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Study Puts Hole In Comet Theory Of Life's Origin
Astervitude writes "A new study by US and Japanese scientists has put a serious dent into one version of the popular panspermia theory that credits comets for bringing the seeds of life to Earth. Surveys conducted by the University of Arizona, the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan and others now show that objects from the main asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars were largely responsible for the period of Late Heavy Bombardment that ended 3.9 billion years ago. UA Professor Emeritus Robert Strom believes that no more than 10 percent of the Earth's water comes from comets and any oceans then extant would have been 'vaporized by the asteroid impacts during the cataclysm.'" Interesting, because this directly contradicts the Nova mini-series Origins that just finished running on PBS. Science never stops moving.
New study by scientists disagrees with programme made by television professionals to give the illusion of education to the masses?
;)
Shocking!
I don't read your sig, why do you read mine?
80 percent of all studies are wrong...
We all know that the Flying Spaghetti Monster created life, you fools!
Sure, this is an interesting paper with important ramifications - but I don't see how it has any bearing on the theory of panspermia.
Surely it only takes one tiny droplet of life-carrying comet water to make it into earth's early oceans without being boiled into sterility. If conditions were right, that initial small pocket of bacteria or virii could multiply to cover the planet in a matter of years.
You can't tell me that over millions of years and millions of impacts, not one would come down at a sufficiently low speed or favorable grazing angle to gently melt comet ice into an existing ocean.
Given what we've observed of Mars meteorites ending up on Earth, it's perfectly possible for life from one part of the universe to spread from planet to planet - and even solar system to solar system.
If you buy into the idea that there was life elsewhere in the universe long before life has been found to have existed on Earth - then panspermia is very possible.
My problem with that theory is that it doesn't answer any questions about how life formed in the first place. There still has to be an origin world - and explaining how life appeared there is just as hard as explaining how it might have formed here in the absence of panspermia.
www.sjbaker.org
> Why would it be easier to believe that life began elsewhere
> than to assume that life started here on Earth?
Two reasons:
1) We have some idea of the early conditions on Earth - but maybe
we have a hard time believing that those were conducive to
forming life from scratch. If life started elsewhere then there
is almost no limit to the range of concievable temperatures, pressures,
gravity, radiation and chemical environments in which it might
ultimately have formed.
2) Time: Is the Earth old enough for that very early phase of going
from completely non-biological materials to DNA, cell walls, etc?
If not - then panspermia explains that by saying that life was
around in some other place LONG before the Earth was formed.
So panspermia allows for a scientific explanation of life's formation
that is perhaps more plausible than formation on early Earth.
www.sjbaker.org
So panspermia allows for a scientific explanation of life's formation
that is perhaps more plausible than formation on early Earth.
Scientific? Sounds to me like you have a untestable theory for the origins of life. You can test components of the theory, but ultimately you always be able to say... well sure it came from somewhere else, but it's been millions/billions of years and all of the concrete evidence has been washed away.
that we are the second evolution of the Ancients, who left the galaxy several millenia ago.
Actually, the theory is testable. If you find life elsewhere, and can show a common evolutionary ancestor, then it is probable that it is correct. If, however, it has no common ancestor with life on earth (e.g. completely different cell structure, or not even cells as we know them), then it is safe to say that life began in different places independently.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
probe puts hole in comet!
No it isn't testable. "If you find life elsewhere" is like saying "If God showed himself" then creationism would be right. You are making sweeping assumptions that cannot be tested.
Well, the panspermia theory is a bit like intelligent design - it is not one theory, but several theories, however, the panspermia theories have a chance to be proven true, while the ID theories tend to be proven wrong.
Examples:
- the cosmos helped life come into existance by simple organic molecules that were
- formed in space
- ejected from a planet
- life spread through our solar system, that is:
- from mars
- the asteroid belt was formely a planet hosting life which
- DNA/RNA came from space
- bacteria survived a journey through the cosmos
The study reported by slashdot makes some of these theories unlikely, but not all of them.
I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
Personally I always hate panspermia. It seemed to fail Occams Razor pretty soundly. Yes, life on this planet came from an asteroid or comet from another planet. Well, if life can exist there to bring it here why can't it just develop here. Seemed like a big waste of time to me. I see no reason we cannot have a homegrown abiogensis on good old Earth. It's not like we hit some major hitch and need an alternate explanation that explains nothing.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
Notice he has two parts in the statement. IF we detect life elsewhere, we can make comparisons. Life elsewhere, in itself, wouldn't be the proof, it's just a necessary condition to make observations. Many other theories on the origin and nature of early life could be strengthened or invalidated if we found it elsewhere and had more than a single sample to study. This is not unique to the theory of panspermia, although of course the outcome validating the theory would be that both samples available to us would in fact show enough similarities to indicate a common origin.
I'm waiting for God to show up and Say "Actually I evolved"
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
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Are you on crack? How the fuck is that testable? Find any life on another planet? Better call NASA because THEY haven't found it yet. Talk about propaganda.
I didn't say that we necessarily need panspermia to explain the origins of life, or that the theory is testable.
If we find a perfectly good explanation for the origins of life on Earth - then that is still not proof that life actually did start here.
That means that Panspermia is unfalsifyable - which is a bad thing for a scientific theory. All you can do is to presume that it's false until someone proves otherwise.
But the previous post questioned why Panspermia could possibly be of any help in explaining the origin problem. I merely pointed out the theoretical possibility that Panspermia might some day be an important explanation of how this happened.
If you somehow managed to utterly PROVE that life could not possibly have originated on early Earth, science would be in deep trouble without something like the Panspermia theory which allows one to hypothesise other sets of conditions and longer timescales.
Suppose we found evidence that life could not have formed without some particular chemical compound that cannot ever have existed at earthly temperatures and pressures? Then you'd be forced to admit that life started elsewhere. In a sense, you could prove panspermia by showing that life could not have come from early earth. Given that there is demonstrably life here now, you'd have proven that it had to have come from elsewhere.
A true test of Panspermia would require us to find another planet - perhaps one very similar to Earth and to demonstrate that life here and life there shared striking similarities that could not have arisen by chance. For example, if both life forms had similar long stretches of 'junk' DNA. You'd be unable to show that the 'life originated on earth' theory was true anymore because by symmetry, it might have arisen on planet-X and travelled here instead of the other way around.
So Panspermia might be proved, conclusively. If we found evidence of life on (say) Mars and could demonstrate that this life bore striking resemblances to Earthly life. You'd then be forced to admit that the overwhelmingly most likely explanation was that life could travel from one planet to another. You'd still be left with the question of whether it originated on Earth, on Mars or in some yet other place...but the idea that life could be formed in one place and travel to another would be demonstrably true.
www.sjbaker.org
Although the panspermia theory is intriguing, it does NOT answer the question of the origin of life -- was it from another planet that was inoculated by an even earlier comet..... It's like the theory that the Earth rides on the back of a giant turtle/ But what does that turtle ride on? Or is it turtles all the way down.
If we are to assess the probability that life is exogenous or endogenous to Earth, we must ask about the relative probability of: a) life forming on a planetary body versus b) life forming on a planetary body which then survives being blasted into space, travelling interstellar distances, happening to collide with another forming planet of just the right composition (without ever venturing too close to some hot star), and surviving that collision.
Even if the probability of life arising on a planet very very low, the relative probability of endogenous versus exogenous origin is very skewed toward endogenous origin. Because exogenous origin requires both endogenous origin (somewhere else) and then a low probability trip between planets, exogenous origin would seem to be very unlikely unless there are large numbers of planets with endogenous life that spew lots of interstellar-traversing chunks. But if there are large numbers of planets with with their own endogenous life, then the probability of life forming on Earth endogenously must also be high and trump the low likelihood of life just happening to make it from somewhere else.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
And yet, when fighting alternative models like "Intelligent Design", everyone pretends scientific findings were cast in stone.
Look, regardless of what we call that life-bearing probe some intelligent entity lobbed at us, we can be certain it would be smart enough to make sure that some of the payload reached the surface and began multiplying.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
That's an interesting comment that glosses over many of the statements of science that are commonly excepted so much as "fact" that anyone that points out inconsistancies in them is labeled as anti-science or ignorant. Of course we are always learning more and yesterday's accepted theories have to adapt to new knowledge, but the virulence some people have for defending pet theories borders on intolerance. /. you get modded into oblivion. Please note I didn't relate it to Creationism or Intelligent Design, it's just that the theory of evolution itself has about as many holes as IE. Sure, right now it's the best idea going, but that doesn't mean it's the end of the conversation. Yet questioning it all usually does end the conversation.
A good case in point is evolution, where if you don't mention it in a glowing light on
If thou see a fair woman pay court to her, for thus thou wilt obtain love
The earliest evidence for life is 3.8 billion years ago. The time the earth cooled to form solid mantle is about 4.0 billions years ago. (Or to go further back the earth formed about 4.3-4.5 billion years ago.) Was about 200 million years enough time for simple life, which is really not very simple, to evolve and then survive during the meteorite bombardment that was happening then?
I think this is a big problem for the current theory. Panspermia pushes this problem off earth and gives the possibility of enough time for random chance to allow simple life to form. I still think this theory and other ideas evolutionists have with the orgins of life are too improbable.
From the post:
UA Professor Emeritus Robert Strom believes that no more than 10 percent of the Earth's water comes from comets and any oceans then extant would have been 'vaporized by the asteroid impacts during the cataclysm.'
Uhuh, so that one that did get through can use the excuse "wha? criminey, Tara was still virgin, its not supposed to happen the first time!"
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
"If it is just us, it seems like and awful waste of space" - Carl Sagan Increasingly complex molecules competed for energy and material to form larger and more sustainable molecules. The molecules that arranged themselves by chance to absorb the most energy and strongest structure surivied the longest, and this process continued until basic structures combined in a symbiotic relationship that would help sustain the period of those structures existance. This process continues until basic cell structures formed, and again combined by chance to form larger structures. Eventually the strongest and most energy effecient structure was developed by chance through the process of natural selection until we had basic repoductive structures. Mutations which led to longer life and thus more chance of reproduction continued until movement and adaption were constituents, from there entire structures began to work together to from basic cells, which over time developed processes for reproduction and survival through chance combination and mutation. Cells began to grow in complexity in a bid for survival, by chance some began working together to form multicellular groups, which became organisms with adaption relative to the abilities of each cell, then came encoded cellular variation to ensure multicellular groups continued to form by precedence. Over much time increased numbers of simple structures combined to form larger and more complex structures witht he ability for their own kenetic movement beyond growth, because of the natural selection of moveable multicellular organisms made them more adaptable then others and thus more likely to reproduce. Eventually all sorts of mutation and chance combination occured which would lead to ever more complex structures with better adaptability till the first regonizable biological systems formed. From there we have basic sea life and countless steps later down the evolution chain, human beings. Of course, it might be out of order, and one would have to know that the time this would take would be immense. For those who make the chance argument, stateing that such complex structures canot possibly arise by chance i say: Look at the size of the universe, there must be at least 125 billion galaxies, each with roughly 100 billion stars, each with the possibility of terrestrial planetoids, each with a massive surface area with plenty or energy and materials for the possibility of forming the molecular strutuces by chance that are a prelude to life. Then take that number, and times it by the age of most galaxies.....All of a sudden the chance doesnt seem so small. As for complexities, whos to say life is complex, its equally possible that life is mearly countless basic systems working symbiotically for the goal of survival and reproduction. I give the cargo cult as ana example: In World War 2 several tribes worshiped American cargo planes because the ability and complexities of human flight were so vast to them that the cargo planes could only be explained as items of a supernatural nature. It never appeared to them that these planes were not godly and no complex beyond their understanding, such is a cargo plane simply a number of systems discovered by humans by chance working in parrallel. As for thurther complexity: If life is so complex that the possibility of chance is so small, then how does one explain oru manipulation of life, for example insulin producing bacteria, or the mapping of the genome. How does one explain the evolution and appearance of new viruses and bacterial strains by chance. Life is beautiful, it is wonderous and magestic, but it is not beyond our understanding. It arose by chance, it's growth is determined by evolution and it is not complex. It just appears that way to some. I always think, that maybe the reason ID and creationalists fight progress and science is they think that discovery is taking the magic and beauty away from life. But instead, what they dont realise, is that all it is doing it discovering more beautiful and wonderous details. We are not finding ans
I'm actually the reason for the origon of life... You ever forget stuff on a trip? Well, I went back in time and left a pair of old, smelly socks...
There are exactly 42,935,718 letter sized sheets in a square mile.
To paraphrase Carl Sagan:
"If it is just us, it seems like and awful waste of space"
Increasingly complex molecules competed for energy and material to form larger and more sustainable molecules. The molecules that arranged themselves by chance to absorb the most energy and strongest structure surivied the longest, and this process continued until basic structures combined in a symbiotic relationship that would help sustain the period of those structures existance. This process continues until basic cell structures formed, and again combined by chance to form larger structures. Eventually the strongest and most energy effecient structure was developed by chance through the process of natural selection until we had basic repoductive structures. Mutations which led to longer life and thus more chance of reproduction continued until movement and adaption were constituents, from there entire structures began to work together to from basic cells, which over time developed processes for reproduction and survival through chance combination and mutation. Cells began to grow in complexity in a bid for survival, by chance some began working together to form multicellular groups, which became organisms with adaption relative to the abilities of each cell, then came encoded cellular variation to ensure multicellular groups continued to form by precedence. Over much time increased numbers of simple structures combined to form larger and more complex structures witht he ability for their own kenetic movement beyond growth, because of the natural selection of moveable multicellular organisms made them more adaptable then others and thus more likely to reproduce. Eventually all sorts of mutation and chance combination occured which would lead to ever more complex structures with better adaptability till the first regonizable biological systems formed. From there we have basic sea life and countless steps later down the evolution chain, human beings.
Of course, it might be out of order, and one would have to know that the time this would take would be immense.
For those who make the chance argument, stateing that such complex structures canot possibly arise by chance i say:
Look at the size of the universe, there must be at least 125 billion galaxies, each with roughly 100 billion stars, each with the possibility of terrestrial planetoids, each with a massive surface area with plenty or energy and materials for the possibility of forming the molecular strutuces by chance that are a prelude to life. Then take that number, and times it by the age of most galaxies.....All of a sudden the chance doesnt seem so small.
As for complexities, whos to say life is complex, its equally possible that life is mearly countless basic systems working symbiotically for the goal of survival and reproduction. I give the cargo cult as ana example: In World War 2 several tribes worshiped American cargo planes because the ability and complexities of human flight were so vast to them that the cargo planes could only be explained as items of a supernatural nature. It never appeared to them that these planes were not godly and no complex beyond their understanding, such is a cargo plane simply a number of systems discovered by humans by chance working in parrallel.
As for thurther complexity: If life is so complex that the possibility of chance is so small, then how does one explain oru manipulation of life, for example insulin producing bacteria, or the mapping of the genome. How does one explain the evolution and appearance of new viruses and bacterial strains by chance.
Life is beautiful, it is wonderous and magestic, but it is not beyond our understanding. It arose by chance, it's growth is determined by evolution and it is not complex. It just appears that way to some.
I always think, that maybe the reason ID and creationalists fight progress and science is they think that discovery is taking the magic and beauty away from life. But instead, what they dont realise, is that all it is doing it disc
Say there was an ocean on earth, and something big slammed into it, vaporizing all the water. Wouldn't that water just eventually precipitate back down?
I mean, vaporizing something like a person would pretty much destroy them, but it doesn't do much to eliminate individual atoms, it just moves them around. So the ocean itself might be turned into water vapor, but then where does that all go?
I'm sure a big enough impact could blow matter up into space, where it'll float away never to bother the busy earth again, but I would think that most matter gets propelled outwards from an impact, not up. So wouldn't a meteor hitting an ocean just spread the water around?
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
It is investigable , I wouldn't say it was testable yet though .
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
"1 + 1 = 3" has been a pretty stable "theory" for millennia.
--
make install -not war
nxtr: 80 percent of all studies are wrong...
sbaker: Which means that there is only a 20% chance that the study that shows that "80% of studies are wrong" is right. Which means that we have no idea what the probability of error is without doing a lot more studies on the subject.
Which means we'll just have to commission a bunch of "scientists" to study the matter further.
Ain't life grand as a "scientist" at the teat of the government sow? It's a win-win proposition, no matter whether you're wrong or you're right.
Regardless of what you think of the grandparent's stance on creation (and the complete absurdity of it that you imply), his point about scientists saying "we know" instead of "we currently believe" is still valid.
You only responded to one part of his statement, but I'm more curious as to what others think of the other half. Personally I agree with that point.
People have to understand what "we know" means. Adults have to take everything we hear with some number of grains of salt. Scientific statements of "we know" are more reliable than metaphysical statements of "we know", and adults should understand that for ourselves.
Which is why it's important for people to learn about science before tehy accept its knowledge. Just like it's important for us to learn about religion. Not just to learn the science, like reading it in _Discover_ magazine, or to learn the religion, like reading it in a bible. But we need to learn how the "knowledge system" works: its history, its failures, its successes, its alternatives and their histories. Just like we don't need to learn enough science to be scientists in order to appreciate science (and our world that it explains), we don't need to become experts in the discipline, to become scientists or clerics. We need to understand what the strengths and limitations are, and what it means when a scientist or a cleric says "we know", "I believe" or "this is". Otherwise, we're just faking it, and we will make all kind of mistakes, without ways to recover. And that's very dangerous, considering how powerful are these ways of knowing, whether they're right or (especially when) they're wrong.
--
make install -not war
My trusty steed politely declines your kind offer (says you are "too small"), I am still considering, and I know how to spell asshole, asshole. Wow...I'm crushed by your overwhelming intellect combined with your mastery of the written language. Leave me bruised and broken on the rocks of mental majesty, why don't ya?
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Many of the plaintiffs in lawsuits against idiotic creationist "equal time" laws have been religious figures. Do not make the assumption that all religious people buy into the creationist agenda.
Logic, m'boy, logic. If you're gonna spout off psuedo-science like the pros, you gotta get a hold of some logic.
why would man and animals need eyes if they couldn't see before, sight is a very high-level ability, a creature without sight doesn't realise he needs it? What does "realise he needs it" have to do with anything? Evolution is not intentional, evolution is not a "force". Nothing decides to evolve. A species ability to visually perceive offers many advantages, depending on the environment. Mate recognition, prey recognition, predator awareness, etc.
Also in 'natural selection' humans would have been eaten by everything without sight no matter how developed the brain was.
Which humans? Modern humans? There's no sense behind those ears, boy! Modern humans can create weapons and modify their environment to prevent being "eaten by everything". If you're talking pre-historic humans, I'd be willing to bet that a fair number of them were eaten.
Still, the ability to form even primitive weapons is an amazing advantage. Plus, do you really think people were always as they are today (physically, senses, etc)?
If we came from the ocean then why can't we breath underwater and if we are the most 'evolved' of creatures then why are the birds flying around the earth like it's going out of fashion? We're wingless, can't go underwater without breathing equipment, the ascent of man? Yeah right.
Who judges humanity as the "most evolved?" You? Last I checked, no mammals have gills, and the set of species that is truly amphibious is rather limited and primitve.
How do you propose a warm blooded animal should go about absorbing the incredible amount of oxygen necessary to maintain a fast metabolism with something like gills? What does Genesis 1:1 have to say about that?
I'm sure if these 'scientists' really thought about it, evolution is absured, mutation is more accurate, but I wasn't a piece of garbage from 10000 billion years ago. I mean even micro-biology points to an intended design. How come nobody talks about entropy no more? Oh if we we're the offspring of monkeys then why arn't monkeys turning into humans?
Ahh, here we see the real truth. It's personal, isn't it? You just couldn't possibly have been from genetic lineage decended from something more primitive, could you? News flash buddy: Just because you want something to be a certain way, doesn't make it so.
Your "intended design" is completely and totally without evidence in reality. The so-called "evidence" is nothing more than fanciful thought expirements based on theology rather than logic. Put it this way: any "designer" with the ability to exactingly design all the myriad forms of life is equally capable of "designing" a process by which life can adapt, change and mutate to best suit its environment over time. I suspect that a being with that much power is perfectly capable of making you an "offspring of monkeys", whether you like it or not.
(pssst.. nobody's forgotten about entropy, it's just that we're all sick of listening to very confused creationists try to bend the second law of thermodynamics to fit their will)
comet impacts
"Interesting, because this directly contradicts the Nova mini-series Origins that just finished running on PBS. Science never stops moving."
Those inclined to believe the Bible and feel skeptical when science apparently contradicts it, should take comfort in the fact that science's story has changed over the century whereas (relatively) the Bible's has not.
This is does not mean that religion ought to ignore and deprecate science. Things like that Galileo business provide powerful insights into how to interpret scripture. If the Bible says "sunrise" it should be interpreted phenomenologically. That is as an observation of brute phenomena and one should not take that as an explanation of the mechanism that gave rise to the phenomena. (Incidentally, the weatherman is not a flat-earther because he tells us sunrise/sunset times.)
With this phenomenological principle in mind, someone who believes in the Bible will be able to interpret its statements about God according to that same phenomenological principle. Troubling verses about God "doing evil" are thus explained. To wit, God establishes things like gravity and hydrodynamics that move in predictable patterns. When those patterns conspire to crush us, via tsunami or hurricane, we perceive evil fom God's hand.
But the character behind these phenomena is more reflective of the scientific principles of natural law.
I suppose I should ask for an offering at this point. Instead, I'll ask that we all work a little harder at our science so we can better predict natural forces and prepare for them.
That's just because such "theories" either ignore any inconvenient facts, or revise the "theory of Creation" so that it is impossible to disprove (and then pretend that's what the "theory" said all along). Eventually, they can say (like you did) that their theory has been stable longer than the physically-testable theories, and is therefore somehow "better".
You obviously haven't read much about the Church of the FSM. Part of their Articles of Faith is that the FSM continually adjusts reality so that you can neither prove nor disprove its existence - much like the fanatics who insist that the Bible is the literal truth say that their "ever-truthful" God created the world thousands of years ago, complete with all the physical evidence that makes us think it is billions of years old.
200 million years is actually quite a long time.
Given daily twice daily tides thats sufficient for 146000000000 mixing cycles and 73000000000 heat/cool cyles in a chemical bath the size of all of Earth's coastlines. That gives a pretty good chance of developing a simple chemical replicator, and once you have that evolution takes care of the rest.
I'm guessing that wasn't on their radar screen...
Good point. There are so many gods out there, you can't just generalize, can you? So confusing. Speaking of "annoying and counterproductive", every time science does what science does, as in throw out a theory that no longer holds water, you can bet your ass that members of the superstitious faction who believe the world is 8-10K years old will be right there, demonstrating yet again their failure to comprehend that the nature of empirical science is to develop theories based on a body of evidence, knowing full well that the theory will be abandoned upon the discovery of evidence or proof to the contrary. It just irks me that they put forth the notion that every time that healthy method is brought into play, it somehow automatically validates their silly assed explanation. But if you are religious, yet do not subscribe to the "theory" of creation, my apologies. The caps were an attention getter meant to convey my exasperation at the same old same old. I'm actually pretty quiet and reasonable in person, unlike most zealots I have met.
Then those "rational" religious folks should be a LOT more vocal about denouncing the fanatics who claim to represent them, and should vote against putting those fanatics into positions of power. It makes it awfully easy to assume that they DO buy into such idiocy.
This theory also directly contradicts another theory I saw this month in Sky and Telescope, which referred to this article. This one is for the formation of the outer gaseous planets and the kuiper belt. The basis of the theory is that the orbits of all the gas giants should have been closer to the sun, as they would have required a much denser gas-and-dust cloud than would have existed as far out as they are now. As well, the kuiper belt would have formed closer to the sun.
Due to gravitational interactions between the gas planets and the kuiper belt objects, Jupiter's orbit shrinks and Saturn, Uranus and Neptune expand, with the latter two actually changing place and moving into much more elliptical orbits before settling down into their current orbits. These larger orbits put both planets squarely into the primordial kuiper belt and, well, cause the Late Heavy Bombardment.
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
Yes, and I may have had sex with a woman.
Edward@Tomato - /home/Edward/ man woman
man: no entry for woman in the manual.
"Qua!?"
One thing I wonder through reading all the posts is why everyone considers a comet or meteor zipping through the atmosphere impacting the earth at great velocities? Yes, there's gravity, but you're assuming there's no reactionary forces.
Billions of years ago, I would expect the atmosphere was thinner (not smog-dense like as current)--and considering the earth had less surface water, the impact was at a much slower pace than what we idealize, so slow that not much really "burned" up, i.e. nothing spectacular as everyone would desire (we all know ./-ers like things that go boom). For all I know, we could be living on Earth V2.1, i.e. remember the theories on how the moon was created? Recombination.
As for the PBS's series and PBS's politics, I see a lot of their shows now becoming strawmans, so buyer/watcher beware.
Well, if life can exist there to bring it here why can't it just develop here. Seemed like a big waste of time to me. I see no reason we cannot have a homegrown abiogensis on good old Earth. It's not like we hit some major hitch and need an alternate explanation that explains nothing.
The best place to form and spread from may not necessarily be the best place to grow up. Maybe life on Earth originated in Jupiter's atmosphere or moons, for example, and then spread to Earth. Earth may be a better place to grow more diverse and complicated. It is sort of a "comparative advantage" of life economics.
Table-ized A.I.
One thing that favors panspermia is that if life developed on Earth instead, then that would be granting a great amount of special significance on this planet; it's kind of (not completely as it doesn't disallow life forming on other planets) like saying that the earth is the center of the universe. Why are we so special?
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Well, I will point out that the various theories of Creation in the last few hundred years has been far more stable than any scientific theory put forward.
That is because ignorance is stable.
Perhaps it would be better if science types started using rhetoric like "We Think" or "We Believe" instead of "We now know..."
We 'science types' usually do. The problem is that if we start saying 'we believe' too much in public, our ideas get attacked as 'just another form of religion'.
I mean, the version of Darwinism that was taught in my school has pretty much been shot to heck, but my Biology teacher sure enough said, "This is how it happened."
That is because the science taught at school has to be simplified hugely. The version of almost any scientific idea taught at school is largely wrong. The idea is to open minds to the principles of science.
Vaporized? And then gone where? Just vanished?
The small percentage of ocean vaporized by the impact would just condense again. Very little would be lost to space.
This quote allone makes me reach for the salt.
It's true that comets are not meteors, but your comment makes it sound like you don't know what a meteor is. A meteor is the streak of light you see when a small object passes through the atmosphere. That object (by definition a meteoroid) could be a piece of a comet or an asteroid.
a,e,i,o,u and sometimes w and y (at be if of up cwm by)
Water gets vaporized on earth all the time.
Then it comes down as rain.
I don't see any problem with the theory that "organic matter" came to primative earth from comets, mixed with water, which was vaporized, then condensed, then that "organic matter" became the building blocks for life.
But at that stage of earth's life, there's little distinction between a comet and earth. They're both big hunks of rock and ice floating in space. I'm sure some "organic matter" originated on earth too. What they're saying is simple hydrocarbons were catalyzed into more complex organic molecules by; lighting, UV, volcanic activity. All of those could happen on earth, and the first two could happen on comets.
What I really don't understand is, where they think they're going with this line of theory. I mean, we can speculate on which of the two was possible - or that both were possible. But there's no way in hell we're going to know which of the two it was. Not until someon invents a time machine, or until we discover a new primordial planetary system to observe.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
It's required because they're having trouble explaining where all of this stuff came from, so they simply assign it to "the great beyond" and don't have to worry about it anymore.
Saying that life arrived here on a comet isn't even slighly better than saying God put it here. Neither are explainations, just excuses.
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Yes, and I may have had sex with a woman.
Consensual sex. Without money involved.
In the free world the media isn't government run; the government is media run.
"That is because the science taught at school has to be simplified hugely. The version of almost any scientific idea taught at school is largely wrong. The idea is to open minds to the principles of science."
is another religion. Also you point out that school is a place to condition minds. Very much in the same way cults do.
I did not say school was a place to 'condition' minds. I said it was a place to open them up. Teaching the principles of science along with the ability to be critical and investigative is the exact opposite of the way cults work. Good education should protect against cults.
Darn typo. Anyway, what I meant to say that you hit the nail on the head. Science is a religion. It is a systems of belief that requires faith.
No. I was saying the exact opposite. Opponents of science mistakenly label it as faith. On the contrary, science is about not requiring faith; about testing belief.
You also admit that science uses schools to condition minds the same way a cult would.
No I don't. Science attempts to prevent the conditioning of minds by encouraging questioning and critical thinking.
The Jews were also forbidden to inbreed.
Expressing a natural evolved behaviour.
Leviticus gives a whole list of people you can't have sex with.
And what types of cloth you should not wear. And the conditions under which members of your family can be put to death (like for planting different crops side by side).
A good guide to how to live? I think not!
The Jews had no idea what genetics were. Good thing they were told what to do.
They were 'told what to do' by evolved instinct. Most species don't inbreed, and manage to avoid it without reading old books.
Nova is known to do documentaries on crackpot and minority theories.
Using Nova as an educational tool, you are likely to learn about theories that are already proven false or have little evidence backing them up. The documentaries are certainly twisted into a certain point of view and convey information that the scientists they interview wouldn't have agreed with. Especially on topics related to Geology.
I'd say the same thing about most of the Discovery Channel's content, given the experiences of some scientists I know. A friend of mine is on a research project, and the Discovery Channel came to do a documentary. The Discovery Channel people kept attempting to change the focus to an infamous aspect of what they were researching, not what actually *mattered*.
Just remember that these programs are designed as entertainment and to get high ratings (even on PBS... nobody donates if nobody watches), not necessarily to deliver the best information. I don't mean to say that all the information is bad, innacurate, or not mainstream, but a lot of it is.
Caveat emptor...
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
Bingo. We'll just have to observe that primordial planetary system, won't we? Just because a theory is difficult to observe currently (as opposed to invoking supernatural stuff), doesn't mean we shouldn't consider them.
Ignorant people ALWAYS say things like this. Sorry, but no matter how long you shake a box of parts, a working computer will not come out of it. Putting chemicals into water and mixing it will never result in anything beyond a few simple amino acids. Work in labs on simulating "primordial ooze" clearly shows this to be a fact.
The simplest forms of life require many complex amino acids in complicated arrangements all working together. One single protein is usually a chain of hundreds to thousands of amino acids in a very specific sequence. No amount of mixing will ever result in one, much less the hundreds of proteins and enzymes needed to make a single celled organism.
THAT is why they make theories about life coming from the stars. The "primordial soup" theory is so much bunk.
One thing that favors panspermia is that if life developed on Earth instead, then that would be granting a great amount of special significance on this planet;
The theory of reverse Copernicus? Since we are not the center of the universe, nothing can happen here. I know where you're coming from. Too many ideas have been wrong who's only merit was that it made us seem more special. But, here panspermia has no merit and the other idea is quite plausible.
I don't see abiogensis showing that life is really really hard to cook up. And I'm not going to accept a theory with no merit because it supposes something important happened here. Why not suggest that Music is really amazing and why do we think we are so special to have invented it ourselves. It obviously must be aliens who invented everything and made everything happen. Because nothing can happen here.
Also, I don't really think we are that special. I don't think abiogensis is that jaw-dropping. What's actually jaw-dropping is 2 billion years of evolution to lead to us. But, surely that makes us seem overly special, I'm sure some alien rocks made us evolve too. It's not hard to get a few proteins to stick together (oversimplification), saying that it has to be done elsewhere to de-special Earth is stupid. There's such a thing as overcompensation. You're just outsourcing the special to something unneeded. I'm not saying we are the center of the universe, I'm just saying there's no evidence for panspermia or reason to even suppose that it's true.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
It is not a question of whether or not it could have developed on Earth, but a question of whether or not it did.
You are making things more complex needlessly. You might as well ask that I accept panspermia on faith. With no evidence you are adding like two steps to the process. Life developing elsewhere, surviving two impact events (count them one to knock them off Genesis world and another to land here), and ending up here. To counteract the typical theory that only involves 'life developing here', which, to date, doesn't need any help.
Perhaps we should rule out the simple and plausible before jumping to alien microbes seeding our planet, from far off distant worlds, surviving two major impact events, radiation and empty space needed to make the journey here.
It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
Personally I always hate panspermia. It seemed to fail Occams Razor pretty soundly. Yes, life on this planet came from an asteroid or comet from another planet. Well, if life can exist there to bring it here why can't it just develop here. Seemed like a big waste of time to me. I see no reason we cannot have a homegrown abiogensis on good old Earth. It's not like we hit some major hitch and need an alternate explanation that explains nothing.
Occam provides an excellent mechanism for analyzing and prioritizing hypotheses, not a doctrine for generating prima facie "truths".
The life-from-comets theory was inspired by the discovery of complex carbons in comets (the dirt in those dirty snowballs), molecules that, if found "in the wild" on Earth would be deemed "organic" and that can form basic proteins. It was raised in the face of evidence and models that showed Earth to be a very unlikely place for "life as we know it" to evolve (this could indeed be, and in fact was, considered a "hitch"), and was developed as a theory to broaden the "origin of life" models. We know much more now than we did then and the theory is still a competitive explanation. Theories as rule are typically dead before breakfast.
Life-from-comets is Exogenesis, but not necessarily (or even likely, apologies to the late Sir Fred Hoyle) Panspermia. There is no reason why comet-borne carbon molecules could not survive entry into Earth's atmosphere under some circumstances any more than all meteors are destroyed. Meteors could also theoretically carry endolithic bacteria intact to the surface, though this is difficult to prove with old meteorites on Earth due to the possibility for contamination.
The intriguing part of the life-from-comets theory (which is a specific theory of Exogenesis and doesn't rely on Panspermia) is that the conditions required for the development of life may somehow actually prove to have been a dirty snowball in an eccentric orbit.
Panspermia specifically predicts the interstellar distribution/seeding of life. We are a long way from being able to gather and study interstellar samples. We are a long way from studying the Oort Cloud directly, though we are fortunate to be able to visit the occasional dirty snowball.
And since we started theorizing alternatives to the purely terrestrial development of life (Geogenesis), we have discovered endolithic bacteria and other outrageous but often simple forms of life in places unthinkable even 50 years ago. Time may prove comets unnecessary to explain life on Earth, but exploring all of the ways life might develop and all of the forms it might take is essential to intelligently exploring the Solar System. We may find life or life-like processes in some form everywhere.
Free Adam Smith! (Or best offer.)
It only takes a single viable microbial spore from space to start life on a planet. A single impact could have delivered it. Or it could have drived through space without any impact at all. Therefore, where most of the objects impacting on earth originated is pretty much not relevant to panspermia.
It seems that what that article is talking about is not panspermia, but the composition of the atmosphere and how that was determined by impacts.
Kiss me, you fool. You know you want it.
fool, aliens did it, not "GOD"
If GOD was so great, he would leave us a real monolith with a truly hardcover bible.
Why is GOD hiding and being mysterious, because hes not here thats why.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Wow, what a completely inept analogy. Of course computer parts won't randomly create a computer when shook, but that's because unlike molecues that are not self arranging.
Funny, you can mix oxygen and hydrogen, add a bit of heat and BAM! water. Funny how all of those atoms arranged themselves into H2O molecules. That can't be though - all we did was shake, heat, and mix. From your computer parts analogy we have solid proof that water can never form!
Oh and those experiments in test tubes - call be back after they have a planet sized test tube that they've left running on a contiunuous test for 200m years. Then your bizarre claim will sound more like 'proof' than "it didn't happen in a test tube during 24 hours, so it'll never ever ever happen anywhere!"
If you really want to confuse people tell them that metaphysically speaking we don't actually "know" anything (we can only ever believe somthing to be "true"). To actually "know" defeats the point of playing the game of life (not knowing all the rules is what makes it "interesting").
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Things like washing our hands is counter intutive to a culture that doesn't know what germs are. I noticed you didn't comment on that. Please, tell me how the Jews evolved to wash their hands before eating before the discovery of germs? It was written in their laws. Also, why didn't the Jews reject this God of theirs? He was strict, they didn't like him much because of His rules, why didn't they just create another one like the Pagans did. The Pagan's gods & goddesses had temple prostitutes and all sorts of "fun" stuff. Imagion going to church and getting laid. Sounds logical that a made up god would satisify one's desires while a real God would direct one to do what is right for the good of the people (like washing your hands before eating, getting rid of mold, not eating harmful food, etc...).
In a way, Evolution is like the temple hookers. You now can say, "I didn't mean to hurt you, baby. It's just my instinctive evolved behavior to create as many offspring as I can. It's not my fault I cheat. I just evolved that way."
Also, why is it so important to have everybody reject God anyway? To make you feel more secure about your decision? I don't get "Heaven points" or anything like that for the amout of people I witness to. I do it because I don't want people to be tormented in Hell for all of eternity. No credit is given to me.
A natural evolved behavior? You mean like homosexuality? Hmmm... I wonder where that evolved from.
It is very common and natural in a large number of animals. Anyone who things homosexuality is purely a human activity is showing nothing more than ignorance of biology. In our close relatives the bonobo chimps, same-sex activity is as common as heterosexuality.
Things like washing our hands is counter intutive to a culture that doesn't know what germs are. I noticed you didn't comment on that.
Because you didn't mention it. There is a natural tendency to avoid dirt and disease because we have evolved a dislike of the smell of such things. You will notice that most higher animals naturally clean and groon themselves.
In a way, Evolution is like the temple hookers. You now can say, "I didn't mean to hurt you, baby. It's just my instinctive evolved behavior to create as many offspring as I can. It's not my fault I cheat. I just evolved that way."
This is also a terribly old-fashioned and ignorant view of evolution. I don't understand why such views are still held, unless it is based on a lazy lack of education about biology. If you are going to debate such matters, you need to keep up to date. You are putting forward 19th-century views.
Evolution does not dicate anything but the broadest aspects of behaviour. We are not robots - we have free will. In fact, we have evolved the ability to make choices, because the ability to intelligently decide what to do is good for survival!
No-one is rejecting God. What we are rejecting is a very limited human-devised idea of God. We are rejecting a deliberate attempt to stifle understanding.
If there is a God, he/she is awesome and beyond anything we can ever imagine. It seems very sad to me when people try to limit God to a creationist who tries to tell people what to do through an ambigous old book.
I get my sense of religious awe by examining the universe at it really is, which includes the wonders of billions of years of evolution - it is a far more impressive and breathtaking idea than anything the bible has to say.
I do it because I don't want people to be tormented in Hell for all of eternity. No credit is given to me.
Even the idea of Hell torment is now considered outdated and irrelevant by most major religions.
I have some respect for what you are trying to do, but I hope you can open your mind and see the wonders of things. Science is not a threat to religion - quite the contrary - it can reveal how amazing and inspiring things really are.
why would man and animals need eyes if they couldn't see before, sight is a very high-level ability, a creature without sight doesn't realise he needs it? Also in 'natural selection' humans would have been eaten by everything without sight no matter how developed the brain was.
Darwin himself deals with this in "The Origin of Species". There are many steps from the basic light/dark sensing that some bacteria have to the fully developed vertebrate eye. Every step gives an evolutionary advantage in some circumstances. Interestingly, it seems that these steps have been followed twice independently, once leading to the vertebrate eye, and once, independently to the eyes of the squid, which are almost identical, but actually a bit better. It seems that our version of the path ended up more or less by accident with the nerve connection on the front of the retina, blocking some light and needing hole (the blind spot) to get the nerves back to the brain. The squids got this one right and have the nerve connection at the back.
If we came from the ocean then why can't we breath underwater and if we are the most 'evolved' of creatures then why are the birds flying around the earth like it's going out of fashion? We're wingless, can't go underwater without breathing equipment, the ascent of man? Yeah right.
We are not "more evolved" than any other contemporary species. All of us are the products of about 4 billion years of evolution from some little understood primordial cell. At a number of points along the way, splits have occurred. Those individuals in a species that happened to be best adapted for the purpose took to pursuing one ecological "niche", others took another "niche". Perhaps they were separated by an ocean or a desert. Pressures of one niche drove gradual evolution in a direction incompatible with the other niche until you had two different species. For instance, early proto-amphibians specializing in spending time on land and eating insects or land plants had evolutionary pressure towards smaller gills, which used less energy to grow and lost less moisture to the air. End result, theit surviving descendants couldn't breathe underwater. Meanwhile their cousins who had stayed in the water were becoming better and better fish, with more and more sophisticated gills.
How come nobody talks about entropy no more?
Sorry? Any statistical physics textbook talks about entropy, which is where it belongs. The entropy of the Universe as a whole is increasing, because all the high grade energy locked up in unfused hydrogen in stars is slowly turning into low-grade heat energy. Temporary local increases in apparent complexity (like life, humanity, culture, etc.) are just tiny "curlicues" on this big picture from a statistical physics point of view.
Oh if wewe're the offspring of monkeys then why arn't monkeys turning into humans?
We're not their offspring, we're their cousins. Some of our common ancestors found themselves in a situation where hairlessness, swimming, two-legged running and living in larger groups favoured survival. We are the descendants of that group. Others found themselves in an environment where moving around in trees, living in smaller groups and so on was best. Their descendants are chimps, gorillas and so on,
Is that like a planetary pearl necklace?
Bad example.
1 + 1 >= 3 is pretty good math if the left-hand side represents a fertile male and female of some given species.
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?" - Patrick Henry
I guess it depends on what the definition of "is" is. Maybe it's "will be". Or the definition of "1", which could be "1.5" or "1+i". But if you're going to quibble with "1 + 1 = 3 is wrong", then religion is probably a great way for you to waste your time pretending to be "right".
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You talk about free will. I guess this is why I think that there is a creative God that exists and created the Universe. The idea of atoms banging around and combining in such a way to create a cluster of atoms that can choose to go left or right is in my opinion, impossible. If you hit a series of dominos in exactly the same way under the exact same condition then they should fall down exactly the same way. How can the ability of a domino to choose which way to fall be evolved? I don't think it can be done. It's as impossible as creating true AI. Eventually something, even a psuedo random number, has to control the AI.
As for major religions rejecting Hell, that's their problem. Jesus talked about Hell more than he talked about Heaven. To say that it either doesn't exist or isn't a place of torment is to make Christ out to be a liar and thus undermine Christianity alltogether. The logic is usually, "God's a good God and thus doesn't send people to Hell." The logic is rediculous if one examines what it is to be good.
A judge has to choose whether to set a guilty rapist free. If he's a good judge, does he set him free? Even knowing that the rapist is guilty? How would that make the victims feel about the judge?
Now let's apply this to the real world. Jesus says that if a man looks at a woman lustfully, he has already committed adultry in his heart. If a man hates his brother, he has already murdered him in his heart. We have all lied. We have all disobeyed our parents. The list goes on and on. So should a good God let a murdering, thieving, adulture in Heaven? Guess not. But God knew we could never be perfect, so he made a sacrifice for us. If someone burst in that courtroom and said, "I'll take his place in the chair on the condition that he admits he was guilty and trusts me to take his place." Would it be logical for the rapist to say "No"?
This idea can also be seen in The Lion, The Witch, & the Wordrobe. Someone had to take the place of the boy's sin. Aslan paid that price. There is no forgivness without the sheding of blood.
I see no reason why all of these things couldn't have been the product of common sense derived through many years of simple observation.
For instance, with inbreeding, remember that humans performed genetic engineering many thousands of years ago: domestication of animals via selective breeding.
However, in any generation there are a lot of young people or dumb people likely to make these mistakes and that is what Leviticus is for.
I think we constantly underestimate how sophisticated ancient societies were. Sure, there was a lot of superstition and immorality, but there was also a fair amount of unofficial science then which produced a lot of amazing things considering how little they had to work with.
How does teaching known errors as absolute fact open minds to the principles of science? Unless the principle to be learned is that scientists are deceptive? Perhaps the purpose is not to open minds to the principles of science but to close the minds to any influence of religion.
I feel that theories that contradict the idea that God made humans and also made them uniquly different than all the other critters on this earth.
The problem is that no matter how much you feel or want to believe something does not make you right!
We aren't unique: we share the same biology and biochemistry as almost every other living organism.
If you hit a series of dominos in exactly the same way under the exact same condition then they should fall down exactly the same way.
Again, you are simply factually wrong. Quantum mechanics and chaos theory show irrefutably that
this statement is false.
You have a problem here: You can carry on believing things like this - that we are unique and that things can't be random - but by doing so you are denying the reality of the very creation and universe you admire!
If you are going to insist that a God created things, you should take the trouble to find out what he actually created, and not impose your own wishes and beliefs on reality.
I wasn't aware that God was about good feelings and aweness. It's about truth. C.S. Lewis wrote about this whole combining everything idea in his book "Mere Christianity". I think he amounted it to be just an excuse. A way to have the "good feelings" of religion without the concequences. As for Quantum Mechanics and Chaos Theory, what decides which way the domino falls? After a time passes in our linear existance, we can't go back. Time moves only one way. That is how time is designed. So the domino had to fall in exactly the way it did. If observed again in the exact same point in history with the exact same conditions (again impossible since going back in time would change the exact conditions) it would fall exactly the same way. It fell exactly the way it did. Thus free will in this dimension is impossible. An atom cannot choose or make decisions just as a rock does not choose or make decisions. Thus since free will exists, it is nothing but supernatural. I have a spirt in me that exists beyond the physics of this universe controlling a set of atoms in this universe. I guess I use my free will to believe I have free will and not to accept my free will as an illusion. Call that ignorance, but I'm pretty comfy with my life. I pray. My prayers are responded to. It's cause & effect. I observe it. Just as I feel the wind. It's not about being in awe or good fuzzy feelings. If believing that you are evolved stardust gives you fuzzy feelings, then more power to you. Enjoy your fuzzy feelings while they last. I come as a witness and nothing more.
I wasn't aware that God was about good feelings and aweness. It's about truth.
What truth? It is about faith, not truth.
C.S. Lewis wrote about this whole combining everything idea in his book "Mere Christianity".
Why should I accept anything he says? He is not qualified to comment on science.
As for Quantum Mechanics and Chaos Theory, what decides which way the domino falls?
Nothing, as far as we can tell.
After a time passes in our linear existance, we can't go back. Time moves only one way. That is how time is designed.
There is no evidence or reason to believe that time was designed.
If believing that you are evolved stardust gives you fuzzy feelings, then more power to you. Enjoy your fuzzy feelings while they last. I come as a witness and nothing more.
Yet again you miss the point. It is not about believing anything! It is about evidence. If there were any evidence that we were not evolved from stardust, then I would have to accept that.
My view is that you are neglecting obvious facts in order to preserve your fuzzy feelings.
Enjoy your fuzzy feelings while they last.
Who said I had fuzzy feelings?
I come as a witness and nothing more.
I believe you come with an arrogance that helps you ignore facts. I pity your small world view.
There are theories in math, about the 'math universe' that math has created. However, math itself is not a theory, as it does not proport to predict anything except itself.
Now, scientific theories use this created universe to attempt to explain the world. However, if we discover a place in the universe where one pineapple plus one pineapple equals four pineapples and a goat, that doesn't make math 'unproven', because it never said that in the first place. It merely means that science can't use math anymore.(1)
Math says 'These are numbers, and if you do things with them you get these other numbers', and that's all it says. It doesn't say a damn thing about reality.
Geez, what are they teaching kids these days? What's next, 'language' as a theory? Maybe we can talk about the theory of 'typing' or 'hopscotch'. No wonder people are confused about what a theory is.
1) Incidentally, this has happened in quantum mechanics. Specifically, the math used there is non-communitive...p * q doesn't equal q * p. QM has to use matrix math.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
I'm stealing this for my .sig
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
a^2 + b^2 = c^2 is a theorem. Finding every square on every hypotenuse to be the sum of the squares on the other two sides of triangular objects is a "theory" of how triangular objects work. "1 + 1 = 3" is a theory about counting things. An invalid theory, because the "a + b = sum(a, b)" formula supports the contradictory theory about counting things, that "1 + 1 = 2". There's more subtlety to vernacular language than there is to math, because vernacular is so much more fuzzy.
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make install -not war
"And as was shown by Deep Impact, comets are really mostly porous ice"
All right, you tried this once, and I let it go. I had to call you on it the second time however.
The Depp Impact mission suggested just the opposite of what you say, that there was very little ice in that particular comet.
I don't know how you drew your conclusions, but they are incorrect.
> A natural evolved behavior? You mean like homosexuality? Hmmm... I wonder where that evolved from.
Glad you asked. Homosexuality is probably caused by improper activation or deactivation of gender specific wiring in the brain during fetal development, possibly by interactions with the mother's immune system.
One of the most tantalising
clues about male homosexuality is that the probability a male will be homosexual increases 33% with each biological older brother. There is no correlation with number of younger brothers, sisters, adopted brothers, etc. Here's what scientists think is happening. All fetuses start out as female. At different points during development, genes on the Y chromosome activate and produce proteins which act as "switches" to the developing embryo: develop a penis, make a male brain, etc. These "mascularizing" proteins are completely foreign to the mother's immune system. Each time the immune system is exposed to a foreign agent, the immune system "recognises it" and orchestrates a stronger attack for the next time (this is the principle behind immunization).
Each time the mother carries a boy, her immune system may get another wiff of these mascularizing proteins, until with son #3 BAM! the mother's immune system attacks one of the proteins that makes a male brain (one that likes trucks and wants sex with females). What is left is a brain with a portion that is still feminine (likes clothes and wants sex with males).
So while there may be no "genes" for homesexuality, there are genes for a vigilent immune system. If these genes are too weak, the
population is vulnerable to disease. If they are too strong, the population will be aflicted with autoimmune diseases (lupus, MS, arthritis, etc) and too many sons end up gay (infertile). So the 2% rate of male homosexuality we observe in the population is reflects a balance in these competing adaptations.
Just as there are many agents that cause a temperature (virus, bacteria, parasites, etc), there are probably multiple agents/pathways that can interfere with gender specific brain development. This is one.
Do you believe God made the Universe, Heaven, Earth, and everything in it?
I do.
Science is the word we use to describe our research trying to find God through evidence of his Creation.
You think Man authored the Laws of Physics which scientists hold so dear? Think again. No man set Avagadro's constant, or any of the other parameters of our observable universe.
If God did create us, did he intend us to try to find Him, or mull around like a bunch of obedient ignorant sheep doing the bidding of those who take it in their mind to control us?
Think of what each faction is trying to do. Scientists are trying to understand God's creation and what our place in it is supposed to be. Damn near every religion I have even run across is full of control and obedience to men, often without ANY concrete evidence of truth, just hearsay.
Now, in the BIBLE you referred to, even there, if you take the BIBLE to be literally the Word of God, it is full of warnings of the false prophet.
Personally, I feel a lot closer to my Creator knowing I can see and verify His work, knowing full good and well I am seeing work of intelligent design. I do not feel comfortable at all dealing with people who sell me a relationship with my Creator like they would sell me a speculative stock investment, based on hearsay and faith that its a sound investment.
Maybe I am a bit jaded by now, but it seems all I have seen religions do is fight. I get the idea all this fighting pleases God about as much as I appreciate my cats fighting. Believe me, I derive no pleasure at all in seeing my cats all scratched up, ears mangled, and bloody.
Am I supposed to believe there is a God up there somewhere who tells various factions all over the Earth to gather in his name and smite the other ones?
Or does simple knowledge of human behavioural psychologies and obedience structures indicate the Gods of Religion are just some entity created by men so they could use it to control other men?
If God created me with sufficient intelligence to seek Him, why is he gonna hold it against me for doing exactly that?
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
How does teaching known errors as absolute fact open minds to the principles of science?
Who says they were taught as 'absolute facts'? When I was taught things at school, we were always told 'there is more to this that you will find out later'.
Unless the principle to be learned is that scientists are deceptive?
On the contrary, it simply shows that scientists discover new things and change their minds.
Perhaps the purpose is not to open minds to the principles of science but to close the minds to any influence of religion.
No, it is to show that if you are after understanding the reality of subjects like life and evolution you have to accept than our understanding is incomplete and can change.
It is called being honest.
Science really cannot prove that reindeer do not fly. Take a reindeer, throw it off a roof. It falls to the ground. All you can say with certainty is this reindeer, on this occasion, either could not, or choose not to fly.
Do it a hundred more times and all you have is that, with the assumption that reindeer are not INSANE, there is a probability that reindeer cannot fly. And it only takes one flying reindeer to shoot all this science to hell.
Therefore, the best science can ever say is "with the data we currently have, with the factors we currently understand and can observe, it appears that life has evolved in complexity through a process of mutation and natural selection." ... and, I would add to that "We do not really understand how that process might have occurred, nor have we been able to observe or repeat it on the scale it appears to have happened."
Any thing beyond that is absolutely, with out a doubt FAITH. I don't care if you are an Atheist or not.
Yeah, I guess I'm funny like that.
Do you believe God made the Universe, Heaven, Earth, and everything in it?
No. There are no gods. There are only beliefs used to comfort people about things they do not understand.
Science is the word we use to describe our research trying to find God through evidence of his Creation.
Nope. Sorry. Science is a methodical way of obtaining evidence of how things work. See the Science entry at Wikipedia
You think Man authored the Laws of Physics which scientists hold so dear? Think again. No man set Avagadro's constant, or any of the other parameters of our observable universe.
No god set it either. If God created the universe, who created God? Don't answer with "He/She/It has always existed either. Because the simpler explanation then, using Occam's Razor, is that the universe always existed.
If God did create us, did he intend us to try to find Him, or mull around like a bunch of obedient ignorant sheep doing the bidding of those who take it in their mind to control us?
Religion, of any type is a form of mind control. It doesn't matter which religion. Galileo was put throught the Inquisition for stating that the Earth revolved around the Sun. A Heresy in his time, but true nonetheless. Religion blinds people to the truth, it doesn't show it to them.
Scientists are trying to understand God's creation and what our place in it is supposed to be.
Scientists are trying to understand the world we live in, NOT "God's creation" as you put it. Some scientists are atheists, you know.
As for understanding our place in it, that is for philosophers to debate, not scientists.
Am I supposed to believe there is a God up there somewhere who tells various factions all over the Earth to gather in his name and smite the other ones?
Yes. Read the old testament. The whole thing. Add up how much smiting goes on. Plenty of smiting just in the first five books.
Or does simple knowledge of human behavioural psychologies and obedience structures indicate the Gods of Religion are just some entity created by men so they could use it to control other men?
Now you're getting it.
If God created me with sufficient intelligence to seek Him, why is he gonna hold it against me for doing exactly that?
Okay, next exercise. Read your Bible. I am assuming you own one. Now, look at all the contradictions. If you need help with that, look here The Skeptic's Annotated Bible to find all the Biblical contradictions you could ever want.
Real software engineers regret the existence of COBOL, FORTRAN and BASIC.
I prefer my alchemical mix of sensory validation and buddhist illusionism. Making it up as I go along, and enjoying the ride :).
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make install -not war
It's already wrong in our real universe, assuming any curvature whatesoever. There quite a few math universes that try to explain a 3D universe, and the one where a^2 + b^2 = c^2 is called 'Euclidian' and does not actually explain ours.
Math is a set of rules. There are facts, there are accepted rules, there are theories, and there are even competing theories. Just like science.
However, it's not science, as it's not trying to describe the actual world, but a fictional 'math world', or, actually a set of different related worlds. Some with imaginary numbers, some with 50 dimensions, some where everything is transfinite, etc.
It's like talking about 'history' in LotR. You can do that, and you can do all sorts of analyse on it, and whatnot, but it is not actually real. Or 'sociology' on Klingons.
Some of these pretend worlds are helpful at explaining the real world. This is possibly a coincidence, or it's possible that one of these worlds is real.
However, right now, if a difference comes up between math and the real world, it is the real world that is 'incorrect'. (Well, it is scientists who are incorrectly using math to describle the real world, when that math does not actually do so.) The math is not incorrect, it is merely not the correct math to match the real universe.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
Ain't it the truth.
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make install -not war
I perceive you and I think very similar.
Note I never defined God.
And note I was cagey around the Bible, as it is written by Man, whereas I consider the Laws of Physics to be written by God himself.
I don't know what God is, and am also quite firmly convinced no one else does either.
Thanks for the link BTW! I collect those links to help me support my position that we should use our BRAINS, not blind obedience, to seek God. Stanley Milgram did some extensive research on Obedience . I have his book, and found it to be a real eye-opener on how people can be led to do terrible things in the name of obedience. My own feeling is this book has helped me recognize the pattern of how the 'control people' operate - albeit it has damned near ruined my 'team player' attribute. It now takes a helluva lot more than some well-coifed head jabbering atop a $500 suit to sway me, I insist that the head make sense.
I have to take anything that has been exposed to an error prone channel as likely to have some error, and not take it as absolute - especially when contradictions show up. If one sees black specks in a jar of supposedly pure white sand, its kinda obvious its been contaminated. Once contamination has been observed, I feel free to speculate there may be other unseen contamination, like its easy to see salt contaminated with black pepper, but I also consider if pepper is present, salt or sand may be present too.
One of the teachings in the Bible concerns what servants given 'talents', which in those days supposedly referenced a quantity of money, were expected to do with them. If my maker gave me intelligence to try to seek him out via the native curiousity He endowed me with, does he really expect me to "bury" my reasoning senses and do nothing with them, only because some other head tells me that its wrong to question and I should just follow. ( And, of course, I am expected to follow the guy giving me the "I am closer to God than you are so you should do as I say", never the other way around!!! ).
Especially, knowing the kind of things things men will do when they blindly obey, and override their own intelligence?
No sir.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
The ultimate rule of life: have as much fun as possible whilst causing the least amount of harm possible. The second rule of life: annoy those that break the first rule :).
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen