolution depending on whether there is a single ancestral organism or not?

Well if you suddenly realized that what you had to believe in order to maintain your philosophical outlook was laughingly absurd, wouldn't you agree that that might be cause for you to change your mind.

From post 56:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=3057629#post3057629

 

[Prometheus]

Well if you suddenly realized that what you had to believe in order to maintain your philosophical outlook was laughingly absurd, wouldn't you agree that that might be cause for you to change your mind.

I Don't know. Since the hypothetical situation you define applies far more aptly to theists than it does to atheists, why don't you tell us?

 

[articulett]

I Don't know. Since the hypothetical situation you define applies far more aptly to theists than it does to atheists, why don't you tell us?

Indeed.

 

[DOC]

Well if you believe in the Big Bang, then there would have to be enough energy in existence "before" the Big Bang to create the 10 billion trillion stars that are estimated to be in our universe. The question then becomes where the heck did that mind boggling amount of energy come from?

Please read......

http://www.astrosociety.org/pubs/mercury/31_02/nothing.html

So in order to believe in the big bang it looks like this is what you have to believe and I'll quote your source:

As crazy as it might seem, the energy may have come out of nothing!...

___

So it seems modern science is sayiing: Nothing to energy to Big Bang to 10 billion trillion stars.

 

[DOC]

I Don't know. Since the hypothetical situation you define applies far more aptly to theists than it does to atheists, why don't you tell us?

Well I guess its a matter of opinion. Theists believe the Universe comes from God and the previous post demonstrates how big bang advocates theorize the universe comes from nothing.

 

[Olowkow]

Well I guess its a matter of opinion. Theists believe the Universe comes from God and the previous post demonstrates how big bang advocates theorize the universe comes from nothing.

This is called equivalence.

 

[Gate2501]

Well I guess its a matter of opinion. Theists believe the Universe comes from God and the previous post demonstrates how big bang advocates theorize the universe comes from nothing.

Taken from the article linked in the previous post:

If this admittedly speculative hypothesis is correct, then the answer to the ultimate question is that the universe is the ultimate free lunch!

You are attacking a straw man in saying that "big bang advocates" theorize that the universe came from nothing. There may be some who do, and most of us have entertained the idea, however I am sure that the majority of "big bang advocates" simply answer: I do not know., if asked where the big bang "came from".

 

[joobz]

Well if you suddenly realized that what you had to believe in order to maintain your philosophical outlook was laughingly absurd, wouldn't you agree that that might be cause for you to change your mind.

From post 56:

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=3057629#post3057629

DOC, It extremely sad that After nearly 1600 posts you still missrepresent my argument. I would be upset about that, but since it is clear that you have no problem missrepresenting views of others, I have no emotion other than sadness for you.


The follow exchange perfectly demonstrates your complete lack of intellectual honesty.

To return to the topic of DOC's favourite article. I contacted the author and asked for his comment on the idea of there being a single 'LUCA'. This is what I wrote :


and his very nice reply which cam into my Inbox today:

...While everyone accepts the reality of horizontal gene transfer, there is currently plenty of debate within the community as to its impact on the tree and on our ability to answer these deep evolutionary questions.

So it's fair to say that we're not sure whether all life really did descend from a single cell.
...

But I still maintain if you read his article, Poole gives the impression that the preponderance of the evidence is that all life came from one cell:

You made your posts a joke of the forum. No one else.

 

[zooterkin]

Well if you suddenly realized that what you had to believe in order to maintain your philosophical outlook was laughingly absurd, wouldn't you agree that that might be cause for you to change your mind.

It's not as if it is a deep dark secret hidden from 'initiates' for fear they might reject ludicrous beliefs. Descent from a primitive organism is a logical conclusion once you understand how evolution works, and it's backed by experimental and other data.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=3057629#post3057629

You demonstrate your misunderstanding. It probably is absurd to think a single organism developed in isolation, from which we, and in fact all life, are descended. It is not absurd to think that there may be a common ancestor, but it may have been one of many organisms which developed at the same time, and in fact there may be more than one. Due to horizontal gene transfer, genes from more than one ancestor may have been passed down.

 

[joobz]

Well I guess its a matter of opinion. Theists believe the Universe comes from God and the previous post demonstrates how big bang advocates theorize the universe comes from nothing.

NO the accurate statement would be.
Theists believe the Universe comes from God and that god comes from nothing and the previous post demonstrates how some big bang advocates theorize the universe comes from nothing while other big bang advocates are unsure of what happened before.

You see the difference is science does not propose to know what it doesn't know. It only has working hypotheses. Theists claim knowledge of something they have no proof of and even that supposed knowledge contains the exact same limitations that they ridicule science for.

 

[The Man]

You are attacking a straw man in saying that "big bang advocates" theorize that the universe came from nothing. There may be some who do, and most of us have entertained the idea, however I am sure that the majority of "big bang advocates" simply answer: I do not know., if asked where the big bang "came from".

And some might add “but we are still trying to find out”

http://www.physorg.com/news126955971.html

http://www.science.psu.edu/alert/Bojowald6-2007.htm

 

[Paulhoff]

So in order to believe in the big bang it looks like this is what you have to believe and I'll quote your source:

So it seems modern science is sayiing: Nothing to energy to Big Bang to 10 billion trillion stars.

First, "believe" is not the right word, the source has nothing to do with belief, it is called information no what is known and/or seems to fit the information now know, it is subject to change.

If you understand the source, you will see that the net energy of the universe is zero. Now go back to the source and re-read it, or at least read it all the all thru, we will help you with what you don't understand.

Paul



Or just play magical so-called god and have it anyway you like it to be.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Repeating this many times doesn't make it so.

Ohh, you don't believe Phil. Good to know.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Well not perhaps, he is.

Paul

Anyone who does not massage your ego and tell you your thoughts are correct is a troll.

Think about your skeptical affiliation in light of this fact.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

You misunderstand my point. In a Democracy scientists are free to advance competing theories which would severely invalidate your CT.

Is that a fact? A Democracy is based upon popular consent, not the search for truth.