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From: Martin Harran <martinharran@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: OoL - out at first base?
Date: Thu, 12 Dec 2024 14:10:58 +0000
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On Wed, 11 Dec 2024 19:12:36 +0000, j.nobel.daggett@gmail.com
(LDagget) wrote:

>On Wed, 11 Dec 2024 17:27:01 +0000, Martin Harran wrote:
>
>> On Wed, 11 Dec 2024 08:32:42 -0800, erik simpson
>> <eastside.erik@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>>On 12/10/24 11:32 PM, Martin Harran wrote:
>>>> On Mon, 9 Dec 2024 13:57:43 -0800, erik simpson
>>>> <eastside.erik@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> [snip for focus]
>>>>
>>>>>   Self-catalyzing time for a strand of RNA is probably on the order of
>>>>> minutes.  A black smoker need only be present for few years, and the
>>>>> early earth had a much hotter interior means that there were at least
>>>>> millions of them.  As SJ Gould remarked "life may be as common as
>>>>> quartz". Indeed.  All you need is hot water and a thermal or chemical
>>>>> gradient and you're good to go.
>>>>
>>>> If that is the case, why have we not seen any new life forms develop
>>>> from scratch in the last several billion years with every form of life
>>>> we know descending from a single origin?
>>>>
>>>> I know the typical response is that in the early earth, there were
>>>> possibly numerous life forms with one dominant one devouring the
>>>> others but that seems a bit of a stretch; it doesn't explain why there
>>>> is no trace of anything developing in later stages and no one has ever
>>>> been able to create laboratory conditions that have allowed new life
>>>> to develop. Miller-Urey got as far as amino acids but that is a long
>>>> way from a life form.
>>>>
>>>> Just to be clear, I am not endorsing MarkE's arguments; I'm simply
>>>> challenging the Gould statement and the "all you need" comment.
>>>>
>>>The new life forms don't have any ecological niches available, because
>>>they're already occupied by fully adapted life.  You'd have to have some
>>>strong advantage to prevail (it does happen, but rarely).
>>
>> Hmmm .... lots of niches for the development of the many many millions
>> of life forms that have evolved over billions of years but no niches
>> available for new forms to evolve. As I said, sounds like a bit of a
>> stretch.
>
>Only if you fail to think about it.
>For new life it evolve, it has to have a significant supply of ready
>food/energy to power its emerging metabolism. The initial chemical
>hypercycles would not be expected to be efficient in the way they
>convert
>their primary energy source into the synthesis of derived chemical
>structures like specific lipids and polymers.
>
>Moreover, any such reservoir of protolife would be a rich feeding ground
>for life that had already evolved.

All of which seems to contradict Gould's statement and Eric's comment
that all you need is hot water and a thermal or chemical gradient and
you're good to go - that is what I was challenging.

MarkE and his fellow ID travellers are wrong in trying to use the
exceptionality of OOL as some sort of proof of a Designer but that
doesn't change its exceptionality.


>
>That is completely consistent with life as we know it now where other
>life competing for the same resources is usually the top threat to its
>continued existence.
>
>Indeed, the supposition that life as we know it is the result of an
>early
>"winner" having driven all other competitors into extinction as part of
>a
>race to consume available resources was put forward at least by the
>1950s
>by scientists observing life.
>
>So it's not a stretch or facile excuse. It's what any reasonably
>thoughtful biologist concludes. The existence of cellular life
>effectively
>precludes a subsequent independent re-emergence of cellular life. It
>would
>be like expecting a child with no knowledge of current racing cars to
>build a racing car that could win a race against a fleet of well evolved
>racing cars.