5 ms·

Scientists get closer to solving chemical puzzle of the origin of life

67 points by gardenfelder 3y ago

gardenfelder 3y ago
[flagged]
- andrewflnr 3y ago
  Specifically pantetheine (if I read it right before the paywall popped up). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantetheine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantetheine
  - gardenfelder 3y ago
    Sadly, at least today, archive.is and archive.ph are not responding, so have no known options.
  - gardenfelder 3y ago
    I linked the paper that goes with that article elsewhere just now; it does talk about pantetheine: "Prebiotically plausible chemoselective pantetheine synthesis in water"
- dang 3y ago
  Can you please stop posting like this? We've asked you twice already, and you've continued to do it a lot. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39515972 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39515972 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39504137 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39504137 Including a related link, as you did in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39553427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39553427, is fine, but posting these routine summaries to the comments is not fine.
pfdietz 3y ago
In OoL, there will be steps. Some could be easy, others potentially very hard. By their very nature, the easier steps will be understood first. Understanding them therefore doesn't say much about how the hard the overall process is. An analogy is those collect-all-the-letters games one sometimes sees from grocery stores or fast food restaurants. If you collect all the letters in some phrase, you win a big prize. When you start playing the game, the letters come quickly, and the phrase fills in promisingly. But there's one letter that never seems to show up. The contest ends and your phrase is still incomplete. What happened, of course, is that all the letters except that one were just distractions. That one letter was very rare and controlled how many times the prize would actually be awarded. The contest exploits the unconscious bias that the letters have to show up with the same probability. They're all just letters, right? There's a feeling that when you get a letter you're closer to winning, but unless it's that rare letter you're not significantly closer at all.
- blackbear_ 3y ago
  That's just how it is when you are studying the unknown. Good thing that there are people who do stuff without letting such thoughts stop them.
  - pfdietz 3y ago
    And bad thing that people overrepresent what's been found so far.
    - blackbear_ 3y ago
      In general I agree, although neither the scientific article nor the press release seem misleading to me. In any case, you seem to be assuming that the most important part is still missing, but do you actually know?
- croes 3y ago
  Just because a step is easy doesn't mean it's easy to understand and vice versa. Just because you understand something doesn't you it's easy or hard. Or to use your letter game: You got an E, without knowing the phrase you don't know if it's a rare letter or a common one, especially if even don't know the language of the phrase.
  - pfdietz 3y ago
    The question is how hard is it to get experimental evidence for the thing. If it occurs under a wide variety of circumstances at a high rate, it's easy. If it involves an extremely unlikely set of circumstances, it's not easy, and will be hard to replicate.
_xerces_ 3y ago
I wonder if AI could help us with the problem of how life started. Either through simulation or some extension of existing programs like the ones used for drug discovery and protein folding. I know AI is not some kind of panacea for difficult problems, but it might be able to suggest things like the experiment detailed in the article and predict results.
- RajT88 3y ago
  "With the rapidly approaching inception Of artificial intelligence Humanity may well set the stage For its own demise Once the exponential rate of intelligence Reaches critical mass There will be no turning back And all of mankind will be exterminated The human race, who, for centuries Have looked to the stars for answers Have always questioned Whether or not God exists He does now"
gardenfelder 3y ago
Here is the paper linked in that piece: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk4432 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk4432
1stub 3y ago
https://web.archive.org/web/20240229165406/https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/02/29/life-earth-origin-chemistry/ https://web.archive.org/web/20240229165406/https://www.washi...
specialist 3y ago
Ever since Sagan showed the flask of chemicals getting zapped, creating a goo of amino acids and whatnot, I've wanted to know how life started. Then I want to know the role of disruption in the emergence of us (intelligence). Randomizers cataclysmic events, plate tectonics, seasons, lunar tides, epochs, and so forth. Would evolution have stalled had there not always new niches being created? Should SETI be focused on planets (in the goldilocks zone) which have had pretty rough histories?
pictureofabear 3y ago
"On early Earth, the reaction could have taken place in small pools or lakes of water, the authors said. Large oceans, though, would have probably diluted the concentration of the chemicals." This has interesting implications for possibility of life in places like Enceladus or Europa--places that may not have any isolated areas for these chemicals to interact over long periods of time.
- animitronix 3y ago
  I'm so glad this has finally been pointed out professionally!! Every time I hear about life on Enceladus or Europa the very first thing I think about is the dilution problem. Maybe in pockets underneath the volcanic vents, but the heat would seem to rule that out, no?
  - kadoban 3y ago
    It's pretty hard not to have _some_ capacity to have puddles or pockets of some sort. If nothing else, you can have infiltrates and cavities in rocks or ice, or pools/puddles/lakes on top of frozen areas.
thriftwy 3y ago
What about ATP? We depend on it but it has to come from somewhere. See https://shkrobius.livejournal.com/401292.html https://shkrobius.livejournal.com/401292.html
- philsnow 3y ago
  not answering your question, but TIL that there are also GTP, UTP, and CTP, having somewhat similar functions, but each fulfilling one or more (much) smaller niches than ATP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleoside_triphosphate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleoside_triphosphate
taejavu 3y ago
By analogy, amino acids are to proteins what a pile of bricks are to a house. Have we made any progress on figuring out what could have possibly caused the amino acids to become arranged into proteins? If you read between the lines, I know this sounds like an argument for creationism, but it's because I'm an atheist that I find the question so frustrating/compelling.
- chimineycricket 3y ago
  Even if you had the answer to that question, I think it should not soothe your atheism/creationism concerns. The bigger question would still remain on why anything exists at all.
  - david-gpu 3y ago
    > The bigger question would still remain on why anything exists at all. Yet, if nothing existed, there would not be anyone asking the question. This doesn't actually answer the question, but it is funny to think about. Many years ago I read a non-testable hypothesis that stuck with me. What is the simplest, most parsimonious explanation for why this universe exists? The most extreme end of simplicity would be that every self-consistent set of axioms forms the universe that can be derived from it. For example, a universe may exist consisting only of the empty set. Another universe may consist of the natural numbers up to 42. Our universe, with a significantly richer set of axioms, has led to an abundance of the hydrogen atom. And we all know that hydrogen is a colourless gas that, if left to its own devices in sufficient quantity and for long enough, progressively transforms and starts thinking about itself.
    - avandekleut 3y ago
      > if nothing existed, there would not be anyone asking the question This is called the Anthropic Principle. I believe you can take it further, in that universes that develop intelligent life may develop the technological capabilities to create new ones (e.g via powerful colliders).
- jryb 3y ago

67 points by gardenfelder 3y ago

gardenfelder 3y ago

[flagged]

andrewflnr 3y ago
Specifically pantetheine (if I read it right before the paywall popped up). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantetheine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pantetheine
- gardenfelder 3y ago
  Sadly, at least today, archive.is and archive.ph are not responding, so have no known options.
- gardenfelder 3y ago
  I linked the paper that goes with that article elsewhere just now; it does talk about pantetheine: "Prebiotically plausible chemoselective pantetheine synthesis in water"
dang 3y ago
Can you please stop posting like this? We've asked you twice already, and you've continued to do it a lot. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39515972 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39515972 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39504137 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39504137 Including a related link, as you did in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39553427 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39553427, is fine, but posting these routine summaries to the comments is not fine.

pfdietz 3y ago

In OoL, there will be steps. Some could be easy, others potentially very hard. By their very nature, the easier steps will be understood first. Understanding them therefore doesn't say much about how the hard the overall process is. An analogy is those collect-all-the-letters games one sometimes sees from grocery stores or fast food restaurants. If you collect all the letters in some phrase, you win a big prize. When you start playing the game, the letters come quickly, and the phrase fills in promisingly. But there's one letter that never seems to show up. The contest ends and your phrase is still incomplete. What happened, of course, is that all the letters except that one were just distractions. That one letter was very rare and controlled how many times the prize would actually be awarded. The contest exploits the unconscious bias that the letters have to show up with the same probability. They're all just letters, right? There's a feeling that when you get a letter you're closer to winning, but unless it's that rare letter you're not significantly closer at all.

blackbear_ 3y ago
That's just how it is when you are studying the unknown. Good thing that there are people who do stuff without letting such thoughts stop them.
- pfdietz 3y ago
  And bad thing that people overrepresent what's been found so far.
  - blackbear_ 3y ago
    In general I agree, although neither the scientific article nor the press release seem misleading to me. In any case, you seem to be assuming that the most important part is still missing, but do you actually know?
croes 3y ago
Just because a step is easy doesn't mean it's easy to understand and vice versa. Just because you understand something doesn't you it's easy or hard. Or to use your letter game: You got an E, without knowing the phrase you don't know if it's a rare letter or a common one, especially if even don't know the language of the phrase.
- pfdietz 3y ago
  The question is how hard is it to get experimental evidence for the thing. If it occurs under a wide variety of circumstances at a high rate, it's easy. If it involves an extremely unlikely set of circumstances, it's not easy, and will be hard to replicate.

_xerces_ 3y ago

I wonder if AI could help us with the problem of how life started. Either through simulation or some extension of existing programs like the ones used for drug discovery and protein folding. I know AI is not some kind of panacea for difficult problems, but it might be able to suggest things like the experiment detailed in the article and predict results.

RajT88 3y ago
"With the rapidly approaching inception Of artificial intelligence Humanity may well set the stage For its own demise Once the exponential rate of intelligence Reaches critical mass There will be no turning back And all of mankind will be exterminated The human race, who, for centuries Have looked to the stars for answers Have always questioned Whether or not God exists He does now"

gardenfelder 3y ago

Here is the paper linked in that piece: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk4432 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adk4432

1stub 3y ago

https://web.archive.org/web/20240229165406/https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/02/29/life-earth-origin-chemistry/ https://web.archive.org/web/20240229165406/https://www.washi...

specialist 3y ago

Ever since Sagan showed the flask of chemicals getting zapped, creating a goo of amino acids and whatnot, I've wanted to know how life started. Then I want to know the role of disruption in the emergence of us (intelligence). Randomizers cataclysmic events, plate tectonics, seasons, lunar tides, epochs, and so forth. Would evolution have stalled had there not always new niches being created? Should SETI be focused on planets (in the goldilocks zone) which have had pretty rough histories?

pictureofabear 3y ago

"On early Earth, the reaction could have taken place in small pools or lakes of water, the authors said. Large oceans, though, would have probably diluted the concentration of the chemicals." This has interesting implications for possibility of life in places like Enceladus or Europa--places that may not have any isolated areas for these chemicals to interact over long periods of time.

animitronix 3y ago
I'm so glad this has finally been pointed out professionally!! Every time I hear about life on Enceladus or Europa the very first thing I think about is the dilution problem. Maybe in pockets underneath the volcanic vents, but the heat would seem to rule that out, no?
- kadoban 3y ago
  It's pretty hard not to have _some_ capacity to have puddles or pockets of some sort. If nothing else, you can have infiltrates and cavities in rocks or ice, or pools/puddles/lakes on top of frozen areas.

thriftwy 3y ago

What about ATP? We depend on it but it has to come from somewhere. See https://shkrobius.livejournal.com/401292.html https://shkrobius.livejournal.com/401292.html

philsnow 3y ago
not answering your question, but TIL that there are also GTP, UTP, and CTP, having somewhat similar functions, but each fulfilling one or more (much) smaller niches than ATP: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleoside_triphosphate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleoside_triphosphate

taejavu 3y ago

By analogy, amino acids are to proteins what a pile of bricks are to a house. Have we made any progress on figuring out what could have possibly caused the amino acids to become arranged into proteins? If you read between the lines, I know this sounds like an argument for creationism, but it's because I'm an atheist that I find the question so frustrating/compelling.

chimineycricket 3y ago
Even if you had the answer to that question, I think it should not soothe your atheism/creationism concerns. The bigger question would still remain on why anything exists at all.
- david-gpu 3y ago
  > The bigger question would still remain on why anything exists at all. Yet, if nothing existed, there would not be anyone asking the question. This doesn't actually answer the question, but it is funny to think about. Many years ago I read a non-testable hypothesis that stuck with me. What is the simplest, most parsimonious explanation for why this universe exists? The most extreme end of simplicity would be that every self-consistent set of axioms forms the universe that can be derived from it. For example, a universe may exist consisting only of the empty set. Another universe may consist of the natural numbers up to 42. Our universe, with a significantly richer set of axioms, has led to an abundance of the hydrogen atom. And we all know that hydrogen is a colourless gas that, if left to its own devices in sufficient quantity and for long enough, progressively transforms and starts thinking about itself.
  - avandekleut 3y ago
    > if nothing existed, there would not be anyone asking the question This is called the Anthropic Principle. I believe you can take it further, in that universes that develop intelligent life may develop the technological capabilities to create new ones (e.g via powerful colliders).
jryb 3y ago