Primodial Soup

[gladiatrix]

Abiogenesis continued........

hey ...

i have a mate and he is always talking about this Primidial Soup.. "alphabetty spergetti" he calls it..where the begining was formed... i just want some more insite into this theory so i can make me own mind up...

cheers

PART 2--Good Theories make Predictions

he Oparin-Haldane hypothesis (the "chemistry" of prebiotic Earth) , proposed by Oparin and Haldane in 1920 and extensively modified in the 1980s, also made the following predictions:

BASED on the geological evidence documenting the early earth environment, IF the organism referred to as the Universal or Common Ancestor had the following characteristics

• it would have been anaerobic
• t would have been hyperthermophilic and halophilic
• it would have been a chemolithoautotroph, obtaining both energy and carbon from inorganic sources, using H2 or reduced sulfur compounds as electron donors and CO2 or oxidized sulfur as electron acceptors to provide energy and fixing CO2 as their carbon source.

THEN organisms possessing the above characteristics would be found in environments (this planet or other extraterrestrial environments like a early earth--Europa?) similiar to that of early biotic Earth.

Has this prediction been verified (thus verifying the chemical spontaneous generation scenario????--->YES, by discovery of organisms inhabiting "extreme" environments HERE, NOW, on EARTH!!!-->Modern Chemolithoautotrophs

MODERN CHEMOLITHOAUTOTROPHS

Organisms thought to be similar to these first chemolithoautotrophs have been isolated in the last few years from what we would call "extreme environments". These organisms are isolated from hot sulfur springs on the earth's surface or hydrothermal vents ("black smokers" ) on the ocean floor where these organisms form purely prokaryotic ecosystems.

Conditions in these environments are thought to mimic those present on the early earth, i.e. high temperature, high sulfur, anaerobic, high salt."

These organisms are called "extremophiles" and here are more sites that describe some of them:

Other Extreme Earth Life
"Extremophilic" Archaea/Eubacteria

• http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/A/Archaea.html
• http://www.firstscience.com/SITE/ARTICLES/volcano.asp
• http://www.space.com/searchforlife/life_methane_020116.html

  Samples of the archaea Sulfolobus shibatae, which lives in environments containing sulfuric acid and magnesium sulfate salts were obtained along with the highly radiation-resistant extremophile Deinococcus radiodurans'

Barotolerant(pressure resistant)organisms in deep sea enviroments (NOTE:75% of all ocean waters are deeper than 1000 meters)

Barotolerant Bacteria Isolated from the Mariana Trench (11,000 meters!) pdf

The existence of these organisms is seen as further evidence for the validity of abiogenesis.

Other Useful Sites:

Quetzal===>Abiogenesis-Or Better Living Through Chemistry (Summary of different hypotheses from EvC Forum)

Borel's Law and the Origin of Many Creationist/IDist Probabilities

Lies, #$%@!! Lies, and Statistics, and the Probability of Abiogenesis

THE ORIGIN OF LIFE: ABIOTIC SYNTHESIS OF ORGANIC MOLECULES (simple explanations of the chemistry)

THE ORIGIN OF LIFE: ABIOTIC SYNTHESIS OF ORGANIC MOLECULES

ORIGIN OF LIFE (powerpoint)

Test-Tube RNA

Reflections on a Warm Little Pond

 

[PhantomLlama]

As a christian, its the Holy spirit who moves on men not the approach...The approach is important, but you have established the parameters already of what is acceptable..that evolution is true..whats next: Jesus is a myth?..
No thanks not under your conditions

Jesus doesn't have to be a myth. I think he is a historical figure, I just think that some of the stuff written about him is untrue or inflated.

And the approach is vital. When I see a nice, polite, kind christian I warm towards christianity and think 'It's given him peace and made him a good person, maybe there is something to it'. When a christian like you comes alng you undo all that work.

see above..God moves on people..people do not move people to salvation..
maybe God has hardened your heart like Pharaoh

So god doesn't want me in heaven I guess. Not that I'd want to share heaven with a being that hardens my heart against conversion and then punishes me for not converting. I'll be perfectly happy in hell, thanks.

..know your mind?..don't really care...

If you actually listened to a word people say to you you would know that proof is not required.

Huh?

Proof is not required in science, it is in fact impossible. As I am sure you have been told before.

If you actually listened to a word people say to you you would know that evolution has no position on the beginning of life on earth.

if I listened to you I would believe in evolution as well...No evolution does deal in an indirect way the beginning of life..

No it doesn't. At all. In any fashion. The two areas are seperate. Evolution occurs regardless of whether the first cell comes from God, chemistry, or even if there is no first cell at all.

"Creation and evolution, between them exhaust the possible explanations for the origin of living things.Organisms either appeared on earth fully developed or they did not.If they did not, they must have developed from preexisting species by some process of modification.If they did appear in a fully developed state, they must indeed have been created by some omnipotent intelligence".. Futuyama Science on Trial 1983 p 197

Context for qoute please.

Firstly, a dolphin is a mammal. Secondly, there are many examples of transitional fossils and the fact that you know of none is only testament to your faliure to look.
References from a peer-reviewed scientific journal please.

so where did dolphins come from?..whales? platypus? trilobite?ant?bat?

I dont know. I wouldn't be surprised if the had a recent common ancestor with whales, but I am not the fount of all knowledge.

Nah..i'll just borrow the one on your head

Oi! Thats mine!

 

[gladiatrix]

Abiogenesis continued........

hey ...

i have a mate and he is always talking about this Primidial Soup.. "alphabetty spergetti" he calls it..where the begining was formed... i just want some more insite into this theory so i can make me own mind up...

cheers

PART 3--Abiogenesis, an Inorganic Solution???

With respect to the current hiding place for the theist God-of-Gaps... There is another possibility for the beginning molecule, an inorganic one...



Revolutionary New Theory For Origins Of Life On Earth

EXCERPT:
A totally new and highly controversial theory on the origin of life on earth, is set to cause a storm in the science world and has implications for the existence of life on other planets. Research* by Professor William Martin of the University of Dusseldorf and Dr Michael Russell of the Scottish Environmental Research Centre in Glasgow, claims that living systems originated from inorganic incubators - small compartments in iron sulphide rocks. The new theory radically departs from existing perceptions of how life developed and it will be published in Philosophical Transactions B, a learned journal produced by the Royal Society.

The idea that life could have arisen in an inorganic form is not new. For those who don't know about it here is a synopsis of an older one that is very interesting, but was discarded for lack of supportive evidence....

The Clay Crystal Hypothesis
Scottish chemist Graham Cairns-Smith proposed a simpler idea less dependent on the atmosphere. References for his work can be found HERE.

Graham Cairns-Smith suggested that perhaps the first living things on Earth were not based on carbon and proposed that first life might have been a sort of clay crystal formed in the mud and made out of silicon dioxide crystals. His idea was based on the following:

• Mineral crystals have the ability to grow by simply adding on to an existing crystal.
• If a growing crystal breaks apart, the fragments of that crystal can continue to grow on their own. In a sense, this is self-replication, and it is a process that is essential for life.
• Certain kinds of clays called kaolinite have the interesting property of growing in thin layers.

Cairns-Smith proposed the following scenario:

• The clay crystals began growing by adding layers to themselves, like adding pages to a book.
• The growing crystals competed with each other for resources as they grew.
• Some crystals would break apart, wash downstream or blow away "infect" new area where they would continue their growth and later fragmentation.
• In the early Earth , the world would be populated by communities of competing clay“beings”.
• Eventually, these clay creations would begin to incorporate carbon-based molecules into their living apparatus.
• One way to do this would be the synthesis of DNA or RNA to augment clay-based genes. In time there would be a transition period where carbon based genetic material (DNA or RNA) would become a suitable alternative to clay-based genes. Cairns-Smith reasons that the clay idea provides a preparatory path for the ultimate synthesis of DNA or RNA, but doesn't not present a complete idea on how DNA came from clay.
• The advance to carbon-based life would be complete. DNA would have been created, and the march of organic life could begin.
• ADVANTAGE 1-->it makes no assumptions about the composition of Earth’s early atmosphere which is a major problem with other earth-based life hypotheses.
• ADVANTAGE 2-->It also is founded on the simplest of crystal properties, that they have the ability to grow and “reproduce”, by fragmentation. This property is a true nature of crystals, and can be easily demonstrated.

This idea is discussed under replicators at this site:

Interesting Ideas in Evolution

Another useful site:
The Precambrian Era

 

[napajohn]

No, only you look stupid here because you don't seem to know anything about evolution which does not address how life began on this planet. However, abiogenesis does and there is quite a lot of evidence to support it. Because Big Jase asked about abiogenesis, here's what's the progress of abiogenesis in trying to model conditions on a pre-biotic Earth that would lead to life as we know it in 3 parts............

problems:
as stated by Phillip Johnson was

"Gerald Joyce, a biochemist who studies test-tube models of the RNA
world at Scripps, says: "It's just beautiful work, people literally gasp
when he talks about it." But he adds: "I wouldn't say it shows life
started with peptides." The problem, says Joyce, is that while every
piece of RNA can serve as a template, the type of protein templating
that Ghadiri observes may be a rare phenomenon unlikely to arise
without a chemist's nurturing. Ghadiri disagrees. "I don't believe I'm
that lucky. How could I have picked the one peptide in a million that
can replicate?"

"Note that although Ghadiri claims that he wasn't "that lucky"
to have "picked the one peptide in a million that can replicate", it
is clear that he selected a molecule that could be split exactly
into two "identical halves" an then they did just that. They
then gave it a "solution of 15- and 17-amino-acid fragments" from
which it could readily build copies of itself"

"There is another problem with such protein replication: it is too
exact. If no errors occur, then there can be no natural selection
and hence no evolution, for example, in the case of an artifical
protein"

""They [MTE] only
replicate in highly artificial, unnatural conditions, and even more
importantly, they reproduce too accurately. Without mutations, the
molecules cannot evolve in the Darwinian sense."

The RNA-World/Oparin-Haldane Hypothesis

RNA is the only known macromolecule that can both encode genetic information and also act as a biocatalyst. RNA molecules that perform enzymatic functions (biocatalysts) are called ribozymes. One of the most interesting of these ribozymes was discovered by Tom Cech when he discoved a self-splicing RNA in the single celled organism Tetrahymena thermophila. This RNA splice out it's own introns WITHOUT the assistance of proteins.
The observation of the above forms the basis for the 'RNA world' model which suggests that both the genetic and enzymatic components of early cells were RNA molecules. There are some problems with the "RNA-world":

• Making the sugar ribose under prebiotic conditions is problematic (it is unstable, in equilibrium with other anomeric forms, etc.) .
• Prebiotic conditions make it difficult to make nucleosides
• The phosphate chemistry utilized to activate RNA nucleotides in present-day living systems is not viewed as feasible under the primitive conditions of the pre-biotic world. However, nucleotide activation can also be based on imidazole chemistry, so this is not an insoluble problem.
• The 4 bases have to be joined to the sugar ribose, which under natural conditions is unstable. As of now, the only techniques discovered for joining the bases to ribose result in low yields, something unsuitable for the RNA world scenario.
• Polymerization of the nucleotides into RNA would have been a problem (assembling them so that they actually contained "information").
• The temperature of a primitive Earth would have made it difficult for RNA (once assembled) to remain stable.

Does this mean "curtains" for the RNA world scenario? NO. RNA could have "evolved" from other molecules better able to have withstood the harsh conditions of the prebiotic world.

Mere speculation..besides where in the planet do you find such combinations of pure RNA?..in a labratory
besides Shapiro points this out:
""If proteins could replicate directly, by some simple pairing scheme,
there would have been no need for them to turn this function over to
nucleic acids. Proteins store the same information more economically,
using less material. For example, an average amino acid in a protein
chain contains about 16 atoms. The same information, stored in three
units of an RNA chain, requires about 100 atoms. In DNA, the
identical information is kept in a complex of two chains and needs
200 atoms. This extra expenditure of material in storing the same
information would be justified only if there was a corresponding
increase in efficiency in moving to the more complex systems. We
must presume that the earlier protein-based hereditary system was
more cumbersome, and less elegant, than the present one."

Life out of magma: a new theory for the origin of life, by Lucido, G.Nuovo Cimento Della Societa Italiana di Fisica D - Condensed matter, Atomic, Molecular and Chemical Physics, Fluids, Plasmas, Biophysics 20(12): 2575-2591; December, 1998

heres a good critique on this:
http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-033.htm


For the ability of abiogenic proteinoids to self-organize into protocells the reference by Sidney W. Fox:
The evolutionary significance of phase-separated microsystems. Orig Life. 1976 Jan;7(1):49-68. For more on the potential of Fox's proteinoid microspheres go to my previous post to Ikester'

Of course, this idea requires "vesicular aggregates". But you can form vesicles on rock surfaces, which then enter the "soup"

Origin of life. II. From prebiotic replicators to protocells, by Turian, G.Archives des Sciences 52(2): 101-109; August, 1999


But can you get interesting chemistry in the microvesicles?

Production of RNA by a Polymerase Protein Encapsulated within Phospholipid-Vesicles, by Chakrabarti, A.C., Breaker, R.R., Joyce, G.F., Deamer, D.W.Journal of Molecular Evolution 39(6): 555-559; 1994

 

[Big Jase]

I am not entirely sure what you are saying. there are many christians who believe in the big bang, then atoms and stuff, and then stars and planets and big heavy things, and then complex chemicals, and then selfreplicating chemicals and then simple life and then more complex life and then primates and then us.

what i mean is... we know that a species evolves inside its own species like... dogs there is 100's of different types of dogs... we know that the evolved inside there own species.... but we don't beleve in human evolving from a different species...uno what i mean..we didn't come from monkeys....

cheers...

 

[Pete Harcoff]

what i mean is... we know that a species evolves inside its own species like... dogs there is 100's of different types of dogs... we know that the evolved inside there own species.... but we don't beleve in human evolving from a different species...uno what i mean..we didn't come from monkeys....

Then how do you explain endogenous retroviral insertions shared between human and chimp genomes if they didn't share a common ancestor?

And how do you explain this sequence of fossil hominid skulls?

 

[Bushido216]

That is entirely possible considering that thre is no historical coraborating evidence outside the Gospels, which were written by Christians. He very well could be the Lao-Tzu of Christianity.

It's generally accepted, actually, that Jesus lived and preached.

The question is whether or not he is the Messiah or if he was just the best preacher under the sun.

 

[Bushido216]

what i mean is... we know that a species evolves inside its own species like... dogs there is 100's of different types of dogs... we know that the evolved inside there own species.... but we don't beleve in human evolving from a different species...uno what i mean..we didn't come from monkeys....

cheers...

But there is no reason why humans and apes couldn't share a common ancestor, give what we know of natural selection's methods.

 

[Data]

what i mean is... we know that a species evolves inside its own species like... dogs there is 100's of different types of dogs... we know that the evolved inside there own species.... but we don't beleve in human evolving from a different species...uno what i mean..we didn't come from monkeys....

cheers...

Then when do you call a breed a new species?

You realise that if a chiwawa and a great dane were found in the wild, they would be classed as different species? The only reason they are the 'same species' is because we bred them that way, and they aren't found in the wild. Differences in species can be very small compared to the differences we see in breeds of dogs.

 

[Karl - Liberal Backslider]

Data, please, if the evolutionist side starts using "specie" as the singular of species I can't berate the creationist side for doing so. Give me back my phasor!

Back to the topic in hand...

Big Jase quoth:

You have to clear that statement up .... christians beleive in evolution but they don't beleive in evolution in creating us as we are today..u know what i'm saying...they don't beleive in evolution as the big bang and then atoms and stuff.....

Where to start? Scientific errors first methinks. The Big Bang is nothing to do with evolution, any more than the Norman Invasion is part of the study of Tudor foreign policy.

On to the more general falsehoods - Christians the world over do accept the Big Bang, molecular precursors to life and so on. It is only a vocal minority, mostly based in the US, who actually insist on a literal interpretation of a clearly mythological ancient text as if it were a scientific document.

 

[Data]

Data, please, if the evolutionist side starts using "specie" as the singular of species I can't berate the creationist side for doing so. Give me back my phasor!

Ack!

 

[fungle]

specii ?

 

[Data]

specii ?

Both singular and plural are 'species', I think.

Eh, I knew 'specie' looked horribly wrong.

 

[Bushido216]

I like specii though.

 

[gladiatrix]

problems:
as stated by Phillip Johnson was

"Gerald Joyce, a biochemist who studies test-tube models of the RNA
world at Scripps, says: "It's just beautiful work, people literally gasp
when he talks about it." But he adds: "I wouldn't say it shows life
started with peptides." The problem, says Joyce, is that while every
piece of RNA can serve as a template, the type of protein templating
that Ghadiri observes may be a rare phenomenon unlikely to arise
without a chemist's nurturing. Ghadiri disagrees. "I don't believe I'm
that lucky. How could I have picked the one peptide in a million that
can replicate?"
/snip rest of Johnson's strawman/

Nice cut and paste, but do you even understand what you have posted? I think not. Phillip Johnson is posting his opinion which seems to be that because peptides can be self-replicating that there is no possibility for selection to occur. This was NOT the point of the experiments, however, so Johnson's opinion is nothing but a strawman===>The point is that the peptide IS self-replicating and there are peptides that are chemical relatives of RNA, the PNAs and TNAs, a point totally ignored by both you and Johnson (how convenient!). Also, the amount of oxygen in the early atmosphere was less than 0.1%. Which is it that I suspect that you think the oxygen content was 20% like it is now. This is just plain wrong.

For years, IDists/creationists have crowed that since DNA/RNA molecules today require proteins for replication that it was impossible for life as we know it today to have arisen spontaneously in a pre-biotic world (the "chicken", genetic inheritance, would have to come before the "egg", the proteins encoded by the genetic inheritance) . These experiments show that peptides can self-replication (no need for genes in cells to encode them FIRST). This can lead to self-replication/self-splicing with RNA molecules that don't require the use of proteins to replicate or for modification via intermediates (PNAs/TNAs?). An example of an RNA does not require proteins for self-modification is ribozyme discoverd by Cech (another bit of evidence by both you and Johnson). The RNA world may simply have arisen via intermediate molecules that bridged the "gap" between a self-replicating peptide/protein world and the type of life we have today (DNA/RNA "world")

From HERE

We are interested in studying a variety of polymerization reactions that may have played a role in the evolution of the RNA world.

The studies that relate most closely to contemporary biology deal with the synthesis of RNA from activated mononucleotides on RNA or DNA templates. These reactions are the equivalent of biological nucleic acid replication and transcription. We have shown that it is possible to copy many DNA or RNA sequences to obtain a complementary oligomer without the help of enzymes.

Somewhat further from modern biology are our studies involving peptide nucleic acids (PNAs). These molecules contain the same heterocyclic bases as the nucleic acids but their backbone is held together by amide bonds. Nonetheless DNA (or RNA) and PNA form double-stranded complexes closely related to DNA. We have shown that DNA acts as a template for PNA synthesis and vice-versa. This illustrates how one genetic polymer could have replaced another.

Comparison of RNA to peptide analogs that may have served as a bridge to the RNA/DNA genetic world today...

In addition, there are proteins today encoded by DNA,lucaspa has also pointed out:

Here you will help me. What good does DNA do every living thing? And what what does DNA do?

DNA has evolved to direct protein synthesis. However, even in modern cells, not all proteins are coded by DNA nor are all parts of proteins coded by DNA.

For instance, glutathione is a 3 amino acid protein in all cells that is necessary for antioxidant activity. It is not coded by DNA but is synthesized by other proteins.

Proteoglycan is a a major component of cartilage and is responsible for the springiness of cartilage that allows you to walk without destroying your joints. Proteoglycan has a small protein core coded by DNA but the major part of the molecule are long chains of carbohydrate that are added to the protein core. In addition, the carbohydrate chains are sulfated (have sulfate attached to the sugar). A proteoglycan has a moleculare weight of 2 million but the protein core is only 100, 000 -- only about 5% of the molecule!

Type I collage is the major strutural protein in all vertebrates. It is about 25% hydroxyproline. But hydroxyproline is not coded by DNA. Proline is. The proline is hydroxylated after collagen is made and this hydroxylation -- necessary for the function of collagen -- is not coded by the DNA. Also in type I collagen is hydroxylysine. It is essential for crosslinking collagen molecles to give the strength of collagen. But again, hydroxylysine is not coded by DNA. Lysine is. The essential conversion is not coded by the DNA.

What DNA does is give a more error-free form of inheritance. Because of the hydrogen bonds between bases, it cuts down on the errors in copying DNA to transfer inheritance to a new organism. It provides stability from generation to generation.

BUT, sometimes error-free copying is not desirable. So some organisms have evolved errors in the copying system so that the mutation rate is higher!

This is where your/Johnson's "God-of-Gaps" ("but you can't explain last biochemical detail!") currently is hiding, in the gap between self-replicating peptides and RNA(not for long, be afraid be very afraid!)

Incidentally, I notice that you didn't go anywhere near the evidence provided by the production of protocells which can be produced with very simple chemistry and perform many of the same functions that today's cells do. Here it is again, since you ignored it the first time:

Life out of magma: a new theory for the origin of life, by Lucido, G.Nuovo Cimento Della Societa Italiana di Fisica D - Condensed matter, Atomic, Molecular and Chemical Physics, Fluids, Plasmas, Biophysics 20(12): 2575-2591; December, 1998

ABSTRACT
On the basis of colloid physical chemistry and taking into account the foundations of the thermodynamics of the unsteady state, a new theory of the origin of life is proposed. The temperature prevailing on the early Earth was too high for any form of life to be formed. The basic elements were distributed chaotically in space and constituted the hot primordial magma ocean. On cooling, however, a certain order slowly but surely began to establish itself. In particular a surficial colloidal soup originated in this magma ocean, once phase separation phenomena started. Subsequently in the long run, at or near the Earth's surface, amphiphilic molecules contained in this colloidal soup began to distribute themselves in vesicular aggregates. Every vesicle structure was surrounded by a barrier that kept it separate from other vesicle structures and from the environment. From a thermodynamic stand point there was a three-phase system: interior, barrier and exterior. The formation of these structures was the crucial event for the origin of cellular life. As to the origin of the earliest cell, the following sequence of events is proposed: primitive hot magma --> spinodal decomposition --> nucleation and growth --> colloidal soup --> amphiphilic molecules --> spontaneous vesicles --> functioning protocells --> prokaryotic cell.

For the ability of abiogenic proteinoids to self-organize into protocells the reference by Sidney W. Fox:
The evolutionary significance of phase-separated microsystems. Orig Life. 1976 Jan;7(1):49-68. For more on the potential of Fox's proteinoid microspheres go to my previous post to Ikester'

Of course, this idea requires "vesicular aggregates". But you can form vesicles on rock surfaces, which then enter the "soup"

Origin of life. II. From prebiotic replicators to protocells, by Turian, G.Archives des Sciences 52(2): 101-109; August, 1999

ABSTRACT
Primitive microvesicles (coacervates, microspheres, marigranules, etc.), free-born in aqueous media, are only protometabolic proteinoids surrounded by an amphiphilic protomembrane. In contrast, surface-born microvesicles could be initiated in the pores of watered rocks providing primary boundaries coated by amphiphilic compounds and acting as sinks for primitive peptides and their coding nucleobases N-P anchored on polyphosphates. Only presumed replication of these prenucleic infopolymers would qualify the basipetally budded microvesicles as protocells.

But can you get interesting chemistry in the microvesicles?

Production of RNA by a Polymerase Protein Encapsulated within Phospholipid-Vesicles, by Chakrabarti, A.C., Breaker, R.R., Joyce, G.F., Deamer, D.W.Journal of Molecular Evolution 39(6): 555-559; 1994

ABSTRACT
Catalyzed polymerization reactions represent a primary anabolic activity of all cells. It can be assumed that early cells carried out such reactions, in which macromolecular catalysts were encapsulated within some type of boundary membrane. In the experiments described here, we show that a template independent RNA polymerase (polynucleotide phosphorylase) can be encapsulated in dimyristoyl phosphatidylcholine vesicles without substrate. When the substrate adenosine diphosphate (ADP) was provided externally, long-chain RNA polymers were synthesized within the vesicles. Substrate flux was maximized by maintaining the vesicles at the phase transition temperature of the component lipid. A protease was introduced externally as an additional control. Free enzyme was inactivated under identical conditions. RNA products were visualized in situ by ethidium bromide fluorescence. The products were harvested from the liposomes, radiolabeled, and analyzed by polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. Encapsulated catalysts represent a model for primitive cellular systems in which an RNA polymerase was entrapped within a protected microenvironment.

HERE is a post by lucaspa on the subject of both protocells and TNA

To get a self-assembling "cell" (protocell) from non-living chemicals, go to the following sites, especially the second one:

http://www.siu.edu/~protocell
http://www.theharbinger.org/articles/rel_sci/fox.html

BTW, you can cook these up in your kitchen....Lucaspa has a recipe! ( I see from doing a seach that you somehow managed to ignore the evidence he presented to you as well). Be aware that protocells form at 700 degrees centigrade at hydrothermal vents. Oceans can't get above 100 degrees C, so the oceans themselves serve a the first "kitchens" for life to arise via non-living chemistry quite nicely.

If you argue that without DNA there can be no transmission of hereditary traits to "offspring" protocells from "parent" protocells, then you would be wrong. This is because the cytoplasm and protocell membrane (all composed of proteins) is divided so that the "offspring" protocells get the same proteins that the "parent" protocells had (when these "divide"). This is a form of inheritance albeit not the one based on DNA/RNA that cells have today. The point is that replication/inheritance is quite possible, based on non-living chemistry.


In short, it's only a matter of time before we figure the process out...then where will your/Johnson's God-of-Gaps be then?
.

 

[napajohn]

Nice cut and paste, but do you even understand what you have posted? I think not. Phillip Johnson is posting his opinion which seems to be that because peptides can be self-replicating that there is no possibility for selection to occur. This was NOT the point of the experiments, however, so Johnson's opinion is nothing but a strawman===>The point is that the peptide IS self-replicating and there are peptides that are chemical relatives of RNA, the PNAs and TNAs, a point totally ignored by both you and Johnson (how convenient!). Also, the amount of oxygen in the early atmosphere was less than 0.1%. Which is it that I suspect that you think the oxygen content was 20% like it is now. This is just plain wrong.

For years, IDists/creationists have crowed that since DNA/RNA molecules today require proteins for replication that it was impossible for life as we know it today to have arisen spontaneously in a pre-biotic world (the "chicken", genetic inheritance, would have to come before the "egg", the proteins encoded by the genetic inheritance) . These experiments show that peptides can self-replication (no need for genes in cells to encode them FIRST). This can lead to self-replication/self-splicing with RNA molecules that don't require the use of proteins to replicate or for modification via intermediates (PNAs/TNAs?). An example of an RNA does not require proteins for self-modification is ribozyme discoverd by Cech (another bit of evidence by both you and Johnson). The RNA world may simply have arisen via intermediate molecules that bridged the "gap" between a self-replicating peptide/protein world and the type of life we have today (DNA/RNA "world")

From HERE


Comparison of RNA to peptide analogs that may have served as a bridge to the RNA/DNA genetic world today...

In addition, there are proteins today encoded by DNA,lucaspa has also pointed out:


This is where your/Johnson's "God-of-Gaps" ("but you can't explain last biochemical detail!") currently is hiding, in the gap between self-replicating peptides and RNA(not for long, be afraid be very afraid!)

Incidentally, I notice that you didn't go anywhere near the evidence provided by the production of protocells which can be produced with very simple chemistry and perform many of the same functions that today's cells do. Here it is again, since you ignored it the first time:

Life out of magma: a new theory for the origin of life, by Lucido, G.Nuovo Cimento Della Societa Italiana di Fisica D - Condensed matter, Atomic, Molecular and Chemical Physics, Fluids, Plasmas, Biophysics 20(12): 2575-2591; December, 1998


For the ability of abiogenic proteinoids to self-organize into protocells the reference by Sidney W. Fox:
The evolutionary significance of phase-separated microsystems. Orig Life. 1976 Jan;7(1):49-68. For more on the potential of Fox's proteinoid microspheres go to my previous post to Ikester'

Of course, this idea requires "vesicular aggregates". But you can form vesicles on rock surfaces, which then enter the "soup"

Origin of life. II. From prebiotic replicators to protocells, by Turian, G.Archives des Sciences 52(2): 101-109; August, 1999


But can you get interesting chemistry in the microvesicles?

Production of RNA by a Polymerase Protein Encapsulated within Phospholipid-Vesicles, by Chakrabarti, A.C., Breaker, R.R., Joyce, G.F., Deamer, D.W.Journal of Molecular Evolution 39(6): 555-559; 1994


HERE is a post by lucaspa on the subject of both protocells and TNA

To get a self-assembling "cell" (protocell) from non-living chemicals, go to the following sites, especially the second one:

http://www.siu.edu/~protocell
http://www.theharbinger.org/articles/rel_sci/fox.html

BTW, you can cook these up in your kitchen....Lucaspa has a recipe! ( I see from doing a seach that you somehow managed to ignore the evidence he presented to you as well). Be aware that protocells form at 700 degrees centigrade at hydrothermal vents. Oceans can't get above 100 degrees C, so the oceans themselves serve a the first "kitchens" for life to arise via non-living chemistry quite nicely.

If you argue that without DNA there can be no transmission of hereditary traits to "offspring" protocells from "parent" protocells, then you would be wrong. This is because the cytoplasm and protocell membrane (all composed of proteins) is divided so that the "offspring" protocells get the same proteins that the "parent" protocells had (when these "divide"). This is a form of inheritance albeit not the one based on DNA/RNA that cells have today. The point is that replication/inheritance is quite possible, based on non-living chemistry.


In short, it's only a matter of time before we figure the process out...then where will your/Johnson's God-of-Gaps be then?
.

whoa Gladiatrix..slow down..I wasn't planning on giving a detailed response so close to Christmas..
I will respond to this time permitting..but you make some incredible leaps here...
Regarding my claim that prelife was 1 % oxygen is not supported by studies found by Clemmey and Badham "Oxygen in the Precambrian Atmosphere: An Evaluation of the Geological Evidence." Geology, v.10, 1982, p.141.

supported by Zeschke, G., Transportation of Uraninite in the Indus River, Pakistan: Trans. Geol. Soc. South Africa, v.63, p.87.

and Grandstaff, D.E., A Kenetic Study of the Dissolution of Uraninite: Economic Geology, v.71, 1976, pp.1493-1506.
and
Dimroth, E., and Kimberley, M.M., Precambrian Atmospheric Oxygen: Evidence in the Sedimentary Distributions of Carbon, Sulfur, Uranium and Iron: Canadian Journal Earth Science, v.13,1976, pp.1161-l185.
these authors contradict the belief that we had an "anoxic" environment...
read it for yourself...

Its often found from these articles that the basis for the lack of oxygen in prebiotic conditions stem not from geological evidence but the desire to validate the conditions needed to simulate their darwinian suppositions.

 

[napajohn]

LOL Gladiatrix..did you even read your source?:

here are some quotes I got out of it and this is from YOUR link:

"TNA does not occur naturally today. Scientists have to create it in the lab in order to study it. Since we can't go back in time to witness the evolution of nucleic acids, we will never be able to prove whether natural TNA made an appearance on Earth. Indeed, says Eschenmoser, "talking about TNA as a a possible ancestor of RNA is actually premature."

"Since the direct evidence has disappeared, it will require an inventive chemist to construct a persuasive scenario," says Dr. Leslie Orgel of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies. "The important issue is whether or not it is possible to make TNA using potentially prebiotic chemistry. That remains to be seen."

"But where did RNA come from? To date, no one has been able to form RNA under in the laboratory under conditions that mimic those believed to have existed on primitive Earth. Some scientists also question whether nucleic acids with a backbone of ribose, or any other sugar molecule, would be stable enough to survive the harsh conditions of early Earth."

i focus on such words as "premature","inventive chemist to construct a persuasive argument","no one has been able to form RNA", "stable enough to survive"...
Geez Gladiatrix sounds like Science is denying evolution as a fact..(actually fantasy and imagination would be a better choice)..Remember your side is claiming fact..yet these people of which you are using as source are at best in a stage of extreme cautionary hope..hope that somehow something out there can prove that life may have evolved as speculated by evolution..if anything its showing me that maybe evolution is not really the Fact that
proponents claim and reputable scientists are leading the way to validate the holes of this so called theory.

 

[PreacherJoe]

I do not personally know any Christians who believe in the soup story. Of course anyone can call theirself a Christian but it takes faith to believe all of the bible is true.

 

[Bushido216]

It takes more faith to believe the Bible is true when clearly Genesis 1:1-8 cannot be taken literally.

 

[ObbiQuiet]

You have to clear that statement up .... christians beleive in evolution but they don't beleive in evolution in creating us as we are today..u know what i'm saying...they don't beleive in evolution as the big bang and then atoms and stuff.....

kools.....

Big jase

Yeah, and I believe in General Relativity but I don't believe in gravity.