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The Origin of Specious Nonsense. Twelve years on. Still going. Answer soon.

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    #152
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    mickrock wrote: »
    No, I'm not a Christian or a member of any other religion.

    I just think it's reasonable to infer intelligence as the best explanation for the appearance of design in life forms. This inference doesn't give the creative intelligence any other attributes normally associated with God, although it raises further questions and the cosmological and fine tuning arguments take on a greater significance.

    All that I can say is if my body is any indication the designer was not particularly intelligent - I was born blind and only my grandmother's determination to prevent my being placed in a home for the blind and the courage of a newly qualified doctor willing to attempt a new treatment gave me partial sight. As an adult my eyesight took two rounds of surgery to get to it something approximating 'normal'.
    I have had gall bladder stones and kidney stones (apparently if one grew up in a 'soft' water area and then consumes 'hard' water as an adult kidney stones are pretty inevitable - brother has had them 7 times now even though he only drinks bottled water but it is still 'hard'). I have diabetes which can't decide if it is type 1 or 2 so every day is a glucose vs insulin lottery.
    I have snapped my achilles.
    As for giving birth....!!!

    Intelligent design my arse - the whole human body acts like something that was making it up as it went along.


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    #153
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    Bannasidhe wrote: »
    Intelligent design my arse - the whole human body acts like something that was making it up as it went along.

    So, you think that if an object is badly designed, that proves it wasn't designed by an intelligence.

    That defies logic.


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    #154
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    mickrock wrote: »
    So, you think that if an object is badly designed, that proves it wasn't designed by an intelligence.

    That defies logic.

    I was questioning the intelligence of the 'intelligent' designer - who seeing as 'he/she/it is meant to be omnipotent and was, allegedly, capable to creating life out of...what exactly? Who created the raw materials?...you'd think he/she/it would have been able to work out the kinks and ensure all of his/her/it's creations worked properly.


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    #155
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    kylith wrote: »
    So you're ignoring the fact that amino acids, the building blocks of proteins, have been found in meteorites* and the fact that they have also been formed in a laboratory under young Earth conditions^?

    Just because you might have a pile of blocks and other materials on the ground doesn't explain how a house comes to be.


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    #156
    oldrnwisr
    Registered Users Posts: 1,594 ✭✭✭oldrnwisr


    mickrock wrote: »
    What factual knowledge do atheists have about, for example, how life could have originated by accident from inorganic matter and how DNA could have come about?

    How do you propose that someone, anyone in fact could have factual knowledge about a conditional proposition. If you had factual knowledge then you would know what did happen not what could happen. Your question already betrays how much you don't know what you're talking about.

    In any case, this has already all been explained to you before. If we get bogged down in the physics and chemistry of all this we're going to be here all day so I'll make this brief.

    As far as determining how life came about on Earth, there are numerous competing ideas. One example is the idea of directed panspermia of which Carl Sagan was one of the early proponents. This idea holds that life was seeded on the planet by other alien civilisations. Another example is the one you've been banging on about abiogenesis, the development of life from inorganic matter through naturalistic methods. However, this term is quite broad since it encompasses a number of different hypotheses.

    What you don't seem to understand is that although we have a number of competing hypotheses we don't have a framework which would allow us to gather the kind of evidence which would allow us to favour one hypothesis over another. Its like standing over the ashes of someone who has been cremated and having an argument over whether they were strangled or stabbed. You can build a reasonable case for each idea but you're never going to know from the evidence you have to hand.

    Which brings me on to this:
    mickrock wrote: »
    Neither side has any factual knowledge of what happened but the more reasonable explanation or inference would be that intelligence was involved.

    For us to consider something as the more reasonable explanation that would mean that it has more evidence to support it than the other competing theories. However, the intelligent design notion (it would be unfair to use a more technical term) has no evidentiary support and is logically flawed to boot.
    Also, methodological reductionism should be kept in mind here. In the absence of evidence to support it, an explanation which requires the assumption of an external agent (in this case an intelligent creator) should be avoided. Ockham's razor and all.

    mickrock wrote: »
    There's zero evidence for abiogenesis, yet it's accepted by many as what must have happened.

    You're doubly wrong here. Firstly, while there is a general lack of confirmatory evidence for any proposed explanation for the origin of life, some of the more accepted abiogenesis frameworks do have solid physical and chemical foundations making them at the very least infinitely better than any theological explanation. Secondly, while there are many scientists out there who accept abiogenesis as the best explanation, no one, at least no one that I've come across argues that abiogenesis must be how it happened. A good scientist almost never uses the word must.


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    #157
    kylith
    Registered Users Posts: 17,736 ✭✭✭✭kylith


    mickrock wrote: »
    So, you think that if an object is badly designed, that proves it wasn't designed by an intelligence.

    That defies logic.

    When you can give yourself a potentially fatal infection by wiping your arse in the wrong direction, or by having vigorous sex (which is, y'know, necessary for the species), when parts of your body can randomly explode and kill you, and when bringing the next generation into the world is potentially fatal for mother and child, then I think you can throw the idea of an 'intelligent' creator out the window. My 3 year old niece could design a better creature than that.


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    #158
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    mickrock wrote: »
    Just because you might have a pile of blocks and other materials on the ground doesn't explain how a house comes to be.

    Just because we don't currently know the answer it doesn't mean it was magic.

    Lot of people used to believe Thor was responsible for thunder...guess what - we now know how and why thunder occurs and there is no involvement by any Norse gods.


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    #159
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    oldrnwisr wrote: »
    How do you propose that someone, anyone in fact could have factual knowledge about a conditional proposition. If you had factual knowledge then you would know what did happen not what could happen. Your question already betrays how much you don't know what you're talking about.

    In any case, this has already all been explained to you before. If we get bogged down in the physics and chemistry of all this we're going to be here all day so I'll make this brief.

    As far as determining how life came about on Earth, there are numerous competing ideas. One example is the idea of directed panspermia of which Carl Sagan was one of the early proponents. This idea holds that life was seeded on the planet by other alien civilisations. Another example is the one you've been banging on about abiogenesis, the development of life from inorganic matter through naturalistic methods. However, this term is quite broad since it encompasses a number of different hypotheses.

    What you don't seem to understand is that although we have a number of competing hypotheses we don't have a framework which would allow us to gather the kind of evidence which would allow us to favour one hypothesis over another. Its like standing over the ashes of someone who has been cremated and having an argument over whether they were strangled or stabbed. You can build a reasonable case for each idea but you're never going to know from the evidence you have to hand.

    Which brings me on to this:



    For us to consider something as the more reasonable explanation that would mean that it has more evidence to support it than the other competing theories. However, the intelligent design notion (it would be unfair to use a more technical term) has no evidentiary support and is logically flawed to boot.
    Also, methodological reductionism should be kept in mind here. In the absence of evidence to support it, an explanation which requires the assumption of an external agent (in this case an intelligent creator) should be avoided. Ockham's razor and all.




    You're doubly wrong here. Firstly, while there is a general lack of confirmatory evidence for any proposed explanation for the origin of life, some of the more accepted abiogenesis frameworks do have solid physical and chemical foundations making them at the very least infinitely better than any theological explanation. Secondly, while there are many scientists out there who accept abiogenesis as the best explanation, no one, at least no one that I've come across argues that abiogenesis must be how it happened. A good scientist almost never uses the word must.

    You, Sir, are a cross disciplinary wonder and my idol.

    That is all.


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    #160
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    oldrnwisr wrote: »
    no one, at least no one that I've come across argues that abiogenesis must be how it happened. A good scientist almost never uses the word must.

    Indeed.


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    #161
    Sarky
    Closed Accounts Posts: 31,967 ✭✭✭✭Sarky


    I think we've established that mickrock isn't any kind of scientist, never mind a good one. :(


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    #162
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    oldrnwisr wrote: »
    Firstly, while there is a general lack of confirmatory evidence for any proposed explanation for the origin of life, some of the more accepted abiogenesis frameworks do have solid physical and chemical foundations making them at the very least infinitely better than any theological explanation.

    To say that abiogenesis has solid physical and chemical foundations is putting a very positive spin on it, to say the least. You're probably saying this because you believe abiogenesis is true or you want it to be true.

    Others would say that it's so implausible as to be essentially impossible.

    If you rule out an intelligent cause from the start then I suppose even a very weak hypothesis, no matter how farfetched, becomes "infinitely better".


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    #163
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    mickrock wrote: »
    To say that abiogenesis has solid physical and chemical foundations is putting a very positive spin on it, to say the least. You're probably saying this because you believe abiogenesis is true or you want it to be true.

    Others would say that it's so implausible as to be essentially impossible.

    If you rule out an intelligent cause from the start then I suppose even a very weak hypothesis, no matter how farfetched, becomes "infinitely better".

    Please say you are aware of the irony of that highlighted statement.


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    #164
    Mardy Bum
    Registered Users Posts: 3,674 ✭✭✭Mardy Bum


    mickrock wrote: »
    Others would say that it's so implausible as to be essentially impossible.

    Who and what evidence do they use?


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    #165
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    Bannasidhe wrote: »
    Please say you are aware of the irony of that highlighted statement.

    To accept abiogenesis you have to suspend credulity and believe in what could be considered a miracle.

    Certain disciplines, like archaeology, infer intelligent design when artifacts are found. I don't see why the same design inferences shouldn't be applied in biology.

    If natural law and chance aren't capable of explaining an appearance of design then an intelligent cause becomes a good explanation. It certainly shouldn't be ruled out on principle.


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    #166
    Doctor Strange
    Closed Accounts Posts: 965 ✭✭✭Doctor Strange


    mickrock wrote: »
    To accept abiogenesis you have to suspend credulity and believe in what could be considered a miracle.

    Certain disciplines, like archaeology, infer intelligent design when artifacts are found. I don't see why the same design inferences shouldn't be applied in biology.

    If natural law and chance aren't capable of explaining an appearance of design then an intelligent cause becomes a good explanation. It certainly shouldn't be ruled out on principle.

    Please, stop. Go and read some papers or simple texts on molecular biology. Then evidence can be presented that the same building blocks for life identified in that discipline (amino acids) are regularly found on meteors and the like. QE-F'n-D. No magic, no miracles. SCIENCE.


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    #167
    darjeeling
    Registered Users Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    Intelligent design is a very vaguely defined idea. Creationists posing as intelligent design advocates have made claims of design for biological examples that are widely separated in evolutionary history, such as the first cell, the bacterial flagellum, the blood clotting cascade and the vertebrate eye. This would require a designer or desginers to act repeatedly throughout billions of years of evolutionary history.

    For anyone claiming that aliens did it, I'd like clarification of when the claimed interventions took place. Are we talking just about the very first cells? Or are the aliens supposed to have visited Earth subsequently and made genetically modifications to the species they encountered, or to have introduced new species?

    It is not inconceivable that life originated elsewhere and arrived on earth in the form of very simple bacterial cells, which went on to evolve on Earth into all the lifeforms we see today. However, why this is a necessary or a better explanation than an autochthonous origin is not clear. Claims that life just couldn't have evolved here seem little more than argument from personal incredulity (similar to Bill O'Reilly's 'Tides go in, tides go out, you can't explain that'). Moreover, people making such claims rarely discuss the ultimate origins of the first life; they seem content to push the business off Earth, but then neglect to consider that life must have gotten going somewhere else and to think of how that might have happened.

    Until someone comes up with a rigorous, testable model of intelligent design, I see no reason to take it seriously. It may be we'll never know exactly how life on Earth began (fine by me), but I don't see that intelligent design currently has anything to offer that other possiblities do not.


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    #168
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    Unforgettable _ Fire wrote: »
    Please, stop. Go and read some papers or simple texts on molecular biology. Then evidence can be presented that the same building blocks for life identified in that discipline (amino acids) are regularly found on meteors and the like. QE-F'n-D. No magic, no miracles. SCIENCE.

    As I've already said, having a pile of blocks on the ground doesn't explain how a house gets to be built.

    I would say that reading textbooks on molecular biology is more likely to make many people more open to the idea of intelligence being somehow involved in the operation of the organism.


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    #169
    Doctor Strange
    Closed Accounts Posts: 965 ✭✭✭Doctor Strange


    mickrock wrote: »
    As I've already said, having a pile of blocks on the ground doesn't explain how a house gets to be built.

    I would say that reading textbooks on molecular biology is more likely to make many people more open to the idea of intelligence being somehow involved in the operation of the organism.

    No. Just no.

    Evolution happens on a daily basis around us. The little steps make up the complex organisms and changes. This is how it works. Your house analogy does not work on any level.

    As for your second point, it's ridiculous. Not even worthy of a response.


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    #170
    Delirium
    Moderators Posts: 51,724 ✭✭✭✭Delirium


    mickrock wrote: »
    As I've already said, having a pile of blocks on the ground doesn't explain how a house gets to be built.

    I would say that reading textbooks on molecular biology is more likely to make many people more open to the idea of intelligence being somehow involved in the operation of the organism.

    What textbook(s) did you read that led you to the opinion that science is wrong about abiogenesis/evolution?

    Can you give any specific examples of where the science is wrong and explain why it is wrong?

    If you can read this, you're too close!



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    #171
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    mickrock wrote: »
    To accept abiogenesis you have to suspend credulity and believe in what could be considered a miracle.

    Certain disciplines, like archaeology, infer intelligent design when artifacts are found. I don't see why the same design inferences shouldn't be applied in biology.

    If natural law and chance aren't capable of explaining an appearance of design then an intelligent cause becomes a good explanation. It certainly shouldn't be ruled out on principle.

    Really? Can you not see the irony of these statements? :confused:

    By the by - as much as I enjoy teasing archaeologists for their tendency to say 'ah yes, this was obviously used for ritual purposes' at the drop of a hat - I have yet to hear one say 'this artifact is obviously the creation of intelligent, non-homo sapiens, design.'


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    #172
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    Unforgettable _ Fire wrote: »
    No. Just no.

    Evolution happens on a daily basis around us. The little steps make up the complex organisms and changes. This is how it works. Your house analogy does not work on any level.

    The house analogy was in relation to abiogenesis (that life formed accidently from inorganic matter), not evolution.


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    #173
    IT-Guy
    Registered Users Posts: 514 ✭✭✭IT-Guy


    mickrock wrote: »
    The house analogy was in relation to abiogenesis (that life formed accidently from inorganic matter), not evolution.

    Unfortunately if you need analogies to understand something then you don't truly understand what you're talking about. It's like trying to describe a horse by referencing a car as they're both forms of transport. As to the flawed house building analogy, if concrete blocks had the ability to join together in an organised fashion as organic matter does then there might be a slight possibility of the resulting structure being a house if that shape confers some advantage to the concrete blocks :)


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    #174
    darjeeling
    Registered Users Posts: 962 ✭✭✭darjeeling


    IT-Guy wrote: »
    Unfortunately if you need analogies to understand something then you don't truly understand what you're talking about. It's like trying to describe a horse by referencing a car as they're both forms of transport.

    Was that an analogy? :P


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    #175
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    koth wrote: »
    What textbook(s) did you read that led you to the opinion that science is wrong about abiogenesis/evolution?

    Can you give any specific examples of where the science is wrong and explain why it is wrong?

    Origin-of-life research has been at an impasse for decades.

    Scientists haven't a clue how life started:

    http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/2011/02/28/pssst-dont-tell-the-creationists-but-scientists-dont-have-a-clue-how-life-began/


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    #176
    Quatermain
    Closed Accounts Posts: 243 ✭✭Quatermain


    Bannasidhe wrote: »
    Really? Can you not see the irony of these statements? :confused:

    By the by - as much as I enjoy teasing archaeologists for their tendency to say 'ah yes, this was obviously used for ritual purposes' at the drop of a hat - I have yet to hear one say 'this artifact is obviously the creation of intelligent, non-homo sapiens, design.'

    Well, your kind words are very much appreciated.

    As an archaeologist, I find this line of reasoning baffling in the extreme. You cannot compare (for the sake of argument) bronze artifacts buried in bogs to the human body, because one is organic, and the other is not. We can chart the evolution of eyes and brains, and we can chart the changing techniques (not to mention cultural significance) in different hand-axes and weaponry. The difference should be plain to even the layman.

    For a start, signs of workmanship and personalisation are often present in archaeological finds. No chisel-scratches or hammer-dents or a name scratched into the surface are present on any facet of any living thing. Intelligent design is inferred in archaeology because we know for a fact they were built by people. Unless objects of smelted bronze (an alloy) that can be socketed neatly into wooden hafts with convenient loops for securing twine just turn up in nature (Hint: They don't).


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    #177
    Bannasidhe
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 19,219 Mod ✭✭✭✭Bannasidhe


    Quatermain wrote: »
    Well, your kind words are very much appreciated.

    As an archaeologist, I find this line of reasoning baffling in the extreme. You cannot compare (for the sake of argument) bronze artifacts buried in bogs to the human body, because one is organic, and the other is not. We can chart the evolution of eyes and brains, and we can chart the changing techniques (not to mention cultural significance) in different hand-axes and weaponry. The difference should be plain to even the layman.

    For a start, signs of workmanship and personalisation are often present in archaeological finds. No chisel-scratches or hammer-dents or a name scratched into the surface are present on any facet of any living thing. Intelligent design is inferred in archaeology because we know for a fact they were built by people. Unless objects of smelted bronze (an alloy) that can be socketed neatly into wooden hafts with convenient loops for securing twine just turn up in nature (Hint: They don't).

    I know you would fondly call me a paper pusher. ;)


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    #178
    Quatermain
    Closed Accounts Posts: 243 ✭✭Quatermain


    Bannasidhe wrote: »
    I know you would fondly call me a paper pusher. ;)

    I prefer to think of historians and archaeologists as stalwart allies in the fight against ignorance. Just that some write memos in dusty books, and others fight nazis with mighty right-hooks. :pac:


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    #179
    Delirium
    Moderators Posts: 51,724 ✭✭✭✭Delirium


    mickrock wrote: »
    Origin-of-life research has been at an impasse for decades.

    Scientists haven't a clue how life started:

    http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/cross-check/2011/02/28/pssst-dont-tell-the-creationists-but-scientists-dont-have-a-clue-how-life-began/

    you really should read all of an article before posting:
    Creationists are no doubt thrilled that origin-of-life research has reached such an impasse (see for example the screed "Darwinism Refuted," which cites my 1991 article), but they shouldn’t be. Their explanations suffer from the same flaw: What created the divine Creator? And at least scientists are making an honest effort to solve life’s mystery instead of blaming it all on God.

    So there may be an impasse but the author is by no means suggesting that ID is a better idea.


    EDIT: You never answered my question btw. What textbooks(s) did you read, and what was in those book(s) that led you to believe ID more probable over abiogenesis?

    If you can read this, you're too close!



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    #180
    mickrock
    Registered Users Posts: 1,021 ✭✭✭mickrock


    Quatermain wrote: »
    Intelligent design is inferred in archaeology because we know for a fact they were built by people.

    If you determine that an object was designed you infer that intelligence caused it, in this case humans and that it didn't come about by natural means.

    The fact that you know it was designed by humans doesn't alter the fact that you have inferred intelligence.

    If someone went to a distant planet and found a machine they could infer intelligent design, even though they don't know who the designer is. You don't need to know who the IDer to infer it.


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    #181
    nagirrac
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,019 ✭✭✭nagirrac


    The honest answer to how life emerged on earth and the answer you will get from any scientist working in the field is "we don't know".

    First of all, you have to define what you mean by "life" and how you distinguish life from non-life. A reasonable local description of life is a system based on certain organic molecules that can grow and reproduce and is capable of Darwinian evolution. The basic building blocks of life as we know it are carbohydrates, lipids, proteins and nucleic acids.

    What the Miller experiment demonstrates is that give the right ingredients (ammonia, methane, hydrogen and water) and conditions (extremely high temperatures, in his experiment generated by an electric spark), you can chemically synthesize amino acids. The most interesting result of his experiment is that the organic chemicals produced are very similar to those found in meteorites as Unforgettable-Fire mentioned above. This would suggest that relatively complex organic molecules such as amino acids were commonplace in the early solar system where the right ingredients and extreme temperatures were present.

    We need to be careful though in not muddling chemistry and biochemistry. There are over 500 amino acids found in nature, all of which can be chemically synthesized. There are 22 used in "life", and all are bio-synthesized in cells using mechanisms that are completely different to chemical synthesis. One small example is that in chemical synthesis ammonia is required, whereas a plant cell can start from atmospheric nitrogen gas and synthesize ammonia using nitrogen fixation.

    The hard part of the "how did life emerge" problem is not how you get to basic and relatively complex organic chemicals, which are apparently commonplace in the solar system at least. We can imagine a hot soup in the early earth with amino acids, fats and sugars floating around. The hard part is getting all these molecules to work together, synthesizing a second set of molecules, then a third, etc. and finally a mechanism where the first set of ingredients are themselves synthesized. What is the driving force for this kind of information rich cycle? It isn't evolution until you have something that can self replicate and is subject to natural selection. There are literally dozens of hypotheses within abiogenesis, with RNA being a leading candidate for the first self replicating molecule, but how you get to RNA is quite the challenge. Even when you imagine a chemical process that can synthesize RNA you are still left with perplexing questions such as "why does a nucleic acid direct proteins to make a membrane for a cell?". In terms of evolution, until you have some type of rudimentary cell that reproduces itself, there is nothing for natural selection to work on.

    In short we are a long way from understanding how life emerged, but if we figure it out, it will be through science.


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