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To: unlearner; VadeRetro
Why do you refuse to answer how my hypothesis differs fundamentally from the law of gravity?

PMFJI, but if I may?

unlearner's Law of Gravity: EVERY object in the Universe attracts EVERY other object with a force directed along the line of centers of mass for the two objects.
unlearner's Hypothesis of Life: Life can only originate through intelligent intervention.

With respect to the Law of Gravity, the theoretical possibility exists that one may test the force between two objects and discover that the force is not on a line between the centers of mass. An observation of this nature will conclusively demonstrate that "unlearner's Law of Gravity" is wrong. Every measurement of the force between two objects is a potential falsification attempt.

Now please describe a test, and a potential outcome thereof, that can conclusively demonstrate that your hypothesis of life is wrong.

2,783 posted on 12/27/2005 3:32:29 PM PST by Condorman (Prefer infinitely the company of those seeking the truth to those who believe they have found it.)
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To: Condorman; unlearner
Now please describe a test, and a potential outcome thereof, that can conclusively demonstrate that your hypothesis of life is wrong.

Answer: his hypothes is falsified when the dirt in his backyard becomes a penguin.

But what O what will ever lend support to his "never" premise? Especially if he wants to rule out abiogenesis spread over 300-500K years as mainstream science hypothesizes.

2,786 posted on 12/27/2005 3:49:29 PM PST by VadeRetro (Liberalism is a cancer on society. Creationism is a cancer on conservatism.)
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To: Condorman
"Now please describe a test, and a potential outcome thereof, that can conclusively demonstrate that your hypothesis of life is wrong."

Any instance of life self organizing entirely from lifeless matter which is not the result of intelligent (i.e. intentional) assembly (assumably by humans). The formation of life in a lab via scientists creating the right precursors, or the right environment, or a primordial soup, etc. would qualify. (If any tools, e.g. nanobots, are required to assemble life, then it does not qualify as abiogenesis.)

Keep in mind the conversation which you are interjecting in concerns why my hypothesis is logically flawed, not whether my hypothesis is actually correct or has been supported as well as some other theory or law.

VadeRetro insists that the statement itself requires that I falsify abiogenesis. (My contention is that abiogenesis cannot be falsified, and I only need for my hypothesis to be falsifiable.) My comparison with the law of gravity is not an indication that I think my hypothesis is comparable to it in general, but that it is not logically flawed.

My statement is verifiable and falsifiable in the same sense that the law of gravity is. The law of gravity is easier to observe at work. It has been substantiated extensively. It has not been proved wrong (though modified of course). Likewise, my hypothesis has the POTENTIAL to be observed and tested. It will probably never be nearly as evident as gravity, but the analogy serves the purpose of showing VadeRetro's argument is logically flawed, rather than my hypothesis.
2,848 posted on 12/29/2005 1:58:36 PM PST by unlearner (You will never come to know that which you do not know until you first know that you do not know it.)
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