Author Topic: The Origin of Life - American Scientist Article  (Read 1833 times)

Offline oilgun

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The Origin of Life - American Scientist Article
« on: May 06, 2009, 04:54:55 pm »
A case is made for the descent of electrons
Our progress on this question has been impeded by a formidable cognitive barrier. Because we perceive a deep gap when we think about the difference between inorganic matter and life, we feel that nature must have made a big leap to cross that gap. This point of view has led to searches for ways large and complex molecules could have formed early in Earth’s history, a daunting task. The essential problem is that in modern living systems, chemical reactions in cells are mediated by protein catalysts called enzymes. The information encoded in the nucleic acids DNA and RNA is required to make the proteins; yet the proteins are required to make the nucleic acids. Furthermore, both proteins and nucleic acids are large molecules consisting of strings of small component molecules whose synthesis is supervised by proteins and nucleic acids. We have two chickens, two eggs, and no answer to the old problem of which came first.

In this article we present a view gaining attention in the origin-of-life community that takes the question out of the hatchery and places it squarely in the realm of accessible, plausible chemistry. As we see it, the early steps on the way to life are an inevitable, incremental result of the operation of the laws of chemistry and physics operating under the conditions that existed on the early Earth, a result that can be understood in terms of known (or at least knowable) laws of nature. As such, the early stages in the emergence of life are no more surprising, no more accidental, than water flowing downhill.


Full Article:  http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/2009/3/the-origin-of-life/1

I'm liking this scenario way better than the accidental and/or miracle scenarios. Fascinating article!

Offline delalluvia

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Re: The Origin of Life - American Scientist Article
« Reply #1 on: May 22, 2009, 12:20:05 am »
Wow.  Great article.  It would be funny if Occam's Razor was there for abiogenesis as well.  I'm sure at some time in the near future, we will be looking back on our new knowledge on the beginnings of life and think, 'Well that was commonsense."