Thoughts on the Existence of the Universe

[widdershins]

So science of the gaps replaces god of the gaps?  When you find this abiogenesis, go to Stockholm and get your Nobel prize.

Yes, there are microbes down deep in the rocks, both on land and sea.  But once you say (not in a form we would recognize) then I start to doubt you.

It's not a "science of the gaps" argument.  I'm simply saying that we wouldn't necessarily detect abiogenesis if it were happening today.  If, say, abiogenesis were happening right now in one specific volcanic vent at the bottom of the ocean scientists would likely not "detect" that happening.  They would have to have samples from that exact volcanic vent and specifically be looking for the types of things you would likely see in abiogenesis, such as the new formation of organic molecules.  This would be complicated by many things, including that they would need continuous, large samples to be able to say with any certainty that it "just happened" and contamination from already existing organic life on the planet.

I'm not saying anything you said there was particularly wrong, I just disagree with the idea that, were abiogenesis happening today, we would absolutely detect it.  I imagine detecting it would be problematic on a world already so thoroughly contaminated with organic material, especially if abiogenesis was a rare occurrence which only happened under specific, rare, poorly understood conditions.  The right place, right time, perfect conditions and assurance of no contamination would have to all come together perfectly and I doubt one could necessarily guarantee that would happen.

[Unbeliever]

Yes, there are microbes down deep in the rocks, both on land and sea.

Thomas Gold's book, The Deep Hot Biosphere was really fascinating. We may yet find that life originated way down deep, perhaps even on other solar system planets or moons.

[Fickle]

Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts of superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices, will penetrate its deepest mysteries.
Carl Sagan (1934 - 1996)

We are star stuff and everything that we are and will ever know came from somewhere else in the cosmos at some other time. Thus we may as well call the fundamental process of creation... Gravitation. Without Gravitation we and nothing we know could ever exist. The real issue is most true believer's understanding of the cosmos ends at acknowledging there are stars in the night sky. That is the limit of their primitive understanding of our place in the universe thus in their mind the Earth is still the center of their universe. Their is no arguing with that mentality any more than I could convince an ant it is somehow a fish.

[Mike Cl]

Their is no arguing with that mentality any more than I could convince an ant it is somehow a fish.

This.  And it demonstrated just about every time I talk to a fundy.

[widdershins]

This.  And it demonstrated just about every time I talk to a fundy.

Hell, even some Catholics are this bad.  I was in a conversation with a man the other day where he just stubbornly refused to admit even the possibility he might be wrong.  The particular subject was Saul going to a woman with familiar spirits to raise the spirit of Samuel.  Most religious people have convinced themselves that this wasn't Samuel he was talking to, it was a demon, even though it never, ever even suggests that anywhere in the Bible.  The story, in fact, said it was Samuel.  And what is the first thing Samuel does?  He calls Saul a dick for doing something so evil as to raise the dead, which begs the question, how can demons cast out demons?  A house divided against itself, blah, blah, blah.

His argument was "The dead are aware of nothing", which simply states their current state, not what they can and cannot be made aware of.  And, if you use the right translation, instead of "Saul realized it was Samuel" it says "Saul perceived it was Samuel, and if you use THAT AND ONLY THAT translation, THEN it has two possible meanings proving BEYOND DOUBT that the meaning he wanted to use was correct.  He also went through some twist on the false dichotomy where he stated that there were "four possible players", being angels, demons, man and God.  He could immediately rule out angels and God because they were good and this was an evil thing.  But then he could rule out man because Samuel was dead, so he wasn't talking to a man.

It was all very frustrating, and coming from a physicist, no less!  This is not a stupid guy.  He has probably forgotten more about the universe than I'll ever know.

[Baruch]

Education doesn't make people smarter, it just makes their stupidity sharper ;-)

[trdsf]

I just disagree with the idea that, were abiogenesis happening today, we would absolutely detect it.  I imagine detecting it would be problematic on a world already so thoroughly contaminated with organic material, especially if abiogenesis was a rare occurrence which only happened under specific, rare, poorly understood conditions.  The right place, right time, perfect conditions and assurance of no contamination would have to all come together perfectly and I doubt one could necessarily guarantee that would happen.

There are good reasons to think that abiogenesis is unlikely to be a continuing process, although it's not impossible.

First, the molecules most suitable to base a new life molecule on are also those quite likely to be consumed by already-living systems, meaning that they're just not available in free and unpredated abundance.

Second, a new molecule on which to base life would be in competition with uncounted other already-living systems for available resources -- resources that existing systems have already been honed by billions of years of evolution to take advantage of.

So if modern abiogenesis is occurring, it only really has a fair chance to catch on somewhere that existing life doesn't have a strong foothold -- and there are very few of those environments.  Everywhere we look, even in "impossible" environments, we find things living there.

Fundamentally, even if abiogenesis is a common process and not a rare one, the race to life on this planet has already been won.  A new molecule just "learning" (it's so hard to avoid anthropomorphicization) how to clumsily copy itself is about three and a half billion years too late to the contest, and the odds of a better replicator than DNA spontaneously arising whole-cloth make quantum tunneling myself across the observable universe a doddle in comparison.

[widdershins]

There are good reasons to think that abiogenesis is unlikely to be a continuing process, although it's not impossible.

First, the molecules most suitable to base a new life molecule on are also those quite likely to be consumed by already-living systems, meaning that they're just not available in free and unpredated abundance.

Second, a new molecule on which to base life would be in competition with uncounted other already-living systems for available resources -- resources that existing systems have already been honed by billions of years of evolution to take advantage of.

So if modern abiogenesis is occurring, it only really has a fair chance to catch on somewhere that existing life doesn't have a strong foothold -- and there are very few of those environments.  Everywhere we look, even in "impossible" environments, we find things living there.

Fundamentally, even if abiogenesis is a common process and not a rare one, the race to life on this planet has already been won.  A new molecule just "learning" (it's so hard to avoid anthropomorphicization) how to clumsily copy itself is about three and a half billion years too late to the contest, and the odds of a better replicator than DNA spontaneously arising whole-cloth make quantum tunneling myself across the observable universe a doddle in comparison.

I don't disagree with any of that and I wasn't speaking to whether it was or was not happening today, just questioning the certainty that we would detect it if it were.

[trdsf]

I don't disagree with any of that and I wasn't speaking to whether it was or was not happening today, just questioning the certainty that we would detect it if it were.

Probably not,  You're basically talking about one molecule in some random environment, probably the ocean.  Even if an experiment was set up specifically to see if it might happen again, some huge nutrient-rich vat bathed in UV and occasionally zapped with electricity, just to keep things percolating, we wouldn't know it had happened until a self-replicating molecule had begun to self-replicate enough to be noticed, and Bob only knows how long the thing would have to be left to sit -- and of course, we might not even recognize it anyway if its mechanism for replication was somehow far different from what we already know.

That's the downside to big numbers.  The kinds of big numbers you need for abiogenesis to have a good chance of happening also mean you have almost no chance of seeing it happen, only its aftermath.

[Blackleaf]

Correct though ... creating life in the lab (by itself) doesn't prove it could happen by chance ... anymore than a chess game played by people, proves it could happen by chance.

The current argument by creationists is that it is impossible to create life from nonlife. If that was proven wrong in a lab, they'd just change strategies instead of admitting they were wrong. Suddenly, they'd be saying, "Well, you may be able to make life in a lab, but then you're just proving intelligent design because an intelligent scientist created it."

Christians change strategies all the time to fit new information and avoid admitting they're wrong. This is why I personally have a pet peeve with Christians who don't believe in the Bible and worship a god of their own creation that fits their own standards. Why take a god who has been used throughout all history to control and oppress, and recreate him to make him more likable? There's no reason to, except that it's safe and easy compared to completely discarding the belief system they were raised to believe in.

[Baruch]

Tricky parts to that.  Taking parts of existing living things, and reassembling them, as in recombinant DNA, isn't creating life from scratch, it is just Dr Frankenstein with higher technology.  If you made an entirely new life form, that would be amazing but I think possible.  Only gods can create life, and whether by conventional means or not, we gods do create life on a small, not universal scale.

If you don't accept that people are gods ... then one has to think that when I put my left-over tea, from lunch, into the refrigerator ... then that happened because of semi-random quantum processes.  There was like a 50% chance it would spontaneously get into my refrigerator, vs 20% chance of being spontaneously spilled on the floor, vs a 30% chance of being spontaneously discarded down the drain (and perhaps that is the percentages summed over the multiverse).  There are no beings, just things, that are responding to deterministic or semi-deterministic physics, in one or more universes.  There is no will, no purpose, no intention ... and the Buddha would agree with modern physics, as many have pointed out.  I think we can throw out teleology ... but not the baby with the bathwater ;-)

I do agree with your counter-argument regarding vitalism (of molecules or larger structures).  But I wouldn't agree that theology was defeated, just bad theology.  Whether a recombinant life form, or an entirely novel life form, is intelligent, or it is intelligent to create such a thing ... I leave as an open question.

[Unbeliever]

And what is the first thing Samuel does?  He calls Saul a dick for doing something so evil as to raise the dead, which begs the question, how can demons cast out demons?  A house divided against itself, blah, blah, blah

Yeah, so said Jesus, in Matthew 12:25:

And Jesus knew their thoughts, and said unto them, Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation; and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand:

And yet, here is God (in the guise of Jesus) curing the deaf, dumb and blind - that God himself (according to Exodus 4:11) had made deaf, dumb and blind!

And the LORD said unto him, Who hath made man's mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the LORD?

Sounds to me like God's house is very much divided against itself!

[widdershins]

I've thought about it a lot lately and I've come to the conclusion, yes, the universe does exist.

[aitm]

I've thought about it a lot lately and I've come to the conclusion, yes, the universe does exist.


hmmm, odd, I have a feeling that somewhere in a previous life, I said that as well.......oh well, time for a beer anyway.

[u196533]

"The origin of life is pretty easy, actually.  All you need is a solvent (water seems most suitable, but you never know, there are other options), basic organic chemistry (already present in vast quantities 4.5 billion years ago), an energy source (the sun), and deep time (about half a billion years).

Abiogenesis may be only a one in a billion bilion billion* chance... but you have to remember you're talking about billions of billions of random chemical interactions taking place every second nonstop for half a billion years.  At that rate, it becomes effectively inevitable: all you need is one molecule that by chance is able to make crude copies of itself, and then evolution takes over.  "

If only it were that easy.  The atoms in any living organism are in a higher state of energy and lower state of entropy than they would be as constituent atoms.  This places them in an unstable state far from equilibrium.  From a chemical/thermodynamic perspective, they should just die and decompose versus taking energy from the environment to maintain their low state of entorpy (we all will eventually succumb to entropy.)  While it is true that energy from the sun (or thermal vents) could provide the energy for some initial chemical reactions, it is unreasonable to conclude that they would just continue indefinitely without some force to drive them.   Most reactions involve a compromise between lowering energy and increasing entropy.  Something that increases energy and lowers entropy must have an external driving force.

At some point in the history of life on earth, a self-ordering, autocatalytic chemical system had to develop characteristics to which selfishness could be attributed.  The driving energy and/or the chemicals needed for reaction would have had to exhaust themselves at some point in a process that took millions of years.  At that point those pre-biotic replicator molecules should have simply ceased to exist.  Instead those autocatalytic chemicals must have had to manipulate the environment in order to extract energy in an act of self-preservation. 

While the will to live/self-preservation can be rationalized in a sentient being, it can’t be explained in a simple organism or the replicator molecules you describe.  Dawkins describes a selfish, replicator molecule emerging.  However, selfishness and replication are 2 independent attributes.  He glosses over the selfish aspect and takes it for granted.  (I am convinced he did so due to his a priori commitment to atheism.)  The fact that Dawkins, a great story teller, did not even attempt to create a semi-plausible story to explain that speaks volumes.  (The fact that over a 100 years of research has gotten us nowhere near a replicator molecule, let alone a selfish one also speaks volumes.)

Selfishness cannot simply be assumed.  A chemical system developing the impetus not merely to replicate, but to persist against existential threat cannot be explained.  No other inorganic self-ordering, autocatalytic, structures does that.   A candle flame, a hurricane, or a Bénard cell does not seek resources when the material conditions for continued catalysis run out; they cease. Living things do so until all options are exhausted.  Some of the simplest organisms engage in elaborate behaviors to forestall death.  The origin of life narrative does not explain the emergence of self-preserving behavior.
Also missing from origin of life narratives is the shift from dynamic, self-ordering autocatalysis to a system that traps and constrains energy to prolong and preserve autocatalysis ( system-preserving behavior).  We need to metabolize energy, store it, and then retrieve it when needed. 

I agree that religion is bullshit since all evidence suggests that whatever created us is indifferent.   However, I don’t think spontaneous abiogenesis is reasonable.    Even if science overcomes the long list of enormous problems with just getting to a replicator molecule, it can't explain how self preservation evolved in those molecules.  I don’t think science will ever explain how molecules and simple life forms defied entropic forces and manipulated the environment in order to acquire the energy to lower their entropy.  Self-preservation can be rationalized in a sentient being, but not in a molecule.