tomcat wrote:
Whether or not you believe in God is up to you, but there is no statistical way that evolution can lead to a higher life form beyond the swimmers in a scum pond. There is too much complication that would have to be placed on hold, awaiting a new mutation before it could move forward to the next stage of complexity. To whit, the immune system and how red blood cells move through the capillaries. The sodium-potassium pump across cell membranes could not have evolved on its own--it's just not thermodynamically possible. The generation of spinal fluid at 0200 each morning interacting with the blood-brain barrier is not something that could have evolved on its own, awaiting a host to accept it and then move on to the next level of complexity. There are more biochemical scientists that believe in divine creation than any other scientific field and that's because we see and know things about life that no one else has a clue about; excepting some physicians (and most of them only had a semester course)....
Whether or not you believe in God is up to you, bu... (
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Evolution on earth has been going on for billions of years. Life started and stopped, and restarted any number of times under a number of conditions. One-, then multi-cell creatures lived, died, and the changes started at the DNA level. It took any number of protein, amino acid, and enzyme combinations to yield what eventually became life.
And nothing likely "stood by" waiting to happen. It happened simultaneously, along billions of combinations, some working some not. The surviving combinations resulted in advancement of life. The survival of creatures depended on their adaptability to the environment.
A planet some 8K miles in diameter has surface area so large, and considering most of it was covered with water, it should come as no surprise that life evolved both in oceans, swamps, probably even the relatively minuscule amount of dry land 3.5 billion years ago. Even eyesight developed and died a number of times before eyes finally came about and stayed. Some creature(s) had a genetic mutation which allowed light sensitivity, allowing it to survive.
No human can possibly understand just how evolution worked. And it's still happening today.
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The sodium-potassium pump across cell membranes could not have evolved on its own--it's just not thermodynamically possible.
And this proves divine intervention? We're only 400 years into the study of thermodynamic science, which didn't develop until James Watt invented the steam engine. And it's been technology advances which allow the sciences to develop. We're only around 100 years into the study of DNA, made possible by the invention of the X-ray. That's the blink of an eye in the 3.5 billion year evolution. The human genome wasn't decoded and mapped until 2003. That's today in evolutionary terms.
For instance, when people develop cancer, they're most often given chemical and/or radio therapy to fight the cancer. However, neither treatment is 100% effective because the DNA of the cancer cells mutates immediately, before it can be killed, not waiting to see if it can survive. It's one reason why cancer has a recurrence rate.
Then a cure for cancer, heart, Parkinson's, dementia/Alzheimer's diseases should just wait until there's a divine intervention? Scientists are actively looking at DNA alteration for cures, not waiting for some top down miracle from above. There is absolutely no scientific evidence for any type of "intelligent design".
Prayer and hope never have been, are not, and never will be operating plans. And just because some biochemical scientists believe in "God" doesn't make biochemistry a divine study.