ABC News - Christian Theologians Prepare for E.T.

[enslaved1]

Well, I think the probability would be much greater if you ditch the requirement that 'alien life' be of an intelligence greater than or equal to our own.

It is very recent still that we have the technology to find extrasolar planets, but it is still very limited and indirect. All the discovered planets, are gas giants (like Jupiter and bigger) AFAIK... detecting planets that would be earth-like is still beyond our technology. We still have no idea how common earth-like planets are, where life (as we know it anyways) could begin, and thrive.

The argument from probability that life could not form by natural processes but must have been created is sometimes acknowledged by evolutionists as a strong argument. The probability of the chance formation of a hypothetical functional ‘simple’ cell, given all the ingredients, is acknowledged to be worse than 1 in 1057800. This is a chance of 1 in a number with 57,800 zeros. It would take 11 full pages of magazine type to print this number. To try to put this in perspective, there are about 1080 (a number with 80 zeros) electrons in the universe. Even if every electron in our universe were another universe the same size as ours that would ‘only’ amount to 10160 electrons.

Cheating with Chance, Answers In Genesis emphasis mine

Yes, the source is biased, yes people will argue numbers all day long, but this way we have some actual numbers to argue over. :)

[LogansPapa]

But you don’t understand! The ID demands that we are unique!

(And I'm not talking about ‘Intelligent Design’, in case you were thinking that.);)

[wilbur]

Cheating with Chance, Answers In Genesis emphasis mine

Yes, the source is biased, yes people will argue numbers all day long, but this way we have some actual numbers to argue over. :)

Yea, source is biased, but its pretty easy to pick apart this argument from AiG. It is oft repeated in various different forms, such as the one 4jack alluded to on the first page in reference to proteins and their probability of forming.

There's not a lot of meat to their argument after reading it actually, but all these calculations generally assume a very complex starting point, such as a single cell, or even a strand of DNA, or a protein. They base the calculations on the assumptions that proteins, cells, DNA or whatever spontaneously formed in a single shot from a chance collision of all the right individual atoms or molecules at the same time. In other words, just poofing into existence out of thin air from a collection of free floating atoms. Kinda like saying the Mona Lisa is impossible, because if you toss buckets of paint at a canvas, you could never end up with anything that looks remotely like it :eek:

Those probabilities do in fact show that such a model is insufficient... but no one actually thinks that how it happened. We do know many organic molecules (amino acids, some components of rna/dna) can form naturally from inorganic material under the right conditions, but we don't know all the steps involved to get from those chemicals to the first replicators that would lead to RNA/DNA. Hence, we can't know the probability of life forming, since we don't actually even know what the first living thing was, though we have some good guesses.... it definitely wasnt anything as complex as a cell, or even DNA/RNA, and probably wouldn't even fit well our current definition of life.

So... we will have to be content with unsatisfied curiosity for a long time to come when it comes to figuring out if life in the universe is there, or probable/improbable.

[jinxmchue]

if the chance of life forming on a given planet is as small as .0000001%, it would be a statistical certainty that the universe has lots of it, at least by our standards.

Except, of course, that the chance is far, far worse than that. 1 in ten million? Add a few thousand more zeroes and you'd be closer to being accurate.

[jinxmchue]

Cheating with Chance, Answers In Genesis emphasis mine

Yes, the source is biased, yes people will argue numbers all day long, but this way we have some actual numbers to argue over. :)

If evolutionists thought they could get away with it, they'd claim the chance of life forming anywhere is 1:1.

[Troll]

If evolutionists thought they could get away with it, they'd claim the chance of life forming anywhere is 1:1.

Yes, thank goodness the 'creation scientists' are there to keep us all honest.

[Shannon]

Yes, thank goodness the 'creation scientists' are there to keep us all honest.

I'm in a particularly foul mood today. I'll leave the internet now before I get mean.

[LogansPapa]

I'm in a particularly foul mood today. I'll leave the internet now before I get mean.

And we’d only know that when we were enveloped by an eclipse.

Movie reference: Central Park scene in "Independence Day.":eek:

[wilbur]

Except, of course, that the chance is far, far worse than that. 1 in ten million? Add a few thousand more zeroes and you'd be closer to being accurate.

What particular hypothesis for the formation of life is invalidated by your calculations? Certainly any calculation has to be specific for the particular hypothesis.

See post #13, you will see why those calculations are irrelevant.

Maybe life forming is just that improbable... but we simply don't have enough information to even begin to know. You don't know what the probability is, Fred Hoyle didn't know, and nobody who has ever lived or is living knows. Evolutionist, creationist, or ID'ist... if they claim they know, they are lying or misinformed.

[IanMartins]

Looking forward to the debates on whether extraterrestrials are born with the original sin or not.