₦airaland Forum

Origin of life scenarios

Did life originate in a warm pond (as speculated by Darwin), near a deep sea vent, on clay particles, or somehow/somewhere else? The number of scenarios proposed, with no winner, suggests that they all have major deficiencies.

A major problem with warm pond and deep sea vent ideas is the presence of water, which prevents many of the reactions needed; to get polymers, for example. Furthermore, the heat in deep sea vents would speed up the breakdown of any lucky chemical formation.

Because of these problems with the presence of water, physical chemist and origin-of-life researcher, Graham Cairns-Smith proposed that clay surfaces were involved in facilitating some of the needed reactions.

However, experiments in warm volcanic ponds have shown that clay particles bind amino acids, DNA and phosphate, essential components of life, so strongly that the clay prevents any necessary reactions from occurring.31

The origin of a whole cell including the DNA, proteins and RNA needed for it to reproduce will never happen by an accident in a chemical soup, as demonstrated above. So advocates of abiogenesis have tried to imagine scenarios whereby life began with simpler requirements and then progressed to life as we know it today.

Proteins first?

Most effort has gone into a ‘proteins first’ approach, whereby proteins supposedly formed first and the DNA sequences to make the needed proteins and the RNAs necessary to make proteins from the sequences of DNA came later. However, other than the problem of getting the correct set of optically pure amino acids and the problem of polymerisation to make the protein chains of amino acids, few proteins can act as templates to make copies of themselves.32 Also, a fundamental problem is that there is no mechanism for creating the DNA sequence for a protein from the protein itself, as pointed out by information theorist Hubert Yockey.33

RNA first?

In the 1980s, some RNA molecules were discovered that have the ability to catalyse some chemical reactions; these were dubbed ‘ribozymes’ (from ribonucleic acid enzymes). This finding stimulated a lot of excitement and so a lot of effort has gone into RNA-first scenarios, or the ‘RNA world’. At least there are enzymes that can generate DNA code from RNA code; that is, if you could get the RNA you might be able to imagine a scenario for getting the DNA. However, the enzyme complexes that can make a DNA copy of an RNA sequence are phenomenally complex and themselves would never arise by natural processes. And there are many other seemingly insurmountable problems with the RNA-first scenarios, 19 of which have been enumerated by Cairns-Smith.34 Furthermore, RNA is much less stable than DNA, which itself is very unstable, as documented above.

The multiplicity of scenarios proposed reinforces the conclusion that researchers really have little idea how life could have ‘made itself’. There is no viable hypothesis as to how life could start off simpler and, step-wise, progress to become an actual living cell. Neo-Darwinism (mutations and natural selection) is often invoked to try to ‘climb mount impossible’ but this cannot help, even hypothetically, until there is a viable self-reproducing entity, aka a cell, the minimum requirements for which I set out earlier (‘What are the minimum requirements for a cell to live?’).

Life from outer space?

Francis Crick, co-discoverer of the DNA double helix structure, is a well-known proponent of ‘life from space’.35 He proposed that aliens sent life to earth, known as ‘directed panspermia’. Another form of this idea, simply ‘panspermia’, is that life arose somewhere else in the universe and came to earth as microbes on meteorites or comets; Earth was ‘seeded’ with life in this manner. Either version of panspermia effectively puts the matter beyond the reach of science. About the only element of panspermia that is testable is the ability of microbes to survive riding on/in a meteorite to earth. And this has been tested and found wanting; microbes don’t survive.36

A lot of the impetus for the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence (SETI) and extra-solar planets comes from a desire to find evidence that life might have formed ‘out there’. But even allowing the whole universe as a laboratory does not solve the problem; life would never form, as the following section reinforces.

Not just a coding system, but information

Not only does the origin of the coded information storing system need to be explained, the information or specifications for proteins, etc., stored on the DNA has also to be explained. Revisiting the simplest cell, derived by knocking out genes from a viable free-living microbe to see which ones were ‘essential’, this minimal cell needs over 400 protein and RNA components. Specifications for all these have to be encoded on the DNA, otherwise this hypothetical cell cannot manufacture them or reproduce itself to make another cell. It would take a large book to print this information coded in the four ‘letters’ of the DNA.

As per the Paul Davies analogy, the problem is similar to a computer program. How do we explain the existence of a program? There is first the programming language (Python, Fortran, C++, Basic, Java, etc.) but then there is the actual set of instructions written in that language. The DNA problem is likewise two-fold; the origin of the programming language and the origin of the program.

Proposals for something simpler that ‘evolved’ into this simplest cell need to demonstrate the route from their hypothetical simpler start to the first living cell. Enthusiasts for abiogenesis often appeal to ‘billions of years’ as a hand-waving approach to solving the problems, but this provides no mechanism. Reactions that are going in the wrong direction are not going to reverse and go in the correct direction by adding more time.

Life also needs error-correcting systems

Molecular biology has revealed that cells are phenomenally complex and sophisticated, even the simplest ones. The information, as stated, is stored on the DNA. However, DNA is a very unstable molecule. One report says:

There is a general belief that DNA is ‘rock solid’—extremely stable,” says Brandt Eichman, associate professor of biological sciences at Vanderbilt, who directed the project. “Actually DNA is highly reactive. On a good day about one million bases in the DNA in a human cell are damaged.27
Therefore all cells must have systems for correcting faults that develop in the structure of the DNA or in the coded information. Without these error-correcting systems, the number of errors in the DNA sequence accumulate and result in the demise of the cell (‘error catastrophe’). This feature of all living cells adds yet another ‘impossible’ to origin of life scenarios.

Any information that happened to arise on a theoretical DNA molecule in a primordial soup would have to be reproduced accurately or the information would be lost due to copying errors and chemical damage. Without an already functioning repair mechanism, the information would be degraded quickly. However, the instructions to build this repair machinery are encoded on the very molecule it repairs, another vicious circle for origin of life scenarios.28

When scientists discovered bacteria that live in extreme conditions, such as around hydrothermal vents in the sea, they were heralded as ‘primitive life’ because some origin-of-life researchers had proposed that life might have started in such places. However, these ‘extremophiles’, as they have been called (‘liking extremes’), have quite sophisticated error-correcting systems for their DNA. For example, Deinococcus radiodurans is a bacterium that can withstand extreme doses of ionizing radiation that would kill you or me, or other bacteria. It does sustain DNA damage where the DNA is fractured into many pieces. However, about 60 genes are activated to repair the breaks and reconstruct the genome in the hours following the damage.29

Hydrothermal vents are hot, inhospitable places and the DNA of microbes that live there is continually being damaged, such that the microbes must have sophisticated error-protecting and correcting systems to survive. They are not at all simple and do not provide any sort of viable model for explaining the origin of life.30

Moreover, all bacteria, not just the ‘extremophiles’, must have sophisticated error-correcting systems that involve many genes, and when the error correction is inactivated by mutations the bacteria become non-viable. This provides yet another problem for the origin of life.

The origin of life is a matter of programming, not just chemistry

The above information would be sufficient to eliminate notions of the naturalistic origin of life, but we have not covered the most important problem, which is the origin of the programming. Life is not based just on polymers but polymers with specific arrangements of the subunits; specific arrangements of amino acids to make functional proteins/enzymes and specific arrangements of nucleic acid bases to make functional DNA and RNA.

As astrobiologist Paul Davies, now director of the Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science at Arizona State University, said,

“To explain how life began we need to understand how its unique management of information came about.
“The way life manages information involves a logical structure that differs fundamentally from mere complex chemistry. Therefore chemistry alone will not explain life’s origin, any more than a study of silicon, copper and plastic will explain how a computer can execute a program.”19
Davies’ clarity on this point ought not to be a surprise to his fellow evolutionists, given his similarly plain-speaking public utterances for well over a decade previously. E.g. “It is the software of the living cell that is the real mystery, not the hardware.” And: “How did stupid atoms spontaneously write their own software? … Nobody knows …”.20

Any attempt to explain the origin of life without explaining the origin of the information processing system and the information recorded on the DNA of a living cell is avoiding the issue. We just have to look at the simplest free-living cell possible to see how the origin of the information is an insoluble problem for scenarios that rely on physics and chemistry (that is, no intelligent design allowed).

Sir Karl Popper, one of the most prominent philosophers of science of the 20th century, realized that,

“What makes the origin of life and of the genetic code a disturbing riddle is this: the genetic code is without any biological function unless it is translated; that is, unless it leads to the synthesis of the proteins whose structure is laid down by the code. But … the machinery by which the cell (at least the non-primitive cell, which is the only one we know) translates the code consists of at least fifty macromolecular components which are themselves coded in the DNA [ed: we now know that over 100 macromolecular components are needed]. Thus the code can not be translated except by using certain products of its translation. This constitutes a baffling circle; a really vicious circle, it seems, for any attempt to form a model or theory of the genesis of the genetic code.
“Thus we may be faced with the possibility that the origin of life (like the origin of physics) becomes an impenetrable barrier to science, and a residue to all attempts to reduce biology to chemistry and physics.”21

Origin of the DNA code

The coded DNA information storage system as described by Popper cannot arise from chemistry, but demands an intelligent cause.22 If we think of other coding systems, such as the Morse code or a written alphabetical language, where symbols were invented to represent the sounds of speech, such coded systems only arise from intelligence. It is an arbitrary convention that ‘a’ is usually pronounced as in ‘cat’ in English; nothing about the shape of the letter indicates how it should be pronounced. Likewise, there is just no conceivable possibility of explaining the DNA coding system from the laws of physics and chemistry because there is no physical or chemical relationship between the code and what is coded.

Furthermore, if the origin of any DNA code were not a big enough problem, the DNA code turns out to be, of the many millions possible, “at or very close to a global optimum for error minimization: the best of all possible codes.”23 This error minimization in the code is possible because there are potentially 64 ‘codons’24 for 20 amino acids, so that nearly all amino acids have more than one codon (a few common amino acids, such as leucine, have six).25 These multiple codons are sometimes called ‘redundant’, often taken to mean ‘extra to needed’ or ‘superfluous’. However, the extra codons are optimized such that the most likely single-letter mistakes (mutations) in the coding are more likely not to change the amino acid, or at least to change it to a chemically similar one (thus being less disruptive to the structure of the protein manufactured).

The extra codons are also involved in sophisticated control of the amount of protein synthesized, through ‘translation level control’. This control system operates in bacteria and higher organisms.26

There is no way that a coding system can develop in successive stages to be optimized. If any workable coding system did come into existence by some incredible fluke, no significant change in the basic code could thenceforth occur because the code and the decoding system (reading machinery) would have to change at the same time (there are some very minor variations in the basic code in some bacteria, for example, where one of the three normal ‘stop’ codons codes for an extra amino acid to the normal 20). So the optimized code cannot be explained except as another incredible fluke of ‘nature’, right at the supposed beginning of life.

What are the minimum requirements for a cell to live?

A minimal free-living cell that can manufacture its components using chemicals and energy obtained from its surrounding environment and reproduce itself must have:

1. A cell membrane. This separates the cell from the environment. It must be capable of maintaining a different chemical environment inside the cell compared to outside (as above). Without this, life’s chemical processes are not possible.

2. A way of storing the information or specifications that instructs a cell how to make another cell and how to operate moment by moment. The only known means of doing this is DNA and any proposals for it to be something else (such as RNA) have not been shown to be viable—and then there has still to be a way of changing from the other system to DNA, which is the basis of all known life.15

3. A way of reading the information in (2) to make the cell’s components and also control the amount produced and the timing of production. The major components are proteins, which are strings (polymers) of hundreds to thousands of some 20 different amino acids. The only known (or even conceivable) way of making the cell’s proteins from the DNA specifications involves over 100 proteins and other complex co-factors. Involved are

nano-machines such as RNA polymerase (smallest known type has ~4,500 amino acids),

gyrases, which twist/untwist the DNA spiral to enable it to be ‘read’ (again these are very large proteins),

ribosomes, sub-cellular ‘factories’ where proteins are manufactured, and

at least 20 transfer-RNA molecules; these select the right amino acid to be placed in the order specified on the DNA (all cells that we know of have at least 61 because most amino acids are specified by more than one DNA three-letter code). The transfer-RNAs have sophisticated mechanisms for making sure the right amino acid is selected according to the DNA code.

There are also mechanisms to make sure that the proteins made are folded three-dimensionally in the correct way that involve chaperones to protect the proteins from mis-folding, plus chaperonin folding ‘machines’ in which the proteins are helped to fold correctly). All cells have these.

Whew! And that’s just the basics.


A greatly simplified animation of protein synthesis, which includes the action of RNA polymerase, ribosomes, transfer-RNAs, chaperonins, and chaperones. All living cells have this system of protein synthesis.
4. A means of manufacturing the cell’s biochemical needs from the simpler chemicals in the environment. This includes a way of making ATP, the universal energy currency of life. All living cells today have ATP synthase, a phenomenally complex and efficient electric rotary motor to make ATP (or in reverse to create electric currents that drive other reactions and movement both inside and outside the cell).

5. A means of copying the information and passing it on to offspring (reproduction). A recent simulation of one cell division of the simplest known free-living bacterium (which ‘only’ has 525 genes) required 128 desktop computers working together for 10 hours.16

This gives some indication of what needs to happen for the first living cell to live.

An interesting project began some years ago to ascertain what could be the minimal cell that could operate in a free-living manner; that is, not dependent on another living organism. However, it did have available a nutrient-rich medium that provided a wealth of complex organic compounds such that the cell did not have to synthesize many of its needed biochemicals. This minimal cell is now known to need over 400 protein and RNA components,17 and of course that means that its DNA needs to be loaded up with the specifications for making these. That is, the DNA needs to have over 400 ‘genes’. We will come back to this later.

Polymer formation (polymerisation)

Life is not just composed of amino acids or sugars but it is loaded with polymers, which are strings, or chains, of simpler compounds joined together. A polysaccharide is a polymer of sugars. A protein is a polymer of amino acids and DNA and RNA are polymers of nucleotides. Polysaccharides are the simplest, where the links in the chain are normally the same sugar compound, such as glucose (making starch in plants or glycogen in animals). Proteins are much more complex, being chains of amino acids where each link in the chain can be one of 20 different amino acids. And there are four different links in DNA and RNA.

Now water is an essential ingredient of living cells; typical bacteria are about 75% water. Being the ‘universal solvent’, water is a necessary carrier for the various components of cells; it is the milieu in which it all happens.

Here is a huge problem for origin-of-life scenarios: when amino acids are joined together, for example, a water molecule is released. This means that in the presence of water, the reaction is pushed in the wrong direction, backwards; that is, proteins will fall apart, not build, unless the water is actively removed. A cell overcomes this by protecting the reaction site from water (inside ribosomes) and providing energy to drive this and the polymer formation. Thus, the formation of proteins of more than a few amino acids is a huge problem for all origin-of-life scenarios (and adding more time does not solve the problem; they just fall apart more).

Polymer formation also requires that the ingredients (monomers) that are joined together are bi-functional. That simply means that the amino acids for making proteins (or sugars for making polysaccharides) have at least two active sites that will allow another amino acid (or sugar) to be joined to each end. A protein-forming amino acid will have at least one amino group (-NH2) and one carboxyl group (-COOH), with the amino group of one amino acid joining to the carboxyl group of another, thus growing the chain. A compound with only one active site (mono-functional) would terminate the formation of the chain. The problem for origin-of-life scenarios is that any proposed chemical reactions that produce some amino acids also produce mono-functional ones that terminate protein formation.18

Nucleic acids such as DNA and RNA are based on a sugar-polymer backbone. Again, the presence of some sugars that are mono-functional would terminate the formation of these and the presence of water also drives this reaction in the wrong direction as well (to fall apart).

Akin1212:
In other words, Abiogenesis is true. I guess you either didn't read the post or you didn't see the author is confused.

Abiogenesis is a natural process, the author was busy talking about artificial processes. How does that explain Abiogenesis?

A natural process is not a supernatural process, nor an artificial process. I am glad you pasted the article. Thanks

On what premises did you arrive at the conclusion that abiogenesis is true? Can you point out the author's confusion? A natural process is any process existing in or produced by nature(rather than the work of humans). How is abiogenesis a natural process like volcanic activity, which is actually observed?

That is an excerpt from the article anyway. Click on the link I provided to see the full article.

I would have loved to paste the whole of this article on the origin of life and abiogenesis, but Nairaland says it's too long. Follow the link below to the article.

http://creation.mobi/origin-of-life

An excerpt from the article:

How did life begin? The naturalistic origin of life is also known as abiogenesis or sometimes chemical evolution.

The origin of life is a vexing problem for those who insist that life arose through purely natural processes. Some evolutionists try to claim that the origin of life is not a part of evolution. However, probably every evolutionary biology textbook has a section on the origin of life in the chapters on evolution. The University of California, Berkeley, has the origin of life included in their ‘Evolution 101’ course, in a section titled “From Soup to Cells—the Origin of Life”.1 High-profile defenders of ‘all-things-evolutionary’, such as P.Z. Myers and Nick Matzke, agree that the origin of life is part of evolution, as does Richard Dawkins.2

A well-known evolutionist of the past, G.A. Kerkut, did make a distinction between the General Theory of Evolution (GTE), which included the origin of life, and the Special Theory of Evolution (STE) that only dealt with the diversification of life (the supposed topic of Darwin’s 1859 book).3

It is only recently that some defenders of evolution have tried to divorce the origin of life from consideration. It’s probably because the hope of finding an answer is rapidly fading, as one scientific discovery after another of sophisticated machinery in even the simplest living cells makes the problem of a naturalistic origin ever more difficult.

So, what do we need to get life? We can break the problem of the origin of life into a number of topics in an attempt to explain to non-scientists what is involved (although it still might be mind-stretching).

How did life begin? Explaining the origin of life by solely physical and chemical processes is proving to be extremely difficult.
What is it that we have to obtain to produce a living cell? A living cell is capable of acquiring all the resources it needs from its surroundings and reproducing itself. The first cell had to be free-living; that is, it could not depend on other cells for its survival because other cells did not exist. Parasites cannot be a model for ‘first life’ because they need existing cells to survive. This also rules out viruses and the like as the precursors to life as they must have living cells that they can parasitize to reproduce themselves. Prions, misshaped proteins that cause disease, have nothing to do with the origin of life because they can only ‘replicate’ by causing proteins manufactured by a cell to become misshaped.

The first things needed are the right ingredients. It’s bit like baking a cake; you can’t make a banana cake if you have no bananas or flour.

Getting all the right ingredients

Right here there is a major problem for chemical soup approaches to the origin of life: all the components have to be present in the same location for a living cell to have any possibility of being assembled. But necessary components of life have carbonyl (>C=O) chemical groups that react destructively with amino acids and other amino (–NH2) compounds. Such carbonyl-containing molecules include sugars,4 which also form the backbone of DNA and RNA. Living cells have ways of keeping them apart and protecting them to prevent such cross-reactions, or can repair the damage when it occurs, but a chemical soup has no such facility.

Cells are incredibly complex arrangements of simpler chemicals. I am not going to cover every chemical that a first cell would need; it would take a book and some to cover it. I am just going to highlight some of the basic components that have to be present for any origin of life scenario.

a. Amino acids
Living things are loaded with proteins; linear strings of amino acids. Enzymes are special proteins that help chemical reactions to happen (catalysts). For example, the enzyme amylase is secreted in our saliva and causes starch molecules from rice, bread, potatoes, etc., to break up into smaller molecules, which can be then be broken down to their constituent glucose molecules. We can’t absorb starch, but we are able to absorb glucose and use it to power our bodies.

Some reactions necessary for life go so slowly without enzymes that they would effectively never produce enough product to be useful, even given billions of years.5

Other proteins form muscles, bone, skin, hair and all manner of the structural parts of cells and bodies. Humans can produce well over 100,000 proteins (possibly millions; nobody really knows exactly how many), whereas a typical bacterium can produce one or two thousand different ones.

Proteins are made up of 20 different amino acids (some microbes have an extra one or two). Amino acids are not simple chemicals and they are not easy to make in the right way without enzymes (which are themselves composed of amino acids);

The 1953 Miller–Urey experiment, which almost every biology textbook still presents, managed to make some amino acids without enzymes. It is often portrayed as explaining ‘the origin of life’, but that is either very ignorant or very deceitful.

Although tiny amounts of some of the right amino acids were made, the conditions set up for the experiment could never have occurred on Earth; for example, any oxygen in the ‘atmosphere’ in the flask would have prevented anything from forming. Furthermore, some of the wrong types of amino acids were produced, as well as other chemicals that would ‘cross-react’, preventing anything useful forming.

The amino acids required for functional proteins could never have been made by anything like this experiment in nature.6 When Stanley Miller repeated the experiment in 1983 with a slightly more realistic mixture of gases, he only got trace amounts of glycine, the simplest of the 20 amino acids needed.7

The origin of the correct mix of amino acids remains an unsolved problem (and see another major problem under ‘handedness’ below).

b. Sugars
Some sugars can be made just from chemistry without enzymes (which are only made by cells, remember). However, mechanisms for making sugars without enzymes need an alkaline environment, which is incompatible with the needs for amino acid synthesis.

The chemical reaction that is proposed for the formation of sugars needs the absence of nitrogenous compounds, such as amino acids, because these react with the formaldehyde, the intermediate products, and the sugars, to produce non-biological chemicals.

Ribose, the sugar that forms the backbone of RNA, and in modified form DNA, an essential part of all living cells, is especially problematic. It is an unstable sugar (it has a short half-life, or breaks down quickly) in the real world at near-neutral pH (neither acid nor alkaline).8

c. The components of DNA and RNA
How can we get the nucleotides that are the chemical ‘letters’ of DNA and RNA without the help of enzymes from a living cell? The chemical reactions require formaldehyde (H2C=O) to react with hydrogen cyanide (HC≡N). However, formaldehyde and cyanide (especially) are deadly poisons. They would destroy critically important proteins that might have formed!

Cytosine, one of the simpler of the five nucleotides that make up DNA and RNA
Figure 3. Cytosine, one of the simpler of the five nucleotides that make up DNA and RNA. In this form of chemical diagram, each unlabelled bend in the ring has a carbon atom at the bend.
Cytosine (Figure 3), one of the five essential nucleotide bases of DNA and RNA, is very difficult to make in any realistic pre-biotic scenario and is also very unstable.8

DNA and RNA also have backbones of alternating sugars and phosphate groups. The problems with sugars are discussed above. Phosphates would be precipitated by the abundant calcium ions in sea water or cling strongly onto the surfaces of clay particles. Either scenario would prevent phosphate from being used to make DNA.

d. Lipids
Lipids (‘fats’) are essential for the formation of a cell membrane that contains the cell contents, as well as for other cell functions. The cell membrane, comprised of several different complex lipids, is an essential part of a free-living cell that can reproduce itself.

Lipids have much higher energy density than sugars or amino acids, so their formation in any chemical soup is a problem for origin of life scenarios (high energy compounds are thermodynamically much less likely to form than lower energy compounds).

The fatty acids that are the primary component of all cell membranes have been very difficult to produce, even assuming the absence of oxygen (a ‘reducing’ atmosphere). Even if such molecules were produced, ions such as magnesium and calcium, which are themselves necessary for life and have two charges per atom (++, i.e. divalent), would combine with the fatty acids, and precipitate them, making them unavailable.9 This process likewise hinders soap (essentially a fatty acid salt) from being useful for washing in hard water—the same precipitation reaction forms the ‘scum’.

Wikimedia commons/Andrei Lomize A potassium transport channel
Figure 4. A potassium transport channel. The red and blue lines show the position of the lipid membrane and the ribbons represent the transporter, which comprises a number of proteins (different colours). To give some idea of the complexity, each loop in each of the spirals is about 4 amino acids.
Some popularisers of abiogenesis like to draw diagrams showing a simple hollow sphere of lipid (a ‘vesicle’) that can form under certain conditions in a test-tube. However, such a ‘membrane’ could never lead to a living cell because the cell needs to get things through the cell membrane, in both directions. Such transport into and out of the cell entails very complex protein-lipid complexes known as transport channels, which operate like electro-mechanical pumps. They are specific to the various chemicals that must pass into and out of the cell (a pump that is designed to move water will not necessarily be suitable for pumping oil). Many of these pumps use energy compounds such as ATP to actively drive the movement against the natural gradient. Even when movement is with the gradient, from high to low concentration, it is still facilitated by carrier proteins.

The cell membrane also enables a cell to maintain a stable pH, necessary for enzyme activity, and favourable concentrations of various minerals (such as not too much sodium). This requires transport channels (‘pumps’) that specifically move hydrogen ions (protons) under the control of the cell. These pumps are highly selective.10

Transport across membranes is so important that “20–30% of all genes in most genomes encode membrane proteins”.11 The smallest known genome of a free-living organism, that of the parasite Mycoplasma genitalium, codes for 26 transporters12 amongst its 482 protein-coding genes.

A pure lipid membrane would not allow even the passive movement of the positively-charged ions of mineral nutrients such as calcium, potassium, magnesium, iron, manganese, etc., or the negatively-charged ions such as phosphate, sulfate, etc., into the cell, and they are all essential for life. A pure-lipid membrane would repel such charged ions, which dissolve in water, not lipid. Indeed, a simple fat membrane would prevent the movement of water itself (try mixing a lipid like olive oil with water)!

Membrane transporters would appear to be essential for a viable living cell.

In the 1920s the idea that life began with soapy bubbles (fat globules) was popular (Oparin’s ‘coacervate’ hypothesis) but this pre-dated any knowledge of what life entailed in terms of DNA and protein synthesis, or what membranes have to do. The ideas were naïve in the extreme, but they still get an airing today in YouTube videos showing bubbles of lipid, even dividing, as if this were relevant to explaining the origin of life (see: Self-made cells? Of course not!).

The chirality of typical amino acids
Figure 5. The chirality of typical amino acids. ‘R’ represents the carbon-hydrogen side-chain of the amino acid, which varies in length. R=CH3 makes alanine, for example.
e. Handedness (chirality)
Amino acids, sugars, and many other biochemicals, being 3-dimensional, can usually be in two forms that are mirror images of one another; like your right and left hand are mirror images of each other. This is called handedness or chirality (Figure 5).

Now living things are based on biochemicals that are pure in terms of their chirality (homochiral): left-handed amino acids and right-handed sugars, for example. Here’s the rub: chemistry without enzymes (like the Miller–Urey experiment), when it does anything, produces mixtures of amino acids that are both right-and left-handed. It is likewise with the chemical synthesis of sugars (with the formate reaction, for example).13

Origin-of-life researchers have battled with this problem and all sorts of potential solutions have been suggested but the problem remains unsolved.14 Even getting 99% purity, which would require some totally artificial, unlikely mechanism for ‘nature’ to create, doesn’t cut it. Life needs 100% pure left-handed amino acids. The reason for this is that placing a right-handed amino acid in a protein in place of a left-handed one results in the protein having a different 3-dimensional shape. None can be tolerated to get the type of proteins needed for life.

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dalaman:
But to Muslims and Hindus Allah and Brhama exist. You haven't shown that they don't exist. The Koran is the word of Allah and in it contains his objective moral system and values. So again even yiur God centered morality is ONLY subjective. It is subjective to the God of the bible.

If Jehovah exists(i.e if the Bible is true), then Allah and Bhrama and all other gods as they are described by other religions do not exist. If Allah exists(i.e. if the Koran is true), then Jehovah and other gods do not exist. All these gods can't exist together. The existence of one nullifies the existence of the others.

Therefore only one universal moral Arbiter exists, on whose authority rest the objective moral values. The identity of this universal moral Arbiter is a different question.

mmsen:
You have just supported the argument that you were trying to counter.

Nope. I have only proven that as a Christian, my worldview is rational in that objective moral values exist, and they necessarily rest on the authority of God, the universal moral Arbiter. As a Christian, only Jehovah exists to prescribe moral values to me. It would make no sense to say that objective moral values exist, while still denying the existence of a universal moral Arbiter.

dalaman:
Which of the Gods? Muslims believe that the Koran and it's sharia is the objective morality from their God. Hindus belive it's the Verdes and their God. Christians believe it is from Jesus/ Yahweh. All are SUBJECTIVE to each God. So where is the objective morality you are talking about?

To a Christian like me, Allah and Vishnu/Verdes does not exist. Jehovah alone is God, and He alone is qualified to be the universal moral arbiter.

hopefulLandlord:
this is not what I said, you can't address it so you raise a strawman and knocked it down, classic doctoralien

now read my post again and (at least try to) give a germane response this time

Your post ultimately points to the Euthyphro "dilemma". That is if you can see it. If you claim that no universal moral arbiter exists, then nothing is objectively good. And that is not view I'd want to adopt.

People of other religions are at least consistent in that they recognize that a universal moral Arbiter(who solely qualifies for that position) has to exist, from which their moralities are derived. Whether that moral Arbiter is Yahweh or Allah or Vishnu is a totally different question.

[s]

OtemSapien:
Here are the things which god Atum said that God Almighty himself told them to do

1. Use your brains positively.
2. Worship no god(God).
3. Do good to humanity.

Anything that falls short of these three golden rule is immoral, no matter who commanded it. So for Yahweh, being a disobedient son of God Almighty to tell you to keep slave, it doesn't make being a slave master moral. For Allah to command Murhamid to kill people doesn't make terrorism moral. Yet anyone who practises these golden rules without even knowing that God Almighty gave it as a universal rule to his children is moral, be it an atheist or an irreligious person.

[/s]

Read the piece I posted on this thread about slavery in the Bible, and be delivered from your ignorance.

hopefulLandlord:
I'll tackle this one and ignore the rest cuz this part of your post is the foundation of the hogwash you just spilled and the rest would crash down once this nonsense is out of the way

how does having a god now make what that god says anymore "Objective" than opinion of person or group of persons?

a Group of Muslims decide that Allah's morals is the true morals to follow, how does their using Allah as standard make their morality any more objective than the Indians who is using Vishnu as standard? how does it make their morals anymore objective than Christians that use Jesus, how does it make their morals anymore objective than the Jews that chose Yahweh? how does that make it anymore objective than atheists that decide for themselves?

if you think a god is source of morality, then morality is simply subjected to that god, which makes it SUBJECTIVE

NOBODY has ever been able to demonstrate objective morality exists without committing fallacies upon fallacies or making illogical jumps along the way

Euthyphro dilemma huh?

Yes, I say that a thing is good because God commanded it. There has to be a universal moral Arbiter, if anything is to be considered objectively good. And that moral Arbiter is God.

I'd rather God were the source of my morality.

Christians Led the Fight to Abolish Slavery

The slavery of “black” people by “white” people in the 16th to 19th centuries (and probably longer) was harshly unjust, like many cultures before. This harsh slavery is not discussed in Moses’ writings because such slavery was forbidden in Hebrew culture. This is not surprising. Paul tells us in Romans 1:30 that people are capable of inventing new ways of doing evil. Peter even reveals that some slave owners were already being disobedient and treating slaves/bondservants harshly (1 Peter 2:18). Of course, the Bible gives no endorsement of such treatment. “White” on “black” slavery was opposed by Christians such as William Wilberforce, but not by examining passages on slavery because the slaveries were of different types.5 “Racial” slavery was opposed because it was seen to be contrary to the value that God places on every human being, and the fact that God “has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth” (Acts 17:26). The last letter that the revival evangelist John Wesley ever wrote was to William Wilberforce, encouraging Wilberforce in his endeavors to see slavery abolished. In the letter, Wesley describes slavery as “execrable villainy.”

Reading this morning a tract wrote by a poor African, I was particularly struck by that circumstance that a man who has a black skin, being wronged or outraged by a white man, can have no redress; it being a “law” in our colonies that the oath of a black against a white goes for nothing. What villainy is this?6
Wesley concentrated on the value of a man, irrespective of the color of his skin. It is this principle of the value God places on human beings—a biblical principle—which was Wesley’s motivation in opposing slavery.

The famous hymnwriter John Newton at one time actually captained slave ships. He did so even after his conversion to Christianity, because he was influenced by the prevailing attitudes of his society; it took time for him to realize his errors. But realize them he did—and he spent the latter part of his life campaigning against slavery. He wrote movingly and disturbingly of the suffering of slaves in the ships’ galleys in his pamphlet “Thoughts upon the African Slave Trade.”

If the slaves and their rooms can be constantly aired, and they are not detained too long on board, perhaps there are not many who die; but the contrary is often their lot. They are kept down, by the weather, to breathe a hot and corrupted air, sometimes for a week: this added to the galling of their irons, and the despondency which seizes their spirits when thus confined, soon becomes fatal. . . . I believe, upon an average between the more healthy, and the more sickly voyages, and including all contingencies, one fourth of the whole purchase may be allotted to the article of mortality: that is, if the English ships purchase sixty thousand slaves annually, upon the whole extent of the coast, the annual loss of lives cannot be much less than fifteen thousand.7
Like Wesley, it was the biblical value of human life that was the deciding factor in Newton’s opposition to slavery in his latter years.

The use of the term “one blood” in Acts 17:26 is very significant. If “races” were really of different “bloods,” then we could not all be saved by the shedding of the blood of one Savior. It is because the entire human race can be seen to be descended from one man—Adam—that we know we can trust in one Savior, Jesus Christ (the “Last Adam”).

Many other Christians could be named in the fight to abolish slavery, which seemed to culminate with Abraham Lincoln in the mid-1800s (slavery was one of the reasons for the Civil War in the United States).

Is the Bible Racist?

Some “white” Christians have assumed that the so-called “curse of Ham” (Genesis 9:25) was to cause Ham’s descendants to be black and to be cursed. While it is likely that African peoples are descended from Ham (Cush, Phut, and Mizraim), it is not likely that they are descended from Canaan (the curse was actually declared on Canaan, not Ham).

However, there is no evidence from Genesis that the curse had anything to do with skin color. Others have suggested that the “mark of Cain” in Genesis 4 was that he was turned dark-skinned. Again, there is no evidence of this in Scripture, and in any case, Cain’s descendants were more or less wiped out in the Flood.

Incidentally, the use of such passages to attempt to justify some sort of evil associated with dark skin is based on an assumption that the other characters in the accounts were light-skinned, like “white” Anglo-Saxons today. That assumption can also not be found in Scripture, and is very unlikely to be true. Very light skin and very dark skin are actually the extremes of skin color, caused by the minimum and maximum of melanin production, and are more likely, therefore, to be the genetically selected results of populations moving away from each other after the Tower of Babel incident recorded in Genesis 11.

The issue of racism is just one of many reasons why Answers in Genesis opposes evolution. Darwinian evolution can easily be used to suggest that some “races” are more evolved than others, that is, the common belief is that “blacks” are less evolved. Biblical Christianity cannot be used that way—unless it is twisted by people who have deliberately misunderstood what the Bible actually teaches. On top of this, rejecting the Bible, a book that is not racist, because one may think evolution is superior is a sad alternative. Recall Darwin’s prediction of non-white “races”:

At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes . . . will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilized state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian [aborigine] and the gorilla.8

Conclusion

Though this short chapter couldn’t delve into every verse regarding slavery, the basic principles are the same. In light of what we’ve learned, here are a few pointers to remember:

Slaves under the Mosaic Law were different from the harshly treated slaves of other societies; they were more like servants or bondservants.
The Bible doesn’t give an endorsement of slave traders but just the opposite (1 Timothy 1:10). A slave/bondservant was acquired when a person voluntarily entered into it when he needed to pay off his debts.
The Bible recognizes that slavery is a reality in this sin-cursed world and doesn’t ignore it, but instead gives regulations for good treatment by both masters and servants and reveals they are equal under Christ.
Israelites could sell themselves as slaves/bondservants to have their debts covered, make a wage, have housing, and be set free after six years. Foreigners could sell themselves as slaves/bondservants as well.
Biblical Christians led the fight to abolish harsh slavery in modern times.

Gotten from: https://answersingenesis.org/bible-questions/doesnt-the-bible-support-slavery/

Does the Bible Support Harsh Slavery?

There are several passages that are commonly used to suggest that the Bible condones harsh slavery. However, when we read these passages in context, we find that they clearly oppose harsh slavery.

If you buy a Hebrew servant, he shall serve six years; and in the seventh he shall go out free and pay nothing. If he comes in by himself, he shall go out by himself; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master has given him a wife, and she has borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master’s, and he shall go out by himself. But if the servant plainly says, “I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,” then his master shall bring him to the judges. He shall also bring him to the door, or to the doorpost, and his master shall pierce his ear with an awl; and he shall serve him forever. (Exodus 21:2–6)
This is the first type of bankruptcy law we’ve encountered. With this, a government doesn’t step in, but a person who has lost himself or herself to debt can sell the only thing they have left: their ability to perform labor. This is a loan. In six years the loan is paid off, and they are set free. Bondservants who did this made a wage, had their debt covered, had a home to stay in, on-the-job training, and did it for only six years. This almost sounds better than college, which doesn’t cover debt and you have to pay for it!

Regarding Exodus 21:4, if he (the bondservant) is willing to walk away from his wife and kids, then it is his own fault. And he would be the one in defiance of the law of marriage. He has every right to stay with his family. On the other hand, his wife, since she is a servant as well, must repay her debt until she can go free. Otherwise, a woman could be deceitful by racking up debt and then selling herself into slavery to have her debts covered, only to marry someone with a short time left on his term, and then go free with him. That would be cruel to the master who was trying to help her out. So this provision is to protect those who are trying to help people out of their debt.

This is not a forced agreement either. The bondservants enter into service on their own accord. In the same respect, a foreigner can also sell himself or herself into servitude. Although the rules are slightly different, it would still be by their own accord in light of Exodus 21:16 above.

If men contend with each other, and one strikes the other with a stone or with his fist, and he does not die but is confined to his bed, if he rises again and walks about outside with his staff, then he who struck him shall be acquitted. He shall only pay for the loss of his time, and shall provide for him to be thoroughly healed. And if a man beats his male or female servant with a rod, so that he dies under his hand, he shall surely be punished. Notwithstanding, if he remains alive a day or two, he shall not be punished; for he is his property. (Exodus 21:18–21)
This passage follows closely after Moses’s decree against slave traders in Exodus 21:16. We include verses 18 and 19 to show the parallel to servants among the Israelites. The rules still apply for their protection if they already have servants or if someone sells himself or herself into service.

Regarding Exodus 21:20–21, consider that many of those who sold themselves into servitude were those who had lost everything, indicating that they were often times the “lazy” ones. In order to get them up to par on a working level, they may require discipline. And the Bible does say to give discipline—even fathers were to give their children “the rod;” to withhold it is considered unloving (Proverbs 13:24, 23:13). So beating with a rod (or more appropriately “a branch”) is not harsh, but required for discipline. Even the Apostle Paul reveals he was beaten with a rod three times (2 Corinthians 11:25), and he didn’t die from it. In fact, the equivalent in today’s culture (spanking) was commonplace in public schools until just a few years ago. Only recently has this been deemed “inappropriate.”

According to verses 20–21, if an owner severely beat his servant, and the servant died, then he would be punished—that was the law. However, if the servant survived for a couple of days, it is probable that the master was punishing him and not intending to kill him, or that he may have died from another cause. In this case there is no penalty other than that the owner loses the servant who is his temporary property—he suffers the loss.4

Some have also complained that God is sexist in his treatment of servants (though sexism is outside the realm of this chapter, we will still address this claim).

If a man sells his daughter as a servant, she is not to go free as menservants do. If she does not please the master who has selected her for himself, he must let her be redeemed. He has no right to sell her to foreigners, because he has broken faith with her (Exodus 21:7–8, NV)
There is a stark delineation between male servants and the female servants in Exodus 21:7. A Hebrew male could sell himself into servitude for his labor (to cover his debts, and so on) and be released after six years. A Hebrew female could be sold into servitude, with permission of her father, not for labor purposes but for marriage. Verse 8 discusses breaking faith with her, which means that they have entered into a marriage covenant (see Malachi 2:14). If God approved of the female leaving in six years, then marriage is no longer a life-long covenant. So God is honoring the sanctity of marriage here.

Imagine what would happen if this rule wasn’t in place. It would mean that men would have the free reign to marry a woman for six years and then “trade” her in for another woman. This is not approved of in the Bible. Of course, when a man buys a male servant, they are not married, and so the male servants were to be set free.

I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God. And if one of your brethren who dwells by you becomes poor, and sells himself to you, you shall not compel him to serve as a slave. As a hired servant and a sojourner he shall be with you, and shall serve you until the Year of Jubilee. And then he shall depart from you—he and his children with him—and shall return to his own family. He shall return to the possession of his fathers. For they are My servants, whom I brought out of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves. You shall not rule over him with rigor, but you shall fear your God. And as for your male and female slaves whom you may have—from the nations that are around you, from them you may buy male and female slaves. Moreover you may buy the children of the strangers who dwell among you, and their families who are with you, which they beget in your land; and they shall become your property. And you may take them as an inheritance for your children after you, to inherit them as a possession; they shall be your permanent slaves. But regarding your brethren, the children of Israel, you shall not rule over one another with rigor. (Leviticus 25:38–46)
God prefaces this passage specifically with a reminder that the Lord saved them from their bondage of slavery in Egypt. Again, if one becomes poor, he can sell himself into slavery/servitude and be released as was already discussed.

Verse 44 discusses slaves that they may already have from nations around them. They can be bought and sold. It doesn’t say to seek them out or have forced slavery. Hence, it is not giving an endorsement of seeking new slaves or encouraging the slave trade. At this point, the Israelites had just come out of slavery and were about to enter the Holy Land. They shouldn’t have had many servants. Also, this doesn’t restrict other people in cultures around them from selling themselves as bondservants. But as discussed already, there are passages for the proper and godly treatment of servants/slaves.

Sadly, some Israelite kings later tried to institute forced slavery, for example Solomon (1 Kings 9:15) and Rehoboam with Adoniram (1 Kings 12:18). Both fell from favor in God’s sight and were found to follow after evil (1 Kings 11:6; 2 Chronicles 12:14).

Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you that he will make him ruler over all that he has. But if that servant says in his heart, “My master is delaying his coming,” and begins to beat the male and female servants, and to eat and drink and be drunk, the master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him, and at an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the unbelievers. And that servant who knew his master’s will, and did not prepare himself or do according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he who did not know, yet committed things deserving of stripes, shall be beaten with few. For everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more. (Luke 12:43–48)
As for Jesus’s supposed support for beating slaves, this is in the context of a parable. Parables are stories Jesus told to help us understand spiritual truths. For example, in one parable Jesus likens God to a judge (Luke 18:1–5). The judge is unjust, but eventually gives justice to the widow when she persists. The point of that story was not to tell us that God is like an unjust judge—on the contrary, He is completely just. The point of the parable is to tell us to be persistent in prayer. Similarly, Luke 12:47–48 does not justify beating slaves. It is not a parable telling us how masters are to behave. It is a parable telling us that we must be ready for when Jesus Himself returns. One will be rewarded with eternal life through Christ, or with eternal punishment (Matthew 25:46).

Bondservants, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ; not with eyeservice, as men–pleasers, but as bondservants of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart, with goodwill doing service, as to the Lord, and not to men, knowing that whatever good anyone does, he will receive the same from the Lord, whether he is a slave or free. And you, masters, do the same things to them, giving up threatening, knowing that your own Master also is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him. (Ephesians 6:5–9)
Again, Paul in Ephesians is not giving an endorsement to slavery/bondservants and masters, but gives them both the same commands, showing that God views them as equals in Christ. Again, bondservants were to be paid fair wages:

Masters, give your bondservants what is just and fair, knowing that you also have a Master in heaven. (Colossians 4:1)

The issue of slavery usually conjures up thoughts of the harsh “race-based” slavery that was common by Europeans toward those of African descent in the latter few centuries. However, slavery has a much longer history and needs to be addressed biblically.1

Some “white”2 Christians have used the Bible to convince themselves that owning slaves is okay and that slaves should obey their “earthly masters.” Regrettably and shamefully, “white” Christians have frequently taken verses of Scripture out of context to justify the most despicable acts. In some cases, it could be argued that these people were not really Christians; they were not really born again but were adhering to a form of Christianity for traditional or national reasons. Nevertheless, we have to concede that there are genuine “white” Christians who have believed the vilest calumnies about the nature of “black” people and have sought support for their disgraceful views from the pages of the Bible.

But what does the Bible really teach?

Greek and Hebrew Words for “Slave”
The Hebrew and Greek words used for “slave” are also the same words used for “servant” and “bondservant,” as shown by the following table.

Greek and Hebrew Words for Slave
In essence, there are two kinds of slavery described in the Bible: a servant or bondservant who was paid a wage, and the enslavement of an individual without pay. Which types of “slavery” did the Bible condemn?

A Brief History of Slavery
It is important to note that neither slavery in New Testament times nor slavery under the Mosaic Covenant have anything to do with the sort of slavery where “black” people were bought and sold as property by “white” people in the well-known slave trade of the last few centuries. No “white” Christian should think that he or she could use any slightly positive comment about slavery in this chapter to justify the historic slave trade, which is still a major stain on the histories of both the United States and the UK.

The United States and the UK were not the only countries in history to delve into harsh slavery and so be stained.

The Code of Hammurabi discussed slavery soon after 2242 BC (the date assigned by Archbishop Ussher to the Tower of Babel incident).
Ham’s son Mizraim founded Egypt (still called Mizraim in Hebrew). Egypt was the first well-documented nation in the Bible to have harsh slavery, which was imposed on Joseph, the son of Israel, in 1728 BC (according to Archbishop Ussher). Later, the Egyptians were slave masters to the rest of the Israelites until Moses, by the hand of God, freed them.
The Israelites were again enslaved by Assyrian and Babylonian captors about 1,000 years later.
“Black” Moors enslaved “whites” during their conquering of Spain and Portugal on the Iberian Peninsula in the eighth century AD for over 400 years. The Moors even took slaves as far north as Scandinavia. The Moorish and Middle Eastern slave market was quite extensive.
Norse raiders of Scandinavia enslaved other European peoples and took them back as property beginning in the eighth century AD.
Even in modern times, slavery is still alive, such as in the Sudan and Darfur.
We find many other examples of harsh slavery from cultures throughout the world. At any rate, these few examples indicate that harsh slavery was/is a reality, and, in all cases, is an unacceptable act by biblical standards (as we will see).

The extreme kindness to be shown to slaves/servants commanded in the Bible among the Israelites was often prefaced by a reminder that they too were slaves at the hand of the Egyptians. In other words, they were to treat slaves/servants in a way that they wanted to be treated.

Slavery in the Bible
But was slavery in the Bible the same as harsh slavery? For example, slaves and masters are addressed in Paul’s epistles. The term “slave” in Ephesians 6:5 is better translated “bondservant.” The Bible in no way gives full support to the practice of bondservants, who were certainly not paid the first century equivalent of the minimum wage. Nevertheless, they were paid something (Colossians 4:1) and were therefore in a state more akin to a lifetime employment contract rather than “racial” slavery. Moreover, Paul gives clear instructions that Christian “masters” are to treat such people with respect and as equals. Their employment position did not affect their standing in the Church.

Other passages in Leviticus show us the importance of treating “aliens” and foreigners well, and how, if they believe, they become part of the people of God (for example, Rahab and Ruth, to name but two). Also, the existence of slavery in Leviticus 25 underlines the importance of redemption, and enables the New Testament writers to point out that we are slaves to sin, but are redeemed by the blood of Jesus. Such slavery is a living allegory, and does not justify the race-based form of slavery practiced from about the 16th to 19th centuries.

As we already know, harsh slavery was common in the Middle East as far back as ancient Egypt. If God had simply ignored it, then there would have been no rules for the treatment of slaves/bondservants, and people could have treated them harshly with no rights. But the God-given rights and rules for their protection showed that God cared for them as well.

This is often misconstrued as an endorsement of harsh slavery, which it is not. God listed slave traders among the worst of sinners in 1 Timothy 1:10 (“kidnappers/men stealers/slave traders”). This is no new teaching, as Moses was not fond of forced slavery either:

He who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall surely be put to death. (Exodus 21:16)
In fact, take note of the punishment of Egypt, when the Lord freed the Israelites (Exodus 3–15). God predicted this punishment well in advance:

Then He said to Abram: “Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions.” (Genesis 15:13–14)
Had God not protected slaves/bondservants by such commands, then many people surrounding them who did have harsh slavery would have loved to move in where there were no governing principles as to the treatment of slaves. It would have given a “green light” to slave owners from neighboring areas to come and settle there. But with the rules in place, it discouraged such slavery in their realm.

In fact, the laws and regulations over slavery are a sure sign that slavery isn’t good in the same way the Law came to expose and limit sin (Romans 5:13). One reverend explained it this way:

In giving laws to regulate slavery, God is not saying it is a good thing. In fact, by giving laws about it at all, He is plainly stating it is a bad thing. We don’t make laws to limit or regulate good things. After all, you won’t find laws that tell us it is wrong to be too healthy or that if water is too clean we have to add pollution to it. Therefore, the fact slavery is included in the regulations of the Old Testament at all assumes that it is a bad thing which needs regulation to prevent the damage from being too great.3

OtemSapien:
Yahweh the god of Christians gave laws to guide how slaves should be treated rather than abolishing slavery. If slavery isn't considered okay by Yahweh, why did he give laws about how it should be done.

Yahweh accepted that Jephthah should sacrifice his daughter to him. If murder isn't considered okay by Yahweh, why did he permit someone to sacrifice his daughter to him?

Onan didn't want to commit ince-st, but according to the bible, Yahweh had to kill him because he didn't want to commit ince-st. So to Yahweh, ince-st was moral.

Yahweh commanded genocides, killing for religious purposes, etc. All these things are morality to Yahweh. Imagine.

Did you know that some people willingly gave themselves to other people to be their slaves? While slavery was not God's plan, it happened that it came into existence. The same is true of polygamy. The fact that God is not in support of maltreatment is attested to by His laying down rules guiding how slaves should be treated with love and kindness.

Jephthah never did a human sacrifice with his daughter. She simply was devoted to the service of God all her life, and never married.

You liar, God killed Onan because he "masturbated" i.e. he slept with his brother's wife but spilled the seed on the ground. He refused to give his dead brother a child. Where did the Bible say that Onan was killed because of incest?

Yes, God commanded the annihilation of wicked people. People who sacrifice their children to idols surely deserve judgment.

[s]

OtemSapien:
Not practising religion doesn't mean denial of God. For example, I practised Christianity earlier, but when I saw the true light of God, which is actually in science, I abandoned the religion and see God in science. That didn't make me a bad person. It actually made me more moral and thirsty to see the betterment of humanity.

[/s]

Crap!

According to which objective moral standard are you moral?

mmsen:
According to the Quran and the Bible slavery is fine.

Domestic abuse is acceptable.

Rape is acceptable.

Child abuse is acceptable.

Meanwhile birth control is a problem.

Religion provides the most useless moral framework and that is why the most religious societies are the most chaotic.

Prove that according to the Bible, all the things you listed above are fine.

When I present my arguments, I do so as a Christian, and not a religionist who maybe is trying to defend all of what is called religion. I argue for Christianity, and so you may do well not to mention Islam to me. For one, the whole of religion provides no single moral code. The religion I practise has as its absolute moral code the 10 Commandments, as they are found in Exodus 20:1-17 KJV. So, your claim that "religion provides the most useless moral framework" is meaningless.

Modified.

You don't get it do you?

The issue is not whether I can do good acts without God; it is that without God:

1. There is nobody or group of persons to reveal what is objectively good. Whenever a person or group of persons says that a thing is good, they would be merely expressing their own opinion, which is by no means superior to any contrary opinion another person or group of persons might have.

2. There would be no objective reason to do good acts, or to avoid bad acts(that is if such things as "good" acts and "bad" acts can exist without God.)

Thus, if I throw God out of the picture, it would make no sense for me to say that I am doing good acts, or that I am a good person, because then I would have become "righteous in my own sight."

smoy:
your prove were baseless but i quoted from the bible for you, compare the quote with your argument.

It's either you never read the explanations I provided, or you have a problem with comprehension.

Truth.

Not so.

Nope!

No!