rationalskepticism.org

Bob@RealScienceRadio wrote:Do Atheists Even Have a Hypothesis on Origins?

Because atheists don't have a workable hypothesis to account for human consciousness, therefore they don't even have a theory to explain where we've come from, let alone a robust theory. It seems ADP, that the following pattern shows that materialists do not have even a hypothesis on origins, as demonstrated by these six irrefutable observations:
- the origin of species for Darwin begins with species already in existence
- the origin of stars begins with the explosion of existing stars and with protostars
- the origin of genes that code for new proteins begins with modifying existing genes
- the origin of species by neo-Darwinism begins with existing complex reproducing life
- the origin of life on earth is increasingly seen as seeded from already existing alien life
- the origin of the universe is increasingly explained by appeals to the pre-existing multiverse.

This pattern demonstrates that many in the public, following a gullible media, have undue confidence in the claims about origins from materialists.

Your “irrefutable” observations are not pointing to any pattern other than that of the argument from infinite regress. At each of the stages of your argument scientists do have an hypothesis of origins, you are simply referring to the origins of processes prior to what those hypotheses actually do purport explain. It may be too subtle for me to convey easily but I will try and explain; Origin is generally used to denote an explanation of how something comes into being. For example Origin of the Species as a title of a particular book conveys the message that the book explains how species come into being but it does not convey the message that the book explains how life came into being (which is something that so often confuses the creationist mindset).

The origin of new genes within existing organisms that contribute to the evolution of organisms obviously begins with modifying existing genes or at least existing genetic material but the ultimate origin of genes is not dealt with by evolutionary theory at all as the very first “genes” would be synonymous with the origin of self replication and thus the origin of life itself.
The origin of life conveys the message of how self replicating organisms originated but does not necessarily explain how organic chemistry and the organic chemicals that make up the first self replicating molecules originated.

In the same way we could talk about the origin of galaxies, stars (the origin of population I and II stars being different from the origin population III stars) and planets to convey the message about how they came into being, which the big bang theory itself does not specifically explain. We could also talk about the origin and the current distribution of matter in the universe, which is what the big bang theory does explain, without conveying the message that we are explaining how the singularity itself from which the matter arises came into being. The origin of the apparent singularity may be that branes collided so it may be that the epkyrotic model does convey the message of the origin of this apparent singularity, however, the epkyrotic model itself does not convey the message of the origin of the branes themselves.

So, do you see, it’s not that scientists don’t have hypotheses for the origins of things, it’s just that that you are simply pointing to hypotheses and theories that do not of themselves purport to explain the origin of previous steps in the chain of origins.

Do you see where I am going with this?

If you want to play the infinite regress game and ask but what was the origin life when discussing evolution, what was the origin of population III stars when discussing the origin of population II and I stars, or what was the origin of the singularity when discussing the big bang, well, we can join in with that game too and simply ask you what was the origin of this creator god that you allude to “know” is the author and creator of all of it.

If everything needs a cause then you are just using special pleading if you say that your god does not need a cause. Fair enough?

Meh, it's not as if any creationist can come up with an hypothesis for the origins of anything other than the un-falsifiable goddunnit cuz he wanted it that way.