Big Bang - Big Dud

Hi SylasIn your reply to SoulFire you wrote: I was just wondering, but can you produce the other chemicals from, say, some minerals, water, carbon dioxide, oxygen and nitrogen?
I have been to one of these DNA-producing companies (pretty interesting by the way) and they had just four bottles with labels saying: "Thymine", "Adenine", "Cytosine" and "Guanine". I didn't ask where they got these bottles from so unfortunately I don't know whether these nucleotides are synthesized in living cells or chemical labs. (These two do not necessarily exclude each other, but I think you know what I mean) Can you help me out?Greets Stellatic

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"What interests me is whether God had a choice when he created the world.". --Albert Einstein

Hi SylasThanks for your answer (and Percy too). I perfectly agree on everything you wrote. However, while reading your reply, I somehow got the feeling that you misunderstood the motivation for my question. If so, I would like to put that straight. I was not wondering whether it is possible in principle to create nucleotides in a lab, rather whether we know how to do it, and it was not meant either as an attack on evolution of some kind. I'm not an expert in biology so I wouldn't dare to criticize on evolution. Not that I believe everything people say about it (people try to make you believe all sorts of things, some scepticism is always required), but I have no basis for a good (scientific) opinion on the matter. I did not follow any courses on biology after highschool and I'm studying astrophysics now, so that's why I only discuss on the Cosmology discussion board.I read your post, where you said that DNA-synthesis is a perfectly standard practice and I wondered if it would be possible to do this as an experiment at home. Like making nitroglycerine or something, that's pretty easy. Seemed fun to me (in some nerdish kind of way, ). Anyway, I took the advice of Percy to google a bit and I found this site where they explained through which processes DNA was synthesized in cells. I was a bit overwhelmed by the complexity of the whole process and came to the conclusion that for me, it isn't possible to do this, but since they know how it is done in a cell, they can, of course, do it in a lab too. Since it is a pretty complex process, I think they usually "harvest it from living tissue" (Yikes! reminds me of The Matrix (don't tell me you don't know this movie, well... ok, I'll explain: robots took over the world and since the light of the sun is blocked by dark clouds they use humans to harvest energy from)) as Percy suggested.I agree with you that creationists shouldn't be looking so hard for proofs of the existence of God. By doing so, they create contradictions between science and religion where there are none, in my opinion. I think science and religion complete each other and together give a more complete view of our world. For answers on the 'how'-questions you should be looking more in the direction of science, for the 'why'-questions one should be looking in the direction of religion. Just my opinion...I found your website on selfsynthesizing DNA strings very interesting, by the way.Greets Stellatic

Hi Sylas In fact, I am a creationist. I will take your remark on my openness as a compliment. I agree that many creationists don't have such an open mind, but I think this holds for many people...I enjoyed the philosophical part of your reply too. I have to admit, despite of our different backgrounds, I agreed on most of your writings. Actually, I just proposed a new thread on cosmology of a fair philosophical level. I'm afraid my first post has become a bit extensive, so it might take some time to read it. I'm really interested what you would think of it, so, if it is approved, reply as you please.Greets Stellatic

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"What interests me is whether God had a choice when he created the world.". --Albert Einstein