Are D.N.A. and R.N.A. sufficient evidence for the existence of God?

Question

Are DNA and RNA sufficient evidence for the existence of God?

If so, why? If not, why?

Answer 1

@no1home2day harks to Zipf's law as evidence against DNA being a product of evolution.



Though the word frequencies of all natural languages follow a power law (Zipf's Law), DNA does not follow that pattern. See Tsonis, A. A., J. B. Elsner and P. A. Tsonis, 1997. Is DNA a language? Journal of Theoretical Biology 184: 25-29.



And this site:

http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2007/01/junk-dna-lingui.html



Now, to the refutation of your argument.



The genetic code is not static. DNA codons are subject to change by mutation, which can change the proteins (ultimately) they code for. The mutations are random, but they are subject to natural selection, which is not random.



That is where you creationists fail--miserably, as has been shown time and time again--by referring only to random mutations and not to the incremental, non-random power of natural selection.



In some cases the mutation does nothing because it still results in coding for the same amino acid (for example, GGG, which codes for glycine, can mutate to GGT, which still codes for glycine) that is used to construct the protein product (and note, there are 64 codons that code for 20 amino acids used to construct proteins). If the mutation results in a detrimental change, it is usually eliminated by natural selection. If it results in a beneficial change, it is selected by natural selection and reproductively passed on to future generations.



Combined with gene doubling, mutations can result in new genetic coding to produce new characteristics. That is, if a gene doubles during the reproduction process, one of the doubled genes continues to serve the original function, while the other gene can mutate to perform another function.



A good example is tricolor vision in the apes and humans. Most mammals have two-color vision. However, in the common ancestor of the apes and humans one of the genes for color vision doubled, then one of the doubled genes had a mutation that slightly modified the protein opsin receptor it coded for, which in turn shifted the frequency of the light the opsin was sensitive to. Since the original gene still coded for the frequency, the result was three genes that resulted in tri-color vision. No supernatural agency was required, and the change was well within the constraints of the limitations of the genetic chemical processes involved. Numerous other examples of genetic increases are known.



That is how natural selection works: Non-intelligently, but non-random.



See also the Best Answer here:

https://answersrip.com/question/index?qid=20091013153311AAOnEhA&show=7#profile-info-cBAeZg7Eaa



Added:

Anthony Flew (at least learn how to spell the name of someone you use as evidence) accepted a form of weak Deism, not theism, and certainly does not accept biblical fables.



And, contrary to your unsupported quote from him, he also continues to accept evolution. His primary concern was how life originated, not how it evolved.



http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA115_1.html

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6688917/



Added:

By the way, that quote you attributed to Flew is not by him. It is by AJ Monty White, Student Advisor, Dean of Students Office, at the University of Cardiff, UK.

http://member.melbpc.org.au/~grjallen/sixdays.htm



You can't even keep your quotes straight.

Answer 2

Scientists have synthesized RNA enzymes that can replicate themselves without the help of any proteins or other cellular components, and the process proceeds indefinitely!!



In the modern world, DNA carries the genetic sequence for advanced organisms, while RNA is dependent on DNA for performing its roles such as building proteins. But one prominent theory about the origins of life, called the RNA World model, postulates that because RNA can function as both a gene and an enzyme, RNA might have come before DNA and protein and acted as the ancestral molecule of life.



Researchers generated a variety of enzyme pairs with similar capabilities in a molecular test of survival of the fittest. Most of the time the replicating enzymes would breed true, but on occasion an enzyme would make a mistake by binding one of the subunits from one of the other replicating enzymes. When such "mutations" occurred, the resulting recombinant enzymes also were capable of sustained replication, with the most fit replicators growing in number to dominate the mixture.



The research shows that the system can sustain molecular information, a form of heritability, and give rise to variations of itself in a way akin to Darwinian evolution. So while it is non-living it does have some life-like properties.



So man is surely as powerful as that non existent god!!



But look since christians claim their god created everything just look at what the scientists are now capable of doing!! Cures for diseases, cancer, heart attacks etc and now many forms of disease prevention!!!

Answer 3

I will say it like this - if you are WILLING to believe in God (or gods), then they are more than sufficient, but if you are not willing to believe in God (or gods), then NOTHING will EVER be sufficient. (might look into Luke 16.31)



I am a computer programmer, and I can tell you that from what I know about DNA and RNA, they are more complex than any program written by humans thus far. I personally find it unreasonable to belief that they are not just that - a program written by someone (or something, I'm willing to compromise for the sake of argument).

Answer 4

They do imply that there was some master coder at the very least. As far as science can show, there are only two major things that the universe can do by itself, chaos and law. I can show that gravity works the same over and over and over again, and I can show how glass shattering is unpredictable. But to generate meaning, that is a totally different task.



Though the amino acids can be generated artificially (albeit, outside of early Earth conditions), the idea of protein coding is unaccounted for. We understand it is there, and how it works, but that's not the same as figuring out how a language wrote itself. We are at a point in science where we need to talk to experts in fields when we discover something. i.e. if something looks like a language, hire a linguist to analyze it and deduct how it came to have meaning, don't just keep looking at how you write the letters.

Answer 5

George Kingsley Zipf , back in 1935, discovered that given some corpus of natural language utterances, the frequency of any word is inversely proportional to its rank in the frequency table. Thus the most frequent word will occur approximately twice as often as the second most frequent word, which occurs twice as often as the fourth most frequent word, etc.



The same relationship occurs in many other rankings, unrelated to language, such as the population ranks of cities in various countries, corporation sizes, income rankings, etc.



Furthermore, this relationship is NEVER found in randomly generated data!



The structure of the DNA and the RNA follow the same law of information frequency, thus proving beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the information stored in the DNA (and mirrored in the RNA) was NOT randomly generated, but intelligently designed.



In fact, Dr. Flue (not sure of the spelling) used to accept evolution as a fact, but the more he delved into the internal structure and function of the DNA, the more convinced he became that random chance was NOT behind the existence of life in the universe.



Even though he received a lot of flack from his colleagues, he announced in an article that for him to continue to accept evolution as a viable cause of life would be tantamount to "intellectual suicide"!



I suppose that there are a lot of people who have committed intellectual suicide, by ignoring the facts, and believing in evolution any way. It requires a blind leap of faith to accept evolution as valid!

Answer 6

No, why would it be? because it is complex? complexity is not evidence for the existence of god , Its evidence of evolution my natural selection. Take the eye for example its very complex and a popular argument for religious folk saying"the eye is too complex and beautiful to be created by accident" people who say this are ignorant because DNA/RNA/the human eye don't happen by "accident ". I'm going to stop here not enough space to type all this out. but i would suggest you educate your self on the process of evolution by natural selection and the full complexities of DNA and RNA.

Answer 7

No, they're not sufficient, but they're certainly enough to imply the existence of God.



"The origin of life appears to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have to be satisfied to get it going."

--- Biologist Francis Crick, codiscoverer of DNA, an agnostic.



Edit: Amazing, isn't it, how the dude that discovered the thing can acknowledge how unlikely it really is, and yet so many others can flippantly say "it'll organize itself." Scientific illiteracy is truly astounding.



UPDATE: no1home2day is referring to Dr. Antony Flew.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antony_Flew

Answer 8

Sure, in the same way hammers and lightning bolts are sufficient evidence for Thor and Odin.

Answer 9

the stars are sufficient evidence



For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse,

Answer 10

There are many proofs of God. See below:

Answer 11

DNA and RNA both support evolution, which in turn destroys the creation theory, which once again, in turn leaves god with no purpose of existence.

Answer 12

No, because RNA and DNA can be spontaneously created through the laws of chemistry.

Answer 13

No.



There is nothing about them that suggests they are made by [insert deity of choice here].



"Evidence" of creation by a deity would, by definition, require something to indicate creation by a deity.



EDIT: good point, Corey.

Answer 14

Hardly. DNA transcription is a terribly flawed and error-prone process that no intelligent being would use that for species propagation.

Answer 15

Put an "a" before god. You assume too much.

Answer 16

Nothing is enough for some people. Dennis Prager did a cool video about this on YouTube.

I highly recommend it.

Answer 17

No, because the mere presence of something suggests nothing about another thing.

Answer 18

No, it shows us how even very complex things can be created entirely through natural processes

Answer 19

No, they're evidence of heredity.

Answer 20

yeah...dont see how that proves god existed....that just proves the human body is amazing.

Answer 21

No. Science has explained genetic coding and how it works, or at least how it exists.

Answer 22

Ah yes! Dina & Rina, I love them dames!

Answer 23

No, they're evidence for evolution and abiogenesis.



http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/05/ribonucleotides/

Answer 24

No. I don't even see how you think they might be.