To atheists: How do you believe that mankind came into existence?

Question

Some of your theories about evolution and so on CAN make sense, even though I do believe in God. But how do you think life happened. Was it just spontaneous generation or what? There had to be some kind of "higher power" right?

Answer 1

It started with a chef from another planet. He pulled out a huge bowl. He then proceeded to put the ingredients to create man.

Answer 2

No there did not have to be some kind of higher power. Things evolve from the less complex into the more complex, not the other way around. From your point of view, i.e. "we are very complex so something even more complex must have made us" you are left to ask, "the being who made us is far more complex than we are, so a being far more complex than that being must have made the being who made us, and a being far more complex than that one must have made that being" ad infinitum.

I have lots of evidence of evolution, none whatever of higher powers.  

Answer 3

if you understood the science behind it then you woudl know there doesnt have to be some kind of higher power

Answer 4

"There had to be some kind of "higher power" right?"

I don't know, if you can prove that statement then I'd believe you.

Until them I'll go with primordial soup...

Answer 5

"can make sense"? Honey, evolution is scientific theory, better understood than gravity. If your thinking "just a theory" you need to revisit your definitions.

As for abiogenesis, I don't know. There are some interesting hypothesis out there, but you have to understand, it happened a loooong time ago and there were no bones or other stuff which might fossilize and give us convenient clues. That said, there was an awful lot of time in which something could happened, and life on earth is made out of stuff common in the universe, plus that stuff "likes" to react with each other.

So no, I don't think a higher power was necessarily involved, nor do I see any evidence for this supposed higher power.

Answer 6

No, there didn't have to be a higher power.

Organic chemicals have a powerful tendancy to self-organize in the presence of abundant energy.

Primordeal Earth was covered with both organic substances and an abundance of geothermal and solar energy.

Life was frankly inevitable on Earth, and once you had an imperfectly self-replicating system, evolution was just as inevitable.

Answer 7

In the natural sciences, abiogenesis, or origin of life, is the study of how life on Earth emerged from inanimate organic and inorganic molecules. Scientific research theorizes that abiogenesis occurred sometime between 4.4 billion years ago, when water vapor first liquefied,[2] and 2.7 billion years ago, when the ratio of stable isotopes of carbon (12C and 13C), iron (56Fe, 57Fe, and 58Fe) and sulfur (32S, 33S, 34S, and 36S) points to a biogenic origin of minerals and sediments[3][4] and molecular biomarkers indicate photosynthesis.[5][6]

Answer 8

The UNIVERSE is alive/a life and its name is not GOD.  

Answer 9

Just because there are things in the universe we aren't yet able to explain doesn't mean that we have to make up gods and spirits to explain them. No, there doesn't have to be "some kind of higher power".  

Answer 10

The most likely theory is abiogenesis - amino acids forming proteins, then cell structure, (it took over a billion years to develop the cell wall alone - eukaryotic structure).  

Various experiments have shown that cell components can indeed form with no artificial assistance, and all else is needed is to remember that these cells had billions of years and billions of square miles of planet surface in a reducing atmosphere (it was the origin of life itself that oxygenated earth - simple life forms excrete oxygen).  Once you have self-replicating cells, the rest is inevitable and can be observed in any biology lab you want to visit.

No there does not need to be a higher power for this, and to imagine one violates Occam's razor - a centuries old construct of philosophy and science that tells us not to introduce excess complexity (in lay-men's terms the simplest answer is most likely correct).

Answer 11

Higher than what, and in what sense?  If you're suggesting that there had to be something supernatural involved, then absolutely not.  

Anyway, I can't explain abiogenesis to you on a question and answer website. I'm sure the staff at your local library could be of some assistance in this matter.