Question:
The theory of evolution and the theory of the Big Bang. Possible?
1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
The theory of evolution and the theory of the Big Bang. Possible?
Ten answers:
?
2012-08-14 00:24:42 UTC
Your premise, "life can only come from other life" is not proven. Therefore the rest of your question is moot. I suggest that you stop reading creationist literature, and read some real science.



The study of how life started is called abiogenesis, and it is making significant progress in showing how life started with normal chemical processes. See the 1st link for the video, "The Origin of Life - Abiogenesis" by Dr. Jack Szostak, winner of the 2009 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. See also the 2nd link: Website of Dr. Jack Szostak.
?
2012-08-14 03:49:45 UTC
In addition to the other good answers ...think about something pretty straightforward like gravity. We all agree gravity exists.



And yet, we don't actually *know* how gravity works. Isaac Newton made a pretty good first attempt at describing gravity, and his theory got great support when it successfully predicted the location of Neptune, based on the orbit of Uranus. But problems still emerged; Newton's theory could not account for variations in the orbit of Mercury. As part of his Theory of General Relativity, Albert Einstein was able to explain perturbations in Mercury's orbit by treating gravity as a curvature in spacetime, rather than as a force. Okay, so now we know how gravity works ... except that General Relativity and Quantum Physics can't be made to agree on how gravity works. They both have theoretical and experimental support and appear to be "true" but cannot be reconciled. In Quantum physics, gravity is sometimes viewed as the actions of hypothetical particles called gravitons. Except that gravitons have never been observed, and won't work properly over very short distances (less than the Planck length). There are also experimental observations in the real world which contradict any of our understandings of gravity - for example the "flyby anomaly" of spacecraft, or the existence of super-massive hydrogen clouds in space.



Now someone could come along and say "Gravity is a myth; none of the scientific explanations work; things fall down because of the invisible hand of God pushing them down".



What would be the best response to a claim like that? Should we say "Yes you're right; after 300 years of trying we still can't explain gravity so we should accept that it is the invisible hand of God making stuff fall down"? Or should we say "Our knowledge of gravity is imperfect but getting better and better all the time; and even if there are gaps in our knowledge we've still used the theory of gravity to land astronauts on the Moon, put GPS satellites into space, land exploratory vehicles on Mars, and calculate the height of forthcoming ocean tides. In time, with more research we will work out the gaps in our understanding; so we're not quite ready to give up and adopt the "Invisible Hand" theory of the anti-Gravitationists"?



Today, we don't know exactly how Life arose from non-living matter. However, we now know a lot more about how Life works than we did 100, 50 or even 15 years ago. There are some promising hypotheses about the emergence of Life, and it is possible - even likely - that within another 50 or 100 years, we will know how Life began.



Meanwhile, it's really throwing the baby out with the bathwater, to reject the Big Bang and Evolution of Life, just because we haven't quite solved the issue of abiogenesis yet. The evidence for the Big Bang is overwhelming. The evidence for Evolution is also overwhelming. They cannot be dismissed as "completely out of the question", because of a guess that abiogenesis is impossible. If you can account for the same observational data with a different or better theory - that's great! But you can't reject the Big Bang and Evolution, including the observed data, just to replace them with an explanation based on mysticism.



For experiments and scientific evidence supporting abiogenesis, try the links below.



As an afterthought ... there's very strong evidence to show the Universe is around 13.7 billion years old. There's even stronger evidence to show that the Earth is 4.55 billion years old. We have found remains of living organisms on Earth stretching back around 3.5 billion years. There's enough evidence now that these can be accepted as "confirmed". If not for the Big Bang, and the (much, much later) formation of the Solar Earth and Earth, and the first appearance of Life on earth, then how *did* these things happen? And what was going on with Life, during that 3.499998 billion years on Earth, since Life first appeared but before humans appeared?



Hope it helps.
Samandriel
2012-08-14 00:24:20 UTC
"life can only come from other life" is an assumption based on your personal experiences. It doesn't mean that it's valid nor does it mean it's invalid. It is simply unknown whether it's true or not. I can understand why you might say it, but when you make claims of this being a "scientific law" you come off as someone who has no idea what they are talking about. Maybe you are, I don't know, but hopefully I can help you understand the world you live in a little more clearly in any case.



Evolution and the theories surrounding the big bang are not directed at what started life.



The basic idea underlying evolution is that things that are more capable of reproducing tend to reproduce more. That's it. It's a trivial concept, but it explains how species can evolve over time. It has NOTHING to do with how life actually started. It's staggering how many people don't realize that.



The basic idea underlying the big bang is that we currently see all the galaxies from ours speeding away from us at speeds proportional to how far away they are. Here is how you can understand why this implies a "big bang":



Take a balloon, blow it up a little bit, make a single dot on the balloon with a circle of dots surrounding it with a marker, then blow the balloon up some more.



When you do this you'll see that the dots have moved farther apart from the single dot after you blew more air into it. We believe this is the same underlying idea behind why we see all the other galaxies as receding from us, namely because the universe is expanding. If you run the expansion in reverse, you'd end up with space and time exploding out from a singularity where our current understanding of physics breaks down. Again, nothing to do with how life started nor even how the universe or the singularity were "created".



There are some random scientific-ish theories floating around as to how life started, but it is still an open question. There is no commonly accepted scientific theory on that topic, but that does not invalidate other scientific theories.



There is far more about this universe that remains unknown than there is that is known. Look at the world with your own eyes, and make your own decisions about what you choose to believe.
andymanec
2012-08-14 20:25:05 UTC
The problem here is that you've started off with an incorrect premise - that life can only come from life. It's true that *modern* life can only come from existing life, but that rule breaks down when you go far enough back into history. It's counterintuitive, but it starts to make sense when you understand two things: how life works, and what the early earth was like. When you look closely enough at life, we're really just chemical reactions. Granted, we're incredibly complex and well-regulated chemical reactions, and no scientist would ever argue that life isn't greater than the sum of its parts, but all of those parts can be described by chemistry. We haven't been able to surpass the technical hurdles of creating life de novo (yet), but there aren't any large pieces of the puzzle still missing.



You also need to understand what the early earth was like (we *do* have a good idea what the conditions were like). The seas were full of reactive chemicals, and they were warm, driving reaction rates even faster. In experiments that replicate those conditions, we've shown that the building blocks of life can form on their own. In other experiments, we've shown that those building blocks can form more and more complex structures. Those structures, like RNA strands, can self-replicate, and even possess enzymatic activity (meaning that proteins wouldn't have been required for the first primitive life).



So when you're looking at the origin of life, don't think of it as spontaneous generation. That's impossible - a pile of grain will never form mice. It was likely a much more gradual process - the complex chemical reactions in the early ocean becoming... slightly more complex chemical reactions. Gradually, they picked up the properties of life - so gradually that drawing a definitive line between "chemical reaction" and "true life" would have been difficult, and fairly arbitrary.



It seems like you don't really understand the big bang either... it says absolutely nothing about life. Contrary to popular belief, it doesn't explain where the universe came from, and if *definitely* does not say that "something exploded from nothing". It only explains during the first few instants after the universe formed. The big bang would be just as valid if it had produced a universe completely devoid of life (though we obviously wouldn't be here to formulate the theory).



From your question, it's obvious that you don't understand the big bang, nor do you understand evolution or abiogenesis (which, again, are two completely unrelated questions - evolution would happen just the same if life had come about naturally, had been engineered by aliens, or had been created by God). It sounds like you're hung up on your misunderstandings, though. What you've stated as scientific laws are actually nothing of the sort... but it's the sort of self-assured ignorance that will actually prevent you from learning. I recommend checking out the links below. Try to get a grasp of the underlying principles before you judge either theory - because what you're railing against are versions of theories that science doesn't actually support.
Freethinking Liberal
2012-08-14 01:33:44 UTC
Nether the theory of evolution or the theory of the Big Bang have anything to say about the creation of life. Read these:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_evolution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_bang



If you want to know about how living things started:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis



Your assertion that "life can only come from other life" and "...spontaneous generation of life (which is impossible)" are obviously wrong as there is life and it must have started somewhere. Now, if you are going to throw in religious and other supernatural answers, all this does is add a superfluous layer of explanation that does not add to understanding. e.g. if you are going to add god by saying he has always existed, then you might as well say that life elements have always existed. it is just as valid yet does not add a whole load new questions about which god?; where did he come from?; did he say this or that?. I could go on and on with all the questions - however, I hope you get the point.



As for what went before the big bang, as yet we are only at the formulation of hypothesis stage.
?
2012-08-14 00:59:40 UTC
got nothing to do with religion. Evolution started in Africa. we migrated. History Channel: Human Journey

Big bang? long before earth was habited by damn humans. this planet was very different from now, and still changing, but SLOWLY!
paul h
2012-08-14 11:36:40 UTC
Well there never has been an experiment which has shown that life forms can originate from non-living materials through any purely natural process which does seem to indicate logically that life must be the result of a non-natural origin...a Creator. There isn't even a viable, scientifically plausible process or mechanism for a natural origin of life ....a million dollar Origin of Life prize is open to anyone who can show how this is possible and no one has claimed it as yet...and never will. No one has ever been awarded a Nobel prize for showing how life can originate from non-life through purely natural means.



People claim that we are getting closer to an answer which shows that life can form through some purely natural process but there is no real indication that that is true. There are fundamental problems with creating ife from non-life via purely natural means that will never be overcome. We can't even recreate life from dead cells which have had life in them already.....all the parts which had life a moment ago are still there yet we cannot bring them back to life once they really die.



The informational code system known as DNA which is found in all life forms also requires a source of intelligence....such systems cannot form from material objects by pure random chance and natural processes. All informational systems can be traced back to a source of intelligence or sender. That is why the SETI program looks for life in outer space by searching for non-random signals....an informational code system. They known that such signals can only come from an intelligent source.



The origin of life has long been a perplexing mystery to people....where and how did life originate?....who or what created us? The early Greeks thought life forms could just spring forth from the earth ( they called Gaia) or flies could spring from rotting meat, etc...Even the Bible mentions that some early people incorrectly thought they originated from rocks or trees....a purely natural origin. Those ideas of biogenesis or life from non-life were disproved long ago by Pasteur and others. Yet the Bible answers the question of the origin of life forms...they were created by God during the Creation week around 6000 years ago...and only on Earth.



The Big Bang model and Evolution theory only claim to answer how the universe and life on Earth formed after they had begun yet both theories have serious flaws which even secular scientists admit to. Preserved tissues and DNA found in fossils indicate they cannot be millions of years old...nor the rocks which contain them... which falsifies all dating methods used to show the Earth is millions of years old.

http://www.icr.org/fresh-fossils/



30 Big Bang problems from a secular source...

http://www.metaresearch.org/cosmology/BB-top-30.asp



Origin of Life Prize..

http://www.us.net/life/



Or this prize....



"A millionaire scientist who once ran as a Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate has just launched a $50,000 prize to promote research on the origin of life. Yes, he has an ulterior motive: He hopes that researchers working on the question will eventually prove that life's origins can be fully explained by physical and chemical processes, without invoking a creator. "

http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2011/06/scientist-politician-atheist-off.html



If they are still offering prizes, that means they haven't found the answer yet , right?



DNA issues...why DNA indicates an intelligent Creator.



"Genetic information specialist Dr. Werner Gitt shows that coded information can only come from an intelligent source."

http://www.answersingenesis.org/media/video/ondemand/beginning-was-information/beginning-was-information

.



Why purely natural abiogenesis is impossible...

http://www.trueorigin.org/abio.asp
FlagMichael
2012-08-14 01:48:35 UTC
There are many theories of evolution, virtually all relying on what Charles Darwin called "a single bright thread" of primitive life.



Sadly, as we try to dig that deep we end up out of our depth. The various theories of the origin of life and the origin of the universe are Creationism. It does not matter a whit whether the theories rely on a divine being, the largest possible violation of the first law of thermodynamics, or chemical reactions nobody can even vaguely describe, it is all Creation by supernatural phenomena.



Any honest person who looks at current theories of abiogenesis has to laugh. We pretend we are getting close to the origin of life but we can't even restore life to a cell that dies from a known cause while we watch. When I was a kid in the 1960s it was seriously believed we were within a few years of creating life in a test tube and 15 years from producing power in controlled fusion reactors. Superstition is still mainstream.
Katie
2012-08-13 23:58:45 UTC
It's not possible. God created the earth and everything in it.
Dog Luva
2012-08-15 08:47:16 UTC
The 3 options of the origin of life.



1) There was a time when there was no life and no information/intelligence. These appeared on their own naturally, at some point. Advancement then occurred (on its own) to get where we are today.

2) God spontaneously came to be an infinite amount of time ago. He then created matter, energy, life, etc, and gave His creations information/intelligence.

3) The first Man on this earth (we’ll call him Adam) obtained life and intelligence from someone else (God), who obtained His life and intelligence from “his Father” (or another God, see Rev. 1:6 KJV), who obtained His life and intelligence from a God, etc to infinity. There never was a beginning. There never was a first. Information/intelligence and life have always been passed down from another.



Admittedly, we have not yet advanced enough to fully test out these hypotheses, but just because we cannot fully test an option does not mean we should throw it out. Also, we can extend the knowledge we do have and see which option has the best support at this current time.



Through scientific study and observation, it is true that we have observed the following: life only comes from life, information always comes from intelligence, and matter cannot be created nor destroyed. While many have theorized that life can come from non-life, information can come from something other than a higher intelligence, and matter can appear from nothing (or be created from nothing), so far, we have yet to ever observe these things occurring, and we have been unsuccessful in forcing their occurrence in a controlled environment.



These present facts do not mean (on their own) that option 1&2 cannot be true, rather they simply imply that option 3 is the only known option at present that does not violate the laws of nature we have so far observed to be true.



We can argue that option 1 could have occurred by saying that all the laws and conditions were different in the past, and we can argue that option 2 could have occurred by saying that God does not have to obey these laws, but if we wish to stay consistent with the current knowledge we have, regardless of being unable to fully prove option 3, it is the only one consistent with what we know, and unless or until our knowledge of these laws of nature completely change, if we wish to stand on anything but a hypothesis in violation of our current knowledge, we must stand upon option 3 no matter what prejudice we may have against it.


This content was originally posted on Y! Answers, a Q&A website that shut down in 2021.
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