Did biologist Craig Venter really give life to lifeless matter? Stephen Meyer explains what really happened.
Excerpt:
A biologist in California has summoned headlines around the world, some distressed and some celebratory, by supposedly doing in reality what Dr. Frankenstein did in fiction: giving life to lifeless matter.
[…]First, Craig Venter has not actually produce artificial life. He and his colleagues read the gene sequence of one bug, copied it onto another strand of DNA, and inserted the copy into another bacterium from which its DNA had been removed. They then found that the second bacterium was able to use the instructions on the second strand of DNA. Nevertheless, both bacterial cells came, like all life we know of, from other life.
He copied some information from one computer to another, then claimed to have invented the computer?
And more:
Venter, of course, did not produce a new gene, a truly novel genetic message. He merely copied one that already existed. Nevertheless, even copying and substituting DNA required his genius. Indeed, to the extent that Venter succeeded in simulating a process involved in living systems—copying pre-existing genetic information—he did so as a result of his own ingenuity and creativity. Craig Venter himself was the crucial actor in this technological achievement.
It’s not a simulation of naturalistic evolution if it requires an intelligent agent. If an intelligent agent is involved, it’s intelligent design. He didn’t create any more information, either – he just copied what was already there. Where did that information come from? That’s the real problem of the origin of life. Where does the information from the first living system come from? Has anyone shown that this information can arise without an intelligence?
Read the rest of the article here.
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WINTERY KNIGHT 