abiogenesis via natural selection

[rigney]

It never ceases to surprise me what can be accomplished when a mind is the cause.

 

Don't pick on this guy too hard. It's possible that he actually has potential.

[J.C.MacSwell]

Over and over we hear that evolution is not part of abiogenesis, that evolution via natural selection did not start until life had already formed. This leads to ideas that life is a very low probability occurrence, a figure 10^-41,000 of how unlikely the formation of life was is often bandied about as though it were the truth. I say that life is a natural occurrence driven by natural selection of the organic chemicals that come about naturally in the conditions of the early Earth.

 

 

Only got that far, but that's an interesting way of looking at it. It probably falls outside the definition of "natural selection" (just a guess, as I'm not an expert) but in many ways it's the same thing.

[rigney]

While I can't argue the pros and cons of Abiogenesis for lack of expertise; I do believe life began on earth as an accident of some proportion. Now don't get teary eyed, but try relating it to a garden that hasn't received a drop of moisture for some weeks. Things start drying up and on the verge of dying. Then, along comes a respite! Holy smokes, plants start shooting up, blooming, producing and looking like a garden again. What the hell happened? A miracle!? No! the crops got rain! I know this is after the fact and only looking at life as it is today. But what if something extraordinary happened a few billion years back, achieving the same results but in a most dramatic setting? And that, a barren, desolate, worthless and lifeless landscape was transformed into a progression of mutations evolving into life form. Who knows how it happened or what those first critters even looked like? But conjecture says, name your poison. However, you're not going back three or four billion years to construct a genome of life as it was then. This was also a garden, but from the seed of its begining, it just took a lot longer time to grow into what we think of as maturity.

Edited August 16, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

I'm not sure what you mean rigney, my assertion is that nothing extraordinary happened, that life is a natural process that happens pretty much automatically with the correct conditions over long periods of time. No sudden extraordinary blooms of anything...

[rigney]

I'm not sure what you mean rigney, my assertion is that nothing extraordinary happened, that life is a natural process that happens pretty much automatically with the correct conditions over long periods of time. No sudden extraordinary blooms of anything...

 

We're not talking about a supreme celestial handout. No, what I'm saying is that for something to spring from nothing there must be a damn good reason? You can rub two sticks together 'til your ass falls off, but it doesn't necessarily mean you'll get a fire. With a stick or two and a bit of tender you might get one started, but to keep it burning, fuel must be added. But, however life began on earth, it was a "single case scenario". Not one or two organisms or a bunch of different ones created accidently, but something that may have enveloped the total continent of Pangeaea for some duration. Perhaps the entire ocean floor for that matter? Fumaroles and vents are good speculative possibilities but I believe the start of life was on a much grander scale. What developed at that initial event was so instantaneously and sufficiently involved that whether it was, RNA, DNA, protozoan, lichen, microbrial, or what ever, there was enough of it to maintain its foothold. We humans, fish, dogs, cats and bats, just happened to evolve from the progressive fallout, and as such, become species.

Edited August 16, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

We're not talking about a supreme celestial handout. No, what I'm saying is that for something to spring from nothing there must be a damn good reason? You can rub two sticks together 'til your ass falls off, but it doesn't necessarily mean you'll get a fire. With a stick or two and a bit of tender you might get one started, but to keep it burning, fuel must be added. But, however life began on earth, it was a "single case scenario". Not one or two organisms or a bunch of different ones created accidently, but something that may have enveloped the total continent of Pangeaea for some duration. Perhaps the entire ocean floor for that matter? Fumaroles and vents are good speculative possibilities but I believe the start of life was on a much grander scale. What developed at that initial event was so instantaneously and sufficiently involved that whether it was, RNA, DNA, protozoan, lichen, microbrial, or what ever, there was enough of it to maintain its foothold. We humans, fish, dogs, cats and bats, just happened to evolve from the progressive fallout, and as such, become species.

 

 

What are you saying rigney? i have seen friction result in fire, it's a process and produces lots of by products like heat, smoke, and debris before you get fire, life did not suddenly spring into existence, it was a process, i think it took lots of time and produced lots of heat, smoke, and debris before there was fire.... and it predated RNA, DNA, or bacteria. Protists, lichens and the rest are johnny come latelys to say the least....

[rigney]

What are you saying rigney? i have seen friction result in fire, it's a process and produces lots of by products like heat, smoke, and debris before you get fire, life did not suddenly spring into existence, it was a process, i think it took lots of time and produced lots of heat, smoke, and debris before there was fire.... and it predated RNA, DNA, or bacteria. Protists, lichens and the rest are johnny come latelys to say the least....

 

Hells Fire man! I'm not arguing the semantics of how life hapened or why? But adding such a comment only meant that I'm not smart enough to deliberate the issue as to what your research has found. I'm only trying to point out that I differ with your thoughts on the origin of life. Can I make it any simpler than that?

[rigney]

What are you saying rigney? i have seen friction result in fire, it's a process and produces lots of by products like heat, smoke, and debris before you get fire, life did not suddenly spring into existence, it was a process, i think it took lots of time and produced lots of heat, smoke, and debris before there was fire.... and it predated RNA, DNA, or bacteria. Protists, lichens and the rest are johnny come latelys to say the least....

 

I Know that wasn't exactly what you were looking for or wanted to hear. And I really dont know one of those critters from another. To me the key is, when a way is found to create the process of phothsynthesis as the bioinductance of crystals and chemicals, it could well be the answer as to how life got its start.

Got this off Google and thought it strange that sunlight is the only way to create natural sugars and that, only through the process of phothsynthesis. Yet, all living things somehow depend on these sugars in on form or another. While it's not a natural crystal found in the earth, sugar is processed into the crystal form we use daily.

’Sugar’ or sucrose, is a carbohydrate found naturally in fruits and vegetables and produced through a process whereby sunlight is magically changed into another energy, sugar. Sucrose in nature is most abundant in sugar cane and sugar beets. While the term ‘sugar’ refers to sucrose, the term ‘sugars’ is descriptive of sucrose, as well as other sugars such as glucose, fructose and lactose. All plants use photosynthesis as the process by which sunlight is turned into vital energy. Sucrose and other types of sugars all become glucose, which is the body’s preferred fuel. And all sugars are sweet. Why?

 

Ever heard of Bioinductance? The nonlinear neuroelectrothermodynamics of a cell? Nonlinear Cell Neuroelectrothermodynamics is the neurofrequency Model of a Rational Mind. Epiphysis Microcrystals as Current Sources. Tends to make me wonder where the hell I'm at in this process?

Edited August 17, 2010 by rigney

[Mr Skeptic]

Sugars can also be produced by abiotic natural processes. For example, the Urey-Miller experiment made sugars, and sugars are found on some meteorites.

[rigney]

Sugars can also be produced by abiotic natural processes. For example, the Urey-Miller experiment made sugars, and sugars are found on some meteorites.

 

Most of you guys are far out of my league. It's just that somehow I think photosynthesis had everything to do with how life began here on earth. Critters on the ocean floor don't seem to need it, but I believe that was a part of their evolution. The abiotic theory come as close as I can imagine to answering this riddle. But as I was explaining my thoughts to Moon, I don't believe the beginning of life was a hit or miss thing, but a consortium of situations coming together at the right time and place. There may have been numerous other times that life forms tried making it here, millennia, or perhaps even billions of years before it finally got a toe hold.

I think the post holds a lot of promise for those developing new theory. And since you are one of the well versed people in these fields, "keep me out of you sights, if you can". If not, use a bb gun. I'm curious, not dangerous.

Edited August 17, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

Rigney, while I think that photosynthesis probably occurred in the prebiotic Earth chemo-synthesis, what the critters at the bottom of the ocean use to make food, almost certainly occurred first... chemo-synthesis produced the first organic chemicals that not only fed but formed the first life forms.....

[Mr Skeptic]

That's an interesting question. What powered early life or pre-life? Photosyntesis might work, but without the ozone layer the possibilities would be limited, I think to a few meters underwater where it is neither too dark nor too much UV. In any case, without repair mechanisms UV would be even more deadly. On top of this photosynthesis might be overly complicated. I think this leaves photosynthesis as an unlikely option, although some of the chemical components could have been created via sunlight.

 

Chemosynthesis could be very simple if there were a constant source of chemical food -- little more complex than a battery. Geothermal vents could provide a constant supply of chemicals for this. It would also seem very consistent with other attributes of life, such as the membrane potential.

 

A third possibility would be heat based. When doing PCR we use heating/cooling cycles instead of the various proteins used to separate DNA strands. It could be provided extremely simply by convection currents from geothermal vents, but it would be a rather meager energy source.

[rigney]

That's an interesting question. What powered early life or pre-life? Photosyntesis might work, but without the ozone layer the possibilities would be limited, I think to a few meters underwater where it is neither too dark nor too much UV. In any case, without repair mechanisms UV would be even more deadly. On top of this photosynthesis might be overly complicated. I think this leaves photosynthesis as an unlikely option, although some of the chemical components could have been created via sunlight.

 

Chemosynthesis could be very simple if there were a constant source of chemical food -- little more complex than a battery. Geothermal vents could provide a constant supply of chemicals for this. It would also seem very consistent with other attributes of life, such as the membrane potential.

 

A third possibility would be heat based. When doing PCR we use heating/cooling cycles instead of the various proteins used to separate DNA strands. It could be provided extremely simply by convection currents from geothermal vents, but it would be a rather meager energy source.

 

My assumption may be off the wall, but is it possible that until the ozone layer was at least partially completed, there was no land water to speak of anywhere on earth? Evaporation of steam from the interior of this planet was the process by which that layer of our atmosphere was created, thereby reducing UV rays down to a managable condition where life might get a foot hold. It may have taken a couple billion years to get the job done, I have no idea? But afterwards, the build up of water over the entire earth was likely to have been pure H2O, and took many years before streams, rivers and especially ocean(s), started forming? I can't find it conceivable that oceans just magically appeared and somehow that was where life got its start. That isn't being factious, but trying to add the building blocks in my mind as I see them.

As I said earlier, there may have been several attempts for life before that first real toe hold happened, but the conditions had to be absolutely perfect, whether on land or in the water?

Edited August 18, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

My assumption may be off the wall, but is it possible that until the ozone layer was at least partially completed, there was no land water to speak of anywhere on earth? Evaporation of steam from the interior of this planet was the process by which that layer of our atmosphere was created, thereby reducing UV rays down to a managable condition where life might get a foot hold. It may have taken a couple billion years to get the job done, I have no idea? But afterwards, the build up of water over the entire earth was likely to have been pure H2O, and took many years before streams, rivers and especially ocean(s), started forming? I can't find it conceivable that oceans just magically appeared and somehow life started there. That isn't being factious, but trying to add the building blocks in my mind as I see them.

As I said earlier, there may have been several attempts for life to happen, but the conditions had to be absolutely right, whether on land or in the water?

 

 

That's a reasonable question for sure, most sources seem to think the formation of the oceans only took a few million years at most to form and land was indeed rare at first. If the collision that formed the moon is a realistic view of how the moon formed then the ocean probably reformed very fast after the impact and that collision could be what keep the Earth from being a water planet with oceans miles deep and no land at all. (much of the water would escaped into space during the impact event and subsequent reformation of the earth, for a few hundred to a thousand years the earth may have had a gaseous rock atmosphere)

 

This ocean was probably very close to being as salty as it is now, (salt is recycled by plate tectonics) and a very steamy atmosphere could provide some protection from UV via UV breaking water into hydrogen and oxygen high in the atmosphere but how much real protection it offered is debatable.

[rigney]

That's a reasonable question for sure, most sources seem to think the formation of the oceans only took a few million years at most to form and land was indeed rare at first. If the collision that formed the moon is a realistic view of how the moon formed then the ocean probably reformed very fast after the impact and that collision could be what keep the Earth from being a water planet with oceans miles deep and no land at all. (much of the water would escaped into space during the impact event and subsequent reformation of the earth, for a few hundred to a thousand years the earth may have had a gaseous rock atmosphere)

 

This ocean was probably very close to being as salty as it is now, (salt is recycled by plate tectonics) and a very steamy atmosphere could provide some protection from UV via UV breaking water into hydrogen and oxygen high in the atmosphere but how much real protection it offered is debatable.

 

I really didn't mean to pose my thoughts so much as a question, but more of less a hypothesis. Ahem!! Imagine me using such a word? This thing about our moon, it's gone through the ringer so many times I wonder why it's even still up there, so; I'll leave it as such. The whys, whens and hows it got to be, are just as arcane today as when the question was first broached. Tectonics on the other hand have probably been happening since the earth was little more than a compacted pile of debris and gases. And that, whether there was water at the time, or not. Somehow we were lucky enough to hit a happy medium where there was some land and a lot of water. Personally, I just don't feel the ozone layer has been given enough credit as to somehow balancing this water to ground ratio? That is, until just here recently. You could be absolutely right in your arguement that life began in a peat bog, mud flat, or some ocean depth. I just like the simplicity of photosynthesis better. Hey!, sue me.

Edited August 18, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

I really didn't mean to pose my thoughts so much as a question, but more of less a hypothesis. Ahem!! Imagine me using such a word? This thing about our moon, it's gone through the ringer so many times I wonder why it's even still up there, so; I'll leave it as such. The whys, whens and hows it got to be, are just as arcane today as when the question was first broached.

 

I have to disagree with that, we have some pretty good theories about the formation of the moon, far better than the ideas when the question was first asked... The impact theory is the still the leading one but a new capture possibility might have some promise.

 

Tectonics on the other hand have probably been happening since the earth was little more than a compacted pile of debris and gases.

 

No there is real reason to think that plate tectonics requires a nearly Earth sized or larger planet, Venus doesn't seem to have plate tectonics and neither does Mars. oceans probably help the Earth's plate tectonics but the mass of the planet does have a huge effect.

 

And that, whether there was water at the time, or not. Somehow we were lucky enough to hit a happy medium where there was some land and a lot of water.

 

The impact theory of the moons formation gives us a pretty good handle on the land sea area problem, not to mention the extra density of the Earth the less dense Moon.

 

Personally, I just don't feel the ozone layer has been given enough credit as to somehow balancing this water to ground ratio? That is, until just here recently. You could be absolutely right in your arguement that life began in the depths of some ocean.

 

Could you expand on that, it sounds interesting... Why would ozone have an effect on the water content of the Earth?

[rigney]

I have to disagree with that, we have some pretty good theories about the formation of the moon, far better than the ideas when the question was first asked... The impact theory is the still the leading one but a new capture possibility might have some promise.

 

Quote: by rigney .. Isn't that what conjecture is all about? The ability to disagree for philosophical reasons?

 

No there is real reason to think that plate tectonics requires a nearly Earth sized or larger planet, Venus doesn't seem to have plate tectonics and neither does Mars. oceans probably help the Earth's plate tectonics but the mass of the planet does have a huge effect.

 

Quote: By rigney..We have eight?, maybe nine planets in this solar system, and they are as different as a "jar full of buttons". Can it be stated, that moons of other planets are chunks of the mothership itself? Naa! Forget the moon theory for now.

 

The impact theory of the moons formation gives us a pretty good handle on the land sea area problem, not to mention the extra density of the Earth the less dense Moon.

 

Quote: By rigney.. Naa! again. The impact theory gives us nothing more than just another theory to postulate. If the earth "reformed itself" as is said, after such a diasterous collision with an unknown object, wouldn't it have assumed the same shape over time as before, a nice round ball? 'course the moon with little gravity and no atmosphere, who knows?

 

 

Could you expand on that, it sounds interesting... Why would ozone have an effect on the water content of the Earth?

 

Quote: by rigney.. That's a minz a minz. But where do you think the ozone layer came from?

Edited August 18, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

Isn't that what conjecture is? The ability of disagreeing because of philosophical reasoning?

 

Don't get your panties in a knot rigney, all I wanted was to see your thought processes, I have shown you mine now show me yours.

[rigney]

Don't get your panties in a knot rigney, all I wanted was to see your thought processes, I have shown you mine now show me yours.

 

Quote: by rigney.. That's a minz a minz. Knickers, shorts, pantie, who gives a shit? But where do you think the ozone layer came from? And heck!, I wasn't meaning to obtrude, but merely to state what I thought were fallacies in your observation? Notice that I said possible, not probable? Many people smarter than I have worked for years assessing what the ozone layer is all about. What it means, does, and what its role is in our survival. I'm only a gambler to say this, but without the ozone, we and our planet are dead. Now give me a break and quit beating me around the head and ears, and I'll give you my reasoning for the earth to water ratio.

Edited August 18, 2010 by rigney

[Moontanman]

The modern ozone layer as we know it is thought to have come from oxygen generated by cyanobacteria. Some photosynthetic bacteria do not release oxygen and they are thought to predate the ones that do. I personally think that some was probably generated by disassociation of water by UV light in the upper atmosphere. So how does this apply to the earth having oceans?

[rigney]

The modern ozone layer as we know it is thought to have come from oxygen generated by cyanobacteria. Some photosynthetic bacteria do not release oxygen and they are thought to predate the ones that do. I personally think that some was probably generated by disassociation of water by UV light in the upper atmosphere. So how does this apply to the earth having oceans?

 

Now, don't get me into an ass kicking contest where I don't stand a chance. I was merely making an assumption as to what I thoght happened, not what actually did happen? If you want to go beyond simplicity, get a better audience!. Told you, my intellect wouldn't fill a thimble, but like everone, I do have thoughts???

[Ophiolite]

Fantastic! And just why are you fooling around on this forum with so much talent at your disposal? Even if a few of us were given your fortuitous brain trust, perhaps the world would be a better place in which to live. Get to using it!!

DNA synthesis through the application of well established and commonly used techniques hardly requires excessive amounts of talent or intellect. (Which is not to say <r Skeptic does not possess these attributes in spades.) What makes you think it does? Indeed why are you using your ignorance as the basis of an insult?

[rigney]

DNA synthesis through the application of well established and commonly used techniques hardly requires excessive amounts of talent or intellect. (Which is not to say <r Skeptic does not possess these attributes in spades.) What makes you think it does? Indeed why are you using your ignorance as the basis of an insult?

 

Look Opie! I don't believe Mr. Skeptic needs your shoulder or sympathy. And using ignorance to make a point?, don't let it drag you down. My remark had nothing to do with you, and however crude, was actually meant as a compliment to Skeptics. So, get the skid marks out of your knickers and back to abiogenesis?

 

Sugars can also be produced by abiotic natural processes. For example, the Urey-Miller experiment made sugars, and sugars are found on some meteorites.

 

If it matters, I would like to apologize for what Opie thought was my slanderious attack on you, even though it was not intended as such. Some of us are just less diplomatic than others when making compliments. The subject is fascinating, and your expertise in the field is not something to be taken lightly, especially by me.

 

compliments.

Edited August 19, 2010 by rigney

[Mr Skeptic]

He's right though... copying DNA (look up PCR) is a fairly simple process, at least if someone hands you the ingredients as in my case. Easier than making a pie in my opinion. Of course, if I had to get the ingredients myself that would be a different story, but the same would be true for the pie.

[Ophiolite]

My remark had nothing to do with you,

This is a public forum. Members are entitled to comment on any remark by any other member.

 

My remark .........was actually meant as a compliment to Skeptics.

The you need to work on your communication skills. Just for your information, though it has nothing to do with me, more than 50% of your posts come across as insulting and condescending. If that is not what you are aiming for I'm afraid you missed.

 

So, get the skid marks out of your knickers and back to abiogenesis?

See what I mean?

 

On the abiogenesis topic, since you wish to return to it, you have several questionable ideas, some of which have been adequately challenged by Moontanman and others. Here are some that concerned me.

 

Many theorize life came from, comets, solar winds, other planets and whatever. The fallacy of such a concept is that life would have had to began elsewhere in the universe, just not here on earth. But how?

There is no fallacy here. What makes you think there is? Of course if life came from elsewhere it would have to originate elsewhere. That is a trivial statement. It is not a fallacious statement.

 

Chemists have for several years tried to concoct different brews in an effort to bring about some simple form of life, but so far, no soap.

I'm fascinated by the topic of abiogenesis and have done a lot of reading in this area. Could you tell me which chemists have undertaken these tests. I am not aware of any serious attempts in this area. There are a huge number of experiments designed to investigate prebiotic chemistry, but no serious attempts that I know of designed to create life.

 

This is interesting: in your first statement below, directed I think at Moontanman, you criticise for vagueness, yet your remarks seem an excellent commentary upon your own second statement. To use your own well established liking for the corny vernacular, isn't that a bit like the pot calling the kettle black.

 

C'mon, there is something more to life forms than "I think" or "I believe". I've gotten hammered everytime I use it. I can respond out of ignorance to your assumptions as I did, but you should do a bit of explaining to passify my stupidity. Life might have began as something we may never understand, but to say that two rocks crawled out from under a third rock and because they were primarially carbon, made whoopee! and we got a fourth rock, that's B.S.

But what if something extraordinary happened a few billion years back, achieving the same results but in a most dramatic setting? And that, a barren, desolate, worthless and lifeless landscape was transformed into a progression of mutations evolving into life form.

 

However, you're not going back three or four billion years to construct a genome of life as it was then.

Yet metaphorically this is precisely what we may be able to do through genome studies and cladistics. The one obstacle may be the practice of horizontal gene transfer in prokaryotes.

 

What developed at that initial event was so instantaneously and sufficiently involved that whether it was, RNA, DNA, protozoan, lichen, microbrial, or what ever, there was enough of it to maintain its foothold.

Protozoans and lichens are incredibly advanced and sophisticated organisms. They were most certainly not the product of that initial event.

 

To me the key is, when a way is found to create the process of phothsynthesis as the bioinductance of crystals and chemicals, it could well be the answer as to how life got its start.

This has already been commented on, but there is no doubt, other than that which should be associated with all scientific pronouncements, that photosysnthesis was a relative latecomer.

 

Rigney, you readily admit, almost with an inverted snobbery, that your are ignorant of almost every aspect of this topic, yet you gaily assert that you believe this and you believe that, without an ounce of supporting evidence. I am curious. What do you think is the advantage in that?