Quote:Yeah, but the molecules are already there, they are just arranging themselves randomly over time.  An amino acid isn't created or destroyed, it's formed with the atoms that are already in existence in nature.  Each element, at the atomic level (besides the noble ones) have a propensity to either gain or lose an electron to bond with other atoms.  Over time, these random combinations can "evolve" into biologically beneficial acids that can then, over time, result in RNA, DNA and yes reproducing organisms.  

 

It's a long road, but we're talking over billions of years.  A time scale that is hard to fathom to us as humans.

 

Is there such a thing as true randomness?   Is anything truly random?   I think not, in a strict sense.   If you had perfect knowledge of the state of all things, and the motion of all things, you could make perfect predictions about the future.  Therefore, nothing is truly random.  Everything is caused by something else.  Nothing is spontaneous.   So there is no such thing as random.   There is such a thing as unpredictable, in the sense that we don't have enough knowledge to predict.  But if you have perfect knowledge of the state of all things and the motion of all things, then there is nothing that is unpredictable. 

 

I don't have a problem with the idea of creation.   My problem is with the way creationists try to use the idea of creation.   We know for a fact that the earth is far older than 6,000 years, for example.  

 

Accepted scientific theories hold that before the big bang, there was no time and space.  (I guess that means there is no such thing as "before" the big bang, but nonetheless...)  

 

I don't know that science will ever figure out what caused the big bang.  But if you believe in science, and if you believe in causal determinism, which is that everything has a cause and that perfect knowledge of both the state of all things and the motion of all things can lead to perfect prediction of the future, and that the universe is 13 billion years old, and that time and space did not exist before the big  bang, you still have the question of what caused the big bang.   What was the "first cause."   In a strict sense, if time and space were created by the big bang, then there was a moment of creation.  And if there was a moment of creation, what caused that?   Was there a creator?  

 

Science can never refute the idea of a creator, because the universe has only existed for 13 billion years.   Therefore the laws of science have only existed for 13 billion years.   The laws of time and space came into existence 13 billion years ago.   So there was something that caused our existence.   Was that a creator? 

 

The laws of science hold that nothing is random.  So how could our existence be random?   There is a cause to everything.   What caused the laws of science to appear 13 billion years ago?  

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