by EdenOne 27 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
I have just read an interesting article by astrobiologist Jacob Haq-Misra.
In this article he describes a process called "Directed Panspermia" as a plausible way that one form of intelligent design - one NOT related with religious driven agendas involving theism - could be involved in the process by which life developed on Earth and possibly in other planets as well.
Sounds like a speculation that's worth entertaining. Your thoughts?
Only problem is that the entire Intelligent Design exercise is already - and always was - intended to be a "religious-driven agenda".
Only problem is that the entire Intelligent Design exercise is already - and always was - intended to be a "religious-driven agenda".
Not in this case. Have you read the article? The very assumption in which it rests is obviously at odds with the biblical account of creation.
I'm talking about the ID movement.
It was originally formulated by evangelicals with an agenda, and always intended to be "stealth evangelism" from the very beginning...
...which, IMO, irrevocably taints the concept right out of the starting gate.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2016/09/10/misra-intelligent/7F0TH4JUoCPDi97VzkSp0M/story.html
Modern science does offer a tenable theory of intelligent design, one that does not resort to religion or pseudoscience. When considering that humans were not far off from the technological ability to transport Earth-based life to other planets, astronomer Carl Sagan and his contemporaries hypothesized that extraterrestrial intelligent beings, if they exist, might try to do the same thing. From this speculation was born the concept that extraterrestrial intelligent designers are responsible for life on Earth.
Biologist Francis Crick is best remembered for his co-discovery of the double-helix structure of the DNA molecule, which subsequently unveiled the universal code of genetics that unifies all life on Earth. Crick expressed his puzzlement over why life used only one form of genetic code, based on only a subset of available amino acids. Crick, and biologists since, could imagine alternative genetic codes based on known amino acids that could have also arisen during the stages of life’s development. For most scientists, this suggested that the genetic code shared by all of life provided survival benefits that outcompeted any other developing forms of life.
But Crick took his speculations a step further and mused that the particular configuration of life’s genetic code might indicate the work of extraterrestrial designers. His attraction to this brand of intelligent design is based on a more general idea in astrobiology known as panspermia, which investigates the possibility that microbial life could be inadvertently transferred among planets through collisions with asteroids and meteoroids. Rocks from the moon and Mars are routinely discovered in barren places like Antarctica, and the turbulent environment of the early solar system could have led to an even greater exchange of material among the terrestrial planets. Many microorganisms are capable of surviving for long periods of time in extreme environments. which suggests that at least in principle, they could withstand a journey through space.
Scientific study of panspermia since the discovery of DNA has generally confirmed that this process could work. The greatest threat to the survival of a microorganism on an interplanetary trip is reaching the surface of the destination planet without burning up in the atmosphere. Careful computational studies have shown that large, dense asteroids or meteors could conceivably keep microorganisms protected through an extended journey. Other factors, such as protection from dangerous radiation in space, seem to complicate the problem but do not necessarily rule out the possibility that microbial life may have been carried from Earth to Mars, or vice versa.
A team of researchers in 1996 announced that a meteorite found in Antarctica, purported to have originated on Mars, showed features with some structural similarities to microorganisms on Earth. Most of the scientific community has remained skeptical that the meteorite offers evidence of past life on Mars, in part because the structures, while visible only with an electron microscope, are much bigger than the terrestrial microorganisms to which they’ve been compared. Still, the idea that such evidence of interplanetary panspermia could exist, and may yet be discovered, remains possible.
It's an interesting concept, reminds me of the book/movie 2001, a Space Odessy. The plot revolves around the idea that some extraterrestrial beings manipulated evolution to create humans.
But besides the fact that extraterrestrial life is highly speculative (as there is no evidence) you are still left with the problem of where did the extraterrestrial designers come from in the first place? Wouldn't they have had to evolve themselves? It doesn't really answer the question of where intelligent life came from.
But besides the fact that extraterrestrial life is highly speculative (as there is no evidence) you are still left with the problem of where did the extraterrestrial designers come from in the first place? Wouldn't they have had to evolve themselves? It doesn't really answer the question of where intelligent life came from.
True, it doesn't answer that question. But it might answer where OUR earthly life came from. And it would close the case for theism - at least on OUR planet with OUR religions and OUR 'holy books' :)
And since you mention Space Odyssey, it's more or less what's behind the plot of Carl Sagan's "Contact".
This sort of nonsense no doubt sells books and get's people speaking engagements but it's hardly real science and as others have pointed out is usually driven by a religious agenda.
It reminds me of simply trying to sweep dust into a pan, as you keep moving back the line of dust does too and you can never get it in.
Trying to explain how life began by claiming some other life must have brought it simply pushes the problem back ... so how did that life begin? Why is it beginning elsewhere, somehow getting into space, surviving a trip for millennia and also the entry into our atmosphere and impact somehow "more believable" as an explanation than the life suited for our environment developing in the environment.
You see the same crazy argument when it comes to even simpler things like "making fire". For some reason, some people believe that no one could ever have figured out or happened upon a way to make fire and that instead, some aliens must have come down and taught us.
So instead of simply needing a neanderthal capable of noticing something or accidentally discovering how to do it, you now need aliens and space flight and so on. Far less likely and ultimately not an explanation at all - because presumably, they needed to make fire at some point ... so who taught them?
Would anyone like to buy my book about the whole thing? ...
Science fiction, entertaining but still pseudo-science. It's the word "directed" that knocks it into fiction.
