Hi Faith,
Since you weren't able to get into chat, let me respond to this message.
Faith writes:
Oh I got it, Percy. "Making things up" as in making an educated guess is how I read it, and one that is subject to all kinds of future adjustments and recalculations. So what's the big deal anyway?
I think this has been explained several times already, so I'll instead ask what it was about those explanations that you found unsatisfactory. Did you not believe us when we told you we don't know how abiogenesis happened? Do you think that probabilities can be calculated for unknown processes?
So it MUST happen once in trillions? Well, perhaps I do misunderstand probability then. Seems to me if something is astronomically unlikely that simply means it most likely didn't happen.
Well, we've already tried the lottery example, so this time lets try the "flip the coin" example.
What do you think the odds are that a coin flipped into the air and allowed to fall on a smooth flat surface would come to rest on its edge. One in a trillion? One in a trillion trillion? Whatever you think the odds are, that's what we'll go with, but for the sake of discussion, lets say you agree the odds are one in a trillion that the coin will come to rest on its edge.
Now you flip the coin 10 trillion times. What are the odds that the coin would have come to rest on its edge at least once? I won't bore you with the math, but the answer is 99.9955%. In other words, if you flip a coin enough times, it becomes a near certainty that an incredibly unlikley event will happen at least once.
Your history regarding information like this is to ignore it and never mention it in your replies, but I hope you don't ignore it this time. If you understand percentages then it is simple and straightforward. This isn't some kind of special evolution math, this is simple probability that everyone is taught in high school and college. And it doesn't matter whether your talking about coins or lotteries or radioactive decay or abiogenesis, it's the same math.
The problem is the jumping from that obvious point to the conclusion that therefore the probability is equal for any given source, whether abiogenesis or a Creator.
I don't think anyone concluded anything like this. About the closest anyone came is perhaps to imply that the probabilities are equally unknown. The point is that life was created. Life is here now, it wasn't always here, so therefore at some point life came to be. Whether it came to be through divine or natural processes is the issue.
To say that the fact that life exists makes abiogenesis a likely origin is begging the question the creationists are challenging with their probability estimates.
You're forgetting to mention this argument is made in a scientific context. All the evidence points to the fact that only natural processes are at work in the universe, and there is no evidence for supernatural processes of the sort hypothesized in the Bible.
Certainly. But if the odds are astronomically against the occurrence of abiogenesis, precisely this fact gives support to the argument for a Creator.
But just like the odds for the lottery are calculated for only a single ticket, the odds against abiogenesis are only for a given point in time. If it is a trillion to one odds against abiogenesis occurring in a particular place at a particular time, but there are a trillion trillion trillion places and times, then abiogenesis is virtually inevitable. But keep in mind that we can't really calculate precise probabilities for unknown processes. The probability discussion has to be considered hypothetical.
...by the same token you can't even say for sure that the creationists' calculations are wrong.
Sure I can. They can only be calculating probabilities for processes they're making up themselves, because no scientist working in the field of abiogenesis would claim we know how it happened. When you figure out how to calculate the probability of things unknown, let us know.
--Percy
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