New Planets

Intelligent Design On Another Planet?
By Babu Ranganathan

Imagine finding a planet where robots are programmed so that they can make other robots just like themselves from raw materials.

Now, imagine an alien visitor coming to the planet and, after many years of studying these robots, coming to the conclusion that since science can explain how these robots work, function, and reproduce there's no reason to believe that there was an ultimate intelligent designer behind them.

The analogy above certainly is not perfect but it is sufficient to reveal the fallacious thinking of those who attack intelligent design behind life and the universe.

Chance physical processes can produce some level of order but it is not rational to believe that the highest levels of order in life and the universe are by chance. For example, amino acids have been shown to be able to come into existence by chance but not more complex structures such as proteins which require that the various amino acids be in a precise sequence, just like the letters in a sentence. A single cell has millions of proteins.

There is no innate chemical tendency for amino acids to bond with one another in a sequence. Any one amino acid can just as easily bond with any other. The only reason at all for why the various amino acids bond with one another in a precise sequence in the cells of our bodies is because they're directed to do so by an already existing sequence of molecules in our genetic code. Without being in a proper sequence protein molecules will not function.

The sequence of molecules in DNA (the genetic code) determines the sequence of molecules in proteins. Furthermore, without DNA there cannot be RNA, but without RNA there cannot be DNA. And without either DNA or RNA there cannot be proteins, but without proteins there cannot be DNA or RNA. They're all mutually dependent upon each other for existence!

If humans must use intelligence to perform genetic engineering, to meaningfully manipulate the genetic code, then what does that say about the origin of the genetic code itself!

If the cell had evolved it would have had to be all at once. A partially evolved cell cannot wait millions of years to become complete because it would be highly unstable and quickly disintegrate in the open environment.