On the origin of life

Howdy all.Got a slightly tricky one here. I've been asked to explain "the origin of life" by a member of a discussion forum (not from here) and the article that's been posted in support of the Intelligent creation of life is this link here.Origin of life - creation.comI have my own views, being a scientists of course- but others may have theirs. What flaws might be found in that article?

Howdy AdminPhat,I'm definitely on the side of a naturalistic view of the creation of life; I don't feel that any supernatural intervention is required to explain the origins of life on Earth. Obviously, others may have a different view."Origins of Life" perhaps?

Haha, that's a very good pickup Pressie. I'd completely forgotten that I'd filled that section out so many years ago. Must be getting old...But anyway- yes, I'm a stonemason but I also possess a degree in Applied Physics. A strange dichotomy to be sure but there you go. It takes all sorts to run a world, as they say.Many thanks for the responses so far- absolutely brilliant. I'll put up a post or two tomorrow, but off to bed now- I'm in Australia and it's just on 9pm. Night all

Far out.It's sad to see that you post an honest question and this is the kind of response I get; suffice to say Pressie that I'll not be bothering to respond to any of your posts in the future. PS- the derogative term you're looking for is "Seppo".This is the forum link in question:http://hotcopper.com.au/...ion-rather-than-evolution.2830412It's an investment forum I'm a member of; a question was posed which was outside the scope of that forum so I thought I'd turn it over to the members here as EVC forums are (IMO) the best place on the web for this type of discussion.Now- if you really want to know. I have my degree in Applied Physics but I haven't worked in a lab for quite some time. I'm now helping out my brother in his stonemasonry business- he needs people, I can do the work and (oddly enough) it pays better. I haven't been here for two days as I've been taking care of my kids while my wife attends court due to the mistreatment of my two daughters by my father-in-law.Hope you're real proud of yourself.Mods- unless there's any valid reason, I think it's best that this thread now be closed due to this unwarranted and disgusting attack upon myself.

Well, I'm back. Apologies to all the posters here for my tardiness; it's been a particularly rough week here and I'd much rather put it behind me.Now- to begin with just one aspect of that website. I didn't read the whole thing...I think my eyes glazed over as so much of it was just a rehash of arguments I first heard twenty years ago- and they were probably old then. But what caught my eye initially was the section containing calculations for the probability of life forming. In my view, just because something is "improbable" doesn't mean it's "impossible". I'll try to illustrate with an example.Where I live (Victoria) registration plates on cars are numbered like this:LETTER-LETTER-LETTER-NUMBER-NUMBER-NUMBER- so you could have (for example) an rego plate of ABC-123 or FTH-677. That gives approximately 17,576,000 different unique plates for the cars here. So, if I take a quick walk down my street and I go past ten cars, what is the probability that the ten cars have the plate combinations that I actually see? I work it out to this number:1 chance in 2.81x10^69(but correct me if I've got this wrong!)Now, you'd say that's impossible. Just by going thorough the calculations- and yet it happened. And if I go for another walk tomorrow, that nigh-on-impossible figure will appear again with absolute 100% certainty. That's how I see it anyway, in that something can be almost impossible and absolutely certain at the same time.Thoughts?

Yep- that's if you have a brand-new car Theodoric. But there's not too many of those around just yet- so most cars here still use the ABC-123 scheme.Of course, it's still not completely cut-and-dried. Victorian government cars will start with an "M" whereas Federal government cars have a special "Z" plate. Hire cars will be a "VHA" etc. My two cars start with a "W" and a "Y".Edited by Lomu, : Spelling