Lesson in genetics

Creationists aren’t the brightest and using this kind of logic on them just makes them pound their fists on their chest, bellow loud noises about jesus and america and how scientists are demon worshipers and will burn in hell for publishing research for stuff that actually exists. Don’t worry though, they didn’t come from no monkeys. You need to be able to make it so a 12 year old could understand and maybe, just maybe they will listen. This science shit though, since they can’t wrap their heads around it, it makes it magic and creationists just aren’t the superstitious type.

On a serious note though, as an atheist, I gotta say that this suggestion is lack luster. Any creationist with a sub par IQ could just claim god created those diseases, they already claim god made HIV to kill gays. We all know we’re not talking to the brightest of people because hell, those people already understand whats going on.

it’s pretty stupid to even dignify the idea that someone was ‘made’ from another persons’ rib a response….

My reason
for stating my intelligence quotient (145, as officially rated by MENSA,
following an invited, invigilated test, taken after an earlier, timed
submission, which was rated by them at 155) was not to say what a clever boy I
am or think I am. Personally, I don’t think IQ tests say a great deal about a
person’s true intelligence and tend to be somewhat subjective, although they
may indicate a measure of some acuity. They could simply be proof that someone
is merely good or otherwise at taking such tests. However, the suggestion had
been made by another commenter that Christians who accept verbatim the claims and
statements of the Bible are less well-endowed intellectually than the average
person, which is why I also said there are very many very highly educated scientists
of the present and many renowned ones of the past who, as I, believe (and believed
and had a life-long faith in Him) that the God of the Bible is the creator of all
the world, the universe and all living things. It was also suggested Christians
have not thought through all of the arguments and counter-arguments sufficiently,
in the light of all of the scientific evidence, but this is clearly not so. If
you look at my previous comments, by clicking on my name and viewing them under
“Activity”, you will be able to see my reasons for my beliefs.

It is true
that Einstein did not come to faith in a personal god, but he is known for very
many quotes on the subject, two of which are as follow:-

“I want to
know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that
phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know his
thoughts. The rest are details.” (The Expanded Quotable Einstein, Princeton
University Press, 2000 p.202 and Encyclopaedia Britannica).

“What I see
in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very
imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of
“humility.” This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to
do with mysticism.”

The fact that
Einstein recognised the awesome order of the Creation he studied must indicate
that it had to have an originator, since order cannot ensue from disorder and
chaos. Christians know this originator as the God of the Bible, although they
may have different opinions as to the precise time He took to do so. You may
not yet feel you can share in their views, but I hope you can appreciate how,
from the reasons I have given, why I and very many other thinking people are so
persuaded, even if you cannot agree with them.

If this is a
science debating forum worthy of the name, then differing opinions should be able
to be freely expressed without unpleasantness. So far, however, I have not seen
here any well-reasoned arguments as to why I should change my views and
beliefs.

It is disingenuous
and uninformed to say that Christians accept what they are taught without
question and haven’t examined all the facts. This is not so. In fact, many have
come to believe the biblical account of creation simply because they have
examined the facts and decided that they make best sense in the light of what
the Bible says. One might add that those who accept macro-evolutionary
explanations for origins believe what they do, simply because that is how they
have been brought up and taught. Indeed, it is true that belief in the theory
of macro-evolutionary development from nothing actually requires far greater faith
than does the Christian view.

According to
Cambridge Professor Fred Hoyle, who carried out a specific mathematical analysis of the subject, the probability of
cellular life’s having evolved is about one in 10 to the power of 40.000 – in other
words, zilch, nil, zero.

He said, “The
chance that higher life forms might have emerged in this way is comparable to
the chance that a tornado sweeping through a junkyard might assemble a Boeing
747 from the materials therein”, which is a reflection of his stance reported elsewhere:-

“Life as we
know it is, among other things, dependent on at least 2000 different enzymes.
How could the blind forces of the ‘primal sea’ manage to put together the
correct chemical elements to build these enzymes?”

After
considering what he thought of was an extremely remote probability of Earth-based
abiogenesis, he concluded:

“If one
proceeds directly and straightforwardly in this matter, without being deflected
by a fear of incurring the wrath of scientific opinion, one arrives at the conclusion
that biomaterials, with their amazing measure or order, must be the outcome of
intelligent design. There is no other possibility I have been able to think
of…

“….The
notion that not only the biopolymer, but the operating program of a living cell,
could be arrived at by chance from a primordial, organic soup, here on the
Earth, is evidently nonsense of a high order.”

However, I
believe that Hoyle’s graphic image of the scrapyard and the assembled 747, though
well making the point, is well short on conveying the real extent of the
comparison he was making. In order to better portray the point, the comparison he
might have used is that of a sandy beach on a windy day, when some sand is
whipped up to form a fully operating computer chip. An amoeba, the simplest living
organism, is actually very complex. It may only contain basic elements such as
hydrogen and carbon, but the DNA is highly complex, The internal structure and
machinery that enables it to move, repair and replicate is far from simple. It clearly
cannot have come about by chance. Again,
the structure of a cell of a complex being, such as a human, is indeed very
much more complex than an amoeba, yet the amoeba still contains thousands of
complex parts and elements of information.

Presuming
Hoyle’s 1 in 10 to the power of 40.000 chance actually somehow did miraculously
occur, through the haphazard coming together of chemicals (Ignoring for the
moment where the atoms which form the required chemicals themselves came into
existence), and thus a
simple cell was formed and all other life forms subsequently developed from it
into the hundred-times more complex living structures of the present and recent
times, the question why there are
absolutely no fossils to be found which indicate the required gradual
progression upwards from such a basic organism,
must be answered. Logically, the strata of the earth should be full of all
manner of grotesque, cellular life forms and structures, giving the evidence that
such a progression actually did take place. However, fossils which are found
invariably show the finished article (e.g. fully-formed leaves, fully-formed
animal bones, etc.) and never any intermediate stage ones.