Nobody is arguing that. It's just a question as to how much it explains.
should one insist that all life descended from a single cell? . . . Well...is that so hard to believe given we all individually start out conceived as a single cell when a sperm and egg meet?
It's not a matter of it being hard to believe, it is a matter of it being reasonable. The human zygote starts with 3 billion chemical base pairs making up its DNA. It's protected in the perfect environment for 9 months, then for many years before it can reproduce.
Now, why would you believe that a single cell can acquire the DNA to produce all life, survive for the appropriate amount of time in the appropriate environment, then solely through natural selection and mutation/recombination evolve into all known life?
Actually the people I was talking to on this thread were saying that evolution did not exist. If you look back at some of the replies to my posts they were sending me links about modern humans being found in cretaceous deposits. So when you say Nobody is arguing that I have to say that is not true, plenty of people are.
Now, why would you believe that a single cell can acquire the DNA to produce all life, survive for the appropriate amount of time in the appropriate environment, then solely through natural selection and mutation/recombination evolve into all known life?
I never made any references to the actual creation of life, so why do you think I have this belief? I was simply arguing that life evolves through natural selection. You seem to agree (?) on this so.... why are we having this discussion?
Of course, if you wanted to discuss this that is fine. My official statement is: "I really don't know how life started." I think there are a lot of missing pieces that fail to explain scientifically how life was created.
Do I think that scientists should just throw in the towel and say "Hey... it must be God!". Well, no I do not. Why? Well if scientists did that everytime they hit a stumbling block then whey would never really get very far, would they?
Remember that at one time, people yelled at Benjamin Franklin regarding the lightning rod. They thought that lightning striking a house for example was God's punishment and that anyone who tried to thwart God wrath was a bad person themself. Franklin was blamed for all sorts of bad stuff because of his lightning rod but in the end... the lightning bolt isn't God's wrath is it? If it was, I do not think that we could stop it (or in this case redirect it).
My point is science doesn't (or shouldn't) use metaphysical reasoning to explain things. If we stayed in that mindset we would never have gotten to the technological level where you and I are discussing it from miles apart.