how did life begin?

[chatlack]

There is no life , everything is a system like non-living. So we are the bigger parts of the systems. But anything different: We seem to work better...

[reverse]

 

From what you have just said,

you could also draw the conclusion that:

"everything is life",

just at differing levels of complexity.

 

[Ophiolite]

 

Prebiotic matter is not organic' date=' it's mostly methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and water, non of this is "alive" in any sense. So these foreign objects (comets, ect.) contributed chemicals ("prebiotic matter") rather than life. [/quote']1. Prebiotic matter is organic - carbon based - standard definitions.

 

2. "it's mostly methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and water," You imply that 80-90% or more is in this form. How do you explain the ~10% of carbon in the interstellar medium that is in the form aliphatic hydrocarbons; an equal or greater amount as aromatic hydrocarbons (including PAHs); the presence of sugars (e.g. Glycolaldehyde); the presence of amino acids (e.g. glycine); the list goes on, and increases virtually every month, in response to increased instrument sensitivity and increased interest.

 

Consider this quote from Identifying Organic Molecules in Space – The AstroBiology Explorer (ABE) MIDEX Mission Concept, ScottSandford et al, NASA Ames Research Centre. "It is know known that a significant portion of the cosmic inventory of the elements C,O,N, and H in space are incorporated into a variety of volatiles and organics that are of biogenic interest."

 

3. Restating my original statement (there is abundant pre-biotic material in comets and asteroids) hardly advances your argument. [but it is cute.]

 

 

 

Re IR signature, this is not the best link, but I don't have my bibliography to hand.

 

http://jesse.usra.edu/articles/breiterman/breiterman-13.html

[-Demosthenes-]

Prebiotic matter is organic - carbon based - standard definitions.

Not what I learned in Bio. The very definition of the "pre" in "prebiotic" implies that it come from before biotic matter and is not biotic matter, however I may be wrong.

[Ophiolite]

Organic, in this context (chemistry) does not mean produced by organisms, it means, as stated 'carbon based' as in 'organic chemistry, the chemistry of carbon'. I am confused as you appear to want to use organic sensuo stricto to refer to the specific products of life.

My central rebuttal point is: rather than the simple molecules you proposed (water, methane, ammonia etc) constituting the bulk of interstellar material, there is a richness and diversity of complex molecules which fit any definition I am familiar with of 'prebiotic', and are described repeatedly in the extensive literature on the subject as 'prebiotic'.

If these same 'prebiotic' assemblages allegedly gave rise to life on earth then it is a rather narrow view that fails to concede the possibility they could produce the same results off-earth..

In passing, you earlier remarked that " Sounds like (a) view from someone who is trying to reconcile two different beliefs, which is not good science."

My response to this is Pasteur, Lord Kelvin, Ahrrenius, Hoyle, Gold, Sagan (for a time), & Crick. Which two different beliefs were they trying to reconcile?

[metatron]

The Goldielocks zone is a bit too anthropocentric for me. It smacks of us being in a special place in the Universe. I don’t see why life could not develop outwith this zone' date=' for instance in liquid seas under the ice on a body like Jupiter’s moon Europa. Or is this within the Goldielocks zone?

The short answer is that Biological systems exhibit aspects of a wave function. Without this underling dynamic chemical and heat energy cannot be captured and sustained. Therefore cannot originate outside these Goldielocks zones.

 

As long as there is a source of energy, it does not have to be light, and a source of nourishment i.e. minerals, or organic chemical compounds I would think that it would be possible for life to begin and survive (think of the black smokers at mid ocean ridges here on Earth).

What Electromagnetism has to do with it I do not know. Metatron I have tried reading your post linked to above but can't find an explanation there.

nor why you think that "panspermia is in conflict with every phase in the origins of order in the cosmos."

some of your posts do look like pseudoscience.

I totally agree Mokele [/quote']

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pseudoscience originates from a consensuses among the uninformed.

These groups attempt to promote their view points by either political means or they find their own life in sensationalistic journalism, rather than scientific philosophical approach.

 

 

If my evolutionary model “look’s like” Pseudoscience go to my post and I will be glad to answer these questions on the wave function and how they relate to biological system. I do not want to hijack this thread.

 

http://www.scienceforums.net/forums/showthread.php?t=9881

 

The short answer is that Biological systems exhibit aspects of a wave function. Without this underling dynamic chemical and heat energy cannot be captured and sustained. Therefore cannot originate outside these Goldielocks zones.

 

As for as how panspermia is in conflict with phase in the origins go to this post, as I do not want to waste bandwidth by being redundant.

 

http://www.scienceforums.net/forums/showthread.php?t=11027

[Bettina]

Post #23 I did, and in #39 I talked about it a little. If you are talking about something else, then more explanation is needed.

 

I'm not trying to argue with you...ok..... maybe a little.... I'm just trying to tell you not to be so convinced that earth life only originated on earth and could never have come from "out there".

 

I have read a lot of articles and the possiblilty is there. I have always believed we were seeded and its nice to read articles from other scientists that believe this too.

 

Bettina

[Sadako]

I think it's important to remember that terms like "organic" and "inorganic" are purely human abstractions. Life didn't necessarily have to have a beginning, as it depends on your definition of life. Maybe the particular properties that we assume to constitute life are a result of all the factors that affected Earth during the primordial soup days, internal and external.

[jcarlson]

 

 

Planets form from accreted star dust after the formation of the central second generation stars.

 

The planets closest to the center accrete heaver elements' date=' while the outer planets form from the lighter elements being blown outward by solar winds.

 

Keep in mind we only have our own solar system as an example.

 

Life will form in what has been dubbed the “Goldie locks zone" close enough to the sun to form liquid water instead of ice, and far enough to keep the water under the boiling point.

 

This zone will insure the formation of oceans, the cradle for the first single cell life to form.

 

Complex organic molecules do form in space and fall to earth.

 

The primordial ocean chemistry is now set for the formation for the first simple cells.

 

 

At this point science is at loss at explaining what brought these complex self-contained self-replicating system together.

 

However I will venture a possibility; Their seems to have been an almost complete over-sight of two other factors for the beginning of life. One that could energize and kick start this metabolic process and the other that would stabilize it into a self-replicating structure.

 

[Electromagnetism and Light waves']

 

 

I don't see a problem with this, except for this part:

 

Complex organic molecules do form in space and fall to earth.

 

Last I checked, the extreme temperatures caused by friction from reentering the atmosphere would pose a pretty big barrier to any organic compounds coming from space...

 

I'm pretty sure there have been experiments that have shown that lightning strikes, combined with the methane rich atmosphere that precluded our nitrogen rich atmosphere in the early days of earth, and other naturally occuring elements can cause chemical reactions that form organic compounds though.

[Halucigenia]

OK we seem to have a few problems with terminology here.

1. Sadako - as Ophiolite says "Prebiotic matter is organic - carbon based - standard definitions"

2.

as it depends on your definition of life

Like I said earlier once you have "found" the first living organism ask the question "who was the first self replicating molecule" It's a bit like looking for that elusive missing link, as soon as you have found one someone will say "but where's the missing link between what you have found and this one"

I kind of agree with

There is no life , everything is a system like non-living. So we are the bigger parts of the systems. But anything different: We seem to work better...

in that until you define what life is then you might as well say that everything is a system, some just more complex than others. The first prebiotic matter is at one degree of complexity, the first self replicating molecule is another degree of complexity, the first self replicating molecule that had the properties which we define as live was another degree of complexity.

Please don't get me wrong and fall into another line of discussion - I am not proposing any kind of Orthogenesis (linear evolution, aka Great Chain of Being) here, just that there are degrees of complexity and what Sadako seems to be discussing in his post are problems with terminology.

I hope I am helping with what both sadako and chatlack are trying to say and that no one posts the comment "now who is talking pseudoscience"

[metatron]

I think it's important to remember that terms like "organic" and "inorganic" are purely human abstractions. Life didn't necessarily have to have a beginning, as it depends on your definition of life. Maybe the particular properties that we assume to constitute life are a result of all the factors that affected Earth during the primordial soup days, internal and external.

 

Welcome Sadako; I can tell you have studied systems theory, great! we need more of this veiw point around here.

 

I'm going to go ahead and post this since this fits so well with what you are saying.

 

 

The universe designs networks of finer and finer connections. Biological \cognitive systems are the finest of these networks, embedded inside a whole hierarchy, like layers of an onion. The First layer we theorize was the big bang. This initial pulses of sends out waves of energy and atoms that curl into points of swirling matter. At the center of this points vortices form. From these black holes implode sending out a second pulse a gravity waves.

These waves curl into points forming stars bound into the matrix of the galaxy. This structure contains a balance of forces enabling all points to interact though gravity. Some stars explode then create complex elements in a third pulse of energy. This assemblage of elements curl into a yet more complex internal matrix of solar systems.

 

Now the stage is set for pre-existing possibilities to form networks of life. Life and Intelligents will manifest though the natural flow patterns inherent between waves and elements. The elements will firstly juxtapose themselves one to another forming simple chemical matrixes, organic molecules.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

In other words complex systems have their origins by drawing information from the prior system they are inbedded in.

 

System emerge from within systems.

 

Once these systems become self-replicating it can continue drawing additional information from these outer matrices.

This is the purpose of why living systems behave in this way, this instability enables the system to collect information in mathematical process {Algorithm iteration} therefore the system builds more and more internal complexity , patterned after its surrounding matrices, or Environment.

 

By the way, this {Algorithm iteration} can be found eminating in one of these outer matrices prior to the formation of life.

 

Light waves

[metatron]

 

 

I don't see a problem with this' date=' except for this part:

 

Quote:

Complex organic molecules do form in space and fall to earth.

 

 

Last I checked, the extreme temperatures caused by friction from reentering the atmosphere would pose a pretty big barrier to any organic compounds coming from space...

 

I'm pretty sure there have been experiments that have shown that lightning strikes, combined with the methane rich atmosphere that precluded our nitrogen rich atmosphere in the early days of earth, and other naturally occuring elements can cause chemical reactions that form organic compounds though.[/quote']

 

You could be right, This phase of complexity I'm having to brush up on, I know a bit about how elements and minerals form, but organic chemistry and the environmental conditions needed to form them, seems to have both terrestrial and non-terrestrial origins.

[reverse]

I'm just trying to tell you not to be so convinced that earth life only originated on earth and could never have come from "out there".

 

Bettina

 

Hmmm, interesting idea.

 

Ok, lets paly it out like a film plot.

 

when shall we say it arrived, and how?

 

what form shall we choose and where will it have come from.

 

(I nominate bugs, they have always looked alien to me).

[Bettina]

Hmmm' date=' interesting idea.

 

Ok, lets paly it out like a film plot.

 

when shall we say it arrived, and how?

 

what form shall we choose and where will it have come from.

 

(I nominate bugs, they have always looked alien to me).[/quote']

 

It wasn't bugs

It could have been amino acids, simple building blocks or even cells. I don't know. But I will guess that in the next ten years, we will find the building blocks of life in space if not on a comet itself.

 

What rained down on our planet, found a place hospitable for it to multiply in the oceans. It also came down on the moon, mars, jupiter, etc, but there, the environment was too hostile for life to flourish.

 

Don't rule this out....you will be eating your words in a few years I think....

I wonder what comet I came in on......

 

Bettina

[reverse]

we will find the building blocks of life in space if not on a comet itself.

Bettina

 

 

Maybe there were two comets?

One for softies and one for hardies.

Bugs are kind of strange like that.

I could never trust any life form with it's skeleton on the outside.

 

so you aren’t thinking life originated on another planet....but rather that it's somehow happening in the expanses of space...?

[Bettina]

Maybe there were two comets?

One for softies and one for hardies.

Bugs are kind of strange like that.

I could never trust any life form with it's skeleton on the outside.

 

so you aren’t thinking life originated on another planet....but rather that it's somehow happening in the expanses of space...?

 

I know this is amusing to you, and that I'm just a 17 year old girl with a huge imagination, but when I look up at those stars at night, I can feel it. I know we are not alone, and I know that the building blocks of life were created along with the formation of matter. This is why "life" was trapped in the comets during the early stages of the formation of our universe.

 

Religion has no part here. The building blocks are everywhere in the universe, raining down on our planet, finding it hospitable, and flourished. Someday, scientists will find evidence on dead planets and moons of how life tried to start but failed.... on every planet and moon in our solar system that couldn't support it. The ingredients are everwhere. Give it some time. They will find it.

 

This is why I support unmanned (not manned) space exploration. Its cheap, and will find the evidence I mentioned.

 

Bettina

[-Demosthenes-]

This is why I support unmanned (not manned) space exploration. Its cheap

Last time I checked launching things into space was not cheap.

 

and I know that the building blocks of life were created along with the formation of matter.

Will you please tell me what these "building blocks of life" are. I really don't know what you mean, like little microbes, amino acids, prebiotic matter, or what?

[Bettina]

Last time I checked launching things into space was not[/i'] cheap.

Compared to manned flights, they are cheap.

 

Will you please tell me what these "building blocks of life" are. I really don't know what you mean, like little microbes, amino acids, prebiotic matter, or what?

 

Something tells me your making fun of me... I think you already know.

 

Bettina

[reverse]

I know this is amusing to you' date=' and that I'm just a 17 year old girl with a huge imagination, .

Bettina[/quote']

 

Don't be like that.

 

If you have a theory then I want to hear it.

If it's unusual, then so what.

 

I'm not so desperate to cling on to today’s scientific understandings that I will close the doors to new possibilities.

[Bettina]

Don't be like that.

 

If you have a theory then I want to hear it.

If it's unusual' date=' then so what.

 

I'm not so desperate to cling on to today’s scientific understandings that I will close the doors to new possibilities. [/quote']

 

I'm not like that....I thought you were pulling my leg a little. Ok friend....Kool then.

 

Look at these and let me know what you think. I've always believed that life started at the same time as the creation of matter and seeded the planets. I just couldn't get it in my head that life could have started on a sterile planet without some outside intervention.

 

http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0101/30spacelife/

 

http://www-curator.jsc.nasa.gov/outreach1/expmetmys/Lesson12.pdf

 

http://www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/Sciences/LifeScience/PhysicalAnthropology/HumanGeneticEvolution/NasaScientists/NasaScientists.htm

 

Bettina

[reverse]

ah.

 

I think I can help with that one.

 

I have never been able to figure out how people can crochet such magnificent patterns in lace using just a few sterile knots...but there you go.

[reverse]

and you might like this...

 

http://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/snowcrystals/

 

[Bettina]

and you might like this...

 

http://www.its.caltech.edu/~atomic/snowcrystals/

 

 

Cute.....but nothing to do with life.....

 

I am going to try some of the snowflake experiments though.....

 

Bettina

[reverse]

LOL

I knew you would say exactly that.

just trying to close that gap between "sterile" and "life".

 

Now I just need to reduce your concept of "life" down to it's most sparse.

[reverse]

and here...

 

PS, that last one is one of those exoskeletal life forms that I will never trust!

 

 

http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/indexmag.html?http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/mag/wimsmall/sundr.html