origin of life (The atheist delusion)

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Thursday, January 17, 2008, 23:05 (5915 days ago)

In this section you write: - "Next, various inanimate globules of matter suddenly became animate and, at the same time, managed to reproduce themselves." - This is a rather crude picture! - Research into the origin of life (abiogenesis) is a very active area of science. Most of those working on this consider that, like evolution of species, it came about by gradual processes over a long period of time, and probably it is not possible to say at what stage replicant chemical systems became "live". Here are some accounts of the current state of knowledge and speculation: - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_life - http://originoflife.net/ - http://www.historyoftheuniverse.com/origlife.html - I hope this is of interest, and that you will revise your essay to take account of the latest research, rather than making your own amateurish speculations.

origin of life

by dhw, Friday, January 18, 2008, 17:10 (5915 days ago) @ George Jelliss

Once again, my thanks ... also for the "Origin" website. This is the sort of contribution I was hoping for when I set up the AgnosticWeb, which as I tried to stress on the home page is to be taken only as a starting-point. An exchange of ideas and information is the only way that any of us can learn, and amid the welter of books and articles, I hoped the forum might provide productive support for people like myself who cannot leap either way. - I don't think it would be right for me to amend the text this time, as what I wrote is not an error of fact as such, and ... crude though it is ... may not even be that wide of the mark. No-one knows. But what you have provided is constructive criticism and a source for further discussion and investigation, which is precisely the purpose of the website. Perhaps eventually I shall be able to write a much more accurate "guide". Or perhaps you will do it, or have done it. - The amateurish (I agree) summary is framed in order to prepare for what seems to me an equally crude over-simplification by Dawkins (dealt with in my section on "Origins"), who condenses the miracle of life's origin to a single factor: "the spontaneous arising by chance of the first hereditary molecule" ... which even he agrees may be "very, very improbable". I have tried to show here that the miracle entails our first molecule coming to life, being able to reproduce itself, and having the potential to adapt itself and to form hitherto non-existent faculties, organs and processes. I think (maybe I'm wrong) that this combination will apply to any origin-of-life theory. My suggestion is that it adds several more "verys" to the degree of improbability, which makes it difficult for me to believe in such chance spontaneity. That does not make me a Creationist, or even a theist ... just as difficult to believe in ... and it's interesting that so far the discussion on the forum has been confined exclusively to the first third of the so-called "guide". But it's early days. - Thank you again.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Saturday, January 19, 2008, 07:33 (5914 days ago) @ dhw

In this section you have this rather curious observation: "imagine a rudimentary penis hanging around for aeons, unable to perform, and of course waiting for a suitable, self-made vagina to insert itself into"! - According to P.Z.Myers penises have evolved several times independently. He goes into quite a degree of detail on the subject: - http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/06/penis_evolution.php - Although you claim to have read Darwin's "Origin of Species" you don't seem to have comprehended his thesis that it proceeds "By Means of Natural Selection" rather than by mere chance.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Saturday, January 19, 2008, 19:14 (5914 days ago) @ George Jelliss

Having read some more of the later chapters, it is clear that you do understand the role of natural selection, but not apparently in the case of evolution of sexual organs! I find this baffling. As I understand it the earliest forms of life used asexual reproduction anyway, sex was a later invention of evolution, and specialised sexual organs an even later development.

origin of life

by dhw, Sunday, January 20, 2008, 12:27 (5913 days ago) @ George Jelliss

I had just drafted this reply to your earlier criticism, then logged on to this one! I think it all covers the same ground, so I shan't change what I'd written, but I can't help noticing your use of the word "invention". It ties in very neatly with my (crude) computer image below. - An interesting and amusing website (on the evolution of the penis). Thank you. - It's difficult to respond without repeating what I've already said in the text and in my last reply. My focus is on the area that Darwin wisely and explicitly avoids dealing with ... namely, the original material on which natural selection works. In Chapter 6, under "Organs of extreme perfection and complication", taking the eye as an example, he makes this abundantly clear: "How a nerve comes to be sensitive to light, hardly concerns us more than how life itself first originated." I gave the example of the penis and the vagina purely for effect, but please note the word "rudimentary". We know how organs are developed and perfected, but we do not know how or why the original forms ... no matter how primitive ... came into being and ... no matter how primitively ... were able to function. Darwin thought that "a nerve sensitive to touch may be rendered sensitive to light and...sound", but how did the sensitive nerve arise in the first place, and how did it originally "render" itself (though Darwin's use of the passive here is interesting) sensitive to new things? - In my crude way, let me draw an analogy. If you put into your car a computer which can produce gadgets to cope with every change in the nature of the terrain, the light, the weather, the traffic conditions etc., the gadgets will appear, function, survive etc. according to a process of "natural selection". My problem is not with the gadgets, it's with the computer. What Dawkins calls "the first hereditary molecule" contained the potential for all these totally new concepts, and to believe that this extraordinary mechanism just fell into place accidentally requires an act of faith that is (almost) beyond me. Perhaps that was a factor in Darwin's own agnosticism.

origin of life

by dhw, Sunday, January 20, 2008, 15:16 (5913 days ago) @ George Jelliss

The thought has just occurred to me that you may have misunderstood the reference to the penis "hanging around". It's meant to be a joke. I'm saying that those first primitive organs must have worked straight away or they wouldn't have survived.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Thursday, February 14, 2008, 11:56 (5888 days ago) @ dhw

Here's some more about penises and their evolution than you may want to know: - http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/12/a-tyrannical-romance/ - It was cited on Richard Dawkins . net for Darwin Day 2007.

origin of life

by Peter P, Tuesday, February 05, 2008, 18:37 (5897 days ago) @ George Jelliss

In your entry under "Teapot Agnosticism" you write: "The postulation of a "designer" to guide these processes is just so over-the-top in improbabilities as not to be worth considering." - Let me get this straight. It's your belief that life originated by accident. You haven't got any actual evidence, but nobody else's beliefs are even worth considering. Past giants like Newton, Faraday, Maxwell, Planck, Darwin, Huxley, Einstein, Heisenberg were totally deluded in their religion or their agnosticism, and anyone else past, present or future who considers just the possibility of a designer is, by inference, a fool. Because only a fool would consider something that is not worth considering. This is the sort of pushy bigotry that gives atheism a bad name. As other correspondents have pointed out, we're all agnostics in the sense that we don't actually know whether God exists or not. OK to make judgements on what seems most likely to you, but to claim that your belief is the only one worth considering seems to me a long, long, long way over-the-top.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Wednesday, February 06, 2008, 18:50 (5896 days ago) @ Peter P

I have responded to Peter P's diatribe in a new thread "Postulation of a Designer", since it doesn't seem to bear any relation to "Origin of Life".

origin of life

by John Clinch @, London, Wednesday, March 05, 2008, 16:30 (5868 days ago) @ Peter P

Dear, dear, dear! - This ad hominem point about the personal religious faith of scientists is immaterial to this discussion. Besides, many of the scientists you mention lived in a time that was extremely hostile to atheism and agnosticism. Wasn't it a crime to espouse atheism in Newton's day? And, anyway, who cares what Heisenburg thought about God when all that matters is that we have his uncertainty principle? - If you must make an ad hominem point, you would do better to refer to the faith position of contemporary "giants" or even your ordinary scientist working today. But as this would probably reveal most to be atheistic or apatheistic (I can't remember the exact stats but it's a proportion far higher than the background population), I don't think it would be one that would go to your argument, such that it is.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Monday, March 03, 2008, 12:34 (5870 days ago) @ George Jelliss

I just thought I'd post this article by Steve Jones, which in passing comments on the failure of the latest tests of the clay crystal theory of abiogenesis. - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/02/26/sciview126.xml - But he mentions several other hypotheses that are still in the running, and of course a way of revivifying the clay method may yet be found. - "Lipid bilayers - sheets of grease - might have trapped simple substances and forced them into new combinations, or chemicals now used in living cells may have emerged in an oxygen-free world of iron and sulphur. / Some say that it all started in boiling oceans, others on icecaps, and everyone disagrees - loudly." - This is a good sign that research is vigorous. - I would also like to object here to dhw's argument, as expressed in the "Absence of Evidence" thread: - "if it needs supreme intelligence to understand, let alone recreate something, one can hardly take that as proof that the original creation needed no intelligence at all." - This does not follow at all, it is a nonsense. The research being undertaken in abiogenesis is trying to analyse the natural processes that could have led to the evolution of self-replicating systems. If this can be shown it will remove one of the last refuges of the "god of the gaps". Intelligence will have shown that no pre-existing intelligence is needed.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Tuesday, March 04, 2008, 02:10 (5869 days ago) @ George Jelliss

The Telgraph article mentioning clay, does indeed show that research is ongoing and clay has been a favored subject since it allows molecules to stick together and try to replicate. Robert Shapiro (I previously mentioned his book, Origins) has been favorable toward that possible approach. But the Telegraph does support the point I'd like to make in later communication. Origin of Life research has only accomplished knowledge of what will not work. And I doubt the answer will be found. But first, let's agree on a definition of what is simple life. Mine: a single cell, fully independent in function, with integrated parts (organelles) that can absorb nutrients to allow the utilization of energy to maintain itself in a continuous form or shape, to excrete wastes, and to reproduce itself in the same form, shape and organization. This excludes viruses which must act as parasites in other independent organisms, utilizing operating parts of that host organism that the virus lacks. Please comment on whether this definition is acceptable.

origin of life

by dhw, Tuesday, March 04, 2008, 07:43 (5869 days ago) @ George Jelliss

George Jelliss draws our attention to Steve Jones's comments on the failure of the latest clay crystal theory of abiogenesis. "But he mentions that several other hypotheses are still in the running....'Some say that it all started in boiling oceans, others on icecaps, and everyone disagrees ... loudly.' This is a good sign that research is vigorous." Yes indeed, and it is also a sign that so far it hasn't made much progress. - George writes: "The research being undertaken in abiogenesis is trying to analyse the natural processes that could have led to the evolution of self-replicating systems. If this can be shown...intelligence will have shown that no pre-existing intelligence is needed." Is trying...could have led...If... From an atheist point of view, you might just as well say: "The research is trying to find a way to prove that life and reproduction could have originated without the intervention of any kind of intelligence. If this can be shown, it will prove that life and reproduction could have originated without any kind of intelligence." Put that way, however, it doesn't sound quite so impressive. Why can't you just wait until the proof is there before you sneer at those who have not committed themselves to unproven hypotheses and so are prepared to consider alternatives? I am strongly reminded of the following comment made earlier on the forum: "The speculations, like those of the string theorists, are certainly interesting and might have something in them, but so far lack definite results." A good enough reason for that particular writer not to commit himself to belief. The comment was not aimed at abiogenesis, though. It was George Jelliss brushing off Pim van Lommel's research into the nature of consciousness and near death experiences.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Wednesday, March 05, 2008, 02:05 (5868 days ago) @ dhw

The problem with origin of life research is that approaches used by the researchers have produced only negative results. They have learned what does not work, and have no solid theories as to how to get from inorganic molecules to something living. Trying to re-invent an imagined RNA world as a first step and been fruitless. Yes, one lab did produce a self-replicating RNAzyme that could copy itself with 95% accuracy, after studying trillions and trillions of RNA candidate molecules with a computer program.
 
This is not surprising. A single celled organism, even the simplest, is made up of enormous numbers of amino acids. There are 20 'essential' amino acids, those required for living organisms. If one cooks up a reaction of nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen and carbon as inorganic atoms, with appropriate catalysts, one get a soup of tar and some amino acids. The problem is amino acids and other organic molecules are three dimensional, and from the reaction half will be right and half left handed. Life uses only left handed amino acids. Similarly if one looks at DNA or RNA in living organisms all the nucleotides are right handed. If life occured by accident, why this preference? No one knows but some substrates have been found to prefer a degree of handedness. - Compounding the problems, protein molecules which are the basis for life are strings of hundreds of amino acids which must be folded properly to have any function at all. As proteins are manufactured by the cell, other proteins already present control the folding. Each single cell is a miniature compound factory. - The only good approach at the present time to researching 'start of life' is to work with simple inorganic molecules according to the method of Robert Shapiro and by working out energy exchange loops of inorganic molecules hope to jump the enormous gap from inorganic to living organic organisms. - Invoking the Fred Hoyle approach of assuming life arrived from outer space, simply removes the problem to elsewhere in the universe.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Friday, July 18, 2008, 21:32 (5733 days ago) @ David Turell

Here's the latest on the "RNA World" - Researchers discover Remnant of an Ancient RNA World - http://www.physorg.com/news135522723.html - Proteins carry out almost all of life's cellular functions today, but many scientists like Breaker believe this was not always the case and have found many examples in which RNA plays a surprisingly large role in regulating cellular activity. The Science study illustrates that - in bacteria, at least - proteins are not always necessary to spur a host of fundamental cellular changes, a process Breaker believes was common on Earth some 4 billion years ago, well before DNA existed. - There are also comments on richarddawkins.net: - http://richarddawkins.net/article,2876,Researchers-Discover-Remnant-of-an-Ancient-RNA-W...

origin of life

by David Turell @, Saturday, July 19, 2008, 00:37 (5732 days ago) @ George Jelliss

George: All this proves is that the RNA portion of genetic control is much more complicated than anyone thought 10 years ago. The 'RNA World' hypothesis is just that, a conjecture with no way of proving it. It is just as likely that RNA preceded DNA as that RNA and DNA arrived simultaneously by chance or on purpose. No one will ever know. The odds against even the simplest RNA just popping up are stupendous as we all admit. I'm not surprised at the findings. I concluded years ago that this result would appear. It had to. We have too few genes to account for our complexity, based on genes alone.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Saturday, July 19, 2008, 16:24 (5732 days ago) @ George Jelliss

Here's the latest on the "RNA World"
> 
> Researchers discover Remnant of an Ancient RNA World
> 
> A horse ran off and I couldn't complete my thought. The above headline is outright wishful thinking. Scientific discoveries can be very exact and very acceptable, but it is the interpretation of the implications that gets folks in trouble philosophically. If you wish to be an atheist, then the interpretation of the headline can support that point of view. If you are agnostic then you can wonder at the complexity, but not be sure. If you tend to theism, then it becomes a marvelous example of God's creation. Science is only science. The past can not be re-created, only possibly (with faith) approximated. Antony Flew kept an open mind and allowed his preexisting prejudices to be influenced. All I see here are minds cast in cement. And loose horses can get into all sorts of places they shouldn't go. They are accidents waiting to happen.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Monday, July 21, 2008, 00:45 (5730 days ago) @ David Turell

There is an excellent summary of the objections to the current theories (?) of origin of life by science at Uncommon Descent: http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/faith-and-reason-in-the-ool-context/#...

origin of life

by Carl, Monday, July 21, 2008, 03:43 (5730 days ago) @ David Turell

David Turell writes
"There is an excellent summary of the objections to the current theories (?) of origin of life by science at Uncommon Descent: http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/faith-and-reason-in-the-ool-context/#... - Paul Giem established that the Miller-Urey experiment did not produce life, that no scientific explanation for the production of life has yet been derived and that explaining how abiogenesis might have occurred is very difficult. He did not prove that it is a hopeless task and should be abandoned.
Even if scientists produce life in the lab, it will not prove that God didn't do it the first time. Failure of science to produce life in the lab will not prove that God did it. Also, if God created the solar system knowing that the earth would form and abiogenesis would occur, did he create life? And if he created our galaxy knowing that our solar system would form did he create the solar system?

origin of life

by David Turell @, Friday, January 16, 2009, 14:11 (5551 days ago) @ David Turell

There may be evidence of life currently on Mars: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090115164621.htm

origin of life

by David Turell @, Friday, January 16, 2009, 17:59 (5551 days ago) @ David Turell
edited by unknown, Friday, January 16, 2009, 18:05

The following article shows how complex the DNA/RNA system really is. Note the length of these microRNA's which regulate genes. A good portion of 'junk DNA' is now found to contain this regulation system. From Nature Genetics Journal: - Small silencing RNAs: an expanding universe
Megha Ghildiyal1,1 & Phillip D. Zamore1 About the authors - Summary
Like nearly all biological mechanisms, small RNA-directed pathways are both elegantly simple — small RNA guides use sequence complementarity to identify their targets — and shockingly complex, with myriad proteins required to excise small RNA guides from much longer precursors and still more required to carry out small RNA-directed functions.
Despite this complexity, the defining features of small silencing RNAs are their short length (20...30 nucleotides) and their association with members of the Argonaute family of proteins.
Small interfering RNAs are typically 21 nucleotides and they are derived from dsRNA, the nearly universal eukaryotic signal for 'foreignness'.
Small interfering RNAs can be both exogenous and endogenous in origin in plants and animals, and provide an epigenetic component of resistance against biotic and abiotic stress.
MicroRNAs 'tune' and regulate development and many other biological processes in plants and animals. MicroRNAs are encoded in the genome and typically repress their mRNA targets by partial base-pairing, and hence have the potential to regulate many distinct mRNA targets.
Piwi-interacting RNAs participate in a feed-forward amplification loop that monitors and silences transposon expression in the germ line.
Small RNA pathways, although distinct, share protein components and repress and enhance each other. Such 'cross talk' between small RNA pathways is poorly understood.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Sunday, June 08, 2008, 23:24 (5772 days ago) @ George Jelliss

Here's the latest news. I just read it on the Richard Dawkins net, and thought I should share it here. - http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080604140959.htm - It's a simulation of what a "protocell" might have been like. And it works, despite being much simpler than the more evolved cells that exist now. Looks like a great step towards explaining the early evolution of life.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Monday, June 09, 2008, 01:35 (5772 days ago) @ George Jelliss

Here's the latest news. I just read it on the Richard Dawkins net, and thought I should share it here.
> 
> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080604140959.htm
> 
> It's a simulation of what a "protocell" might have been like. And it works, despite being much simpler than the more evolved cells that exist now. Looks like a great step towards explaining the early evolution of life. - I went to the article George suggested as a 'great step' noted above; from the article: "Szostak's team carefully analyzed vesicles comprised of different fatty acid molecules and identified particular features that made membranes more or less permeable to potential nutrient molecules. They found that, while large molecules such as strands of DNA or RNA could not pass through fatty acid membranes, the simple sugar molecules and individual nucleotides that make up larger nucleic acids easily crossed the membrane. - To further explore the function of a fatty acid cell membrane, the researchers used activated nucleotides they developed for this study that will copy a DNA template strand without needing the polymerase enzyme usually required for DNA replication. After placing template molecules inside fatty-acid vesicles and adding the activated nucleotides to the external environment, they found that additional DNA was formed within the vesicles, confirming that the nucleotide molecules were passing through the fatty-acid membranes." - Please note the enormous amount of intelligent design by the scientists. Just making some activated nucleotides involves strands of about 15-20 nucleotides, literally a very small RNA-like strand. Just having nature make such a strand is an enormous accomplishment, the odds against which are stupendous. - George's note to us is wonderful wishful thinking. Copying what nature has shown us doesn't really tell us how it happened, and in doing the copying we have to use the molecules nature gave us. We have no experimental findings to tell us how RNA started, how the complicated coded information arose. Using passive fatty acid micelles is one of the older unproven theories that has been around for many years. As the authors of the article point out, current living membranes are very different, using chemical pumps to get chemicals in and out of the cell. The authors, by using micelles, make the assumption that life 'had' to start simply. We don't know that.

origin of life

by George Jelliss ⌂ @, Crewe, Saturday, January 03, 2009, 14:39 (5564 days ago) @ David Turell

Hewre's another article from the same source: - http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081218213634.htm - Experiments have shown how RNA strands can combine to form longer strands.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Saturday, January 03, 2009, 22:44 (5563 days ago) @ George Jelliss


> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081218213634.htm
> 
> Experiments have shown how RNA strands can combine to form longer strands. - George's article describes short segments of RNA being fused under special conditions, that may have existed or never have existed in the ancient world. The researchers used already-formed RNA segments. Just getting those segments by chance from the inorganic ancient world is against stupendous odds. We are seeing intelligent design in action by the scientists.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Friday, February 27, 2009, 20:27 (5509 days ago) @ David Turell

A recently reported advance in the science of the RNA world, the supposition that life started in a population of RNA molecules, has been reported in Science. I have reviewed the lab preparations for this discovery and they can be seen in the supporting materials presented with the abstract. The work is very meticulous and very complicated, but they did find RNAzymes that could copy. http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/short/323/5918/1229 Again, a very complex experiment, not likely to occur by chance.

origin of life

by David Turell @, Friday, February 27, 2009, 20:44 (5509 days ago) @ David Turell

A new article on the RNA world concept, that life started at that genetic level, has appeared in Science. I have reviewed the preparations, which are meticulous and very complicated, but The RNA zymes do accommplish accurate copying. Note again this is laboratory work using intelligence to arrive at the result. The molecules ARE VERY COMPLICATED. http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/1167856

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