The Atheist Perversion of Reality

April 5, 2009 | Jean F. Drew

[LeGrande]

Which captivity is Jeremiah talking about and where is Judah?

[metmom]

*I* know that, and *YOU* know that.....

[LeGrande]

LG has tried this before and has been provided with more than ample examples of fulfilled prophecy, which he promptly blows off as never having happened,

Sorry, but Adam stepping on the head of a snake isn't a prophecy foretelling of Christ.

Is this like reading tea leaves with you people?

[metmom]

I rest my case.

[metmom]

Thanks for providing all that.

Likely it will fall on some deaf ears.

The rest of us will marvel over God’s faithfulness.

[betty boop]

...mutations are credited by naturalists with miraculous supernatural capabilities that somehow beat all odds against it, and leapt over biological and chemical roadblocks as though it were superman, and supposedly created organs and features via mutations, which, as we know, can only work on info that is already present — it can’t create the necessary new non species specific info needed for moving species beyond their own kinds.

That seems to be the jist of it CottShop. Excellent summary. Thank you so very much for writing!

[wagglebee]

Excellent post!

[TXnMA]

There is an ineresting recent article here on FR entitled, Ocean Hidden Inside Saturn's Moon " [Enceladus} with speculation that it might provide an environment suitable for life...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That reminds me: I have been reading scientific reports about a planet on which life forms have been discovered, living in conditions that would be instantly fatal to most known earthly organisms:

• extreme pressures akin to those deep in the atmosphere of Jupiter

• high temperatures typical of the surface of Venus -- or inside the deadly chamber of a sterilizing autoclave

• a poisonous liquid "soup" environment -- with high concentrations of toxins like heavy metals and sulfides

• absolutely zero sunlight (photosynthesis is impossible)

• microbes that convert heat and sulfides (instead of sunlight) to energy

• several varieties of symbiotic, sessile larger organisms that derive their energy from the microbes.

The bottom line is that the environment would be instantly fatal to most terrestrial organisms -- even bacteria.

It is difficult to see how such a biome could have evolved from organisms with which we are familiar...

~~~~~~~~~~~

(In case you still haven't recognized the planet and location, check here...)

'-}

[Alamo-Girl]

Indeed. Thank you so much for the ping, dearest sister in Christ!

[Alamo-Girl]

Thank you for sharing your insights and thank you for the link, dear brother in Christ!

[mrjesse]

Said TXnMA:I am interested in where your reasoning falls apart so badly as to allow you to be suckered into to the concept of a young universe

Hey there TXnMA! Haven't heard from you in a day or two. Had a chance to read my last post to you? Did it help you understand how my reasoning falls apart so badly as to allow me to be suckered into a young universe? Can you help me understand?

Thanks and have a great day,

-Jesse

[betty boop]

That reminds me: I have been reading scientific reports about a planet on which life forms have been discovered, living in conditions that would be instantly fatal to most known earthly organisms.

Which leads to a curious question: How do we know these are life forms? Or the better question: What criterion was used to classify these entities as life forms in the first place? Especially since biology doesn't seem to know how to define "What is life?" At best, on the basis of what is now known, the most we are entitled to say (IMHO) is, maybe these are life forms; but we really don't know. Based on our experience of the earthly biosphere, they do not look like anything we would here describe as "living."

In short, its seems we need a precise definition of living organism before we can start classifying entities as such. At least if we're doing science.

Or is this a baseless quibble?

Thanks ever so much for writing, TXnMA!

[TXnMA]

You do realize that I was talking about our planet, don't you? IIRC, our remotely operated submersibles that made the photos at the link also retrieved samples of a significant number of those "lifeforms".

Bur you missed my main point: How could lifeforms as we know them have evolved into those "alien" critters that live in that "deadly" environment down on the mid-oceanic ridge?

Do you think that, perhaps, our Creator had a hand in that?

(BTW, sometimes , when you wax philosophical, your musings get a mite too "squishy" for my literalist mind...) LOL!

[LeGrande]

Which leads to a curious question: How do we know these are life forms? ... Or is this a baseless quibble?

Actually that is a very good question and goes to the heart of the problem, especially with the discovery of the giant viruses.

In biology it appears that there are very few places where a fine line can be drawn.

[Alamo-Girl]

betty boop: Which leads to a curious question: How do we know these are life forms? ... Or is this a baseless quibble?

LeGrande: In biology it appears that there are very few places where a fine line can be drawn.

Indeed, that is a great example of why the Newtonian paradigm in biology is inadequate.

If we turn to Mathematics, more specifically Information Theory, the answer to "what is life v. non-life/death in nature?" is readily apparent.

Information (Shannon) is the reduction of uncertainty (Shannon entropy) in the receiver (or molecular machine) as it goes from a before state to an after state.

It is the action of successful communication, not the message itself (e.g. DNA.)

Dead biological organisms also have DNA. Moreover, the Shannon model applies whether the message is biological, Shakespeare's Hamlet, a keystroke, etc.

So it is correct and useful to observe that that which is alive in nature is successfully communicating. If communications cease, the thing in nature is dead. If it never could communicate, it was non-life.

This definition is not stumped by the objects which are anomalous to descriptive definitions, e.g. metabolism in living things.

For instance, under the Shannon model bacteria are autonomously and successfully communicating and mycoplasmas and mimiviruses are autonomously and successfully communicating as parasites. The dormant anthrax spore is alive in stand-by, awaiting an interrupt to begin communications. And viroids, viruses and prions - which are not autonomous - nevertheless are part of the communication as “noise” or deformations in the channel, whether for good or for ill (successful or not).

In the Shannon model, the latter are like broadcasts or "bleeding" of messages or message fragments into otherwise autonomous channels.

On the one hand it can be seen as the pathway for mutation under a materialistic evolution model.

And on the other hand, it can be seen as a pathway of God speaking a thing, function or whatever into existence.

The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handywork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night sheweth knowledge. [There is] no speech nor language, [where] their voice is not heard. – Psalms 19:1-3

God's Name is I AM.

[allmendream]

Read Erwin Scroninger’s book “What is Life?”.

Life is a structure of molecules that consumes metabolic energy to maintain and replicate its own structures.

Of course by that definition a virus is alive, and some people don't seem to agree with that.

But definitions of things are not the things itself.

Quibbling over definitions is as ridiculous as claiming that Pluto being called a planet or an ‘extra solar body’ has any relevance at all to the accuracy of science, or anything really, other than how astronomers are going to categorize it.

[betty boop]

You do realize that I was talking about our planet, don't you?

No, didn't realize that, didn't read the article.

But you missed my main point: On what basis were these critturs classified as "lifeforms?" (I notice you had the good sense to put the term in quotation marks.)

I'm not saying they aren't life forms mind you. But it would seem if they are life forms, then this complicates the issue of how to define life. And that definition is still missing. Biology continues to be unrigorous, even "squishy" in this regard.

[betty boop]

In biology it appears that there are very few places where a fine line can be drawn.

Indeed. Which perhaps accounts for the claim that biology need not be "rigorous" in the sense that physics is rigorous; i.e., can be conceptualized and expressed in mathematical language.

Yet it seems theoretical biology aims to do this very thing, sooner or later.

We live in fascinating times, dear LeGrande! Thank you so much for writing!

[Alamo-Girl]

Life is a structure of molecules that consumes metabolic energy to maintain and replicate its own structures.

That is a description of what life looks like, but it doesn't answer what life v. non-life/death in nature "is."

Try it on yourself, try answering the question "Who are you?"

If you say, I am a man, then I reply, "but who are you?" and so on.

[Alamo-Girl]

Which perhaps accounts for the claim that biology need not be "rigorous" in the sense that physics is rigorous; i.e., can be conceptualized and expressed in mathematical language.

Truly, biology has had little interest in such questions. But the mathematicians and physicists will change the dynamics.

Thank you for sharing your insights, dearest sister in Christ!