Asha'man

Matter is condensed energy, just like liquid water is condensed steam.

If you start with an empty room and inject a bunch of steam, the steam will expand and cool, eventually forming water droplets.

This is essentially the idea for what happened in the first few seconds after the big bang. All the universe was in a small area, so the energy density was extremely high. There simply was no matter, it was nothing but energy (photons?). As the universe expanded, the energy density was reduced, cooled in effect. When that density dropped below a certain threshold, some of that energy was converted into matter. First the most fundamental particles formed (quarks, as I understand things currently), then those fundamental particles combined to form more conventional particles, such as protons and neutrons. Much later, as the cooling continued, the atoms began to capture the free floating electrons, and space became transparent for the first time. (We can see the optical afterglow of this electron capture time as the cosmic background radiation.)

GunnerJ

Reality check: Atoms are not made of quantum singularities.

Atoms are composed of electrons, protons, and usually neutrons. Protons and neutrons, in turn, are composed of quarks. (What was it, u-u-d for protons, d-d-u for neutrons?) Beyond that, any further speciaition of composition is speculative.

SULPHUR

Don't forget about gluons and hadrons. It could be easier to become a christian What do we agnostics say about proof?

Albert Cipriani

And don't forget the charmed particle (last quark to be discovered), MACHO's, WHIMPS, muons, and nutrinos, tho you're free to forget how they're spelled, as I have. -- Albert the Traditional Catholic

GunnerJ

Well, all those exist, but they aren't parts of the atom. That's what I was listing.

Jesus Tap-Dancin' Christ

Actually, no--that does not occur at all. The places don't cease to be--the elctron just isn't there any more. In all reality, the electron isn't ANYWHERE until you measure it's presence--after which, it will always be where you measured it (unless you stop looking for a long time--then it may be elsewhere).
Ah, metaphysics. Unfortunately, not real physics. When you get down to small things, they all behave highly illogically. Like how could a single particle interfere with itself? It does. How could looking to see if something was somewhere change where it is? It does. The place of an electron does NOT defy analysis--there is a probability of it's placement anywhere. One cannot therefore logically assert that the electron illogically exist and yet dos not exist in the same place at the same time.

You haven't studied any Quantum Mechanics--you'd never have brought this up if you had.
The matter has not dissappeared--it still exists. However, it has changed form--like all matter. Matter/energy simply does not dissapear--it goes somewhere.
They hacen't gone anyhwere--time is not matter, nor is it a place--it is a when. The when has changed--and some changes are permanent. It hasn't gone anywhere--just changed form. No one can retrieve that.
Actually, it DOES. If he is infallible, how could he be unworthy of being followed? If he was infallible, how could he be WRONG? That is utterly IMPOSSIBLE, period. If you cannot fail, you cannot be wrong--you will always make the right decision, based on all information given to you at the time. The Pope KNOWS the Bible like the back of his hand, he knows all the apologetics arguments--and he was given the evidence in favor of evolution. Given that he is infallible, he could only have rendered the CORRECT choice in re evolution v creation.
Dante wasn't that traditional--he defined that which the church daren't. I have read Dante (I love the inferno, warms my heart).

I know that the popes were wrong, and had erred--and were fallible. I'm not a Catholic. I can say that without contorting and misrepresenting reality.

Albert Cipriani

Yes. Thus absolving you of your ill-formed notions regarding Catholicism.

For example, this gem: For one of the longest reigning pontiffs in the history of the Church, this one has been infallibly mum. He's written and said probably more than any other two popes combined, but most theologians will tell you probably only one statement of his qualifies as infallible. And that one did not concern evolution. It concerned the irreforable Church position on the non-ordination of women. Sorry to disappoint you. -- Albert the Traditional Catholic

Jesus Tap-Dancin' Christ

Then, in other words, catholics don't hold to the infallibility doctrine.

What is the point then of even having it? This is to say that the Pope IS fallible. If this pope is, then so must all the others--you cannot logically say that this is not so. And at this point, you can disregard EVERY papal decree ever. After all, he could very well be mistaken.

SULPHUR

Gluons stick quarks together to form hadrons which are the basic particles making an atom.

GunnerJ

Ack, more confusion. I was responding to Albert. You were correct to list gluons and hadrons as parts of the atom I had overlooked. (I knew about gluons, I simply didn't consider them "component parts" based on their role in keeping the nucleus together.)