Higher math and Darwin (Introduction)

by dhw, Monday, April 12, 2010, 14:08 (5148 days ago) @ xeno6696

I shan't go over the various arguments again, because the point at issue between us was your earlier statement that the chance v. design dilemma was false. I disagreed and still disagree, because in your response of 10 April at 00.58 you haven't actually addressed that issue. No matter what conditions may have been at the beginning, the fact remains that we do have life, and unless you subscribe to BBella's theory (there has always been life), either it originated by accident or by design. What follows on ... namely evolution ... from the origin of the mechanism for life, reproduction, adaptability and innovation can be made to fit into either pattern, and so I agree that you can't draw any sharp distinction from that point onwards.-In your post to David, you emphasize that "there IS a physical nature to how life got here, and outside of the greater debate here, THAT should be our focus." Unless people believe in magic (some do, but they don't include any of our current contributors), then that has to be an incontrovertible truth, since life on Earth is physical. Even God would have had to use physical matter to create physical life. And scientists are indeed focusing on THAT. But are we incapable of focusing on more than one subject at a time? David has offered us one post after another (e.g. his latest under "Why is a designer so compelling?") detailing the astonishing physical complexities of life. His conclusion that these provide evidence of design is not a distraction from the physical realities of life, or from the quest to discover their origin. Nor is George's conclusion that it's all down to chance and the laws of nature. Maybe, as you say, we won't "figure out the origin of life by studying life". But your argument concerning our ignorance of the conditions and forms that existed then applies to any approach to the subject. However, that shouldn't and fortunately doesn't stop us from studying life, from analysing and marvelling at what that unknown original mechanism has produced, and from speculating about how it could possibly have come into existence.