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©2003 by Thomas F. Heinze
Where Did the Information in Cells Come from? The DNA of a bacterium contains as much information as a 1000 page book!1 What is information? The principle dictionary definition is, "knowledge communicated or received…."2 Speaking of the information in DNA, Philip Johnson explains, "By information, I mean a message that conveys meaning, such as a book of instructions.… Information is not matter, though it is imprinted on matter.… Instructions in the fertilized egg control embryonic development from the beginning, and direct it to a specific outcome."3
Professor Werner Gitt, who works in the field of information science writes:
This statement, if true, destroys the whole basis of the idea that no intelligent mind was involved in the formation of the first life. Is his statement true? All known languages, alphabets and codes, as well as the information spoken or written in them, originated in minds. The faith of the atheist that the first life was an exception is contrary to all known evidence. Some have argued that monkeys beating at random on a typewriter or computer keyboard might eventually produce a few recognizable words, which would be information. How many words would the monkeys type if no one had designed any alphabet or keyboard or computer, and they had to beat on the dirt? It's hard to be an atheist. One must have faith that, contrary to all evidence, not just a few words but huge amounts of usable information, and the language and code with which the information was written, popped up by themselves. De Duve, a Nobel Prize winning scientist writes: "In all modern organisms, DNA contains in encrypted form the instructions for the manufacture of proteins. More specifically, encoded within DNA is the exact order in which amino acids, selected at each step from 20 distinct varieties should be strung together to form all of the organism's proteins."5 Informationnever develops apart from intelligence, yet cells contain huge amounts of information. I believe this is the most important single evidence that life came from the mind of an intelligent Creator rather than from dumb chemicals. Information does not come from the material that carries it A message is not determined by the material it is written on. The same sheet of paper can be used to draw a comic strip or write out a chemical formula. The same stretch of DNA that carries the commands for brown hair can just as easily hold commands that will make blond hair-or teeth for that matter! Information comes from minds. The message is independent of the material it is written on. The information in DNA is real information. It has been copied onto computers in the Human Genome Project, and printed out on paper. It is the same information no matter what it is written on. Many atheists understand, but purposely side-step the really difficult question, "Where does the information come from?" They substitute made up stories about where the material that carries the information might have come from. It is like thinking of a way paper could form in nature and claiming to have explained an encyclopedia. All available evidence indicates that it takes intelligence to devise letters or code, and arrange them into instructions. Many evolutionists ignore the evidence and claim that life arose from an "organic soup," but how could the imagined soup know the precise order of each of the amino acids of even one protein, let alone the hundreds of proteins necessary for the survival of a "primitive" cell? Others claim that RNA came first, perhaps formed by contact with a clay template, then went on to produce the first cell. This implies that the clay passed on the basic information which natural selection later perfected. Neither soup nor clay has this or any other information, but if clay had information, what are the chances that it had the right information to form the first RNA? Why not something simpler, like the directions for repairing an airplane engine or making more clay? If clay or organic soup had passed on the directions for making RNA, how did the RNA know to make proteins? And out of millions of possible proteins, why would it have made exactly the proteins a cell would need? Could it have folded, addressed, and regulated all those proteins and enclosed them in a membrane? Because all known information comes from a mind, the presence of large quantities of organized information in cells is evidence that a mind was involved. Faith in the fantasy that the cell with all its information came from clay or organic broth is contrary to the evidence. It is anti-science and should not be used to promote the religion of atheism in our tax supported public schools. Nor should the evidence that information always comes from a mind be suppressed. Some Christians pay for private schools to teach that God created. Atheists have freedom to have their schools, and should not be allowed to use tax dollars to hide scientific evidence and promote in public school books their faith that there is no Creator. Clay that could produce a simple RNA, capable of making copies of itself, would have been more intelligent than all of today's origin of life scientists put together. They can't produce any RNA at all,6 let alone one with these special abilities. Some claim that the amount of information depends only on the number of "letters," and that if you add random letters instead of creating typographical errors, you increase the information. But not in the book they wrote! Neither would sprinkling ink here and there in their book produce more information. The more ink is sprinkled, the more information is covered up. Those who claim chance occurrences add information confuse static with message in a desperate attempt to save their atheistic faith. Scientists use information as a proof of intelligence Scientists with the SETI (Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence) institute are using huge radio telescopes to search for messages from "intelligent beings in space." The first step is to separate between static and message. So far all they have is static, but if they find a message from space, they say they will have shown that there are intelligent beings out there because intelligent messages are created only by intelligent beings. If exceptions existed, and intelligent messages could be sent out without any intelligence involved, their whole search would be useless. Dr. Charles Thaxton hits the nail on the head when he tells us that if it is wrong to infer that the information found in DNA comes from an intelligent source, it is equally wrong to think that intelligent messages from space would come from an intelligent source. He continues, "More important, our knowledge of past civilizations provided by archeologists would be in jeopardy. The supposed "artifacts" might be, after all, the result of unknown natural causes. Cave paintings, for example…may not be the result of early humans… Indeed, excavated ancient libraries could not be trusted to contain the works of intelligent men and women."7 Scientists use information as proof of intelligence because the evidence overwhelmingly supports this position. The information in ancient libraries came from the real minds of real people. The far more complex information in cells came from the far more intelligent mind of God. Modern people put symbols in their spacecraft to send into space the message that intelligent beings exist on earth. Perhaps God was sending you a message that an intelligent Creator exists when He built cells out of materials so hard to make that in all of nature those materials never form except when made by already living cells. Into these cells He placed information which can only have come from a mind. In doing so, He sent a message which can help pry open stubborn hearts to make space for Him who said, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free" (John 8:32). For a better understanding, see How Life Began. Miniaturization The evidence that an intelligent Creator made the information in DNA is reinforced by the fact that the information in both human DNA and in "primitive" cells takes up the least space possible.8 After a number of intelligent scientists had worked for many years developing ever better microfilm they fit the entire Bible on one 32 X 33 mm film. Amazing! However, that same space covered with DNA would hold information equivalent to 7.7 million Bibles!9 If DNA was formed with no intelligent input as biology books often imply, why did it take generations of intelligent scientists thousands of man hours to develop the millions of times less efficient microfilm? No matter how strong the atheist's faith may be, his belief that the information in cells formed with no mind involved is not in line with the facts. The evidence indicates that the information in DNA was put there by a Creator who is so intelligent that we should listen to everything He has to say.
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