Why are amino acids and other organic molecules (not life, but the
building block of life) found in galatic space clouds and in
meteorites from outer space. Were they created, too, at the same time,
or do they occur through some natural process?
Why creation? Why not have the life forms brought to Earth by aliens
in a space ark? Is there any way to distinguish between my hypothesis
and that of creation? I'm quite serious -- I think point 2 is quite
ad-hoc, since there is no evicence for spontaneous creation of life
today.
>3. All present living kinds of animals and plants have remained fixed
> sience creation, other than extinctions, and genetic variations in
> originally created kinds has only occured within narrow limits.
If all the different kinds were created separately at the same time,
then why do they all look so identical at the molecular level (e.g.,
every life form uses DNA with the same chemical pairs for reproduction)?
Such basic similarities seem easier to explain with the hypothesis of
shared ancestry than one of separate ancestry.
If all the different animals have been here since creation then why
are single-celled animals found alone among the oldest rocks and
larger life forms only found in relatively young rocks?
Why is there no convincing fossil evidence that humans co-existed with
dinosaurs? Why did the catastrophe that wiped out dinosuars not
wipe out humans? Why do the earliest human written records not
acknowledge the existence of dinosaurs if we lived with them?
Since humans don't have tails, why do we have the remains of a tail-bone
in our body? If humans were created in their present form, then why
do we have biological "archaic-ness" built in (useless appendix, goose
pimples that try to raise the fur we no longer have, etc.)?
Why were different animals created in different places? Kangaroos
in one place, buffalos in another. Why would simultaneous creation
put different life forms in different places that still have similar
climates?
Why would simultaneous creations lead to oddball animals? Shouldn't
there be more consistency to the animal kingdom? Why create a handful
of mammals that thrive in water, when clearly (by numbers anyways) the
rule for mammals seems to be they should live on land? Why make one mammal
that lays eggs (the platypus), when none of the others do? There are
many more examples, but this should surfice. This (and the previous
paragraph) all looks very chaotic, suggesting random mutations, not
simultaneous creations.
>4. Mutation and natural selection are insufficient to have brought
> about any emergence of present living kinds from a simple pimodial
> organism.
The insufficiency here has not been proven. A proper experiment
would take millions if not billions of years to perform. Without
the experiment, one can only estimate the odds using a large
number of assumptions (amount of UV light and lightning available,
generation cycle time for early organisms, effects of earlier
environments on mutation/selection rates, etc.) Changing these
assumptions changes these odds. Also, odds are not evidence of
impossiblilty only improbability.
And even *if* mutation and natural selection as we understand it
could be shown to be inadequate to the task, why does it follow
that simultaneous creation is the only remaining choice?
We know that mutations and natural selection do occur in the
present epoch and we also know that spontaneous creation does
not occur in the present epoch. Doesn't it make more sense to
invoke some kind of super-mutation or super-selection
process (an unknown, but more effective form of what we see now)
than to invoke a creation process (which we have NEVER observed)?
Isn't it better to extrapolate from what we know than simply jump
off into the totally unknown?
I bring this last issue up since point 4 is only a refutation of
evolution and says nothing to support creation. Point 4 no more
supports creation than it does the idea that all life forms on
Earth were imported by UFO's.
>5. Man and apes have a separate ancestry.
Why is this so important that it has to be noted separately?
Wasn't this already covered in point three?
I really don't see why this needs to be a separate point from
point three, unless this result is one of the primary
motivating factors behind this "supposed" model.
You know, of course, that scientists have looked at the fossil record
and concluded that they branched off from the same distant ancester.
>6. The earth's geologic features appear to have been fashioned largely
> by rapid catastrophic processes that affected the earth on a global
> and regional scale (catastrophism).
Most of the mountain chains we see were formed by the tedious slow
process of continental drift, which can be accurately measured year-by-year
today. There have been cataclysmic events in the past as witnessed
by sudden changes in the fossil record, meteoric dust deposits, and
large scale extinctions.
It appears that creationists agree with evolutionists that dinosaurs
disappeared after one of the global changes. Since the same fossil
record is involved, I can't understand why creationists can't also
agree that some new forms of life appear after these global changes.
The idea that global changes can only kill off life forms but never
lead to new ones indicates that life on earth is a process of
attrition and that we are all doomed, each life form eventually
picked off by a global change and not replenished or replaced.
How gloomy -- the future of life is one of depletion, not of growth.
>7. The inception of the earth and of living kinds may have been relatively
> recent.
Evidence? Moon rocks are dated at roughly 4 billion years old.
Some life forms have fossils dating back to a few million to a
hundred million years ago. Other, simpler life forms, have fossils
dating back far further.
>There are statements about each of the above that give a little more
>details. Which if any do you want me to expand on?
>
>>Why would God leave all those fossils lying around if He wanted us to
>>embrace Creationism as a scientific theory? Why would he implant
>>rocks with radioactive elements that give false readings of the rocks'
>>age?
>For one thing, how can you trust radioactive elements. It makes too
>many assumptions. How do we know the something created 6000 years ago
>had the same amount of radioactivity as something created today? Who
>says the creator intended radioactive elements to be used for dating.
Radioactive elements decay with clocklike precision from one element/isotope
to another. Measure the amount of the radioactive element remaining
relative to the amount of the redioactive decay product and you can
figure how long ago the radioactive element was deposited into the
rock.
The assumptions are far more testable and far less numerous than those
used by creationists to defend the point 4 conclusion. Why should
their point 4 be more reliable than rock dating?
>About the fossils, it's obvious. He left systematic gaps to occur
>between fossil record, that demonstrate things did not evolve. Point
>to an intermediate fossil between any of the following:
>single-celled organisms, invertebrates, vertebrates. Or between
>fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, or mamals. Or between "lower"
>mamals and primates.
The vast majority of life perishes on this planet without leaving
any fossils. Fossils only occur under special conditions.
So, we know going in, that we are only going to find fossils for
a small fraction (perhaps 1 in a million? probably less) of the
creatures that lived on this planet. The gaps are easily explained
by the rarity of fossil formation -- no divine guidance is needed.
For example, assume a life form is stable for ten million years, but
then evolves to a different form over ten thousand years following
a global change. The new form also is stable for ten million years.
Say you're able to find three fossils of this evolving creature from
the fossil record spanning those 20,010,000 years. How likely is it
that one of the three fossils will be during the short transition period?
The odds are 667 to 1 AGAINST you being lucky enough to have a fossil
from the transitional era. If the creature almost dies off during the
transition period and thus the transition population of the creature is,
say, 100 times smaller than the stable form populations, then the odds
against finding a transition fossil among the three fossils increases to
66,700 to 1 against!! So, if natural selection accelerates during
global climate changes, as it should, then the gaps are readily
understandable given the paucity of data.
If God really wanted to demonstrate to us conclusively that evolution
isn't at work (as you suggested above), she would've left a different
calling card in each animal kind, instead of the same old, tired,
reused strands of DNA that we find in all of them.
Try this analogy: If archaeologists can find human dwelling
ruins from the bronze age and the stone age but have yet to find a
dwelling ruin showing the transitional stage, are we to automatically
conclude that there have always been bronze users and stone users
simultaneously from the start of creation? It doesn't follow.
Since these ruins are found at two different ages in the fossil record,
it seems more credible to hypothesize a transition from one technology
to the next.
>>Read your biology textbooks on abiogenesis. Life certainly was not
>>created out of 'muck,' whatever that is.
Well, the building blocks of life (amino acids, etc.) are EASILY
created out of "muck", as shown by the Urey-Miller experiment
and others.
>Sorry, I do not have one handy. How was life created? (IYO)
>>Joshua. Jericho. There's the implication that the sun revolves
>>around the earth.
>I don't have a bible handy, but I will look it up.
I certainly hope that the "scientific" theory of creationism does
not state that the sun revolves around the Earth. I don't think
it does, which is too bad -- that means the biblical story of the sun
stopping in its tracks is unsupported by the creationism "theory"
as well as our knowledge of celestial mechanics.
>>"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." Well and
>>good; amen and preach it. As an affirmation of God's authority over
>>the universe, I buy it. But there's nothing that stops us from using
>>science to map out how He did it. The Theory of Evolution, imperfect
>>as it is, is a product of scientific inquiry. I have yet to see a
>>Theory of Creationism that can make the same claim.
>Does the above come closer?
No.
End of Part I.
For really wild stuff, read my Part II post where I try
the ridiculous by attempting to apply creationism to other
planets! :-)
=========================================================================
From: Scott W Roby
To: All Msg #111, Feb-21-93 03:10PM
Subject: CREATIONISM II: Other Planets (repost)
Organization: University of Delaware
From: roby@chopin.udel.edu (Scott W Roby)
Message-ID:
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