The Origins of Life

[jeepster]

you're close, but not quite right, it was a celestial chub......

[poledark]

As the day gets nearer and nearer to when we can make our own design of creature, so surely we edge closer to the idea of Intelligent design?

 

I was intrigued by the small creature shown as an example i.e. what were/are the odds on those 50 seperate parts having evolved with no purpose or use until they all came together to make a working "Whip"

 

Each part was useless without the other 49 parts, so how does evolution come into the equation?

 

Doubtless there has been some evolution, probably quite a lot in the later stages of Earths existence, but what drove evolution to produce a creature with a brain and imagination....who or what imagined imagination? Who or what conceived the idea of action and consequence?.. If something has never happened then how do you evolve to deal with it?

 

 

To my simple mind, there has to have been some intelligence at work, life forms on Earth are so complex that simple evolution and "survival of the fittest" cannot account for some of the complex and staggeringly beautiful creatures that abound...............................and where do Wasps fit in??

 

There has to have been a creator, but who created the creator?

 

Den

[Ken Davison South Wales]

17% opted for intelligent design but 'only' 48% chose evolution. Whilst 48% is still the majority that still leaves 39% that subscribe to some mythical supreme being responsible for creating life.

 

Evolution can be applied to what we understand and I think if the question was applied under the correct conditions the percentage would be a lot higher for evolution.

 

However there is still the burning question about whats on the outside of everything we have knowledge of.

 

Is it nothing? If so what is nothing? People have to be able to comprehend eternity and that's where evolution stops and creationism takes over. It gives comfort to those who cannot accept nothing, I can see little harm in comfort.

 

For those of us who accept nothing there is the continuing battle to establish exactly what nothing is

Edited January 31, 2006 by Ken Davison South Wales

[gozzer]

Some good posts. I think that humans did evolve but not on Earth. I think the "Bad Back answer" could well hold the key. I ve said this before maybe its designed for a planet with a lower gravity.

Same as we STILL squint at the Sun, surely after X millon years of evolution our eyes would have adjusted to the amount of sunlight they get.

I have read that the ammount of debrie in the asteroid belt betwen Earth and Mars could well have been a planet long ago. Maybe our eyes would be more suited to a planet just a bit father away from the sun.

Could life on earth be a last ditch atempt of some doomed race from there. Maybe well find out if we ever get a foot hold on Mars.

 

If just humans evolved on another planet, why do animals squint at the sun?

I think its hard for people to believe that we might be just an accident, a meeting of the right elements at the right time, in the right conditions, to create the building blocks of life. then evolution and natural selection take over. I've read that, some people believe the earth has had many dominant species, and that each has been wiped out and another takes its place for a million years or so. I think eventually through increased population, polution or whatever, humans will go into decline and something else will take over.

We tend to think we are special, different from the rest of the planet, so we try to justify ourselves,by inventing religions and beliefs, to make us believe that we are "Gods" chosen ones, but in reality we are just like any other animal on the planet with the same basic needs, the rest we create for ourselves.

[Scapanapper]

you're close, but not quite right, it was a celestial chub......

 

Curse Ye heretic!!!

Be gone Chub idolotrist

[Ken L]

Fair point Vagabond.

The problem of going from a collection of compounds (even complex organic compounds like proteins and lipids) to a functional cell with the ability to replicate is still a sticky point but I firmly believe that eventually we will understand the incrememental processes that allowed it to happen without some form of supernatural intervention.

As with many ideas, just because we don't understand the minute detail of every aspect of it, doesn't mean that the overall concept is wrong.

 

Humans evolved elsewhere and came to earth - Utter rubbish !

I supose we also brought all of our primate relatives with us, buried a fairly decent fossil record for a bit of a laugh, errased all signs of the technologies that allowed us to get here from another world and yet somehow found the problem of re-tweaking our DNA so that we didn't end up squinting in the brighter light of our new planetary home utterly intractable ?

 

My thoughts on religious indocrination in schools are probably best left out of a family forum.

Edited January 31, 2006 by Ken L

[jeepster]

Curse Ye heretic!!!

Be gone Chub idolotrist

 

 

why, what you say is an affront to the great lord chevin himself

Edited January 31, 2006 by jeepster

[Vagabond]

why, what you say is an affront to the great lord chevin himself

 

 

The great lord chevin (should that be The Great Lord Chevin ?) is spending a couple of weeks in Sydney, but I will relay these comments when he returns to Perth.

 

When he left these shores, he left me a big game reel (Senator 9/0) - compare that with the "cargo" cult of John Frum.

 

The Great Lord Chevin was of course a disciple of Dick the Walker go lightly.

[jeepster]

i didn't mean that chevin, i meant the one with fins

[Vagabond]

i didn't mean that chevin, i meant the one with fins

 

The Great Lord Chevin doesn't need fins. He was once one of the reserves for our Olympic swimming team.

 

He had plans to rule the world too

 

Driving to a venue one Sunday with Chevin and Pete, a crawling motorist got in our way, causing us to waste valuable fishing time.

 

Vag "Get out of the @####~ way you #@#** merchant banker"

 

Pete "When I come to power, only anglers will be allowed to drive on Sundays"

 

Chevin "Hunh, when I come to power, only anglers will be allowed to live above ground"

Edited February 1, 2006 by Vagabond