NASA finds proof that amino acid components in meteorites originate in space.
This is exciting news. NASA-funded researchers have evidence that some building blocks of DNA, the molecule that carries the genetic instructions for life, found in meteorites were likely created in space. The research gives support to the theory that a “kit” of ready-made parts created in space and delivered to Earth by meteorite and comet impacts assisted the origin of life. We may all be immigrants on Earth.
By Bill Steigerwald
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
NASA-funded researchers have evidence that some building blocks of DNA, the molecule that carries the genetic instructions for life, found in meteorites were likely created in space. The research gives support to the theory that a “kit” of ready-made parts created in space and delivered to Earth by meteorite and comet impacts assisted the origin of life.
“People have been discovering components of DNA in meteorites since the 1960’s, but researchers were unsure whether they were really created in space or if instead they came from contamination by terrestrial life,” said Dr. Michael Callahan of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. “For the first time, we have three lines of evidence that together give us confidence these DNA building blocks actually were created in space.” Callahan is lead author of a paper on the discovery appearing in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.
The discovery adds to a growing body of evidence that the chemistry inside asteroids and comets is capable of making building blocks of essential biological molecules.
For example, previously, these scientists at the Goddard Astrobiology Analytical Laboratory have found amino acids in samples of comet Wild 2 from NASA’s Stardust mission, and in various carbon-rich meteorites. Amino acids are used to make proteins, the workhorse molecules of life, used in everything from structures like hair to enzymes, the catalysts that speed up or regulate chemical reactions.
In the new work, the Goddard team ground up samples of twelve carbon-rich meteorites, nine of which were recovered from Antarctica. They extracted each sample with a solution of formic acid and ran them through a liquid chromatograph, an instrument that separates a mixture of compounds. They further analyzed the samples with a mass spectrometer, which helps determine the chemical structure of compounds.
The team found adenine and guanine, which are components of DNA called nucleobases, as well as hypoxanthine and xanthine. DNA resembles a spiral ladder; adenine and guanine connect with two other nucleobases to form the rungs of the ladder. They are part of the code that tells the cellular machinery which proteins to make. Hypoxanthine and xanthine are not found in DNA, but are used in other biological processes.
Also, in two of the meteorites, the team discovered for the first time trace amounts of three molecules related to nucleobases: purine, 2,6-diaminopurine, and 6,8-diaminopurine; the latter two almost never used in biology. These compounds have the same core molecule as nucleobases but with a structure added or removed.
It’s these nucleobase-related molecules, called nucleobase analogs, which provide the first piece of evidence that the compounds in the meteorites came from space and not terrestrial contamination. “You would not expect to see these nucleobase analogs if contamination from terrestrial life was the source, because they’re not used in biology, aside from one report of 2,6-diaminopurine occurring in a virus (cyanophage S-2L),” said Callahan. “However, if asteroids are behaving like chemical ‘factories’ cranking out prebiotic material, you would expect them to produce many variants of nucleobases, not just the biological ones, due to the wide variety of ingredients and conditions in each asteroid.”
The second piece of evidence involved research to further rule out the possibility of terrestrial contamination as a source of these molecules. The team also analyzed an eight-kilogram (17.64-pound) sample of ice from Antarctica, where most of the meteorites in the study were found, with the same methods used on the meteorites. The amounts of the two nucleobases, plus hypoxanthine and xanthine, found in the ice were much lower — parts per trillion — than in the meteorites, where they were generally present at several parts per billion. More significantly, none of the nucleobase analogs were detected in the ice sample. One of the meteorites with nucleobase analog molecules fell in Australia, and the team also analyzed a soil sample collected near the fall site. As with the ice sample, the soil sample had none of the nucleobase analog molecules present in the meteorite.
Thirdly, the team found these nucleobases — both the biological and non-biological ones — were produced in a completely non-biological reaction. “In the lab, an identical suite of nucleobases and nucleobase analogs were generated in non-biological chemical reactions containing hydrogen cyanide, ammonia, and water. This provides a plausible mechanism for their synthesis in the asteroid parent bodies, and supports the notion that they are extraterrestrial,” says Callahan.
“In fact, there seems to be a ‘goldilocks’ class of meteorite, the so-called CM2 meteorites, where conditions are just right to make more of these molecules,” adds Callahan.
The team includes Callahan and Drs. Jennifer C. Stern, Daniel P. Glavin, and Jason P. Dworkin of NASA Goddard’s Astrobiology Analytical Laboratory; Ms. Karen E. Smith and Dr. Christopher H. House of Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pa.; Dr. H. James Cleaves II of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington, DC; and Dr. Josef Ruzicka of Thermo Fisher Scientific, Somerset, N.J. The research was funded by the NASA Astrobiology Institute, the Goddard Center for Astrobiology, the NASA Astrobiology: Exobiology and Evolutionary Biology Program, and the NASA Postdoctoral Program.
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@Kuhnkat and others
All the creationist canards (no transitional fossils, intermediates would be unviable, homochirality, all the rest) have been dealt with a thousand times. Sure, there are gaps in our knowledge, but not one gap for which “design” has been the best answer. For a list of answers to creationist claims, kind of like a “skepticalscience” for evolution, try here:
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/
Bring on the flames…
Eric Anderson says:
And as I said, those who think it is poor, including you, do not propose any kind of better solution based on actual engineering considerations.
Put the nerves behind the retina of course.
There is zero evidence that a different wiring scheme would be better, and plenty of good engineering reason for having it the way it is.
The debate is not about how good it works. It’s about if the vertebrate eye was designed by an intelligent being.
At the end of the day, however, it is irrelevant to the question of whether it was designed.
No it isn’t, it’s highly relevant. An intelligent engineer wouldn’t do that: First make a bad choice for the wiring and then come up with an adjustment to his original blunder. An engineer would avoid the bad choice from the beginning. The fact that our eye is designed so bizarrely is strong evidence that it developed from a series of trials & errors, not organised planning.
mattweezer says:
“So why would “the desgner” make it look so much like all life evolved from one or a few common forms (as Darwin put it)?”
You asked the question, one possible non-scienitific answer (for a non-scientific question) is perhaps he wanted to confuse you.
If you want to assume all natural phenomena to be a smoke screen put up wilfully to be impenetrable to human understanding, you can as well give up rational thought and go right to superstition. Go right ahead and do it, it’s a self consistent world view that cannot be rationally refuted.
The only argument against it is that it’s a wilflul departure into cultural and mental immaturity, everything that we have overcome since the age of enlightenment, which has done endless good to us, both materially and culturally.
@John B & Kuhnkat
All the creationist canards (no transitional fossils, intermediates would be unviable, homochirality, all the rest) have been dealt with a thousand times.
I didn’t understand most of Kuhnkat’s questions directed at me, so I skipped the answer. Could anyone (Kuhnkat or someone else) please rephrase them?
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/
Oh yes, talk.origins. Is that still around? Excellent FAQ.
Having already proven that he’s not sane (what other kind of critter does the online equivalent of maniacal “HAHAHA…” gibbering?), now at 5:47 PM on 12 August we find kuhnkat responding to my observation that “Done properly, science is self-correcting” with further divergence from sanity:
How is science – “done properly” – not self-correcting? From kuhncat: “blank out.”
The noise made by kuhncat and his fellow religious whackjobs in this forum when confronted by the straightforward adherence to reason and what writer George H. Smith (1976) characterized as “the habit of reasonableness” on the subject of theism has been the rejection of reason combined with the recitation of formulae which appear to have been milled by the creationist priests of the “intelligent design” cult in much the same way that we observe scientifically illiterate AGW True Believers” regurgitating propaganda fabricated by online charlatans like Joe Romm and refusing real engagement in logical argumentation.
F’rinstance, in that contemptible scrawl from kuhncat recapitulated above, we have six sentences of squalling unreason that support nothing that any reasonable reader could receive as anything except evidence that kuhncat is really, really angry at me. Probably feels threatened, the poor yutz.
Not without good reason, of course. I’ve got his number, he knows it, and it’s driving him bugnuts.
The reasonable person, literate in science as kuhncat keeps demonstrating that he really is not, knows that there’s nothing of scientific method that admits of emotion. The process of scientific investigation has been, in fact, devised deliberately to minimize (ideally, to eliminate) the effects of such emotional loading as critters like kuhncat are demonstrating in this forum. The purpose is the ensure as much of an unprejudiced and dispassionate approach to the particular subject under examination as can be managed.
This is one of the reasons – perhaps the most important reason – why theism and a fixation on the “supernatural” are incompatible with science. Indeed, “done properly” science simply disregards concerns such as those of our religious whackjobs in this discussion. The “supernatural” is no more a primary concern of science than is the artistic concept of “beauty.”
And that gets us back to the reason why the aggressive political designs of religious whackjobs like kuhncat and his fellow creationist clowns gibbering and capering in this venue must be condemned and opposed.
It’s not simply that their peculiar form of unsanity is execrable. kuhncat has the perfect right to go to hell in his own personal handbasket, and it looks as if he’s there already. What neither he nor his co-religionists have, however, is the right to impose their unsanity coercively – by way of government thuggery – upon other people.
The whole purpose of this “intelligent design” religious jerking-off is political, to induce government schools to incorporate creationism (doesn’t matter whether it’s Christian, Jewish, Muslim, animist [“it’s turtles all the way down!”] or Satanist [“and when you get to the bottom, you’ll find our Dark Lord waiting for you, ha-ha!”]) as part of the science curriculum.
The reasonable reader – as well as the religiously unsane, like kuhncat – know full well the results of this malignant political effort, if allowed to go forward. Children and adolescents condemned to suffer the comprachico indoctrination of government schooling will emerge with a debilitated and wrongful understanding of what science is and how it works.
As I’ve said, it’s not simply that aggressive religious whackjobs like this kuhncat clown seek to have their Great Sky Pixie indoctrination rammed down kids’ throats at taxpayer expense but that they wish to impose upon scientific thought a degree of fundamental debilitation rendering it much more difficult for people in these United States to perceive the difference between reason and unreason.
In this, kuhncat is proving himself to be morally equivalent to the AGW fraudsters. Heck, precisely equivalent. To the extent that the god premise is without objective proof, it has to be considered in the same light as the AGW contention, and dismissed by scrupulously reasonable scientifically literate people on the same basis.
Hm. Is kuhncat also a warmista? Don’t recall, but it wouldn’t surprise me none.
By the bye, just for lagniappe, the position of atheism is not predicated on any form of belief, but on the exact opposite of belief – the insistence upon verifiable evidence before accepting an assertion of fact. The “supernatural” being by definition devoid of such verifiable evidence, the whole of that category must be accepted on the basis of unfounded credulity, and the incredulous – the nonbeliever – simply and honestly reject it as “not proven.”
No “belief system” involved. Really seems to fry the clabbered oatmeal between the ears of religious whackjobs like the contemptible kuhncat, doesn’t it?
Ah, the “bad design” argument. Another classic. This argument is religious in nature. Those making it conflate bad design and no design. They justify it with a presumption that the designer is perfect. This is a presumption based on a belief about the nature of the designer. The belief has no empirical rationale behind it.
The more often-used canard is the Problem of Evil which has vexed philosphers and theologians for thousands of years i.e. why would a loving and caring God allow evil to exist. Intelligent design doesn’t speak to this problem. It makes no conclusions about the nature or intent of the intelligent agency. Maybe our universe is a forgotten science fair project in the basement of some really advanced intelligent agent who has since moved on the other projects. The bottom line remains one of assessing law and chance and making an inference to what is reasonably possible for law and chance to accomplish given a finite universe.
The hallmark of intelligent agency is exceeding improbable things happening in routine succession. For instance it is not impossible for a spacecraft that can carry men into space and return them safely to be formed by law and chance alone. The odds however make it so unlikely we very righty assume that when we encounter such a craft it there was intelligent agency involved. The probability is explained by comparing the number of arrangements of matter that can perform a certain function to the number of arrangements that cannot perform the function. In this case there are far more arrangements of the atoms in a spacecraft that will not produce a working craft than there are arrangements that do. So many more that given a finite number of opportunities for law and chance alone to make a working arrangement is absurd in our finite universe.
Determining the probability for law and chance to accomplish something versus the ability of intelligent agency to produce very improbable outcomes is the basis for all forensic sciences. A flint might splinter in the shape of an arrowhead but where you find many of them close together all very similar to each other you rightly expect intelligent agency was involved. It’s all a matter of assessing the odds just like you assess the odds in a game of chance to determine if there was cheating involved. At some point “luck” or “chance” becomes an unreasonable explanation. There are many things in the nature of the universe ranging from finely tuned laws and physical constants that allow it to exist in the first place to the complexity of the molecular machinery and information processing systems in even the simplest living cells that makes law and chance alone appear to be an unreasonable explanation.
Intelligent design does not dispute common descent. Neither does it require a designer that is still around today nor one that has stuck around and tinkered with the design along the way. Indeed it appears to be the case that all the information in the universe today was extant at the instant of the big bang. If the universe is a closed system then by the laws of thermodynamics there cannot be more order in it today than there was at any time in the past. It may only become less ordered. This is required by the law of entropy which has not been overturned as far as I know. So all the complexity, all the thoughts and dreams and aspirations of 6 billion human minds was woven into the fabric of the universe at the instant when it was born.
One might justifiably question whether it’s reasonable to view that initial tapestry as an accidental happenstance as purely the result of law and chance alone.
Tucci78 says:
August 12, 2011 at 10:43 am
“I’m still inclined to go with Smith’s wager”
That’s because you haven’t thought through the risk/reward inherent in the wager.
What are you risking and what’s the payoff?
Try Pascal’s Wager instead. It has a much better risk/reward ratio.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_Wager
Ron Cram says:
August 12, 2011 at 9:33 am
“JimG,
You write:
An eternal universe does NOT obviate the necessity of a God and I continue to believe He wants us to continue to grow by making the search go on.
If you are saying we need to continue the search for scientific truth, I fully agree. Was there something I said that made you think I would not agree?”
No, but your book citation seemed to indicate that without a proof of a beginning, as in the big bang, God was not necessary to the equation. My point is that the perfection of physical laws in their minute details, though not a scientific proof, leads a logical mind to believe in God unless one accepts the anthropomorphic principal, which is not scientific at all.
Ron Cram says:
August 11, 2011 at 8:30 pm
Good grief! There’s so much being said here that is patently wrong.
The “Argument from Design” saw the light of day (at least in writing) 500 years before the birth of Christ.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleological_argument#Classical_and_early_Christian_writers
The argument was famously restated about 200 years ago by William Paley in The Watchmaker argument. Poorer students of history, as opposed to the abysmally ignorant who don’t know Paley from Picasso, attribute the argument from design to Paley. In point of fact Cicero made the first watchmaker argument before the birth of Christ.
Modern science has done nothing to weaken the argument. Pundits of an accidental universe call it an illusion of design. Unfortunately for them the way that illusions work out is they are revealed as illusion upon closer examination. In all scientific inquiry into the universe, at both the smallest and largest scales, the so-called illusion of design does not disappear. The intricate machinery in living cells that requires an electron microscope to resolve is so complex that it still defies the ability of our supercomputers to tease out how it works. As we looked to the edge of the observable cosmos we found recently that Einstein’s cosmological constant, which Einstein called the biggest blunder of his life, actually does exist. Einstein (eventually) concluded that its value was zero and should be dropped out of the equation. Further inquiry, within the past twenty years, has discovered that it isn’t quite zero but is rather 0.0000000000000000000000000000001. Moreover any tiny deviation in that exquisitely tiny number would result in universe that either expanded so fast that stars and galaxies could not form or collapsed back in on itself so quickly that stars and galaxies could not form.
The more we learn from science the stronger the design argument becomes. The so-called illusion just won’t disappear no matter how closely it is examined.
John B says:
August 13, 2011 at 1:28 am
@Ron Cram
My worldview can best be summed up as “I don’t know, and neither do you”
That seems to put you squarely in the “It’s not possible to know” side of the agnostic camp. My only question is “How do you know?” Seriously. Isn’t it possible someone else may have information you don’t have?
JimG,
You write:
No, but your book citation seemed to indicate that without a proof of a beginning, as in the big bang, God was not necessary to the equation.
I see what you mean. No, I think there are many evidences for God, but for people with scientific minds the proof the universe had a beginning was enough to convince even agnostics and atheists.
Jeff Alberts says:
August 12, 2011 at 11:52 pm
I still stand by my statement. The philosophical views of agnostics, whether astrophysicists or otherwise, are irrelevant to the facts.
But the quotes I provided by Jastrow, Eddington and others were not philosophical statements, but statements of theoretical physics.
Again, Ron, you’re attributing statements to people that they didn’t make.
If someone says “I don’t know”, that in no way means “It’s not possible to know”. It also in no way means something supernatural must be the cause.
Jeff Alberts says:
August 13, 2011 at 8:55 am
Again, Ron, you’re attributing statements to people that they didn’t make.
If someone says “I don’t know”, that in no way means “It’s not possible to know”. It also in no way means something supernatural must be the cause.
Jeff, he said “I don’t know, and neither do you.” Now, either he thinks I am incapable of knowing or he thinks it is not possible to know. I chose to understand his statement in the least offensive form possible. If he was intending to offend me and not all of mankind, he can make that clear in his next comment.
@Ron Cram
I didn’t mean that you nor I know nothing at all. I meant that I don’t know anything about God, the ultimate origin of the universe or anything supernatural, and neither do you. You might have made up some story that helps you sleep at night, but that is all it is, unless you have some evidence to the contrary.
What helps me sleep at night is that all the evidence points to me being a member of an evolved, social species and that it therefore makes me feel good to do things that are good for my children, family, friends and the species. I accept that many (maybe most) people harbour supernatural thoughts, which makes me sad but doesn’t make we want to do them harm, except when those thoughts lead them to stupid acts like flying planes into skyscrapers.
All of which has little to do with nucleobases on meteorites 🙂
Tucci78 said:
Is kuhncat also a warmista?
——————
Nah, I’ll bet he’s one of yours
John B,
But you did not answer the question. It seems clear you do not think God is knowable or that it is even possible to know if God exists.
I’m wondering how you came to this conclusion? Have you ever examined the question in a systematic way? Ever studied the texts of world religions? Ever studied the lives of people who claim to know God personally? Ever studied the claims of Jesus Christ or the historical evidence he rose from the grave?
It is one thing to say “I don’t know.” Not knowing things is part of the human condition. There are plenty of things I don’t know. But to say “I don’t know, and neither do you.” Well, that kind of statement indicates you have studied the question in detail. Have you? If so, please tell me what you have studied.
Demonstrating that you can put a reference right to hellangone in front of religionists with the expectation that they won’t hit the frelkin’ link, at 7:54 AM on 13 August, Dave Springer writes in response to my inclination to go with Smith’s wager(1976):
Nope. For the benefit of Mr. Springer and others who don’t seem to know how to use a “hotlink,” let me quote a greater length from the source cited:
Mr. Springer will recognize the last paragraph as having been quoted in my post of 10:43 AM on 12 August.
So thanks, Mr. Springer, but I came into this discussion with an appreciation of Pascal’s wager, and when I made mention of Smith’s rejoinder thereunto (see his Atheism: The Case Against God, 1979, in which “Smith’s wager” is recapitulated) it was to spike the intellectually untenable nonsense of Pascal’s wager in anticipation of some religious whackjob bringing it up.
I’ll tell you what, Ron. Give me your top 10 reasons for believing God exists from this list, then we’ll talk:
http://www.godlessgeeks.com/LINKS/GodProof.htm
But seriously, are you of the “my religion is right, the others are all wrong” school? As in, if Jesus was the son of God, then all other religions that don’t accept this are worshipping the wrong guy. Or, are you of the “all religions are valid ways to know god” school? Or maybe the “even atheism is a religion” school? You see, religionists can be slippery customers, as whatever flavour of God one argues against the existence of, they will say “oh no, that’s not my God, of course I don’t believe in creationism/resurrection/Hell/diviene conception/virgins for martyrs/whatever”. In other words, you’ll have to give me something to go on.
Sorry, but this one made me laugh out loud:
121. ARGUMENT FROM PERSECUTION (II)
(1) Jesus said that people would make fun of Christians.
(2) I am an idiot.
(3) People often point that out.
(4) Therefore, God exists.
At 11:25 AM on 12 August, the morally degenerate and intellectually contemptible Eric Anderson evades address of points made in my post at 4:29 AM on the same date, writing nothing more than:
…so I’ll shove the flamethrower all the way up this sphincter by recapitulating much of what these religious whackjobs are ducking. Let’s begin with a specific paragraph that Mr. Anderson is sliming away from:
Whether the “religious conspiracy” behind the aggressively coercive political effort to degrade the teaching of scientific method by passing off your Great Sky Pixie hokum as part of the government educationalist gulags’ science curricula is “evil” or not is a wonderfully fit subject for discussion, however. I’ll take the “affirmative” side in that debate, and with gusto.
Readers here will take note that I’ve brought this point up repeatedly in this forum, including at 5:52 AM on 13 August, where I’d written:
The whole purpose of this “intelligent design” religious jerking-off is political, to induce government schools to incorporate creationism (doesn’t matter whether it’s Christian, Jewish, Muslim, animist [“it’s turtles all the way down!”] or Satanist [“and when you get to the bottom, you’ll find our Dark Lord waiting for you, ha-ha!”]) as part of the science curriculum.
The reasonable reader – as well as the religiously unsane… – know full well the results of this malignant political effort, if allowed to go forward. Children and adolescents condemned to suffer the comprachico indoctrination of government schooling will emerge with a debilitated and wrongful understanding of what science is and how it works.
…it’s not simply that aggressive religious whackjobs … seek to have their Great Sky Pixie indoctrination rammed down kids’ throats at taxpayer expense but that they wish to impose upon scientific thought a degree of fundamental debilitation rendering it much more difficult for people in these United States to perceive the difference between reason and unreason.
Got that folks? This is the objective behind all of this “intelligent design” garbage, and this is what all of the religious whackjobs polluting this Web site are sweating and squirming and weaseling to avoid addressing.
Don’t let ’em get away with it.
Tucci78 quotes:
August 13, 2011 at 1:02 pm
“As one final argument or satire on an argument, you may have heard of Pascal’s wager at some point. Blaise Pascal was the famous French mathematician, philosopher, and theologian. He came up with this argument which consequently became quite famous, which went something as follows. Reason can’t prove or disprove the existence of God. Weigh the odds. If the atheist is correct, we’re going to die, nothing will happen, and nothing is lost. But if the Christian is correct, the nonbelievers are going to believe in Hell for eternity. So it seems like the practical odds would lie with Christianity. We would wager on Christianity because the practical odds are so important. If you wager on Christianity and there is no god, you don’t lose anything.”
Tucci, I am much impressed with your noble efforts in defense of your position. However, on Pascal’s wager, you want to read William James’ “The Will to Believe” (1896) in which he explains that Pascal’s argument works only for people who hold belief in God as what he calls a “live option.” James’ address is available for free all over the internet.
At 2:57 PM on 13 August, after recapitulating the first paragraph of my most recent draw from George H. Smith’s 1976 speech “How to Defend Atheism,” Theo Goodwin writes:
or the sake of economy, Theo, be advised that William James’ effort was addressed in Smith’s Atheism: The Case Against God (1979), previously cited. See page 185, where it reads in part:
You want I should look the book up on Amazon.com for you? It’s still in print, and they’ve got it in stock. The Kindle version is available for direct download, only $9.59.
Now, inasmuch as James’ contention “is insufficient to compel our rational assent” per Smith’s assessment, and I concur, just why d’you think that going back and reading William James’ “The Will to Believe” yet another time is going to change my position on this subject?
It hasn’t yet.
JohnB,
I see you still haven’t answered my question. But it appears you promise to answer mine if I answer yours first. Okay. By the way, I don’t think these arguments prove absolutely the existence of God, but I do think they show why it is reasonable for a well-informed and rational person to believe in God.
First, I would say it is rational to believe in the existence of God because the universe had a beginning at the Big Bang. The beginning indicates there has to be a Cause, the Supernatural – an actor who is above the laws of physics. Even atheist and agnostic astrophysicists have agreed to this point, even though it was “repugnant” to them. Prior to the confirmation of the Big Bang, the Cosmological argument did not have much power because some embraced the position the universe always existed. We now know that is not true. But this argument does not tell us much about the nature of God, except that he is big and he likes color and variety. We need more.
Second, it is rational to believe in God because life does not come from non-life. The matter of timescales is unimportant. Whether in a short time or long time, life cannot spawn from non-life. To believe it does is the same as believing in fairy tales. There is no evidence to support such a belief. So, it is reasonable to believe in a Life-giver. This argument tells us a little more about the nature of this supernatural being, his love for living things and his ability to plan for their needs. This points us to the next argument.
Third, it is reasonable to believe in God because of Botany. Food producing plants and trees have one main purpose, to produce food. There are lots of plants and trees which do not produce food which survive and propagate the species. But consider food producing trees – apple, orange, apricot, plum and thousands more. Why? If trees evolved, wouldn’t the trees just be concerned with their own survival? It is rational to believe fruit bearing trees, vines, vegetables, etc are the design of the intelligent designer to provide food for his creatures. This tells us a little more about the Designer, that he cares for his creation.
Fourth, it is reasonable to believe in God because of Genomics. See http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2651812/pdf/gkp089.pdf As you read this paper, written by an atheist, you will see he is grasping at straws to redefine neo-Darwinism. Genomics has taken us into the post-neo-Darwin era. There is a vast difference in genome organization between these different organisms. I especially like when he discusses “the fallacy of evolutionary progress.” The author is proposing a series of biological “big bangs” which shake up the “Tree of Life” each time. As far as I can tell, he has not proposed any mechanism by which these “big bangs” come. To me, his ideas look like a grasping at straws to maintain a belief in atheism. It is far more reasonable to accept the fact that evolution does not provide “progress” or increase the complexity of life.
Fifth, it is reasonable to believe in God because he has acted in human history. The most telling and powerful action is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It is the most well-attested event in ancient history. Do you believe Julius Caesar visited Britain? There is far more evidence of Jesus rising from the dead than there is that Caesar ever lived. Several people, including CS Lewis and Lee Strobel, attempted to prove that Jesus never rose from the grave. Instead, their study convinced them to become Christians. If Christ rose from the grave, then this tells us very much about the nature of God.
Sixth, it is reasonable to believe in God because I have a personal relationship with him.
BTW, my favorite from your link was #625:
C.S. LEWIS’ ARGUMENT FROM LOVE AND HUMAN KINDNESS
(1) Humans can love and be kind to each other.
(2) This doesn’t make sense in the nasty world of survival of the fittest.
(3) The only possible source for love and kindness is God.
(4) Therefore, God exists.
That’s actually not bad. Okay, your turn.