• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

Fossil and Evolution

John Hewitt said:
No, it would be wrong. That paper did not show the creation of life.
Click to expand...

John does not consider DNA the first replicators--he thinks cells are, and he supports Behe's argument in this respect.

What would you define as proof of the first life developed from non life John-- the first cell able to replicate itself? What sort of experiment, if any, would you say would convince you of abiogenesis. Or would nothing ever be enough to convince you that life could start from non-life via natural selection?

And have you develped your oscillating data alternative hypothesis so that we can test that similar to Bada's experiment that refined Urey Miller producing amino acids?
 
John Hewitt said:
No, it would be wrong. That paper did not show the creation of life.
Click to expand...
Regardless of that particular paper of which I am not discussing the merits of here, viruses have been created in the lab from non-living molecules. Scientists have assembled the first synthetic virus. Granted they had a plan and the technology used did not replicate random natural events, but non-living became living in the lab.

So it can happen, it has happened artificially, there's no reason at this time to conclude it didn't happen naturally 4 billion (give or take a billion or so) years ago.
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
The oceans are a sea of dna/rna fragments. That's what viruses are.

It doesn't necessarilly follow that multi cell life was selected from that though.
Click to expand...

It's accurate to describe the oceans as a sea (or perhaps ocean) of dna/rna fragments? What are the best evidence of the proportions of dna/rna fragments vs. cellular life in the ocean? In terms of mass of each, for example? And/or for the planet generally?
 
I'd like to reiterate that I think it's sloppy and unhelpful to make creationists the primary foil in discussing abiogenesis theories. As opposed to empiricists who are skeptical of various elements of abiogenesis theories.
 
Dave1001 said:
I think it's very unhelpful to use creationists as a crutch/foil in discussing abiogenesis. This is where the human tendency to replace empiricism with medieval morality play (jesus vs. satan -to convince the audience to choose jesus) come in, in my opinion.
Click to expand...
I think it's very unhelpful to drop into the middle of a discussion you haven't even read and start rambling incoherently about morality plays. There is a human tendency to not know what the hell you're talking about, in my opinion.
 
delphi_ote said:
I think it's very unhelpful to drop into the middle of a discussion you haven't even read and start rambling incoherently about morality plays. There is a human tendency to not know what the hell you're talking about, in my opinion.
Click to expand...

We'll have to agree to disagree. Because I think it was helpful to call you out on this. :)
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
Viruses outnumber bacteria in seawater. Billions per cup. I'll see if I can find a link.

ETA: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1134/is_1_108/ai_53682809
Click to expand...

Interesting that according to this article it was only verified about 20 years ago. Well, intuitively I think this information helps the abiogenesis argument quite a bit, because the more viruses out there interacting, the more opportunity for replicating cellular life to emerge in part from them, it seems to me.
 
John Hewitt said:
No, it would be wrong. That paper did not show the creation of life.
Click to expand...
If saying crazy stuff magically made it true, then creationists would have won a long time ago.

You tried to lie this one away on kleinman's thread. You failed, remember?
 
John Hewitt said:
No, it would be wrong. That paper did not show the creation of life.
Click to expand...

Depends on how you define things, but trying to argue such merely misses the point.

The sticking point for those who argue the impossibility of moving from non-life to life is succinctly destroyed in that one paper. As I mentioned in my earlier post, I think it is more likely that peptides first arose, followed by RNA that could assemble on peptides, followed later by DNA. We have the creation of amino acids by the Miller Urey experiment. I would need to look a bit to find the processes necessary for amino acids to form into peptides without the aid of enzymes (but if it happens with enzymes it could happen without -- just takes longer). This shows clearly the creation of RNA strands on peptides. We already know the ease with which such material can be packaged into lipid membranes in the presence of certain types of clay. The muddy waters clear.

The "central dogma" shows us how it must have occurred in nature, but in reverse order. This is a very important piece of the puzzle. Frankly, it is beautiful.
 
Dave1001 said:
It's accurate to describe the oceans as a sea (or perhaps ocean) of dna/rna fragments? What are the best evidence of the proportions of dna/rna fragments vs. cellular life in the ocean? In terms of mass of each, for example? And/or for the planet generally?[/QUOTE

http://discovermagazine.com/2006/mar/guide3

http://microbiologybytes.wordpress.com/2006/12/04/ocean-viromes/

http://www.mcb.oregonstate.edu/giovannoni/

http://ebiomedia.com/

great video clips:

http://www.microbeworld.org/look/videopodcast.aspx

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2003617493_microbes14.html

cool visuals: http://microbes.arc.nasa.gov/movie/large-qt.html

We're just getting a hand on the smallest forms of life in the ocean...some things aren't clearly viruses or cellular...there is a lot of material in the ocean composed nucleic acids that replicate-- And there is tons of the stuff. We've only begun to catalog them--the extremophiles are especially interesting. Some are CO2 produces like animals--and some are oxygen producers like algae. But there are also aneorobic bacteria and oxygenless photsynthesizers. It's really cool.

Yes, the ocean is full of nucleic acid chains..some are enclosed in membranes; some are not--and then there is stuff that is inbetween-- making nucleic acid chains from non living materials in a lab is a really big step in understanding how the raw material of life can spring from non life. We have tons of info. showing that it can and did happen. We just haven't narrowed down the most likely explanation for what the amazing amount of data coming out now.

Every time I see what we are learning, I marvel at how right Darwin was--and how much we have discovered with his way of framing what we were observing--and how giddy he'd be to be able to see what we see and know what we know and to verify just how on target he was with such beautiful examples. We humans have figured out what no one imagined humans could figure out-- and I find that very impressive.
Click to expand...
 
Dr Adequate said:
If saying crazy stuff magically made it true, then creationists would have won a long time ago.

You tried to lie this one away on kleinman's thread. You failed, remember?
Click to expand...
I merely stated that the paper you cited did not demonstrate the artifical creation of life and that, by my reading of it, the authors did not make such a claim. They claimed that q-beta replicase can, when provided with chemically activiated nucleotides, synthesize RNA fragments without the benefit of a primer. That is all they claimed and I do not know whether even that was subsequently confirmed by other workers.

I would further add
1. That such an activity, even it exists, seems irrelevant to any chemically sensible theory of abiogenesis.
2. I fail to see why you are referring to creationism.

My recollection of the "Annoying Creationists" thread is of your bad habit of citing papers which, on examination, proved not to demonstrate, or even claim to demonstrate, the things you attributed to them. This seems another example.
 
Ichneumonwasp said:
Depends on how you define things, but trying to argue such merely misses the point.

The sticking point for those who argue the impossibility of moving from non-life to life is succinctly destroyed in that one paper. As I mentioned in my earlier post, I think it is more likely that peptides first arose, followed by RNA that could assemble on peptides, followed later by DNA. We have the creation of amino acids by the Miller Urey experiment. I would need to look a bit to find the processes necessary for amino acids to form into peptides without the aid of enzymes (but if it happens with enzymes it could happen without -- just takes longer). This shows clearly the creation of RNA strands on peptides. We already know the ease with which such material can be packaged into lipid membranes in the presence of certain types of clay. The muddy waters clear.

The "central dogma" shows us how it must have occurred in nature, but in reverse order. This is a very important piece of the puzzle. Frankly, it is beautiful.
Click to expand...
It may "depend on how you define things" but few people define life as bits of RNA. It is nice that you find the central dogma of molecular biology beautiful but emotional responses are not arguments. For myself, I can see no evidently necessary connection between the structure of the central dogma and the sequence of mechanisms in abiogenesis.
 
John Hewitt said:
It may "depend on how you define things" but few people define life as bits of RNA. It is nice that you find the central dogma of molecular biology beautiful but emotional responses are not arguments. For myself, I can see no evidently necessary connection between the structure of the central dogma and the sequence of mechanisms in abiogenesis.
Click to expand...

I'm really sorry that you don't get it. There has always been a conceptual problem in abiogenesis with the initial creation of DNA to RNA to protein while maintaining specificity. But if the original stuff was peptide to begin with, then the central dogma actually makes sense. Think of it -- why have a central information storage unit that creates a message copy that is later translated into some effector substance? Too many steps. But if it all began with peptides and RNA grew on top of it, then DNA is just a later addition, an improvement on the design that allows for more creativity.

This paper is very important in showing the link between peptide and RNA synthesis. Once RNA chains are created, then self-replication becomes possible. That is the beginning of the process that leads to what we call life.

Frankly, it's beautiful.
 
Why do you think that a templateless replicase producing oligonucleotides is an example of abiogenesis or at least how abiogenesis occurred in the primordium?

It is seems that you are overinterpreting the results of the paper. The investigators took a preexisting molecule of one type (in this case a protein) and had it produce a molecule of a different type (in this case an oligonucleotide). There was no self-replication, which at least form how I understand life, is an important, and maybe the defining, aspect of life, along with self-organization. To be fair, it was interesting that the different conditions produced oligonucleotides with different properties, which implies some sort of "adaptation", but there was also no mention of them being self-replicating.

I think that the discussion would be much more productive if we came up with a working definition of "life" so that we could then in turn define "abiogenesis". Right now, I feels like we're talking circles around one another because we don't have a common ground from which to start. This allows us to deny one another's definitions and cry "creationist" instead of learning from one another.
 
articulett said:
Hey, look at the video of this bacteria--it looks sort of like a double helix--the finder is looking for clues as to what it might be-- anyone?

http://ebiomedia.com/gall/micronat/Spinsters.html
Click to expand...
That's not what a real DNA molecule looks like just so you know. It's what the diagram looks like which we depict the double helix as. Normally the DNA is totally twisted up and folded.

The bacteria in this case is interesting. Spirochetes themselves are a common bacteria.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom