Does evolution have enough time to produce highly advanced designs in nature? Within the framework “time” produces miracles for evolution but advances in science they claim, doesn’t increase the difficulty in natural processes creating life. An angry professor was asked this question about probability and here is what he states…
“This represents my more substantive response because I know she is interested in an actual answer. A problem comes from the nature of the question itself. I do not know the context with which these statements of mathematicians came up. Was the discussion with an actual mathematician or is this some second hand remark made by a stealth-creationist.”
He then dives into the history of evolution since Darwin’s time. He says that evolution is dramatically different from that time which is true. He then argues trying to use “inductive reasoning” in a way which means that a conclusion could come out false even though all other aspects are true. So he outlines old earth assumptions that were proven wrong but were still right on the earth being extremely old.
For instance, the angry professor and others have attacked Cornelius Hunter for degree credentials but he still uses Darwin who had no degree and who considered himself a geologist. The angry professor points out that Darwin claimed that Weald in England was at least 300 million years but was wrong as he did not take into account according to the angry professor, factoring how much time it would take to deposit all the material to be eroded.
This has nothing to do with nature producing a living cell, rather he suspects that the reason why the question was brought up in the first place was because of a creationist. And of course, creationists (but not all) believe the earth is in the 6,000 year range. So he then proceeds as though he is debating a creationist. He makes an analogy of flipping a coin which a strange way of trying to prove that probability is on their side.
“Let’s start with a simple probability idea and work our way up. If we get a penny and flip it, the chance of it coming up heads is ½ or 50% (the other possibility being tails of course). The odds of getting heads twice in a row is ¼ (½ x ½) or 25%. Similarly the odds of flipping a coin and having it come up heads and then tails is also ¼. We can take this a little further, the chance of flipping a coin 10 times and having it come up heads each time is 1/1024. 1/1024 is the same as 0.0009765 or 9.77×10^-4 or ~1×10^-3. It’s about 1 time in a 1000. The important thing here is that the odds of getting any specific combination of heads and tails in 10 flips is about 1 in a 1000. However, if you flip a coin 10 times, you will get a specific combination. I just flipped a nickel 10 times and got T(ails), T, H(eads), T, H, T, H, H, T, H. Was the chance of that happening 1 in a 1000? Well, it was before I flipped the nickel the first time, but now that it has happened the chance that it happened is 100% or 1/1. …”
“Remember when we flipped the coin 10 times above? The odds were ~1/1000 (a 1 followed by 3 zeros) that any specific sequence would come up. Well if we flip that coin 270 times, the odds of it coming up heads every time, or any other specific sequence, is 1/1.9×10^81. If I flip that coin every 15 seconds, it will take me just over an hour to get enough flips to get a sequence of heads and tails. If we calculate the odds of getting that sequence ahead of time, we get a number greater than the number of atoms in the universe! Using the creationist logic, then it was impossible to get the sequence of 270 Heads or Tails we just got.”
The angry professor claims all outcomes are one in the same like flipping a coin to designing human beings. Meaning that they all eventually come true given enough time. He then fails to mention that over 50 years of research in the lab, nobody has ever observed natural processes creating a cell outside an organism’s body. Therefore the angry professor resorts to flipping a coin.
Sadly, the angry professor fails to recognize the person whom he is debating with. Cornelius Hunter is not a young earth creationist nor is he up on the latest of what creationists advocate. He is however, in the modern intelligent design movement which claims such things as one species turning into another, the only difference between Darwinism and ID is, how that information was designed in the first place. Evolutionists claim it was through a mindless process while the ID movement relies on some sort of vague intelligent agent or agents at work but never attempt to identify what that is nor explain what that agent or agents are because they say it goes beyond the realm of science.
Cornelius then uses the poker analogy where he believes many evolutionary scientists bluff on having the royal flush. He writes…
“For instance, evolutionists claim that all the evidence supports evolution. Amazingly, they say there is no contradictory evidence, no scientific problems to deal with. When I first heard this argument I was astonished. But when you are certain you are right, then any and all arguments must support evolution.”
Doesn’t it seem odd that scientific theories can encounter some contradictory evidence but not evolution? That is because evolution is not a scientific theory, it’s a man-made story where aspects may change but its essence remains the same. Using flipping of a coin analogy is one of the weakest arguments one has ever seen that allegedly prove time is on evolution’s side.