Did God Invent Us, Or Did We Invent Him

[Instar]

I wouldn't categorize evolution as random. Evolution at the same time isn't a system with a finite number of states.
Random mutations can crop up in genetic information due to just pure chance, such as errors in copying DNA, but usually it occurs as DNA is mixed together in reproduction, or even when bacteria exchange bits of genetic material or absorb other bacteria's genetic material.
Strong genes will be generally selected for, at least in the wild, and those genes will perpetuate themselves until something changes. In some ways, it can be predicted, but it can surprise very quickly.

[Suicide Junkie]

Evolution is most definitely nonrandom.

Lots of random and semirandom changes are introduced via mutation and gene swapping.
The individuals with positive changes get copied because they survive to breed.
The individuals with detrimental changes get killed off.

If you take a random distribution of new individuals similar to your current population and then kill off the lowest 90%, the average goes up.

We are the top 0.0000...001% of our class, because we passed the survival exam and its brutal, bell curved marking scheme.

[gbrutt]

Too many posts to reply to them all at once. I will try to deal with some of the material. First of all, the author of Darwin's Black Box is Michael Behe. He is a Professor of Biochemistry at Lehigh University. Before you "debunk" his book, try reading it. He is far from ignorant. Instar, your example of coding is a good one. No matter what you say about complexity, there is a mind behind it, writing, entering, debugging the code. It did not arise of its own will. Your second paragraph also contains speculation, not facts. It takes far more faith for you to adhere to this than for a man to believe that God exists. The chemical reproduction also shows that under controlled conditions, man can manipulate materials to make responses. This is hardly creation.
Phoenix D, could you please explain your statement, "Evolution is not random." It isn't clear, unless you provide an example. Spontaneous generation, that is, starting with nothing, or non-life, and coming up with order, and life, does not work. You still need to start with something. Those who have tried to "recreate" a proto-earth, are using controlled conditions to simulate random patterns. That is hardly scientific, and it never has produced life, even when all of the materials were present and properly manipulated. You still need to begin with something being there or you will never get anything. Instar admits as much when he says, "given certain certain environmental factors, the precursors of life can be generated." Someone is doing the generating, for without manipulating these precursors, the experiment fails. Unfortunately, precursors of life and life are not the same. Klvino, makes an interesting comment when he says that, "the single greatest miracle in all of this universe and the next is that of random chance and the process of evolution." It is impossible to wholly rid ourselves of theological terms like miracle, even when we are trying in vain to be atheists. That's the way that we were made. Man is made in the image and likeness of God. It's the only thing which lends meaning and purpose to this life. If you really believe in microevolution, that all that exists arose from non-life and fell by random chance into the intricate order which we find on planet earth, that you and I are nothing more than a glorified ape, what ultimately, is the purpose of life as we know it? Even your debating this issue is meaningless, for you are nothing more than a random arrangement of molecules destined to rot in the grave. The Bible tells us that, "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." All that is is created by Him and owes its very being to Him. That's the real reason most men find the subject troubling to them. They don't like the fact that there is something greater than themselves and to which they are endebted for all that they have.
"The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God."
Psalm 14:1

[Azselendor]

SJ, your example of evolution being non random is an example of forced evolution where if artificially eliminating a large majority of the population, you improve the gene pool. However, there is a flaw in this. Bananas, believe it or not, will more than likely be extinct in all of our life times because humans have pretty much bred all genetic diveristy out of the modern banana. As a result, it can easily be wiped out if a banana-born disease manages to get free.

GBrutt, As for michael behe, his ideas about 'intelligent design' are with the rest, as the overwhelming majority in the scientific community reject it as baseless creationist pseudoscience trying to pass itself as hard science. His Book, Darwin's Black Box, reads like it's based on personal incredulity instead of an actual explanation for his examples. Indeed, a couple of them been used to actually disprove his ideas by his critics. lol

As for the designing of software, keep in mind that software evolution, while done by man, actually evolves not because of the efforts of the programmer, but that of the industry, the community, users, testers, need, and improvements. These are natural influences that influence the direction the programmer (IE force of program evolution) to improve and make new versions of a program, which may spin off into seperate programs that may or may not survive and then further evolve at the hands of yet more programmers and influences around it.

Take Any program, remove the users' and customers' needs. What do you have? A program without enough influenece for dramatic change that will, pretty much, not advance more than what it is. Why? Because the programmer, being the force of program evolution, does not have anyone buy and using his program, thus he is unable to continue to develop it.

Moving on, You are right, life didn't start from nothing. I more than likely started about 8 billion years ago when a red giant went supernova and left enough stellar material behind to create our star system 3.5 to 4 billion years later. Those materials, by random chance and good energy managed to come together and create the right conditions on earth for life and create the building blocks for life which took form in earth's primitive oceans billions of years ago. Computer driven recreations of protoearth enviroments will never yeild the correct responses, mainly because they are best-guess simulations.

Ask yourself what DNA is and then ask yourself what it is made of. Sugars, Amino Acids, etc. What are they made of? basic elements and all of these things exist, already in nature and can form on their own. Often, creationist argue that life had to start at one point. How can we be sure of that? For all we know, CNN might report evidence that many kinds of microbacterial life formed on earth, at different places, all around the same period. Simply, no one knows and no one will know until a proto-earth enviroment can be found.

Now you are assuming that someone is behind everything, someone pulling all the strings, not so. Does lightening have direction? No. It lands on chance and probilities. Then factors increase that chance or decrease it. And remember, Lightening can strike twice.

Now as for you twisting my words, don't. My statement was never about god or religion and the word 'miracle' is used for the purpose of stating the extreme possibility of life, not the fact someone did it. The way you twisted it around would be me saying you endorse free thinking because you uttered "Athiests" The fact is that creationism mythology
is not science and cannot ever compete with it.

Now if "god" did make us in his image, then I think his Xerox needed a serious toner replacement. He got a lot of stuff wrong. The human knees are not load bearing structures. Try standing at attention all day with your knees locked. Humans have some 3000 genetic diseases and faults bred into us alone!

The fact is the complexity of evolution is not complex at all. It only appears complex because it has aeons upon aeons of history behind it that we are yet to uncover.

The bible says the world was created one way, but every religion has different ways. Who's to say who is right and wrong. Hell, the egyptians claimed the unvierse sprung up from godly intercourse and endured because they kept up at it! Can you disprove the egyptian creationism? Greek? Hindu? Zulu? Native Americans? and so on.

You seem to think athiests and free thinkers have an issue with god, in reality most of us don't. As we don't believe in a god-figure or divine-lifeform, we cannot have an issue with it. We won't go to hell, because we don't believe in it thus we cannot go. We don't believe in satan or the devil, so clearly they can't influence us.

So really, how can a free thinker be endebted for all eternity to someone they don't believe even exists? At the risk of insulting all the religious folk and bring down their wrath on me with my next example, but "How many of us owe the toothfairy money for our babyteeth?"

Athiesm has been around since 300bce, if not earlier. I don't think we are going anywhere.

A man called Löffler who was burned in Bern in 1375 for confessing adherence to athiesm is reported to have taunted his executioners that they would not have enough wood to burn "Chance, which rules the world".

[Instar]

I'm afraid you missed the point of the software example. The process of evolutionary software does NOT involve any human input, besides the design of the algortithm, that is, setting the code up to evolve. The software itself creates several versions of a program, each with some randomly chosen changes, and then runs simulations to see which version of the program works best, and then combines the best ones to be members of the next generation.
To reiterate, there is absolutely NO human intervention beyond actually setting it up to evolve. Evolutionary software mimics the natural process, and even can create many novel and interesting solutions to problems.

[Phoenix-D]

Evolution is not random, Klvino [ORB]. It is mainly driven by natural selection; the organisms that aren't good at dealing with their current envioroment don't do as well as the organisms that are. Either they just breed more, they live longer, whatever.

Yes, you've got mutations and genetic drift in their too. And those are important, since they can seperate two otherwise identical populations into sub-species or species, given enough time. But natural selection does most of the 'work'.

GBrutt, see the above and also note that abiogenesis and evolution are two different topics. Evolution theory doesn't care how life got here- it just covers what happens when it did.

Abiogensis does rely on random processes to an extent, though, but you don't have to maniuplate anything. Give conditions much like the early earth and early components of life will form spontantiously. Given that its estimated it took several billion years to go from that to single-celled organisms to multi-celled organisms, its not surprising we haven't gotten any farther yet.

That's why research is still continung in that area. It gets really murky because the early life left very few traces; bacteria simply don't fossilize well, and just to make things complicated bacteria "species" are very flexible, given that many bacteria can eat DNA and sometimes instead of eating it use it in their own chromosome.

[Instar]

gbrutt, the Bible also says that God killed a guy for, well, spilling his seed on the ground. God also says in Malachi 2:3 that hes going to wipe poo on people's faces.
Skeptic's Annotated Bible has a ton of such inconsistencies (and yes, there is a Skeptic's Annotated Koran too).

[Azselendor]

You forgot the one for the Mormons too, Instar! lol

Pheonix-D, Natural Selection is one of several evolutionary processes Darwin proposed. Had the Indian Subcontinent not smashed into Asia, then our ancestors would have never had a practical reason to climb down from their trees. Off course, it did happen and the monsoon didn't go to africa any more thus changing the climate where our ancestors lived dramatically.

[gbrutt]

Perhaps they seem ridiculous, as they are lifted out of context without any backround or explanation. A tenent of basic Bible study is that, “A text without a context is a pretext.” The Bible is never meant to be taken as some pretty, sanitized look at what we want life to be. It is life and death and war and love. There are songs and psalms, history, battle accounts, science and every other imaginable detail that God wants us to know. That is why it resonates with such force. Lewis Sperry Chafer said this about the Bible, “It is not such a book as man would write if he could, because it condemns him, or could write if he would, because it surpasses him.” There are details in it that are disturbing and difficult to explain, but they are hardly ridiculous. Read the Scriptures yet again, my friend.

As to your comments on the issue of prebiological evolution, there is still too much- perhaps, maybe, kinda- in the pro-evolutionist posts to even pretend that it is rooted in science. The sticking point of this is the fact that there has never been a way for Darwinists to explain how life got started in the first place. It is one thing to say that this is what could have happened, given the right conditions. It is quite another to show that it did happen, let alone how it happened. That is precisely what evolution cannot do; prove any of its claims. The Miller-Urey experiment of the 50’s showed all too well the fact that even under controlled conditions, all you end up with is a dirty glass beaker, not life.

The software analogy doesn’t work, not because I do not understand programming, but because the analogy is faulty. Even if it is a simulation of evolution it is not evolution. First, because it is only a simulation of what someone thinks might have occurred, given the properly staged conditions. Second, evolution is at best a philosophy. In desperation, some cling to this old and unproven theory and look in vain for anything to support their hope of random order derived from nothingness. Lacking this, as all evolutionists do, they go to any and every concievable extreme to cling to their beloved “faith”. Such are men like Eldredge and his admission that, “We paleontologists have said that the history of life supports the story of gradual adaptive change, all the while really knowing that it does not.” Better still is Francis Crick and his “directional Pan-spermia” theory. He believed that aliens seeded our planet. Isn’t this the humanist equivalent of a miracle? At its worst it all smacks of a bizarre form of pseudo-religion, with all the trappings and none of the content.

Consider this for a moment. If what you and others believe is true, that we are nothing more than accidental groupings of molecules, what is the purpose to life? What ultimate meaning and reason do you have for your existence? Does your faith in nothingness and chance give you comfort at the end of the day? Does it lead you to strive for excellence in all that you do? That’s not the answer given in the Bible. Man is made in the image and likeness of God. Each and every man has great worth in God’s eyes. We can choose to ignore the truth, or look into it for ourselves and see if these things are not so. I leave you with the words of the Apostle Paul.

“Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:” Romans 1:19, 20

[Instar]

I tried my best to explain it, but I guess it wasn't good enough. You failed to understand, which is partly my fault, but I guess you didn't want to understand, either.
The evolutionary algorithm analogy IS relevant. Self-modifying programs can create concepts similar to what we see today: a diversity of life, natural selection, and so on. Of course, I'm just repeating myself.

"that we are nothing more than accidental groupings of molecules"
Accidental? Hardly, evolution can explain where we came from, and study into the first life forms can find that origin. Study of astrophysics tells us that everything seems to have come from the Big Bang.
"what is the purpose to life?"
Why must there be one?
"Better still is Francis Crick and his “directional Pan-spermia” theory"
His ideas are NOT representative of the whole. Just as I cannot judge you by the words of Anne Coulter ("Hang all liberals from lampposts" and "Forcibly convert muslims to christianity"). Anne Coulter is a horrible person (specifically, she is ethnocentric, racist, and suggesting mass homicide).
"Does your faith in nothingness"
Who said I have faith in nothingness? I have faith in myself, in science, and other things. I think you're just tossing an emotionally loaded and vague term around here.
"Does it lead you to strive for excellence in all that you do?"
In fact, yes. I strive to be the best person I can be, everyday.

You've had your turn.

The Christian faith is full of logical inconsistencies.
Christian dogma says that God is omniscient -- past, present, and future -- and omnipotent. This premise is core to the Christian faith.
Also, the Christian faith says that man has free will.
The premise that a supernatural being being omniscient, past, present, and future, automatically negates free will. You are not free to choose if someone has already charted your every thought and action. You cannot choose a different path. It has already been determined.

Christian dogma also states God is benevolent. It would seem that this supernatural deity isn't omnibenevolent, because it is well within this omnipotent deity's powers to prevent all suffering, and indeed, "save their souls." Given that you have no choice in the matter (no free will), human suffering and eventual trip to purgatory (for bad people) is all but determined. What kind being would arbitrarily condemn many individuals to eternal torment?
It would be like a child care facility sourrounded by stoves, with the children unable to stop themselves from getting burned.

The Christian faith has also divided the world many times. If God was so kind, he would not have let the various factions of Christian war against each other for so long. Christianity must not be his chosen church, because of its fractitious nature. Also, I hope you're willing to condemn at least 4/5 of the world's population to eternal suffering. How kind of God to let only the majority of Europeans and related groups only go to heaven.
"Each and every man has great worth in God’s eyes"
Unless you're a Muslim, Jew, Hindu, or Buddhist.

If the only way to get people to behave is through the promise of eternal paradise (heaven), that doesn't say much about humanity. In my opinion, people ought to be good, not for some reward, but because it is the wrong thing.

" I leave you with the words of the Apostle Paul."
If you keep quoting the Bible, I will start quoting the Qu'ran, or better yet, some crazy *** Wiccan stuff. Or maybe one of the many Christian cults. Or Satanists. Big whoop.