The question isn't mentioned. Even the movie's website doesn't mention the question. Since there is so much smoke and noise about this movie, I decided to see where it is showing. I checked Fandango and got nothing. I searched the Internet, and got... nothing. This movie, as far as I can tell, isn't playing anywhere.From the movie's website, I found that I can DOWNLOAD the movie for a mere $19.99! Which is insane, since for that price I can buy two tickets to Star Trek Beyond, and still have change left for a bag of M&Ms.
So I went looking for spoilers, and found them on Hemant Mehta's blog. So here's the spoiler, here's the question that Ray Comfort asks atheists that according to World Net Daily, "stuns" atheists...
Where did DNA come from?
Comfort points out that DNA is complex, that it contains information. It's like a book. And books have creators, therefore DNA has a creator. Right?
Are you stunned? Have you lost your atheism? Or are you remembering Paley's watch?
This is a slick trick that I see happen too often in apologetics - ask a professional a question that is not in their field of study. Ask a physicist about biology, ask a biologist about astrophysics. The answers you get are muddled and lacking any depth - then jump on THOSE answers and yell, "AHAH!"
It works even better if the person is not prepared to respond. And Comfort's "Living Waters" demonstrates the methods of 'ambush reporting' as its preferred style of asking questions.
In other words, "The Atheist Delusion" is tabloid journalism, or business as usual for Ray Comfort.
As for his question, "where did DNA come from?" I'll answer that.
I don't know. What does the deity of the Bible have to do with it?
The idea that information must have a creator is incorrect. I could go into information theory to show that information can happen if the process of creating information has a built in "ratchet" to keep the wheels spinning in one direction. In the modern theory of evolution this ratchet is called, "natural selection". And let's skip the entire field of machine learning...
Circuits that exist inside FPGAs are usually created using a Hardware Definition Language of some sort. They are created by a creator - usually an electronic engineer with a software proficiency. But Dr. Thompson proved that FPGAs could be created using an evolutionary process based on artificial selection - the sister to natural selection that we see in evolution.
The resulting circuit meets the artificial selection requirements without ever having been created by a human.
Where did the information in this circuit come from? Dr. Thompson didn't write it.
Maybe God did it? Maybe we should ask Ray Comfort? Because what does he know about electrical engineering?
But having read several of Comfort's apologetics, I think I could answer for him. He would skip the question entirely, and ask me who built the FPGA. Which is a neat way to tap-dance away from the actual question that is asked.
Here is one simple question that will destroy Christians.
Can you prove that your deity created the universe?
4 comments:
So, the opening weekend for "The Atheist Delusion" was a smash hit. According to the latest press release from Jen Thompson at Living Waters, "thousands" have downloaded it.
Literally thousands.
Let's see, a quick Google search shows me that the worst weekend opening for a fairly recent movie was "Oogieloves In The BIG Balloon Adventure", which opened August 29, 2012. That weekend this movie earned $443,901.
"The Atheist Delusion" is selling for $20 a download. To be equal to this movie, "The Atheist Delusion" must have been downloaded at least 22,206 times.
That would be tens of thousands. Versus literally thousands.
As I said in my posting, the price per download is too high. Ray Comfort has promised to release the movie for free on Youtube in September / October. The reason for the early paid release is money, of course. Living Waters needs the money to create new material. And I'm pretty sure that they haven't earned just under a half million dollars for the weekend release.
Comfort has said that money isn't his goal. If he saves a few souls, he'll consider the movie a success. Still, it should be noted that Comfort makes a pretty good living as an evangelical minister. Comfort's ministry supported his wife and three children. Now two of his children are working in some capacity with the Living Waters ministry.
Maybe he would be even more successful if he came up with something like evidence.
This is nonsense. The entire article's basis is first denying that information needs a designer, saying computers and DNA are not analogous, then, finally the author uses the same analogy he/she said was invalid. It's like someone pushing a stool away from themselves before they are about to sit down. They just end up falling on the floor and hurting themselves.
And the fact that the FPGA even had a designer was just left dangling on the bottom of the article. YEC (even Ken Ham and the scientists at AiG) believe in natural selection. But it does not add new information (analogous to the FBGA example) and it fis needed a designer to prepare it.
Nothing ground breaking happening over on the OEA side of reseach I see.
You didn't understand what I said, did you Rudy?
We are already using genetic algorithms to create new information.
We are already doing this. No one is writing this new information, it is being created through a genetic process that is based on the modern synthesis of evolution.
You can deny that it is happening if you like. But the fact remains.
One other question for this young scholar...
"...believe in natural selection. But it does not add new information"
Please explain what the process of natural (or unnatural) selection in regards to an evolutionary process - either in the modern evolutionary synthesis, or in genetic algorithms.
I'm not sure you can, because this single sentence you've written is self contradictory. It shows a primary misunderstanding of how this works.
Actually, I think you'll come up with a definition that is NOT about natural selection.
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