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If it's inevitable (i.e. it's not a low probability event) how come all life on earth today comes from a single ancestor? Did all other life started on earth di
by gnulinux 6y ago
If it's inevitable (i.e. it's not a low probability event) how come all life on earth today comes from a single ancestor? Did all other life started on earth die? Maybe we didn't find them? Maybe it started only once because earth is a very unlucky planet, and other planets had multiple abiogenesis events? Maybe it's not inevitable and it' low probability but still not it's not out of question most planets with the given properties have life?
- cmrdporcupine 6y agoactually not the case that all came from a single ancestor. there's two separate prokaryote lines, archaea and bacteria. they share some things in common so might have had some primitive pre-cell RNA-world thing in common... but their chemistry is different from each other. also we'd never know, since prokaryotes swap genes freely.. they don't have sex, they just laterally transfer genes all over... even between bacteria and archaea ... so you can't draw a family tree... and they also (early in life's history) modified the environment such that the exact chemistry that might taken place in the alkaline vents can't happen anymore... the ocean has become less acidic as a result of oxygen production