[Buddha-l] life force vis a vis Xianity & Hinduism

[Jim Peavler]

On Aug 22, 2005, at 12:28 PM, curt wrote:
> It is not impossible to ask and answer "why" questions scientifically.
> For example: why is the earth's atmosphere approximately 20%
> oxygen?

Here is another equivocation. In this case you use "why?" to mean "what 
is the cause?" I was, and I think the original discussion was, using 
"why?" to mean "what does it mean that". The answer to the first is 
that many plants give off oxygen etc. The answer to the second is 
"because God made humans to breath oxygen so he put oxygen in the 
atmosphere.  Buddha would not have been interested in either answer, so 
far as I can tell.

> That question is a perfectly good starting point for a scientific
> investigation. So is this question: "why do some organisms strongly
> resemble each other while others bear little resemblence?" Or this one:
> "why are all living things composed of cells?" Or this: "why do all
> cells share the ability to carry out the process of glycolosis?" These
> are all very important questions - some of them have quite interesting
> answers.

My response to each of these is the same as above. This is a quibble. 
If you and I mean "how did this arise?" and not "what is the ultimate 
meaning of this?" when we say "why" then we are in agreement.

The Buddha might have been interested in the first question under some 
circumstances, but almost certainly not interested in the second.
>
> The last question above - "why do all cells share the ability to carry
> out the process of glycolysis?" is actually one of the more dramatic
> demonstrations of evolution. All cells have DNA to code for a
> group of enzymes that enable the cell to carry out the "primitive"
> metabolic process of glycolysis. This is a metabolic process that
> does not rely on oxygen. Up until three billion years or so ago there
> was little if any oxygen in the earth's atmosphere - and all living
> things on earth relied primarily on glycolysis. But then green plants
> came along and "invented" photosynthesis - which creates oxygen
> as a waste product. A little while later "respiration" was invented by
> another group of organisms who had figured out how to use this
> nasty oxygen as fuel. The clear implication is that all currently 
> living
> cells share a common genetic heritage - because they all inherit
> this DNA that makes glycolysis possible.

I like this example very much. It answers the question "what is the 
cause?", and "what happened". It does not answer "what is the meaning 
of this. The scientist probably wouldn't ask the question and the IDer 
would say some higher intelligence designed it that way .