Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
0 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,817 Year: 3,074/9,624 Month: 919/1,588 Week: 102/223 Day: 13/17 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   questions evolutionists can't or won't answer
crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1467 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 136 of 141 (53993)
09-05-2003 6:48 AM
Reply to: Message 135 by Andor
09-05-2003 6:22 AM


Is cryptolife life?
When it's a spore? I guess not. Not to me, anyway. It will be when it un-spores, though.
Suspended animation is clearly a great strategy for surviving drought, etc. But it's hardly something we'd expect to find a whole planet's ecology based on. I hardly think we're over-narrowing our search if we restrict it to life that's actually doing something.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 135 by Andor, posted 09-05-2003 6:22 AM Andor has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 137 by Andor, posted 09-05-2003 7:29 AM crashfrog has not replied

  
Andor
Inactive Member


Message 137 of 141 (53998)
09-05-2003 7:29 AM
Reply to: Message 136 by crashfrog
09-05-2003 6:48 AM


quote:
But it's hardly something we'd expect to find a whole planet's ecology based on
But what about Mars, or Europa, or the primeval Earth?.
With bacterial spores, is at least very curious that ability to be alive and "not-alive" according to environmental changes.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 136 by crashfrog, posted 09-05-2003 6:48 AM crashfrog has not replied

  
sidelined
Member (Idle past 5908 days)
Posts: 3435
From: Edmonton Alberta Canada
Joined: 08-30-2003


Message 138 of 141 (54000)
09-05-2003 8:08 AM
Reply to: Message 135 by Andor
09-05-2003 6:22 AM


I guess this is a point where if we can show a transition of chemicals that is agreed by both sides to be inanimate when in contact with another chemical would be ,at the least , arguably life then we could perhaps refine the studies until we found something that would be undeniably LIFE.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 135 by Andor, posted 09-05-2003 6:22 AM Andor has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 139 by Mammuthus, posted 09-05-2003 8:26 AM sidelined has not replied

  
Mammuthus
Member (Idle past 6475 days)
Posts: 3085
From: Munich, Germany
Joined: 08-09-2002


Message 139 of 141 (54001)
09-05-2003 8:26 AM
Reply to: Message 138 by sidelined
09-05-2003 8:08 AM


I think it would still be very difficult. Say you find short (30 base long) chains of RNA (for the sake of argument), in a pool on mars that are able to replicate themselves...would this be recognized as life? As pre-life? Potential life? Viruses are not defined as alive mostly because they require a host to replicate. I find that a bit of an artificial distinction like saying humans are not alive because we need to eat and do not generate ATP without input from nutrition...the fact is, after a system has evolved for billions of years, I think it would be very difficult to reconstruct anything even resembling the initial replicator molecules that began life. One could perhaps one day find conditions where such replicators arise from a mixture of elements and conditions that could not self replicate i.e. potential abiogenesis....however, this would not necessarily tell us how abiogenesis occurred prior to our most remote common ancestor...it would only demonstrate the feasability of abiogenesis (no small achievement regardless)....of course then creationists would say...evolution is false because that self replicator did not become a dog in a week

This message is a reply to:
 Message 138 by sidelined, posted 09-05-2003 8:08 AM sidelined has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 140 by Andor, posted 09-05-2003 10:34 AM Mammuthus has replied

  
Andor
Inactive Member


Message 140 of 141 (54012)
09-05-2003 10:34 AM
Reply to: Message 139 by Mammuthus
09-05-2003 8:26 AM


I agree, but
quote:
...it would only demonstrate the feasability of abiogenesis (no small achievement regardless)....
Is not this the real question?
The investigation has already make clear that there are not impossible steps, life "could" have started spontaneously, no need for other "factors" intervening.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 139 by Mammuthus, posted 09-05-2003 8:26 AM Mammuthus has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 141 by Mammuthus, posted 09-05-2003 11:00 AM Andor has not replied

  
Mammuthus
Member (Idle past 6475 days)
Posts: 3085
From: Munich, Germany
Joined: 08-09-2002


Message 141 of 141 (54016)
09-05-2003 11:00 AM
Reply to: Message 140 by Andor
09-05-2003 10:34 AM


I would agree that the ultimate goal of scientists studying abiogenesis is to demonstrate conditions and elements that could lead to a system that self replicates using combinations of elements and conditions found in nature. Then that ends the discussion of whether or not and how it can happen which would be a nice Nobel Prize winning result. However, determining the exact nature of the replicators that resulted in the beginning of life on Earth is probably impossible (was it RNA? DNA? what were the exact conditions?)....but that is my own personal feeling since billions of years of subsequent evolution would have probably erased any meaningful signals...much like the way phylogenetic reconstruction (at a molecular level) gets much much harder the farther back in time you go.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 140 by Andor, posted 09-05-2003 10:34 AM Andor has not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024