Panspermia

[NotReady]

I'm not trying to start a new thread here - this is just for general reference on what I've called HAT (Hopeful Alien Theory). It's much older than I thought, like evolution it goes back to the ancient Greeks. It's called

panspermia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia)

and I don't really want to continue the debate on it. I first came across it when researching the application of probability to evolution, and especially abiogenesis. The book by Coppedge was my starting point, but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible. So I quit pursuing the probability question.

Again, this is just for information since in came up in another thread - this article is a good summary for anyone interested.

[hmkpoker]

We're all human, dude. If we have an emotional need to justify our beliefs to ourselves, we'll do it. This is not a valid argument against evolution.

[NotReady]

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This is not a valid argument against evolution.


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I didn't offer it that way. I just came across it and thought it was interesting. Maybe sometime I'll give it more attention, just wanted to post it for those interested.

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The book by Coppedge was my starting point, but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible. So I quit pursuing the probability question.

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So, the entire reason you studied this was to argue for God's existence? Do you see why this is futile? You should study these things so that you can understand what other smart people have learned about our universe. Not to prove that you aren't insane for believing in God. Or, to prove others are insane for not believing in God. Your agenda clouds your rationality.

[hmkpoker]

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The book by Coppedge was my starting point, but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible. So I quit pursuing the probability question.

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So, the entire reason you studied this was to argue for God's existence? Do you see why this is futile? You should study these things so that you can understand what other smart people have learned about our universe. Not to prove that you aren't insane for believing in God. Or, to prove others are insane for not believing in God. Your agenda clouds your rationality.

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Well, that or he wants to spread his beliefs, and honestly, I don't see any problem with that. I mean, I study Christianity with the intent of debunking it, and I doubt I'm the only one.

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but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible.

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Not realy. That life has been shaped by evolution for the last billion years or so is beyond dispute. How life began, or how heredity/replication began to be a stickler, is the question that panspermia seeks to answer. Even if life was planted on earth from somewhere else it still would have have evolved Darwinian style somewhere along the line.

[Trantor]

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I'm not trying to start a new thread here - this is just for general reference on what I've called HAT (Hopeful Alien Theory). It's much older than I thought, like evolution it goes back to the ancient Greeks. It's called

panspermia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panspermia)

and I don't really want to continue the debate on it. I first came across it when researching the application of probability to evolution, and especially abiogenesis. The book by Coppedge was my starting point, but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible. So I quit pursuing the probability question.

Again, this is just for information since in came up in another thread - this article is a good summary for anyone interested.

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A good example of a scientific theory that is open to investigation and validation. In contrast to God made us a we are 5000 years ago rot.

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The book by Coppedge was my starting point, but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible. So I quit pursuing the probability question.

[/ QUOTE ]

So, the entire reason you studied this was to argue for God's existence? Do you see why this is futile? You should study these things so that you can understand what other smart people have learned about our universe. Not to prove that you aren't insane for believing in God. Or, to prove others are insane for not believing in God. Your agenda clouds your rationality.

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Well, that or he wants to spread his beliefs, and honestly, I don't see any problem with that. I mean, I study Christianity with the intent of debunking it, and I doubt I'm the only one.

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Your agenda clouds your rationality. That was the point. He was studying probability of abiogensis to somehow show that it's too improbable for God not to exist. That's just a bit different that studying Christianity to see if IT is credible.

[NotReady]

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Your agenda clouds your rationality.


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We all have an agenda. I try to make the case regardless and judge the opposite the same way.

[NotReady]

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A good example of a scientific theory that is open to investigation and validation. In contrast to God made us a we are 5000 years ago rot


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Panspermia is science and ID isn't. Um, ok.

[hmkpoker]

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A good example of a scientific theory that is open to investigation and validation. In contrast to God made us a we are 5000 years ago rot


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Panspermia is science and ID isn't. Um, ok.

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If I may steer this in a different direction, is ID falsifiable?

[garion888]

I have to agree with Not Ready here. I don't see what the possible predictions of panspermia are. Did anyone else read a prediction in that article? While this may be falsifiable, it kind of falls into the useless bin just like ID does.

[NotReady]

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If I may steer this in a different direction, is ID falsifiable?


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We're discussing this in the thread "The argument that convinced me etc". My position is that falsifiability is a slippery concept and often used to exclude discussion. It can be phrased by either side to obtain the results desired. I think there are elements in both evolution and ID that can be falsifiable and elements that can't. I haven't read the inventor of the concept, Popper, but I understand he abandoned it as a touchstone for the definition of science. In the end it just begs the question. The real and only question is how well do the facts fit a given theory, and if they don't, then what needs to be changed about the theory. Isn't that what science does?

[hmkpoker]

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If I may steer this in a different direction, is ID falsifiable?


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We're discussing this in the thread "The argument that convinced me etc". My position is that falsifiability is a slippery concept and often used to exclude discussion. It can be phrased by either side to obtain the results desired. I think there are elements in both evolution and ID that can be falsifiable and elements that can't. I haven't read the inventor of the concept, Popper, but I understand he abandoned it as a touchstone for the definition of science. In the end it just begs the question. The real and only question is how well do the facts fit a given theory, and if they don't, then what needs to be changed about the theory. Isn't that what science does?

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I think it's the other way around; they gather the empirical facts, then a theory emerges from them.

[UncleSalty]

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If I may steer this in a different direction, is ID falsifiable?

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Sure! God could come down and tell us how it REALLY happened!

[DougShrapnel]

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Panspermia is science fiction and ID is historical fiction.

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FYP

[Trantor]

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I have to agree with Not Ready here. I don't see what the possible predictions of panspermia are. Did anyone else read a prediction in that article? While this may be falsifiable, it kind of falls into the useless bin just like ID does.

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Panspermia is quite claerly a scientific theory. http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/9909013

I haven't looked into it but one possible prediction of panspermia, I would tentatively suggest, is that complex molecules having the same bases as life on earth's RNA/DNA will be found in the vicinity of our solar sytem.

[Trantor]

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The book by Coppedge was my starting point, but after pursing the idea for awhile I came across panspermia and realized atheists have an out even if evolution on earth were shown to be statistically impossible.

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Evolution and atheism are independent concepts. If evolutionary theory were ever surplanted it would not mean the rug had been pulled away from under the feet of atheists. An "out" wouldn't be needed. Atheists were around a long time before Darwin etc were on the scene!

[NotReady]

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Atheists were around a long time before Darwin etc were on the scene!


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Darwin wasn't the first evolutionist. It goes back to the Greeks at least. Darwin was the first popularizer to offer a scientific explanation.

[garion888]

I sit corrected, there is a prediction...

[Sifmole]

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A good example of a scientific theory that is open to investigation and validation. In contrast to God made us a we are 5000 years ago rot


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Panspermia is science and ID isn't. Um, ok.

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If I may steer this in a different direction, is ID falsifiable?

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Is Evolutionary Theory falsifiable? This is the main problem with these discussions. Vehement ET believers are quite often vehement christians-are-idiots believers as well; and the ET vs ID discussion becomes nothing more than a thinly veiled attempt for Atheists and Christians to attack each other's core beliefs.

Can one of the vehement ET people explain why ET gets lets go on the following points:
1) There is zero PROOF of any occurance of evolution ( lots of pieced together observations and remains around which a story has been built yet -- but no hard PROOF )

2) That ET would seem to predict ongoing unaided evolution, which has not been observed ( natural selection != evolution ), yet all the ET has to say is "the time frame is too short" -- this avoids falsiability.

3) ET so far appears untestable.

Please responses, other than " you fool you are wrong " are desired, such as actual references to cases testing the falsifiability of ET would be appreciated.

Obviously ID fails on all these counts which is why ETs ridicule it.