Theoretical origin of life: a need for new information (Introduction)

by David Turell , Friday, June 23, 2023, 19:22 (519 days ago) @ David Turell

An ID essay:

https://evolutionnews.org/2023/06/information-and-lifes-origin-a-retrospective-view/

"In conjunction with the understanding that the formation of life from non-life constitutes a rise in specified complexity rather than increasing order, this generalized Second Law raised a theoretical barrier against any natural origin of life scenario.

"The traditional Second Law of Thermodynamics is viewed as an inviolable arbiter of possible outcomes for all physical processes. In particular, any conceivable proposal for a perpetual motion machine can, without analysis, be rejected based on the Second Law. With regard to the origin and development of life, the generalized Second Law states that any “alleged natural explanation…will be untrue in the same way a patent examiner in Washington, DC, knows an alleged invention for a perpetual motion machine is untrue.

"...articles by Hubert Yockey on the application of information theory to the origin of life. Noting that “The information content of amino acid sequences cannot increase until a genetic code with an adaptor function has appeared,” Yockey states,

"Nothing which even vaguely resembles a code exists in the physico-chemical world. One must conclude that no valid scientific explanation of the origin of life exists at present.

"By the mid 1990s, I had read The Mystery of Life’s Origin4, in which the authors distinguish between thermal entropy (related to the distribution of energy in the system), and configurational entropy (related to the distribution of mass — for example, the specific sequence of amino acids comprising a protein). Their analysis of multiple proposals for natural mechanisms to overcome the thermodynamic barrier represented by the high degree of configurational entropy in living systems led them to conclude that all such mechanisms are “clearly inadequate to account for the configurational entropy work of coding.

***

"In the late 1990s, my academic schedule allowed me to pursue other source material on the physics of the generalized Second Law, and I obtained copies of two main textbooks on statistical mechanics referenced by Gange. The author of one of these texts gives a fundamental definition of information that emphasizes the relationship between information and the mind:

"Information is the entity which makes the difference between knowing and not knowing, between being faced with a number of possibilities and between knowing the one that actually prevails.

***

"...Arthur Hobson, affirms that given an initial measurement of a system, predictions of the system at a later time “cannot contain more information (but may contain less information)” than the initial data describing the system.7 This limitation on natural processes, based upon the laws of quantum mechanics, prohibits a system (even the entire universe bounded by the cosmic horizon) from progressing from a state of lower information (pre-life) to a state of higher information (post-life) by any combination of natural forces.

"William Dembski affirms the proscriptions of the generalized Second Law by showing that chance and necessity are insufficient to ratchet up the complex specified information (CSI) content of a closed system over time:

"at natural causes cannot do, however, is originate CSI. This strong proscriptive claim, that natural causes can only transmit CSI but never originate it, I call the Law of Conservation of Information. It is this law that gives definite scientific content to the claim that CSI is intelligently caused.

***

"Have the last twenty years produced any experimental research demonstrating how unguided natural processes can successfully produce the complex, specified arrangements of components inherent in functional biomolecules? Any dearth of success in this field is not for lack of trying, nor is it surprising that scientists have not been able to coax even a single biochemically relevant protein into existence from a mix of ingredients likely to be available on the early Earth.

"A Rice University professor of chemistry, James Tour, who is renowned for his research in synthetic organic chemistry, draws this conclusion regarding any naturalistic origin-of-life scenario:

"…the requisite molecules (lipids, proteins, nucleic acids, and carbohydrates) are so unlikely to have occurred in the states and quantities needed, that we could never have gotten to the point of figuring out the genesis of the requisite code or information.

"Unguided natural processes, according to the generalized Second Law, cannot systematically increase the information content of a closed system over time. Since the origin of life, represented by the formation of a single-cell organism, constitutes just such an increase in information, natural processes are not expected to be the cause. Intelligence is the only recognized source of information, as inherent in living organisms. What we know of the laws of physics supports this conclusion."

Comment: this discussion of the need for information is quite clear and not confusing. I await dhw's thoughts.