How "life" arose from non-living materials.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6QYDdgP9eg

Let's accept for the sake of argument only that
1) dna is a code
and
2) all codes we know of require a mind

To get to God, you still need to prove that because we are only thus far aware of codes that come from a mind that there aren't any codes that don't come from a mind.

In other words, (2) isn't really true because we know of DNA and, if it is a code, we don't know if it comes from a mind or not. So in order to say it must come from a mind we have to assume that which you are trying to prove, i.e., that ALL codes come from a mind.

Religious beliefs make claims that are scientific claims. Those claims can be subjected to scientific method. There are some religious beliefs that do not make scientific claims. Science can't answer those questions. But neither can religion.

Nature identifies and utilizes prime numbers without the use of a conscious mind.

If you define code as something that represents a plan, then crystals absolutely meet that requirement.

In fact, much of chemistry meets that requirement.

OP, you seemed genuinely curious at the onset of this thread. Now, it seems like your trying to convince (proselytize?) us.

Some of us are alright with no having a supernatural being to look after us. I don't need to seek out Aristotle or Shakespeare to tell me what to think. I don't need a holy text to tell me right from wrong. I don't need an afterlife to feel hope or happiness. And, I don't need pity for my soul with clogged arteries, or whatever you were trying to say with your analogy a few pages back.

I'm fine with you or anyone else holding religious beliefs that work for you. It doesn't offend or challenge my atheism for others to believe.

Your obsession with the beginning the end of life kind of takes away from all that is here right now. Right now you should be concerned with improving justice and life.

Anonymous wrote:

4. Therefore, if information is as described in information theory, it refutes the part about "That Mind is God". Sorry, I really didn't mean to do that. But there it is. Maybe the idea survives if you revise what you are thinking about regarding information.
5. But next, I think that even with an everyday understanding of information (semantics), we see it consumed to powerful effect without the presence of a mind. DNA is transcribed by transcription RNA to encode messenger RNA to encode proteins that do useful things. None of this requires a mind to operate. A crystal builds copies of itself by simple inorganic processes. Now you may believe that this took a creator, but you can't conclude that merely from seeing that a nonthinking process consumed information. And if that is tough, it is clear that nature produces information continuously. Wind blowing across the sand encodes ripples. Waves and the tide are the encoding of the moon's gravitational pull on the earth. And so on and so on.

This is a crucial distinction. You are confusing patterns and code.

Patterns (snowflakes, crystals, hurricanes, tornados, rivers, coastlines) occur in nature.

A code is “A system of signals used to represent letters or numbers in transmitting messages.” Examples of code include computer languages, English, Chinese, music, the base ten numbers system, and radio signals. Codes always involve a system of symbols that represent ideas or plans.

All codes contain patterns, but not all patterns contain codes. Naturally occurring patterns do not contain code.

Do you see the distinction?

Really? If a pattern matches a complex mathematical equation, how can it not be a code? If the pattern is used to develop other patterns how can it not be a code?

Fractal patterns exist in nature, they meet both tests.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP again, as promised:

From a discussion on the Infidels blog:


#1 The sequence of base pairs in DNA is a code.

#2 All codes that we know the origin of come from a mind.

#3 Therefore DNA came from a mind.


4 months and 500 some posts later, still standing.

PP, this is one way to show God exists by logical argument based on things observed in this world.

But as I said a long time ago, the intellect only informs the will. It cannot force it. That is why atheists and theists can look at the same evidence, and disagree on the conclusion.

Weird, given that PP rebutted this quite handily only a few posts ago. The fallacy here is actually quite obvious: using the word "code" begs the question. Let me know if you want me to elaborate.

Completely fatuous argument.

.

I do care. But I won't have the chance to post again for a while. In the meantime, please feel free to raise objections. Infidels were not able to disprove it over several months, but who knows? Maybe there is something new under the sun.

.


Actually, I have been accused of wasting precious time, time that could be spent in a bubble bath instead, and I share the same time limitations as other material beings. So rather than wait for the series of objections that is sure to come, allow me to point any open-minded DCUMers to a summary of the Infidels blog debate:

http://www.cosmicfingerprints.com/dna-atheists/.

This summary contains all of the objections and responses of the past several years. Of course, the first objection is that DNA is not a code.

I read the thread during a time of doubt. No one has ever believed because of an argument alone, so nonbelievers need not be afraid that faith will sneak up on them. But intellectual honesty is something believers and unbelievers can both benefit from. Enjoy!

Given that the poster you link to never bothers to link to the actual conversation it can be assumed he has no interest in intellectual honesty. I did come across this complete and total evisceration of his argument, though:

http://www.atheistpropaganda.com/2008/08/atheists-riddle-oh-no-im-so-scared.html

OP, I'm still waiting for you to answer my two riddles, which have more support than your fallacious DNA guy.

More here: http://www.atheistpropaganda.com/2009/06/atheists-riddle-revisited.html

One more:

1. Humans are a form of life.

2. All life evolved naturally; there is no process known to science by which a god could create life.

3. Therefore, humans evolved naturally.

If you can provide an empirical example of a form of life that was created by a process of a god (and can prove it), you've toppled my proof. All you need is one. (It would also be nice if you'd describe the process used. We're curious.)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP again, as promised:

From a discussion on the Infidels blog:


#1 The sequence of base pairs in DNA is a code.

#2 All codes that we know the origin of come from a mind.

#3 Therefore DNA came from a mind.


4 months and 500 some posts later, still standing.

PP, this is one way to show God exists by logical argument based on things observed in this world.

But as I said a long time ago, the intellect only informs the will. It cannot force it. That is why atheists and theists can look at the same evidence, and disagree on the conclusion.

Weird, given that PP rebutted this quite handily only a few posts ago. The fallacy here is actually quite obvious: using the word "code" begs the question. Let me know if you want me to elaborate.

Completely fatuous argument.

.

I do care. But I won't have the chance to post again for a while. In the meantime, please feel free to raise objections. Infidels were not able to disprove it over several months, but who knows? Maybe there is something new under the sun.

.


Actually, I have been accused of wasting precious time, time that could be spent in a bubble bath instead, and I share the same time limitations as other material beings. So rather than wait for the series of objections that is sure to come, allow me to point any open-minded DCUMers to a summary of the Infidels blog debate:

http://www.cosmicfingerprints.com/dna-atheists/.

This summary contains all of the objections and responses of the past several years. Of course, the first objection is that DNA is not a code.

I read the thread during a time of doubt. No one has ever believed because of an argument alone, so nonbelievers need not be afraid that faith will sneak up on them. But intellectual honesty is something believers and unbelievers can both benefit from. Enjoy!

Here's one for you:

1. Your god is a supernatural being; it is a spirit, with absolutely no evidence to support its existence, and a bigger problem of how it itself got created if it does indeed exist.

2. All supernatural beings are created by, and exist only in, human imaginations; there is no natural or supernatural process known to science which can create them or a place for them to exist.

3. Therefore your god was created by, and exists only in, human imaginations.

If you can provide an empirical example of a supernatural being which exists outside of the human imagination (and can prove it), you've toppled my proof. All you need is one.

4 months and 500 posts, and still standing!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP again, as promised:

From a discussion on the Infidels blog:


#1 The sequence of base pairs in DNA is a code.

#2 All codes that we know the origin of come from a mind.

#3 Therefore DNA came from a mind.


4 months and 500 some posts later, still standing.

PP, this is one way to show God exists by logical argument based on things observed in this world.

But as I said a long time ago, the intellect only informs the will. It cannot force it. That is why atheists and theists can look at the same evidence, and disagree on the conclusion.

Weird, given that PP rebutted this quite handily only a few posts ago. The fallacy here is actually quite obvious: using the word "code" begs the question. Let me know if you want me to elaborate.

Completely fatuous argument.

.

I do care. But I won't have the chance to post again for a while. In the meantime, please feel free to raise objections. Infidels were not able to disprove it over several months, but who knows? Maybe there is something new under the sun.

The arguments fallacious because it takes poetic license as one of its assumed premises. DNA is a "code". And a code is defined as something that an intelligence encodes with symbols to signify something to another intelligence.

Therefore, DNA is proof of an intelligent designer.

Only DNA is not a code. That's a convenient metaphor biologists use to explain it.

It's like the argument:

1) Life is a gift.
2) But a gift needs a "giver".
3) God is the giver.

Sorry, but it's a stupid argument. I actually found the home page of the guy making it, and there's a photo of him pointing his finger at a sign in a museum that says, "DNA is a code..."

DNA is a code in the same sense that the geological formation of mountains is code to tell trees where to grow. (How mountains are created then erode encodes the "tree-line".)

The fact that your author still hasn't managed to wrap his head around this simple critique after "4 months and 500 posts" is evidence of his supreme, irrational pig-headedness...nothing else.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP again, as promised:

From a discussion on the Infidels blog:


#1 The sequence of base pairs in DNA is a code.

#2 All codes that we know the origin of come from a mind.

#3 Therefore DNA came from a mind.


4 months and 500 some posts later, still standing.

PP, this is one way to show God exists by logical argument based on things observed in this world.

But as I said a long time ago, the intellect only informs the will. It cannot force it. That is why atheists and theists can look at the same evidence, and disagree on the conclusion.

Weird, given that PP rebutted this quite handily only a few posts ago. The fallacy here is actually quite obvious: using the word "code" begs the question. Let me know if you want me to elaborate.

Completely fatuous argument.

.

I do care. But I won't have the chance to post again for a while. In the meantime, please feel free to raise objections. Infidels were not able to disprove it over several months, but who knows? Maybe there is something new under the sun.

Anonymous wrote:OP again, as promised:

From a discussion on the Infidels blog:


#1 The sequence of base pairs in DNA is a code.

#2 All codes that we know the origin of come from a mind.

#3 Therefore DNA came from a mind.


4 months and 500 some posts later, still standing.

PP, this is one way to show God exists by logical argument based on things observed in this world.

But as I said a long time ago, the intellect only informs the will. It cannot force it. That is why atheists and theists can look at the same evidence, and disagree on the conclusion.

Weird, given that PP rebutted this quite handily only a few posts ago. The fallacy here is actually quite obvious: using the word "code" begs the question. Let me know if you want me to elaborate.

Completely fatuous argument.