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ORIGINAL: hellohellohi

gluadys,

Good point though:

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DNA can code for what amino acid is needed next in a protein, but it doesn't dictate the availability of right vs. left oriented amino acids. Rather, one will work and the other won't as the protein is constructed.

"If it works, it works." Some come out "left," some come out "right" but the unusable ones are trashed perhaps?

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ORIGINAL: hellohellohi

Okay, but what do they do in the ambient environment?

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Are they a matter of evolutionary indifference

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Also, are you aware of some of the hypotheses regarding prions?

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Hmm, I have a precise way to express one of the things I wonder about: Lamarckian evolution. If genetic inheritance and evolution can be viewed as the process of the code of an organism testing itself against the environment through the mechanism of relative reproductive advantage across successive generations, then there is obviously some point where "the rubber meets the road." Natural selection states that within a lifetime of an organism, there is only one direction in which genetic information can travel, from genes to expression. The feedback occurs only across successive generations. However, given that proteins may be capable of inducing changes in one another, might there be a possibility for a "back channel" or reversal of the typical flow of information within a given lifetime. Even if this back channel is not capable of directly changing DNA, perhaps it could resort to a process of "selecting" certain genes for mutation, that is, altering the surrounding structure of the DNA so that the nucleotides are relatively more exposed to mutagens. Certainly, the cell affords some protection to the DNA, and why couldn't the cell control the extent of this protection? Or perhaps certain gene sequences could be marked for deletion at the most convenient time, following a real-time feedback mechanism. What I am basing this on is that -- perhaps -- the information transcribed (wait, what is the technical term?) onto proteins is not "lost" due to subsequent changes in structure, but can be retranslated backward -- and the original "sense" of the DNA retrieved. That is, might protein folding represent an invertible function, to use the terms of mathematics?

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None of this has anything to do with the truth of the TOE or whether or not it is compatible with Creation, I suppose.

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Still, the question would remain, Why would God change anything that He made?

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Wouldn't He know what to do to get it right the first time?

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But, perhaps, the alternative is that not only did God commission us (through Adam) to name the animals and all objects of his Creation, but that He wished for us to name the processes as well?

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I suppose the real question is, What does God need with process?

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If God is infinitely Creative, why would He stop with Creation after six days? I don't question His wisdom in taking a day to rest, but might Creation still be unfolding?

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When God creates a caterpillar, isn't His glory only compounded when it is seen to later change? If the TOE leads one to believe that God may have started with the simple forms of life first -- would it be an insult to His glory that He didn't immediately jump to the complex? OR, in enabling us to investigate questions of process, isn't He only granting us a deeper understanding -- that is, with greater detail -- of His Creation and thus His glory.

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If the Universe could be said to have flashed into existence with the utterance of the Word, did it take an independent utterence for each object in the Universe? Why then did God commission US to name the animals rather than givin gus the words Himself. No, He gave us the Word; all other words were for us to create, as a commission granted to beings made in the Speaker of the Word's image. Thus, the process which was detail as occurring over six days in Genesis was for our understanding -- a constraint God placed on Himself, if one is inclined to think of it as a limitation to process. Similarly, as Jesus reminded us, the Sabbath was created for man rather than man for the Sabbath -- His rest on the seventh day was, therefore, an integral part of the process that is there to benefit us, and to heighten our appreciation of the glory of God. If it was out of a constraint of fatigue of God for Him that He rested, how then could Jesus say, the Sabbath was created for man? It would seem, alternatively, that the Sabbath is not only a requirement of nature, but God himself.

The six days, it seems, could be viewed as a commission to participate in reductionism. How can we understand God's creation of the Universe ex nihilo? Obviously, we can't. However, since we are made in His image, we are given to understand what we can -- the history and process of the mortal Universe it there for us to contemplate. If it was that God began with the creation of light -- then this was not out of necessity but rather to show that if we understand the basic elements of the universe, we can go on to understand the complex -- the animals, and even our own flesh. If the creation story is a narrative, it is because it has an internal logic to it -- the simple precedes the complex, even though ALL of creation was present in the mind of God at the moment that He breathed the Word -- and who's to say if not before then?

If we cannot understand beyond the scope of mortality, God still made us in His image, and I would suppose tha would include that we are granted the ability to understand our sphere -- that is, that the creation itself, though not the primary power that is Creation, is intelligible.


I know I am preaching to choir, gluadys, but perhaps others will read this.

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Still, the question would remain, Why would God change anything that He made?

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If the Universe could be said to have flashed into existence with the utterance of the Word, did it take an independent utterence for each object in the Universe? Why then did God commission US to name the animals rather than givin gus the words Himself.

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"objects" (including you and I)

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Then again, an "utterance" seems to be a concept which is predicated by notions of causality.

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It's deeper than that though: why would God create anything considering that the very act of creation is a change? Why change anything when everything is already perfect? How is it possible for God to act to create without desire to act? Yet how is is possible for God to desire when everything is perfect?

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ORIGINAL: Jhud
Of course, and why evolution would produce a less efficient and less prolific organism than the one that proceeded it would seem to be one of those things evolution isn't very good at explaining.

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ORIGINAL: hellohellohi

It is perhaps strange to realize, but evolution and natural selection really do not have efficiency as a criteria.

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If, eventually, the ecosystem is wrecked by such organisms, then you will have quite a die off.

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but my beliefs are probably not founded on a consistent rational basis or system, but rather paradox. I don't really think I know what I am talking about.

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I don't think actions need to be backed by desires though.

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I would not call people objects; why do you? And I would not claim a priori that "utterance" is a factor of a cause. After all, the universe is not apparently causal -- doubts have of course been raised by science itself.

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I sense that we may be headed for a funny philosophical debate

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Though, it would seem quite odd that genes that wanted to survive would produce kittens at all, when the most effective mechanisms of propagating genes is a bacterium.

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I accept what you say about causality and science but what is your position on this? Do you accept causality or not? And do you confine your acceptance or denial of causality to within this universe or this and "beyond?" It bothers me that when we talk about God creating ex nihilo by a simple utterance, that we are necessarily taking causality as a prior assumption and worse than that, applying this notion to some sort of realm "beyond" the universe. Essentially we end up speaking about the cause of causality which to me is illogical. Maybe you think (as I do) that the creation account including the fall of man is allegorical?

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My position is that God is a person, knowable only in the way that people are knowable. This can be seen, as you have begun to speak to, in the difference in the naming of things and the naming of people, or personalities. A "man" is a category of thing, surely, but Adam was a person, allegorical or textual or not. Etc.

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I don't think actions need to be backed by desires though.


If an action is not preceeded by a desire (or a 'will' if you like) to act, then isn't such an action mindless and essentially random? I don't think the result could be called 'designed' if that's the case. Now since the action we're talking about is the creation of the universe, I suspect many an atheist would agree with you on that very specific point.