Patheos

BuddhistCatholicContemplativeEvangelicalGeneral ChristianHinduJewishLatter-day SaintMuslimNew VisionsProgressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Patheos

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos Patheos on Facebook Patheos on YouTube

danpeterson

“Nature is skewed toward life.”

Last updated on: April 18, 2018 at 7:04 pm   by Dan Peterson

“Nature is skewed toward life.” 2018-04-18T19:04:44-06:00 Dan Peterson

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

 

Nick Allen does MIT from above

An aerial view of the East Campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Charles River, facing Back Bay and central Boston. The Harvard Bridge is at the bottom right.
(Wikimedia Commons public domain photo by Nick Allen)

 

Gerald L. Schroeder earned B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D. degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in nuclear physics and in earth and planetary sciences.  An American and an Orthodox Jew, he now lives in Jerusalem.  Here are a couple of passages from pages 44-45 of his book God According to God: A Scientist Discovers We’ve Been Wrong About God All Along (New York: HarperOne, 2009):

 

Strings of proteins vary in length from a few hundred to a few thousand amino acids.  Consider a relatively short protein, such as one 200 amino acids long.  into each of the 200 spaces along the protein any one of the 20 amino acids found in life can fall.  That means the total number of possible combinations is 20 times 20 times 20 repeated 200 times.  The result is 20 to the power of 200, or ten to the power of 260 (10260), a one with 260 zeros after it, or a billion billion billion repeated 29 times.  From this vast biological grab bag of options, we are told that nature, by random chance mutations, has been able to form the few hundred thousand proteins useful to earthly life and upon which nature could exert its selective pressures.

Let us assume that the entire hydrosphere, all of the approximately 1.4 x 1021 liters of water in all the oceans and icebergs and lakes on earth, was imbibed in biological cells each weighing a billionth of a gram.  We would have had 1033 cells reproducing, mutating, actively moving this grand process of evolution.  If each cell divided each and every second since the appearance of liquid water on earth some four billion years ago, the total number of mutations, or stated another way, the number of evolutionary trials, would be 1050.  Although vast, this number pales when compared with the 10260 potential failing options for a single protein.  Hitting upon the useful combinations did not, and could not, and will not happen by chance. . . .

Clearly there must be other factors that limit the types of mutations that can occur.  There are, but not as randomly as materialist biologists would have it.  And that is the entire point.  Nature is  skewed toward life.

 

***

 

And now for some science news:

 

“Diamonds in Sudan meteorite ‘are remnants of lost planet’:  Scientists say rock fragments that hit the Earth in 2008 contain evidence of a lost planet that was part of the early solar system”

 

“No One Knows How Long the U.S. Coastline Is”

 

“‘Nuclear geyser’ may be origin of life: The perfect for conditions for life – including a handy power source – may have been a natural nuclear reactor on the early Earth.”

 

 

Uncategorized

Previous Post



April 18, 2018

Another dishonest bit of anti-Islamic propaganda

Next Post



April 18, 2018 What about the recent attack on Syria?


Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 June 2026 May 2026 April 2026 March 2026 February 2026 January 2026 December 2025 November 2025 October 2025 September 2025 August 2025 July 2025 June 2025 May 2025 April 2025 March 2025 February 2025 January 2025 December 2024 November 2024 October 2024 September 2024 August 2024 July 2024 June 2024 May 2024 April 2024 March 2024 February 2024 January 2024 December 2023 November 2023 October 2023 September 2023 August 2023 July 2023 June 2023 May 2023 April 2023 March 2023 February 2023 January 2023 December 2022 November 2022 October 2022 September 2022 August 2022 July 2022 June 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 January 2022 December 2021 November 2021 October 2021 September 2021 August 2021 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 March 2014 August 2013 February 2012


Follow Us!

Follow Us on Facebook



TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

I brought my husband food and wine, preventing a massacre and later became a queen. Who am I?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Bathsheba Ahinoam Abigail Michal

Related posts from Sic et Non

Family

Walking through History

Sic et Non

Family

Learning more about a region of which I've...

Sic et Non

Family

From Serbia's "White City," Belgrade

Sic et Non

Family

Accounts of Premortality?

Sic et Non

TRENDING AT PATHEOS Latter-day Saint

Letters on Living the Faith by C.S. Lewis

Most of us met C.S. Lewis as a public intellectual. Mere Christianity....

When Halloween Unmasks Married Hearts

Written by Dr. David K. Ewen from Eternal Truth Bible College Behind...

Jesus Was Not an Aristotelian

Aristotle. He’s been called the father of logic, the father of the...

Methodist Central Hall and Westminster Abbey

Situated on the same square is Methodist Central Hall and Westminster Abbey. ...

57th Dove Awards Honor Dolly Parton, Crown New...

On gospel music’s biggest night, the 57th annual GMA Dove Awards honored...

The First Eucharistic Controversy: Christ’s Real Presence

For Catholics, the Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian...

view all Latter-day Saint blogs

Patheos on Facebook Patheos on YouTube

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Copyright 2008-2026, Patheos. All rights reserved.

Subscription Support Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In

Follow Patheos Patheos on Facebook Patheos on YouTube