Atheists: can a scientist create life from non-living substance? I'm from Missouri.?

Question

I am from Missouri, and we have a saying "Don't tell me, show me."
I consider myself a religious person, but I also try to be as open minded as possible.
Can anyone do the Dr. Frankenstein thing and make dead things come to life? Or even better, can a scientist take substance that has never been alive and give it life?
I'm not talking about splicing DNA or cloning; neither of these actually involve the creation of life, and frozen embyos aren't "dead."
I am aware that it's not possible to empirically prove that God exists, but, on the other hand, it is not possible to prove God does not exist. You can speculate any way you want; that is only opinion. Show me that a human being can create life and provide evidence that it is factual information. If that can be done, I might have justification to adopt at least agnosticism, and perhaps atheism. Until then, I am inclined to believe there is some sort of undefinable mystery in the universe than can be called "God." Thank you.

If you say that humans can create living things, however you may define it, please provide a reference I can look up--a web site, a book, or something like that. That's what I mean by "show me." Sorry if I wasn't clear about that. Thanks.

My definition of "creating life" is to create an independent living organism that was not alive before the person made it alive. It can be an animal, plant, or bacteria. It didn't occur to me that someone might define "life" differently than that. Thanks.

Answer 1

For the record, I'm not an atheist. I'm a Christian. The other answer from Nolte all Grown Up about DNA , the key word in his answer was almost. Almost just isn't good enough, dude. I don't think an almost was quite what the question was trying to find. Like the question stated in part, from Missouri, the SHOW ME state. Oh dear! Foiled again by God.

Answer 2

God of the Gaps, anyone?

"Show me that a human being can create life and provide evidence that it is factual information. If that can be done, I might have justification to adopt at least agnosticism, and perhaps atheism. Until then, I am inclined to believe there is some sort of undefinable mystery in the universe than can be called "God." Thank you."
Argument from Incredulity. This has been done. Do your homework.

Answer 3

Science has created the fundamental building blocks of life or to say it differently, a possible starting point for evolutionary development. I'd say that we are a ways off technologically of being about to create live at the moment.

An interesting thought, nano machines, while still on the drawing board, are nearly synonymous with viruses, they replicate and go about their existence....

I'll throw you another "show me" in return though, show me that this earth is the only body that can and does support life in the universe, and then I will consider creation.

Answer 4

In my humble opinion, agnosticism is much more rational than outright atheism. I believe, like you stated at the end, that there is most likely something... some force, or maybe even some being... that started life as we know it.

I also believe that we know nothing about it. No religion on this planet makes sense, and I don't accept their explanations of this "god."

I also believe the whole idea is, in the end, an unknowable paradox. Where did this creative force come from? If there was no creative force, where did the energy/matter for the big bang come from? It just goes around and around.

So my worldview is this:
Do all we can to help each other, believe in each other, and let the rest be whatever it is.

Answer 5

The closest scientists have come is the creation of viruses, but they are not generally thought to be really "alive." Now, viruses ARE able to propagate genetic material like cells, but the reason they are not considered "alive" is because they require a host to undergo these processes (http://serc.carleton.edu/microbelife/yellowstone/viruslive.html) but from the creation of viruses to the creation of cells is a small step once we replicate cell machinery.
Technology is advancing, so wait a few more years for this to develop. Scientists are working hard so it is not unfeasible that this will develop withing the decade.

Anyway, it's just a claim of ignorance that if scientists can't yet duplicate the complicated chemistry of life that therefore life requires a divine act to generate it. If you study what is really known about that chemistry you come away with a respect for how intricate it is, and a clear understanding that it is, at bottom, just chemistry.

Answer 6

Even if a human could reformulate the 'primordial soup', accelerate the process and produce a living organism...isn't that intelligent design? The real trick is not to manufacture life from basic components, but create those basic components from nothing, or at the very least, pure energy.

Answer 7

Well UF researches made artificial DNA that can replicate back in '03...

Oh and in case you are asking, it has 6 artificial nucleotides... not the 4 natural ones.

I think that almost counts as life, right?

Oh it's not life.... sorry. But if we put one of the spontaneously forming membranes around it, throw in some helicase, ligase, polymerase, make some ribosomes and lysosomes, we'll be all set. The DNA was the hard part.

Answer 8

There was an experiment done where a guy amde the conditions of the early earth...methane atmosphere hot..you know....And after leaving it like that in the test tubes for like a few weeks, amino acids were on the glass. amino acids are the building blocks of DNA. its possible that some fused and started to build some single cell critters

Answer 9

When you have a lab consisting of at least one entire universe ( which may well be infinite ) (and maybe an infinite number of universes ) and billions of years to do it is it really surprising life would form somewhere . Scientists have small room size labs and only a few decades, and really this is hardly a high priority.

Answer 10

I am sure somewhere on this planet scientist are as we speak, proving that life can and will be created from non living organisms, until then i wait with anticipation. Very interesting.