Evidence against abiogenesis/evolution

[True_Blue]

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms. Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness. In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve. The crowding-out effect on a limited supply of food would take effect instantaneously, immediately killing in a few generations any life form that couldn’t compete to the max. Over time, the effect is like the exorable pounding of the ocean upon the shore. Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve and compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes. The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

Here's another fundamental problem with abiogenesis. When the very first replicating bacteria evolved (or pre-bacteria, if you prefer), it would very rapidly, (within days or weeks, consume every bit of biochemical oxygen demand in the hypothetical primordial sea, until none was left, and then every last bacteria cell would die for lack of food. The only way the first spawned life form would survive would be if another life form evolved that biochemically works in the opposite direction, i.e. Bacteria #1 converts sulfate into sulfur, and Bacteria #2 converts sulfur into sulfate, closing the loop in a coculture. I shouldn't have to say how incredibly unlikely it would be for two organisms to simultaneously evolve with opposite pathways. And reality is yet more complex because it takes more than two organisms to create a balanced ecosystem. A whole ecosystem would have to evolve all at once to create a balanced, sustainable aquarium.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores. Fruit shouldn't exist in a hypothetical evolutionary construct. Creationists believe God created fruit for animals and people to enjoy (it tastes good), so it serves a purpose. Fruit trees tend not to do so well without farmers, and trees with selectively bred large fruit don't do as well against their wild cousins. This is one of many examples I could cite.

I find young earth creationism a better explanation for the ecosystem as it exists.

 

[IzzyPop]

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms. Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness.

Not really. Were that true, you would have a decent argument. But reproductive efficiency will trump energy efficiency as long as there is an abundant supply of energy.

In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve. The crowding-out effect on a limited supply of food would take effect instantaneously, immediately killing in a few generations any life form that couldn’t compete to the max.

Unless they are not competing for the same source of food or the food source is abundant enough to supply both.

Over time, the effect is like the exorable pounding of the ocean upon the shore. Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve and compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes.

You are making some pretty big assumptions. You assume a limited food or energy supply, you assume that all the organisms are relying on the same supply. You assume that they are not separated by tide pools or thermal layers.

The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

That is an awful big leap.

Here's another fundamental problem with abiogenesis. When the very first replicating bacteria evolved (or pre-bacteria, if you prefer), it would very rapidly, (within days or weeks, consume every bit of biochemical oxygen demand in the hypothetical primordial sea, until none was left, and then every last bacteria cell would die for lack of food.

Unless, say, the first organisms didn't rely on oxygen. Maybe their waste was oxygen. Read up on photosynthesis.

The only way the first spawned life form would survive would be if another life form evolved that biochemically works in the opposite direction, i.e. Bacteria #1 converts sulfate into sulfur, and Bacteria #2 converts sulfur into sulfate, closing the loop in a coculture. I shouldn't have to say how incredibly unlikely it would be for two organisms to simultaneously evolve with opposite pathways. And reality is yet more complex because it takes more than two organisms to create a balanced ecosystem. A whole ecosystem would have to evolve all at once to create a balanced, sustainable aquarium.

Once again, you are assuming that all are using the same source for food. These are rapidly reproducing single celled organisms. Generations are being produced quite quickly. If a large amount of sulphur is being produced the first organism that has a mutation that can utilize that sulphur, no matter how inefficiently, has an edge over the competition. And that organism will reproduce, creating more sulphur using organisms, until a balance is achieved.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores. Fruit shouldn't exist in a hypothetical evolutionary construct.

Because fruit allows the seeds to be carried away from the parent plant and deposited in a nutrient rich package. It make great sense.

Creationists believe God created fruit for animals and people to enjoy (it tastes good), so it serves a purpose. Fruit trees tend not to do so well without farmers, and trees with selectively bred large fruit don't do as well against their wild cousins.

Of course they don't. Fruit trees are a bad example. Any domesticated crop had been intelligently designed by humans for humans. We have bred them for ease of growth and their fruit. They do not need the same defenses in a domesticated environment that they would need were we not around to care for them.

This is one of many examples I could cite.

You may want to. These were bad examples.

I find young earth creationism a better explanation for the ecosystem as it exists.

Then look harder. YEC explains nothing.

 

[ChordatesLegacy]

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms. Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness. In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve. The crowding-out effect on a limited supply of food would take effect instantaneously, immediately killing in a few generations any life form that couldn’t compete to the max. Over time, the effect is like the exorable pounding of the ocean upon the shore. Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve and compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes. The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

Here's another fundamental problem with abiogenesis. When the very first replicating bacteria evolved (or pre-bacteria, if you prefer), it would very rapidly, (within days or weeks, consume every bit of biochemical oxygen demand in the hypothetical primordial sea, until none was left, and then every last bacteria cell would die for lack of food. The only way the first spawned life form would survive would be if another life form evolved that biochemically works in the opposite direction, i.e. Bacteria #1 converts sulfate into sulfur, and Bacteria #2 converts sulfur into sulfate, closing the loop in a coculture. I shouldn't have to say how incredibly unlikely it would be for two organisms to simultaneously evolve with opposite pathways. And reality is yet more complex because it takes more than two organisms to create a balanced ecosystem. A whole ecosystem would have to evolve all at once to create a balanced, sustainable aquarium.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores. Fruit shouldn't exist in a hypothetical evolutionary construct. Creationists believe God created fruit for animals and people to enjoy (it tastes good), so it serves a purpose. Fruit trees tend not to do so well without farmers, and trees with selectively bred large fruit don't do as well against their wild cousins. This is one of many examples I could cite.

I find young earth creationism a better explanation for the ecosystem as it exists.

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms. Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness. In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve. The crowding-out effect on a limited supply of food would take effect instantaneously, immediately killing in a few generations any life form that couldn’t compete to the max. Over time, the effect is like the exorable pounding of the ocean upon the shore. Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve and compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes. The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

A couple of things to concider.

1 For the first ~3 billion years of life on earth, only single celled creatures thrived
2 Multi cellular creatures evolved by single celled creatures working together in a symbiotic relationship beneficial to all. We can still see vestiges of this in humans i.e. mitochondria.




For the first 3 billion years of life on earth, single celled bacteria ruled, their remains, or more accurately the remains of the structures they formed can be seen in stromatolites. Cyanobacteria do not use oxygen (see quote below), they get their energy from photosynthesis and produce oxygen as a by-product.

Quoted from wikipedia Cyanobacteria

Cyanobacteria, also known as blue-green algae, blue-green bacteria or Cyanophyta, is a phylum of bacteria that obtain their energy through photosynthesis. The name "cyanobacteria" comes from the color of the bacteria (Greek: κυανός (kyanós) = blue). They are a significant component of the marine nitrogen cycle and an important primary producer in many areas of the ocean, but are also found on land.
Stromatolites of fossilized oxygen-producing cyanobacteria have been found from 2.8 billion years ago.[2] The ability of cyanobacteria to perform oxygenic photosynthesis is thought to have converted the early reducing atmosphere into an oxidizing one, which dramatically changed the life forms on Earth and provoked an explosion of biodiversity. Chloroplasts in plants and eukaryotic algae have evolved from cyanobacteria.

There is good evidence of this oxygen production in the early seas in the form of banded iron stones. “Banded Iron Formations are thought to have formed from the precipitation of iron from the Earth's ancient oceans. Photosynthetic bacteria produced, for perhaps the first time in the young Earth's oceans, free oxygen which oxidized the dissolved iron that existed abundantly at the time. Oxidized iron is not soluble in water and thus it would precipitate out of the oceans and onto the muddy sea floor” Quote from here.
.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores. Fruit shouldn't exist in a hypothetical evolutionary construct. Creationists believe God created fruit for animals and people to enjoy (it tastes good), so it serves a purpose. Fruit trees tend not to do so well without farmers, and trees with selectively bred large fruit don't do as well against their wild cousins. This is one of many examples I could cite.

What in the world make you thing that a tree that produces billions of spores (yes it is billions) is more efficient than a tree that produces hundreds of fruits.

All you are doing is showing your complete lack of understanding for the natural world; ignorance is not a defence, read up on the subject matter before making such illogical statements.

 

[Naraoia]

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms. Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness.

Unless the less energy-efficient critter simply eats the more energy-efficient one Or shades it out, grows over it, dunno. I'm an apprentice evolutionary biologist, not a bioenergetics expert I'm thinking in terms of selective advantage in general, not just one factor influencing fitness.

In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve.

New multicellularity apparently evolves and is highly advantageous under selective pressure from unicellular organisms. See this site (search the page for "multicellular" to quickly find the relevant example) for a unicellular alga that by accident came into contact with an also unicellular predator. Within a very short time the algae became colonial and stayed so.

The crowding-out effect on a limited supply of food would take effect instantaneously, immediately killing in a few generations any life form that couldn’t compete to the max.

Unless, of course, they outcompeted the more efficient life-forms by killing them.

Over time, the effect is like the exorable pounding of the ocean upon the shore. Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve

As demonstrated by the aforementioned algae, they needn't evolve slowly. and

compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes.

Enormous competitive and food source

The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

In short, life proves you otherwise. If energy efficiency was the only factor influencing fitness then I doubt we eukaryotes would have the junky genomes we have. Imagine how much you could spare if you didn't have to replicate an extra few thousand inert retroviruses upon every cell division.

Here's another fundamental problem with abiogenesis. When the very first replicating bacteria evolved (or pre-bacteria, if you prefer), it would very rapidly, (within days or weeks, consume every bit of biochemical oxygen demand in the hypothetical primordial sea, until none was left, and then every last bacteria cell would die for lack of food.

First mistake: we're definitely not talking about oxygen at this stage. Oxygen was the fault of cyanobacteria and caused a major extinction AFAIK.

The only way the first spawned life form would survive would be if another life form evolved that biochemically works in the opposite direction, i.e. Bacteria #1 converts sulfate into sulfur, and Bacteria #2 converts sulfur into sulfate, closing the loop in a coculture. I shouldn't have to say how incredibly unlikely it would be for two organisms to simultaneously evolve with opposite pathways.

You are again forgetting about something important. The sulphur compounds you bring up, for example, come abundantly from volcanic sources. Ever been to the Solfatara crater near Naples or some similar place? The stink is unforgettable. There's more hydrogen sulphide there than any bacterium could exhaust. Sulphur just grows in visible crystals around the cracks. And sulphur plus compounds are not the only things that come out of volcanoes. In short, you needn't set up a nutrient cycle when it's coming from the earth in a virtually endless supply.

And reality is yet more complex because it takes more than two organisms to create a balanced ecosystem.

Now I'd love to know where you get that.

A whole ecosystem would have to evolve all at once to create a balanced, sustainable aquarium.

no, not at all. Something would first evolve to exploit the non-biogenic resources (eg H2S and carbon dioxide) that are already there. Then some of the somethings would evolve to exploit the somethings that exploit the primary resources... and so on. Complexity would build up gradually until you get a whole interdependent food web that indeed couldn't function if something was taken out - maybe with the exception of the original primary producers.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores. Fruit shouldn't exist in a hypothetical evolutionary construct. Creationists believe God created fruit for animals and people to enjoy (it tastes good), so it serves a purpose. Fruit trees tend not to do so well without farmers, and trees with selectively bred large fruit don't do as well against their wild cousins. This is one of many examples I could cite.

Of course our cultivated fruit trees don't do so well, they probably have much larger fruits than they'd need to successfully reproduce in the wild.

There are two extremes of reproductive strategy: either make millions of tiny spores/seeds/whatever, each with a low individual cost, and risk the death of most of them due to lack of sufficient resources to start new life. Or invest more in each individual fruit and make few of them - but high investment ensures that (a) the seed contains enough nutrition for the young plant to start off and/or (b) that the seed gets properly dispersed (i.e. someone eats it and hopefully doesn't sh*t it out right under the parent's shadow - additionally, excrement has some excellent nutritional value for a young plant).

On the whole, neither of them is universally better than the other. I don't think either strategy is less costly than the other - orchids may make very small seeds but make absolutely millions of them - and both can be viable strategies.

I find young earth creationism a better explanation for the ecosystem as it exists.

Then I suggest you take an evolutionary biology course and think about fitness from more angles. You main problem seems to be seeing only one aspect of complex problems.

 

[Allegory]

Umm, didn't someone make essentially this exact post already?

 

[Chalnoth]

Umm, didn't someone make essentially this exact post already?

Yeah, I think he's trying to branch his part of the discussion into a new thread. Which is good, since it was a little bit off-topic. For future reference, True_Blue, when doing this it can be useful to post a link to the new thread within the old one.

 

[Split Rock]

Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve and compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes. The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

We have about the same number of species of bacteria today, as in the past. Please explain why the microbes do not out-compete and render all multicellular organsims extinct today?

 

[FishFace]

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms. Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness.

No. There is one standard of evolutionary fitness, and that is to what extent you are able to pass on your genes. That is all.

In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve. The crowding-out effect on a limited supply of food would take effect instantaneously, immediately killing in a few generations any life form that couldn’t compete to the max. Over time, the effect is like the exorable pounding of the ocean upon the shore. Multicellular life forms would be at an enormous competitive disadvantage. It’s absurd to believe multicellular life forms could slowly evolve and compete against the enormous competitive force of the microbes. The fact that they exist today means that an intelligent being made them and placed them here, not that they evolved. If evolution were true, they would never have evolved in the first place. Multicellular life forms trying to evolve would never win the life-and-death struggle for resources.

It may disturb you to learn that the evolution of multicellularity has been observed multiple times, probably due to a failure of cytokinesis, or another failure to separate after mitosis.

Here's another fundamental problem with abiogenesis. When the very first replicating bacteria evolved (or pre-bacteria, if you prefer), it would very rapidly, (within days or weeks, consume every bit of biochemical oxygen demand in the hypothetical primordial sea, until none was left, and then every last bacteria cell would die for lack of food. The only way the first spawned life form would survive would be if another life form evolved that biochemically works in the opposite direction, i.e. Bacteria #1 converts sulfate into sulfur, and Bacteria #2 converts sulfur into sulfate, closing the loop in a coculture. I shouldn't have to say how incredibly unlikely it would be for two organisms to simultaneously evolve with opposite pathways. And reality is yet more complex because it takes more than two organisms to create a balanced ecosystem. A whole ecosystem would have to evolve all at once to create a balanced, sustainable aquarium.

Since there was no, or virtually no oxygen on the early earth, this probably wasn't much of a problem - the first organisms metabolised something more like hydrogen sulphide. Considering how small the population would be at this point, you're going to have to come up with some maths if you want to convince me that resources were scarce.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores.

First of all, there was pressure to produce seeds, because a seed, packed with nutrients for the seedling (rather like a yolk) increases the offspring's chances of survival.
But then we have a problem - the seeds are heavy, and so they can't float off in air currents like spores can. Now there are a few ways of solving this problem. One is to give your seeds wings or parachutes - sycamores and dandelions, for example. Another is to make them into rafts, such as the sea beans. A third is to make them attractive to animals, which were buzzing and slithering around at the time. In order to so, a reward had to be offered - fruit.


Well, your three arguments from lack of imagination were dealt with there, I think.

 

[FishFace]

We have about the same number of species of bacteria today, as in the past. Please explain why the microbes do not out-compete and render all multicellular organsims extinct today?

God prevents them from doing so...

 

[Loudmouth]

I have a strong business interest renewable energy, and in my research, I learned that unicellular life forms, whether they have a nucleus or not, are 10-100 times more energy-efficient than the most energy-efficient multicellular life forms.

Then why are there large plants? Unicellular life should have driven them to extinction by now, even if the world is 6,000 years old. How did plants establish themselves after Noah's Flood, for example.

Energy efficiency is a very excellent proxy for evolutionary fitness.

No, it's not.

In the hypothetical evolutionary primordial sea, unicellular life forms would utterly decimate any multi-cellular life form “trying” to evolve.

Not if the multi-cellular life started eating the unicellular organisms.

Here's another fundamental problem with abiogenesis. When the very first replicating bacteria evolved (or pre-bacteria, if you prefer), it would very rapidly, (within days or weeks, consume every bit of biochemical oxygen demand in the hypothetical primordial sea, until none was left, and then every last bacteria cell would die for lack of food.

There are many anaerobic bacteria alive today. In fact, there are bacteria that can not grow in the presence of oxygen.

The only way the first spawned life form would survive would be if another life form evolved that biochemically works in the opposite direction, i.e. Bacteria #1 converts sulfate into sulfur, and Bacteria #2 converts sulfur into sulfate, closing the loop in a coculture.

Why sulfur? RNA replicators could have replicated using temperature differences.

I shouldn't have to say how incredibly unlikely it would be for two organisms to simultaneously evolve with opposite pathways.

No, please do tell.

Another way of looking at energy efficiency is consider why fruit-bearing plants consume so much energy to make fruit, compared with the efficiency of plants that throw of billions of spores. Fruit shouldn't exist in a hypothetical evolutionary construct.

Um, yes they should exist. Their seeds are designed to pass through the digestive system of vertebrates. Upon exiting the animal they are surrounded by nitrogen rich dung. They are also transported far away from the parent plant which reduces competition between generations.

Creationists believe God created fruit for animals and people to enjoy (it tastes good), so it serves a purpose.

Creationists believe a lot of nonsense. So what?

Fruit trees tend not to do so well without farmers, and trees with selectively bred large fruit don't do as well against their wild cousins. This is one of many examples I could cite.

Of course. Farmers have bred these plants for their fruit production, not their ability to reproduce. A fit fruit tree will produce just enough fruit to attract animals to eat it. Humans prefer more fruit body than is necessary for reproduction.

I find young earth creationism a better explanation for the ecosystem as it exists.

And yet you are wrong at every turn.

 

[Tomk80]

Two very general comments.
1. Lab experiments have shown that single cellular algae will evolve a colony forming mechanism if confronted with a single cellular organism that eats single cellular algae. In other words, energy efficiency is not the only determinant for fitness, in this case not becoming food is another. Which shows a more general error in the OP, namely singling out a single selective factor.

2. Minor point, but the second paragraph of the OP states "another problem with abiogenesis...", but the evolution from a single cellular to multicellular state is not abiogenesis.

 

[Split Rock]

Two very general comments.
1. Lab experiments have shown that single cellular algae will evolve a colony forming mechanism if confronted with a single cellular organism that eats single cellular algae. In other words, energy efficiency is not the only determinant for fitness, in this case not becoming food is another. Which shows a more general error in the OP, namely singling out a single selective factor.

This sounds very interesting, Tom. Could you please provide references for these experiments?

 

[Tomk80]

This sounds very interesting, Tom. Could you please provide references for these experiments?

Boraas ME et al. Phagotrophy by a flagellate selects for colonial prey: A possible origin of multicellularity. Evolutionary Ecology 1998(12), pages 153 - 64.

If you can't find it, I can send you the pdf.

 

[Naraoia]

Boraas ME et al. Phagotrophy by a flagellate selects for colonial prey: A possible origin of multicellularity. Evolutionary Ecology 1998(12), pages 153 - 64.

If you can't find it, I can send you the pdf.

Ah, so there is something newer than 1983 about this stuff. I saw the summary of the case from TO/the Evolution Evidence page and saw this 25-year-old reference and when I couldn't find the paper I thought that was the end of my reading. *happy*

 

[Dilvish]

True blue, have you perchance stumbled upon (by using, say, Google or somethin') those pesky, impudent Myxococcus xanthus critters? They somehow manage to refute your vision of Life, the Universe and Everything...

 

[Loudmouth]

True blue, have you perchance stumbled upon (by using, say, Google or somethin') those pesky, impudent Myxococcus xanthus critters? They somehow manage to refute your vision of Life, the Universe and Everything...

For visual aid, here is the multicellular form of the unicellular bacteria Myxococcus.

 

[Naraoia]

True blue, have you perchance stumbled upon (by using, say, Google or somethin') those pesky, impudent Myxococcus xanthus critters? They somehow manage to refute your vision of Life, the Universe and Everything...

I learn something again.

 

[Dilvish]

Thanks for the visual aid, Loudmouth, I really appreciate it I wanted to stress more on another aspect of these bacteria, however:

[snip] ... Myxobacteria reconvene during times of nutrient depletion in order to form fruiting bodies which consist of about 10^4 to 10^6 cells.
[snip for shortness of post]
In addition to aggregating to form fruiting bodies, which in and of itsself, is an unusually social behavior for bacteria to exhibit, some cells also commit 'suicide' to ensure the survival of other cells. During the process of fruiting body formation only a minority of cells that aggregate form spores. Many cells, instead, lyse, releasing their contents which serve to feed the sporulating cells.

Emphasis mine.
From h**p://microbewiki.kenyon.edu/index.php/Myxococcus

 

[True_Blue]

Some of you made excellent points in using the ability to pass genes to the next generation as a metric of evolutionary fitness. Here too, microbes are unsurpassed. An imaginative mind could scarcely devise a more prolific organism than a microbe, which doubles itself every 30 minutes to 4 days, depending on the microbe. At that rate, they would fill the earth in a matter of weeks. Contrast that to people, who need 15 years or so to duplicate themselves (don’t quibble this point, please). So now evolutionists are left with two insurmountable uphill battles instead of one. The first is the extraordinary energy efficiency of microbes. The second is their unsurpassed ability to procreate, also related to energy efficiency. The overwhelming force of natural selection should be forcing multicellulars to procreate faster by becoming unicellular instead, and in forcing multicellulars to become more energy-efficient, again by becoming unicellular. The inexorable selective pressure is in the direction of unicellularity.

Multicellular organisms survive today (at least for a while) because they have fully functioning, highly complex, and truly marvelously designed immune systems. Having an immune system requires energy and reduces efficiency. As soon as a single component fails, the species dies. The larger and more complex the multicellular organism, the more energy-intensive and complex the immune system. In engineering, this is sometimes referred to as parasitic energy costs. Competitive economic systems eliminate ideas that involve excessive parasitic energy costs, and natural selection acts to gradually eliminate such costs as well. That’s why manufacturing plants, power plants, military bases, cities, etc. become less efficient as they reach a certain size. Same is true for biological systems.

I don’t particularly care whether evolutionists assume the first microbe was photosynthetic or not. If I were an evolutionist though, I would be compelled to make my first bug as simple as I possibly could. That would rule out photosynthesis, which is extraordinarily complex, even in organisms with only one photosystem.

Some of you are hung up on my use of the term “oxygen” in my first post. I am using Chemical oxygen demand (COD) and Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) as engineering measures of the amount of food in the medium available for consumption. It doesn’t matter whether the food refers to CO2, O2, H2S, N2, or any other sort of food the bacteria eat.

Assuming a limited food supply and assuming the very first evolved cell would relies on that same supply is an extremely safe and very reasonable assumption. Any other assumption requires magic. The raw amount of food available is irrelevant—bacteria will eat through any amount of food supply in an extremely rapid period of time. More important is the flux of food over time. Even volcanic activity doesn’t typically last very long (decades, sometimes, but not millions of years). Volcanoes die along with everything else. One of you said that evolution is rapid, but that’s synonymous with X-Men-type evolution. I believe this is the only realistic form of evolution that could account for our ecosystem, and such evolution is the stuff of fantasy/sci fi movies, not a documentary.

Myxococcus Xanthus colonies are still unicellular organisms. There’s a vast gulf between them and multicellular life forms. The fact that M. Xanthus aggregates for survival is functionally equivalent to cyanobacteria colonies emitting toxins to allow the colony survive.

Remember that I’m asking you to visualize the hypothetical world in which the first living bacteria would spring into being. Would a person rationally expect the world as we see it day to have sprung from the conditions in the hypothetical world as it may have existed billions of years ago? No.

Also, I am a young earth creationist, so I believe the earth is six-ten thousand years old (measured on Earth’s time clock). In the absence of intervention by God or Christ’s return, I fully expect that accumulated genetic defects and microbial attack will eventually and inevitably render mankind extinct. Here is one enunciation of the genetic aspect of this theory: http://www.onelife.com/evolve/degen.html. Think of the human race as a single big self-replicating machine. Just as a machine eventually breaks, so will the machine of the human race. Six thousand years or so is not enough time for microbes to destroy us, but I am convinced the outcome is inevitable, assuming no intervention by God.

 

[Baggins]

,
Assuming a limited food supply and assuming the very first evolved cell would relies on that same supply is an extremely safe and very reasonable assumption.

Not it isn't it is daft.

You are talking about small numbers of life forms and vast nutrient and energy pools.

I know it is the only way your hypothesis can stand if you do make those assumptions, but they are not convincing at all.

A cursory read of this shows why:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_smokers