Subby - You won't get as many bites unless this was in the Politics tab.

The article mentions the oxygen breathing bacteria. I thought there were multiple species of bacteria which do not require oxygen and can survive in amazingly hot environments, and the article was specific to just oxygen breathing bacteria related dates. It said nothing about the first life which was likely much earlier, another misleading part of the headline.

Bucky Katt: Heretics! Everyone knows it was never 6000. It's established fact that the earth was created on Sunday 23 October 4004 BC.

Is that on the Gregorian or Julian calendar?

Ishkur: h goody. I haven't seen Bevets in awhile.

I'm ready for another evolution thread.

Let's battle.

I could probably write a program that randomly quote mines scientists that would be all but indistinguishable from Bevets. I guess it's progress that creationism is so well debunked here that the only person defending it probably couldn't pass a Turing tests. I only wish the numbers here reflected society in general though.

Ishkur: Oh goody. I haven't seen Bevets in awhile.

I'm ready for another evolution thread.

Let's battle.

Oh goody just can't wait for what quotes he's going use to cut and paste in this here thread.

Ishkur: Oh goody. I haven't seen Bevets in awhile.

I'm ready for another evolution thread.

Let's battle.

Let's try something new: let's all ignore Steve. I don't mean everyone should put him on ignore, just that no one should respond to him. Ever again. He will never change his mind and anyone so mind-numbingly stupid as to beleive him deserves to wallow in ignorance and superstition.

Please, let's move on. Let's evolve the discussion. Let's leave the intellectual deadweight behind.

Freschel: Ishkur: Oh goody. I haven't seen Bevets in awhile.

I'm ready for another evolution thread.

Let's battle.

Oh goody just can't wait for what quotes he's going use to cut and paste in this here thread.

Since the headline is about the origin of life I'll guess the "science is atheistic and can therefore only come to one conclusion about the origin of life, but that's wrong because it's not God".

. . . and Mt Dew is the best soda ever . . .

Sausage and cheese pizza was the earliest life on earth?

Gwyrddu: Bucky Katt: Heretics! Everyone knows it was never 6000. It's established fact that the earth was created on Sunday 23 October 4004 BC.

Is that on the Gregorian or Julian calendar?

And how did those people know that their lord and savior would be born about 3,980 years after they died?

Well I'm glad we settled that. Happy now Darwinists?

"This profound shift in weathering regimes beginning (2.48 billion years ago) constitutes the earliest known geochemical evidence" for oxygen-breathing, acid-tolerant microbes living on land, the Nature study states.

Somewhere, Timothy Leary is smiling.
/We could learn a lot from our earliest ancestors.

Here's a tip, guys: When you say "an estimated 2.48 BILLION" years ago, nobody really cares too much about a hundred million difference. If you were attempting to retain employment instead of trying to impress the government enough to get another grant, you'd have just written it off as a rounding error.

Bucky Katt: Heretics! Everyone knows it was never 6000. It's established fact that the earth was created on Sunday 23 October 4004 BC.

So...how many years ago do you think "4004 BC" was?

Monkeyfark Ridiculous: Bucky Katt: Heretics! Everyone knows it was never 6000. It's established fact that the earth was created on Sunday 23 October 4004 BC.

So...how many years ago do you think "4004 BC" was?

6015, what's my prize.

btw...Happy Birthday Earth!!!1!

EnviroDude: /if you want to have fun, have an evolutionist tell us how the materials that formed life got here.

Quantum vacuum fluctuations. Now that we've solved that, here's Billy Joel.

6027 years?

Meh. I have socks that are older than that.

EnviroDude: gilgigamesh: Um, no.

100 billion years is a long time from our perspective, but not from the perspective of deep time.

We're talking about pushing the clock back from 3.27 billion years to 3.28 billion years, not smashing the clock and replacing it with Jesus.

Several assumptions that can never be proven and circular reasoning.

/if you want to have fun, have an evolutionist tell us how the materials that formed life got here. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with evolution (or God), but that it doesn't matter.

The irony is that in evolution and the start of life, you wouldn't have to rely on a goldilock's planet for it to happen on. In evolution, Mars should be a thriving planet.

Yet it isn't.

/sad day for the evos

If you want to have fun, ask a person who believes in God where God came from. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with his existence, they will also tell you that it doesn't matter.

gilgigamesh: EnviroDude: Several assumptions that can never be proven and circular reasoning.

That isn't a sentence. What are you talking about? What assumptions, specifically?

EnviroDude:/if you want to have fun, have an evolutionist tell us how the materials that formed life got here. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with evolution (or God), but that it doesn't matter.

No, what they'll tell you is that the theory of evolution doesn't describe origins of life or the materials of life. It describes speciation. Other theories describe those things.

Where did the materials that form life come from? Stellar explosions. Complex chemicals that form the building blocks of life form in the bellies of stars that go boom. We know this because we can detect those chemical signatures in spectroscopic analysis of existing stars and in supernovae.

EnviroDude:The irony is that in evolution and the start of life, you wouldn't have to rely on a goldilock's planet for it to happen on. In evolution, Mars should be a thriving planet.

What? Mars is freeze dried and has very little atmosphere. It probably had more of an atmosphere at some point billions of years ago, but Mars' fate is far more likely than the stable explosion of life that occurred on earth.

And incidentally, Mars may well have subterranean microbes. I would guess it probably does. What happens to your belief then? Why would God create life on two planets, one that thrives and one that does nothing but wiggle under the sand for billions of years?

OBVIOUSLY HE WOULD DO THAT TO TEST OUR FAITH AND AS A JOKE, OR SOMETHING.

dustlesswalnut: EnviroDude: /if you want to have fun, have an evolutionist tell us how the materials that formed life got here. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with evolution (or God), but that it doesn't matter.

If you want to have fun, ask a person who believes in God where God came from. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with his existence, they will also tell you that it doesn't matter.

Actually, it's no mystery how the materials that formed life got here, it's astrobiology. What science doesn't have an answer to is "what made the Big Bang", but that's okay.

Side note, evolutionary theory actually dictates that Mars shouldn't be a thriving planet, though it's got more to do with how lively our star is, how (geologically) dead Mars is, and monkeys on typewriters.

rev. dave: Subby - You won't get as many bites unless this was in the Politics tab.

The article mentions the oxygen breathing bacteria. I thought there were multiple species of bacteria which do not require oxygen and can survive in amazingly hot environments, and the article was specific to just oxygen breathing bacteria related dates. It said nothing about the first life which was likely much earlier, another misleading part of the headline.

Politics has infected all tabs since the loss of the Music tab.

I wonder why.

Happy birthday oxygenated life forms.

dustlesswalnut: If you want to have fun, ask a person who believes in God where God came from. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with his existence, they will also tell you that it doesn't matter.

Isn't "TAA-DAAH!" good enough for you whipper-snappers anymore?

dustlesswalnut: EnviroDude: gilgigamesh: Um, no.

.....

If you want to have fun, ask a person who believes in God where God came from. Not only will they tell you that it has nothing to do with his existence, they will also tell you that it doesn't matter.

I like the belief of some of the deeper thinkers on the subject, who reject "deity" but who hold a belief in a higher reality. "God" (for lack of a better term) pre-exists time or exists outside of time because It is the eternal ground of being. Time and other dimensions were created in the condensation after the Big Bang. So, if it's the foundation of reality, why call it God? Maybe, because, in some of these minds, It is conscious and creative. Or maybe, It's what the Universe looks like when you strip away the sensory and conceptual limitations.

Maybe God will be found in the lab and not the church, after all.

starsrift: Actually, it's no mystery how the materials that formed life got here, it's astrobiology. What science doesn't have an answer to is "what made the Big Bang", but that's okay.

Side note, evolutionary theory actually dictates that Mars shouldn't be a thriving planet, though it's got more to do with how lively our star is, how (geologically) dead Mars is, and monkeys on typewriters.

I completely understand that, I was just showing that non-believers can make false, unsupported statements about the beliefs of people that think differently from them, too.

Skeptimystic: Maybe God will be found in the lab and not the church, after all.

When I'm arguing against the existence of a deity, I'm really arguing against the metaphysical and afterlife implications of religion. Of course everything came from something, and at some point we'll figure out that there's some general force that is what drives every other force and is responsible for everything, but it sure as hell isn't going to be some bearded white dude that has a strong opinion about the location of the tip of my penis when it ejaculates.

For some reason your comment made me think of this:

Monk #1: A member of our brotherhood sits at these controls every hour of every day, scanning the heavens for God.
Leela: How long have you been at it?
Monk #1: 700 years. We've not yet examined one-ten-millionth of the sky. But we will go on until we find the Almighty, even if it takes till the end of time.
Fry: And then what?
Monk #1: Then we utter unto him a short prayer. You see, the telescope is also an amplifying transmitter.
Leela: Sort of like a giant karaoke machine?
Monk #1: Not really. Would you like to see our giant karaoke machine?
Leela: Not really.
Fry: Hmm. Finding God. That-That's important, yeah. But you know what might be a treat for everyone? If you let me use the telescope to find my lost friend, Bender.
Monk #1: I-I don't know what to say... other than: absolutely not! Your loss is a tragedy, but our work--
Fry: Oh, come on! You have forever to look for God! All I'm asking is one measly lifetime to find my friend!
Monk #2: He speaks out of love for his friend. Perhaps that love in his heart is God.
Monk #1: Oh, how convenient! A theory about God that doesn't require looking through a telescope. Get back to work!

Ishkur: Actually, they'll tell you that God is eternal and didn't come from anywhere -- he's always existed -- and that is a perfectly acceptable, closed answer to them.

You're right that that's the answer they would use. Of course if saying something is eternal excuses one from explaining why something exists, then the same logic can be used on the universe. After all, the universe actually existed before the big bang, just in another form. Thus, since the universe has always existed, there is no reason to explain why the universe exists, after all it has always been here.

dustlesswalnut: Skeptimystic: Maybe God will be found in the lab and not the church, after all.

.....

Monk #1: Oh, how convenient! A theory about God that doesn't require looking through a telescope. Get back to work!


Mirth!