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Scientists May Have Found How Life Began

Hatuey said:
So much for people being made from ribs and mud.
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If it was spoken figuratively it is right on the money. Fact is we have no idea if it was literal or otherwise.
 
I think this article explains it a tad better: Mystery of how life on Earth began solved by British scientists - Telegraph

Apparently they were able to synthesize two of the four building blocks of RNA (although which two I don't know). To quote Dr. Sutherland, ""We haven't yet made the RNA molecule itself but we've made two of the four sub-units or building blocks. It suggests that making the molecule is possible. The building blocks are strung together and doing that is actually easier than making the building blocks themselves".

Exciting stuff!
 
Singularity said:
I think this article explains it a tad better: Mystery of how life on Earth began solved by British scientists - Telegraph

Apparently they were able to synthesize two of the four building blocks of RNA (although which two I don't know). To quote Dr. Sutherland, ""We haven't yet made the RNA molecule itself but we've made two of the four sub-units or building blocks. It suggests that making the molecule is possible. The building blocks are strung together and doing that is actually easier than making the building blocks themselves".

Exciting stuff!
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This is what I don't agree with. The title is very misleading. They have not solved anything yet. They have good evidence that will hopefully lead them in the right direction, but solved? Not by a long shot.

Yes it is pretty exciting.

This was not an attack on you. Started reading the article and it is excellent so far. I just think the title is misleading.
 
Singularity said:
I think this article explains it a tad better: Mystery of how life on Earth began solved by British scientists - Telegraph

Apparently they were able to synthesize two of the four building blocks of RNA (although which two I don't know). To quote Dr. Sutherland, ""We haven't yet made the RNA molecule itself but we've made two of the four sub-units or building blocks. It suggests that making the molecule is possible. The building blocks are strung together and doing that is actually easier than making the building blocks themselves".

Exciting stuff!
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To make an analogy, they made ethene, RNA is polyethylene. The focus of the study was assembling the monomer in realistic conditions
 
Blackdog said:
This is what I don't agree with. The title is very misleading. They have not solved anything yet. They have good evidence that will hopefully lead them in the right direction, but solved? Not by a long shot.

Yes it is pretty exciting.

This was not an attack on you. Started reading the article and it is excellent so far. I just think the title is misleading.
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No offense taken, I promise! ;)

I don't think it will be solved unless they can synthesize all four building blocks, but synthesizing two of the four under primordial conditions was pretty remarkable. I think they titled the article this way because this illustrates that all four could definitely be synthesized. And again, I think that this could easily go hand-in-hand with one's faith, if they believe that their Creator created all this.

That's my two cents, anyway!
 
Singularity said:
No offense taken, I promise! ;)

I don't think it will be solved unless they can synthesize all four building blocks, but synthesizing two of the four under primordial conditions was pretty remarkable. I think they titled the article this way because this illustrates that all four could definitely be synthesized. And again, I think that this could easily go hand-in-hand with one's faith, if they believe that their Creator created all this.

That's my two cents, anyway!
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Oh I agree as far as faith goes. I looooove science. Don't always agree with findings, but it does not change the fact I love it.
 
Blackdog said:
This is what I don't agree with. The title is very misleading. They have not solved anything yet. They have good evidence that will hopefully lead them in the right direction, but solved? Not by a long shot.

Yes it is pretty exciting.

This was not an attack on you. Started reading the article and it is excellent so far. I just think the title is misleading.
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Of course it is, most of the media is terrible at reporting about scientific studies. This isn't even a new theory, it's just a practical demonstration of one way in which one portion of one step in a theory that was already well respected in the scientific community may occur in nature. In a scientific context it was an important study, but for the public to give it more than a glance the papers and blogs gave it an overblown title.
 
In theory would it be possible to travel far enough away from the earth to actually observe the conditions at the time? Is it even plausible?

I am not quite certain if light ever stops moving so I don't know. For example I think it takes 8 Min's for the light from our sun to reach us. So we are actually seeing the sun as it looked 8 Min's ago.

It gets me as I look through my telescope that I am seeing light that started it's journey in some cases thousands of years ago.
 
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Blackdog said:
In theory would it be possible to travel far enough away from the earth to actually observe the conditions at the time? Is it even plausible?

I am not quite certain if light ever stops moving so I don't know. For example I think it takes 8 Min's for the light from our sun to reach us. So we are actually seeing the sun as it looked 8 Min's ago.

It gets me as I look through my telescope that I am seeing light that started it's journey in some cases thousands of years ago.
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Conditions on early earth are known with varying detail for varying periods of time. Things such as atmospheric composition leave their mark in various ways. Just to name a couple examples, the makeup of the atmosphere has effects on the formation of various rocks and minerals, and by taking samples from deep within glaciers and other large, long-lived bodies of ice scientists can get samples of air and water that have been isolated from the time that they were on the surface long ago.

To answer what you were asking, no. One would have to travel faster than light to catch up to and view the light that was reflected off of early Earth. The only reason that we can see what the universe was like billions of years ago is that we are billions of light years away from the place where said light was emitted.
 
"an RNA-like synthesis took place through a series of chemical reactions and an important intermediate substance"

"an important intermediate substance"=Alien dad stopped the saucer so alien child could pee.
 
What I find more interesting than the discovery is how some people are threatened by intellectual curiosity.
 
So it took this stuff with some of this stuff to make this stuff.

..and what stuff made the first stuff?
..and what stuff made the stuff that made the first stuff?
..down to the stuff that suddenly appeared in what?
..made by what or maybe whom?

Point is science cannot discredit faith anymore then faith can discredit science. They will always co-exist even if science is used by mankind to create on a scale we today would think of as Godly.
My overall point being people should not view things like this as a threat to faith or use them as proof there is a lack of an actual existing reason for that faith.
 
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What I find amusing about the fifteen dozen or so breakthrough "How Life Began©" theories that are published every year, is that they are advanced by people who so rarely appear to engage in life-generating activity.
 
Singularity said:
Scientists May Have Found How Life Began - Science News | Science & Technology | Technology News - FOXNews.com



While this may be controversial among a number of people, it's still very interesting regardless. The publication can be read in the latest issue of Nature or online here: Access : Synthesis of activated pyrimidine ribonucleotides in prebiotically plausible conditions : Nature

I personally believe that faith is different from science, and those who believe can certainly point to their Creator as the ultimate cause for all this. This is certainly no 'smoking gun' against any religious belief, and hopefully will not be taken as an attack against those who are devout.
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Interesting. This is really how good scientific investigation begins. With a hypothesis and a theory. Luckily, this should be something that we will have the technology to test in the future. If these Scientists are right, Man will be able to learn how to create life in a laboratory.
 
obvious Child said:
As a general notion no. But science can discredit specific interpretations of faith.
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True. For example, faith that the Earth is the center of the universe, or that the earth is flat, or that someone can gain magical powers, etc. Any faith in an objective reality can be tested and verified scientifically. It is only those theories and matters of faith that deal with the Metaphysical that cannot be scientifically tested.
 
Burning Giraffe said:
True. For example, faith that the Earth is the center of the universe, or that the earth is flat, or that someone can gain magical powers, etc. Any faith in an objective reality can be tested and verified scientifically. It is only those theories and matters of faith that deal with the Metaphysical that cannot be scientifically tested.
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Well, the exception to that is Young Earth Creationism which would bypass such a problem by citing God's capacity to hide the evidence and plant fake evidence. That of course makes God a liar (and creates a whole slew of bigger theological problems in the process), but it allows YEC to get around the science discrediting it.
 
obvious Child said:
Well, the exception to that is Young Earth Creationism which would bypass such a problem by citing God's capacity to hide the evidence and plant fake evidence. That of course makes God a liar (and creates a whole slew of bigger theological problems in the process), but it allows YEC to get around the science discrediting it.
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Right. Yeah, deception is not a quality I've found to be a characteristic of the divine. It's really quite frustrating when religious people fight science. If God is real then there is no reason to fear the truth.
 
Scientific fact and hypothesis's are worlds apart. The belief in the theory of Divine creation can be made to fit with any hypothesis of evolution from instant primordial creation from and pool of enzymes and acids to evolution from apes. All that is required is an open mind and the faith to believe what ever one wants. It can also be said that way too much time is wasted worrying about and thinking about it when what we should be doing is trying to make the limited time we have as enjoyable as possible while putting an end to human misery where we can. We are never going to be able to talk with a Supreme being directly or find a way to live forever, so let's make the best out of what we can control and or have some real positive effect on, and stop worrying about how we got here and who is right in his or her theory about it. In the end that's all meaningless.
 
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obvious Child said:
As a general notion no. But science can discredit specific interpretations of faith.
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And that's what it's all about isn't it? Science can't explain away everything, but that doesn't matter to you.
 
American said:
And that's what it's all about isn't it? Science can't explain away everything, but that doesn't matter to you.
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What matters to you?

Science and facts have zero political or reigious bias.

2+2=4 is neither pro religion nor anti-religion, even if religion tried to say the answer is 5.

The fact that science continually eats away religious notions seems to bother you quite a bit.
 
Joe1991 said:
The fact that science continually eats away religious notions seems to bother you quite a bit.
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Problem is with older religious text: was it figurative or literal? Of the older religions this is a real issue with translations into and from multiple languages. Not to mention the loss of meaning to words from century's ago.

Then you have the input of man himself and it is a lot more confusing as interpretations very, sometimes wildly.
 
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