Charvak - "I might be nitpicking here but what does evolution have to do with thorium in rocks or mud at the bottom of the sea. evolution is not the theory of geology or rare element."

I think I can answer that for him. His argument seems to boil down to "X demonstrates the Earth is less than Y years old, and you need more than Y years for evolution to be the cause of species; therefore evolution is not the cause of species (insert god here)". Clearly I don't agree with the details of his argument, but I believe that is the form.

Jam Jam,

CyberLN and Nyarlathotep are absolutely right. Biological evolution has nothing to do with abiogenesis; it begins where abiogenesis leaves off. Apparently, you know nothing about evolution which can be a problem. How would you even know if your sources are respectable? It looks like you are recycling "Dr." Kent (Dino) Hovind's stuff which was taken mostly from Dr. Henry Morris (a real PhD this time), and Henry ripped it off of George McCready Price who was an early pioneer in scientific creationism. The bankruptcy of Hovind's arguments may be found at: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/hovind/howgood.html and the other sites that have been given to you. Do check them out before tossing more candy at us!

#1 THAT PROBABILITY ARGUMENT WITH 75 ZEROES

In your probability argument concerning iso-1-cytochrome c (the one with 75 zeroes) you forgot to give us the mathematics, hence no argument was initially advanced. Later, you referred us to an Institute for Creation Research (ICR) site. I've seen a number of these kinds of probability arguments, including an earlier one from ICR. Having a degree in mathematics (with emphasis on probability and statistics) it is easy for me to see that this type of argument against abiogenesis is a load of horse manure. They all violate one or more of the 3 rules that are absolutely necessary for such arguments against abiogenesis.

Rule #1: Matter seldom interacts randomly at the atomic level since atoms combine or break apart according to the rules of chemistry. The water molecules of a lovely snowflake, which may seem to require a master designer, naturally come together (given the right sequence of weather conditions at that location) to form marvelous snowflake designs. If the laws of chemistry are not accounted for, the odds of getting a lovely snowflake might seem impossible. Ignore this rule and the probability argument is utterly worthless.

Rule #2: Is this PARTICULAR molecule even necessary for a cell? Have all the workable variations of that molecule (and there are often quite a few), or even reasonably similar molecules, been ruled out? Is the particular chemical pathway, itself, even necessary? A different chemical pathway doing the same job might not even need that molecule or any of its relatives! We must also consider all possible groups of chemical pathways (and the variations of their key molecules) that can sustain a cell. A particular pathway might not even be needed. But, we can't stop there. We must consider whole life forms. A different version of life might not need any of the above variations at the molecular level! Don't we also have to consider every possible form that arising life might take? Who knows, maybe the first step need not be a cell (as we know it) at all!

To do the calculation right you must know the details of all possible life forms that might arise from non-living matter. After all, if life had taken a completely different course some other creature might now be wondering about the odds. We have to calculate those odds, too! If we fail to do that we are committing the fallacy of calculating the odds after the fact. Here is an example: If you threw a shovel-full of sand on a table, what are the odds that each of those sand grains would have assumed their final positions? Shall we conclude that a miracle occurs every time you dump a pile of sand on the table? Hardly! A proper calculation must consider all of the possible forms and arrangements that a pile can have. We can't throw the dart first and then paint the target so that the dart is dead center!

Our present knowledge of the possible ways that life might arise is way too incomplete to even think about a meaningful calculation of the odds.

Rule #3: The possibility of intermediate stages must be considered. If you calculated the odds of getting a mammalian eye all at once you would find it quite improbable. But, once you realize that there are many intermediate stages that are useful to some creature, somewhere, sometime, then the odds practically melt away! The same holds true at the molecular level. A huge amount of molecular evolution went into the cells we see today, including the more "primitive" prokaryotes (without a nucleus). If your calculation uses one of those evolved molecules, then you have blown it right then and there! By the way, organic molecules usually don't come with little signs indicating how much evolution they have undergone.

Even in the cold depths of space we can find a number of important organic molecules that have formed and are reasonably stable! That was a shocker! And, that material would have been arriving at Earth via meteorites and dust. Charting all these intermediate molecular complexes that might have been reasonably stable in some environment (the surface of clays, Darwin's little pond, space, undersea "smokers"…), at some time, has never been done. Without a thorough knowledge of these intermediate complexes any calculation of the type you gave is meaningless.

Thus, you can consign this impressive-sounding argument to the circular file.

#2 NOT ENOUGH MUD ON THE OCEAN FLOOR

In the light of plate tectonics, this argument is easy to debunk. When an ocean plate dives beneath a continental margin some of its accumulated sediment goes down with it. THE REST OF THE SEDIMENT gets scrapped off and plastered to the boundary of the continent. Most of the coast of California, including the coastal mountain ranges, are largely stuff (including small islands) that got scrapped off an ancient ocean floor that (at that time) was diving below the North American Continent. At some places along the coast of California, right on the beach, you can actually find pillow lavas freshly eroded from a bluff. Pillow lavas originate at the bottom of ocean, at places where the sea floor is pulling apart and new sea floor being exuded. These lavas had traveled a long way before being plastered onto the continental margin. (Care to calculate how long that takes? Forget about 7000 years!)

If you need more insight, we might look at the separation of the North Atlantic basin which created the North Atlantic Ocean. Magnetic dating, the current rate of the spreading, and fossils types all point to this even occurring during the Jurassic period. Obviously, that ocean floor is not going to have billions of years of mud on it!

You may consign this geologically naïve argument to that same circular file.

#3 FAINT EARLY SUN CAN'T PROVIDE THE NEEDED HEAT

Around 3.9 billion years ago (roughly when life began to arise) there was 83% more uranium-238 around, and the small quantity of uranium-235 today would have been multiplied some 45-fold. All that extra radioactivity in the rocks (including a significant contribution from potassium-40) would have generated a fair amount of heat and probably meant greater volcanic activity on the whole. Volcanic activity meant more CO2 in the atmosphere. Reasonable models of the Earth's early atmosphere indicate that it could have provided a greenhouse effect good enough to keep things from freezing over. There was even a greater dissipation of tidal energy (still more heat) because the moon was considerably closer. Note that if life arose near undersea "smokers," it would have its own heat supply. The availability of water, minerals, and energy make "smokers" a prime location for abiogenesis.

What might be called the "faint young sun" paradox hasn't been wholly resolved as it is a complex study, but there is scarcely room here for the naïve argument that you, Jam Jam, are giving us! You can't pretend that the Earth had no cloud cover, that elevated quantities of CO2 and methane were absent, that heat from radioactive decay wasn't considerably higher, etc. Those variables, and likely others, make a huge difference!

#4 HELIUM SHOULD HAVE LEAKED OUT OF THE ROCKS 3 BILLION YEARS AGO.

As Nyarlathotep pointed out, uranium and thorium are still in the rocks and are still producing helium. We still have nearly half of the original uranium-238 in the rocks. Moreover, Jam Jam, your claim that it all leaks out readily is false. A quick visit to geology.com/articles/helium tells us that if porous, sedimentary rocks above the source (granitoid basement rocks rich in thorium and uranium) is capped by an impermeable seal of halite or anhydrite, then migrating helium can be trapped and contained and concentrated. Hence, helium is often associated with traps that catch and hold natural gas.

Jam Jam, you need to give us facts and figures. Provide at least a competent summary of your argument, complete with key calculations, or deposit it in that big, round file.

#5 WHY IS OIL STILL UNDER 20,000 LBS/ SQUARE INCH PRESSURE?

Jam Jam, according to you rock cannot resist 20,000 lbs/square inch for more than 10,000 years. Thus, oil should not be under such pressure today.

If you tallied up the overhead weight of fairly dense rock (specific gravity = 2.8), then 20,000 lbs/in2 would correspond to about 3 miles down. Most oil wells are less than about a mile deep. Where on Earth (literally!) did you find this oil under 20,000 lbs/in2 ? Why should that figure apply to a typical oil reservoir? You need to do some explaining.

Oil is created in what is called "source rock" where organic matter is compressed and heated but it cannot pool there. It must migrate to a suitable area (reservoir) that can store it. Impermeable rock caps the reservoir and prevents further seepage upward. The migration is extremely slow.

"Some idea of the extremely slow speed of fluid motion to be expected can be gained by considering the movement of ground water at shallow depths in dense clays, classed as "impermeable." Under a moderate hydraulic gradient and a reasonable value of permeability for clay, we come up with flow speeds of ground water on the order of 2 to 3 million years per kilometer [3.2 to 4.8 million years per mile]. Yet the permeability of source shales of petroleum is rated at only one-thousandth as great as for clays tested in the surface environment." (Wszolek, P. C., and A. L. Burlingame. 1978. "Petroleum--origin and evolution" In Fairbridge and Bourgeois. 1978. p.573) This source was given in geologist Arthur N. Strahler's book "Science and Earth History - The Evolution/Creation Controversy."

It's not entirely clear to me how the above should be interpreted, but I think it's safe to say that oil migration out of its source rock does not happen overnight! Forget about 7000 years for a typical migration!

Jam Jam, I suspect that you can pitch this "proof" into the circular can as well.