4 ms·

Considering the extreme difficulty in getting organic chemistry processes to work in the laboratory, having random chance work to get any pre-biotic sequences i

Considering the extreme difficulty in getting organic chemistry processes to work in the laboratory, having random chance work to get any pre-biotic sequences is of such low probability that all the hand waving and blackboard erasures of the current biology experts, etc., means nothing. We do not know and cannot show any viable means of creating the full sequence of pre-biotic chemicals needed for the first organism to exist. When one of the top organic chemists in the world puts out that challenge and nobody responds, one can then say that all of these experts know full well that they do not have a clue and are just deluding everyone else as to how life even came to be. Just using probability to say that life came about without at least a semblance of an idea of possible sequences that could work is useless. You need at least some possible viable sequence for the full biotic complement of chemicals to be available. Since the sequence requires processes and solvents that are inimical to previous and follow-on chemicals, this sequence development is a major, major problem that is regularly ignored by those who use probability to say life can arise. When these things are taken into account, the simple fact that there is life here on this planet can be seen as a unique event throughout all of the universe. On some estimates of random action giving rise to life anywhere in the universe, the probabilities are so low that the universe would need to exist for many magnitudes of time longer than its apparent age at this time. Your "one in a billion" is oh so many magnitudes of order higher than the probabilities estimated. Of course, your view can be very different and if you can come up with a viable sequence then simply accept the challenge that has been put out. There will be an awful lot of relief if this could be done.

interfixus 9y ago
The simple truth is, we have no idea. Of course we don't. Data points so far: One. Statistics on that kind of basis tend to be rather meaningless. One thing we do know to be extremely unlikely: That we - exactly we, us, here at this specific point in time - should somehow have arrived at a point where we can confidently secondguess the universe in all its glorious details. We can't, and we don't really even have the foggiest idea what kind of life is possible, or how it comes about in the first place. All the Drake equations in the world can't hide the fact that we know nothing. Every single galaxy may be bursting with life, or we may the only specimens anywhere in the dark, cold void. My personal guess - which is no better or no worse than anyone else's - is that life or its functional equivalents is more or less everywhere, but that intelligent critters like ourselves are exceedingly rare.
flukus 9y ago
> We do not know and cannot show any viable means of creating the full sequence of pre-biotic chemicals needed for the first organism to exist. When one of the top organic chemists in the world puts out that challenge and nobody responds, one can then say that all of these experts know full well that they do not have a clue and are just deluding everyone else as to how life even came to be. There are many more stars than chemsists, and the universe has had much more time to get lucky than our chemists have had. The universe has gone through more chemical permutations than our scientists can dream of.

interfixus 9y ago

The simple truth is, we have no idea. Of course we don't. Data points so far: One. Statistics on that kind of basis tend to be rather meaningless. One thing we do know to be extremely unlikely: That we - exactly we, us, here at this specific point in time - should somehow have arrived at a point where we can confidently secondguess the universe in all its glorious details. We can't, and we don't really even have the foggiest idea what kind of life is possible, or how it comes about in the first place. All the Drake equations in the world can't hide the fact that we know nothing. Every single galaxy may be bursting with life, or we may the only specimens anywhere in the dark, cold void. My personal guess - which is no better or no worse than anyone else's - is that life or its functional equivalents is more or less everywhere, but that intelligent critters like ourselves are exceedingly rare.

flukus 9y ago

> We do not know and cannot show any viable means of creating the full sequence of pre-biotic chemicals needed for the first organism to exist. When one of the top organic chemists in the world puts out that challenge and nobody responds, one can then say that all of these experts know full well that they do not have a clue and are just deluding everyone else as to how life even came to be. There are many more stars than chemsists, and the universe has had much more time to get lucky than our chemists have had. The universe has gone through more chemical permutations than our scientists can dream of.