Do you believe in evolution?

[injest]

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/04/080421-lizard-evolution.html

interesting study of a group of lizard introduced onto an island that in a few decades developed a new digestive tract and a bigger head.

[Brokeback_Dev]

I dont know if I buy totally into the whole evolution theory.  From a scientific point of view it is a very interesting concept.  Yet let us not forget, they still dont know how life began.  Nope no theory.  There is just the old primordal soup theory.  I'd have to get out my text book to explain, and if I must well....ok

[nakymaton]

Personally, I'm kind of skeptical about this whole "earth going around the sun" thing.

Gravity, too. It's only a theory.

[Brokeback_Dev]

Personally, I'm kind of skeptical about this whole "earth going around the sun" thing.

Gravity, too. It's only a theory.

Thats completely different and sarcastic.

[Brokeback_Dev]

and i guess you believe the earth is flat

[Brokeback_Dev]

Plants, animals and humans evolved.  No question there.  My experience has been that scientists have no way of knowing how life came into exsistence.  And im not saying I agree with Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden either.  Its just that there are no scientific facts as to how life began.

[nakymaton]

and i guess you believe the earth is flat

  Yep, you get the picture.

(Sorry about the sarcasm. There are a lot of people who don't believe that species develop from other species by means of mutations and natural selection - which is the subject of the study that Jess linked to. And the theory of evolution doesn't include the origin of life as a whole - just how it developed once it got started. A lot of people combine them - and worse, mix them with the origin of the Earth, which is probably better understood than the origin of life, but which isn't the result of evolution.

The theory of evolution is a theory in the scientific sense, meaning that it has successfully predicted a lot of stuff in disciplines as different as molecular biology and paleontology. The origin of life, on the other hand, is something that scientists throw out crazy ideas about, test them, and decide that they aren't that great, all the time. Very different.)

[delalluvia]

Plants, animals and humans evolved.  No question there.  My experience has been that scientists have no way of knowing how life came into exsistence.  And im not saying I agree with Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden either.  Its just that there are no scientific facts as to how life began.

Absolutely.  It's a fact and there is a multitude of proof and evidence everywhere in nature and in the literature.

Now, how life originated is a completely different field of study.  It's called abiogenesis, the study of how life on Earth emerged from non-life.  Personally I feel that in a few decades, maybe less, science will figure that out as well.

[Brokeback_Dev]

Absolutely.  It's a fact and there is a multitude of proof and evidence everywhere in nature and in the literature.

Now, how life originated is a completely different field of study.  It's called abiogenesis, the study of how life on Earth emerged from non-life.  Personally I feel that in a few decades, maybe less, science will figure that out as well.

Really del?  You believe scientists will have a theory about abiogenesis in a couple decades or less?  Its possible, but I dont believe that they will, and if they do come up with a theory I doubt they will have as much evidence to back it as they have with the theory of evolution.

[delalluvia]

Really del?  You believe scientists will have a theory about abiogenesis in a couple decades or less?  Its possible, but I dont believe that they will

Yep.

"Essential to the spontaneous origin of life was the availability of organic molecules as building blocks. The famous "prebiotic soup" experiment by Stanley Miller (Miller 1953, Miller-Urey experiment) had shown that amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, arose among other small organic molecules spontaneously in the lab by sparking a mixture of methane, hydrogen, ammonia and water."

You can do the above experiment in your kitchen and get the same results.  All you need is an electrical current to stimulate the mixture.

This is a good read on the subject:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/originoflife.html#synthesis

if they do come up with a theory I doubt they will have as much evidence to back it as they have with the theory of evolution

Well, it would depend on what you think is satisfactory for evidence.  If scientists could find the right combination of conditions and ingredients or whatnot and spark life (precursors to life), would you find that sufficient evidence?  Basically scientists would have proven that given XYZ in situation ABC you get LIFE.

But is that the way it really happened?

Scientists will never be able to say that's EXACTLY how it happened.

The best they will be able to say is "We've proved that given XYZABC you can get life (precursors to life) and earth had XYZABC at ancient point GG in time..."