What is the origin of life on Earth?

[valich]

No reason at all really why complex hydrocarbons can't be formed out there and collected up by passing bodies and so forth - but then you've got here and how the Earth was back then and if you could find a greater antithesis from the conditions such deposited materials would be finding themselves introduced to you'd have to be looking at the surface of a star.

Not quite that extreme I know but really not all that far off.

Processes tempered in that actual fire of that far back giving rise to ever more increasing complexity on the otherhand... It just strikes me that only something forged here would have any possibility of enduring, unless the planet underwent a global cooling off point considerably earlier than anyone currently imagines...

You're pissing me off too by not being straight forward in your communication abilities. Theres no reason at all why complex hydrocarbons can't be formed here on Earth. So what's your point?

What greater "antithesis" do you propose. Your not talking in the same language terminology as is used in a biology forum. Do you know what the meaning of "antithesis" is? It implies an initial thesis, and you haven't made that thesis clear except for referring to "how the earth was back then and if you could find a greater antithesis from the conditions such deposited materials would be finding themselves introduced to you'd have to be looking at the surface of a star ." You're grammar is so out of whack that your meaning is incomprehensible!

Then you state: "that actual fire of that far back giving rise to ever more increasing complexity." In clearer terms, what you mean is that the origin of life were thermophiles? Then you state: "something forged"? Are we talking about iron or bronze swords?

 

[Ophiolite]

Mr Anonymous, I had no trouble following your thesis. I don't, as you know, agree with it, but you make pertinent points. Your style is occasionaly florid and a tad contrived, but preferable to vacuous drivel. And of course the content is always interesting. As we both know valich has repeatedly displayed comprehension problems to the point I suspect dyslexia as a minimimum and autism as a possibility.
I subscribe more and more to the notion he is a troll - really, nobody could be that thick. I think shall send him a truly offensive pm, then pop him on ignore.

Oh, and valich, you asked, "Theres no reason at all why complex hydrocarbons can't be formed here on Earth. So what's your point?"
His point is "Theres no reason at all why complex hydrocarbons can't be formed here on Earth." He makes it clearly. He makes it succinctly. He makes it with some nice poetic effects. As usual you are incapable of understanding.

 

[valich]

Okay, now I understand. His thesis IS that complex hydrocarbons can be formed on Earth, although he doesn't state it as such. And he is suggesting that a possible antithesis would be extraterrestrial. But he restricts this antithesis to "stars" by stating, "you'd HAVE to be looking at the surface of a star." This makes his point unclear, confusing, and open to multiple interpretations.

 

[spuriousmonkey]

Weird that we all got exactly what he was saying except you. And you still don't quite get it.

 

[Mr Anonymous]

Mmmmm, well. I did suggest he try putting on his reading glasses. Possibly he didn't have them on when I suggested it. Could explain a far bit....

Oh, and Ophiolte? Your terribly kind. Thank you once more for abundant generosity.

Perhaps, if I may suggest, we consider withdrawing for the time being from this "discussion" until Valich can locate his nearest optometrist at his earliest convienience, perhaps our time may be less abusively spent elsewhere...

Drinks on me down in Pseudoscience, anyone?

 

[valich]

Welcome back! I don't think it's my blind eye that gets in the way: it's more the rapidity of the neurons firing away inside my brain, converging on so many divergent subject matters and states of simultaneous analyses that are constanly going on. So much to learn: so little time.

 

[Mr Anonymous]

Well, have a good old sort through of where it is your wanting to go with this thing Val' and perhaps we can all pick it up again when your ready.

Mine's a pint, by the way. Of rum....

 

[valich]

Valich.... For the love of Puppies will you.....No reason at all really why complex hydrocarbons can't be formed out there and collected up by passing bodies and so forth - but then you've got .....Processes tempered in that actual fire of that far back giving rise to ever more increasing complexity on the otherhand... It just strikes me that only something forged here would have any possibility of enduring, unless the planet underwent a global cooling off point considerably earlier than anyone currently imagines...

I LOVE PUPPIES!!! So the next pint of rum is on me! Want to do drink it in the Bahamas?

The introduction of hydrocarbons into the equation is important because the amount of energy to form hydrogen bonds is near nill, but more important is that the amount of energy to form hydrocarbon bonds is also extremely small compared to that of the twenty essential amino acids and other proteins (usually calculated in kcal/mol). So the formation of hydrocarbons should be the first essential building block? I'm speculating here.

But you have to explain to me what you mean by "forged" - the initial organic compound? And why you need to postulate a "global cooling point" at all in relation to the first organic organisms?

I'm still wiping away the dust from my blind eyes.

 

[valich]

- Archaeans dine on a variety of substances for energy, including hydrogen gas, carbon dioxide and sulfur. One type of salt-loving archaean uses sunlight to make energy, but not the way plants do it. This archaean has a light-harvesting pigment in the membrane surrounding its cell. This pigment, called bacteriorhodopsin , reacts with light and enables the cell to make ATP, an energy molecule.

- A recent article in Astrobiology Magazine (May 19, 2004) by Leslie Mullen reports that halobacteria may be the oldest life form on earth. Comparisons of small ribosomal RNA sequences indicate that halophilic bacteria are closely related to the methanogens. Halophiles need oxygen while methanogens are anaerobic; however, halophiles can produce energy without oxygen in two ways: from the degradation of arginine, and by using the photosynthetic molecule bacteriorhodopsin). It has been suggested that these two methods of anerobic energy production are the last remnants from the halophile's anaerobic ancestry....Another survival adaptation of extreme halophiles is their exceptional resistance to solar radiation.

- Endoliths can survive by feeding on traces of iron, potassium, or sulfur. As water and nutrients are rather sparse, endoliths have a very slow procreation cycle. Early data suggests that some only engage in cell division once every hundred years. As most endoliths are autotroph, they can generate organic compounds essential for their survival on their own from inorganic matter.

- The most recent view is that the first cells on earth might have been extreme thermophiles.

- Archaeal photosynthesis - the earliest photosynthetic organisms lived in an anaerobic atmosphere.

Hydrocarbons are no problem, nor are amino acids as proved by Miller/Urey with methane (CH4), ammonia (NH3), hydrogen (H2), and water (H2O). So we have to find the "missing link" to thermophiles or halophiles.

 

[invert_nexus]

Mr. Anonymous,

...unless the planet underwent a global cooling off point considerably earlier than anyone currently imagines...

Funny you should mention this. It's now conjectured that oceans might have formed as early as 200 million years after the formation of the earth. Zircon crystals have been found in the Jack Hills of Australia that date back to 4.3 billion years ago. The conditions required to form those crystals are much cooler than what is thought. (I believe I've already mentioned this in this thread. I guess I can't blame you for not reading through the thread as I was talking more about justification of knowledge than biology per se. Maybe you'll read it this time though... Fingers crossed.)

By the way, I'll also admit that the grammar you've used is a touch on the slippery side. Not so slippery that I can't make out our general idea, but the nuances are a bit more difficult to grasp.

"but then you've got here and how the Earth was back then and if you could find a greater antithesis from the conditions such deposited materials would be finding themselves introduced to you'd have to be looking at the surface of a star."

The above being a touch on the difficult side to comprehend. However, after a few readthroughs I think I get it. You're comparing the Earth back then (the Hadean conjecture) with the surface of the Sun. Saying that only the surface of the sun could be more hell-like and less likely to be a medium which said hydrocarbons could survive.

I'd say that antithesis is a bit of a poor word choice. Or perhaps its merely my usage of the word. If you're calling the Earth's surface at that time hellish, then its antithesis would be... like today's Earth. Wouldn't it? The surface of a star would be more along the lines of a hyperbole of the surface at the time (conjectured.)

 

[valich]

"We perform protein engineering augmented by knowledge derived from structures determined by x-ray crystallography, computational homology modeling, rapid protein characterization, and structure/function relationship analyses to create new products.

We have determined over 100 structures for different enzymes including proteases, lipases, amylases and cellulases, some at ultrahigh (0.78 Å) resolution. From these we have understood protein fold, modifications that the protein undergoes after its initial formation, the substrate-binding site, the catalytic site, as well as the overall substrate-binding cleft and used this detailed understanding to obtain desired characteristics in our products. For example, we have produced alpha amylases with increased stability, altered calcium-binding properties and improved low pH performance."

Genecor International Homepage
http://www.genencor.com/wt/gcor/design

 

[invert_nexus]

Valich,

You're doing it again. I fail to see what relevance that link has to anything. What it seems to say to me is that they're studying protein folding and that their understanding is getting better and better as time goes on.

What does this have to do with the topic exactly?

Have you ever tried protein folding yourself? Well. Not yourself. But, there is a sitcky in this subforum about protein folding at home. I spent some time donating my computers to it. I think that it contributed to the demise of my laptop (wonder if I could sue Berkely?)

Our understanding of protein's tertiary structures is really reaching a critical mass right now.

However, just when we begin to understand proteins so well, we're being made aware that proteins aren't the end-all and be-all of gene expression that we once thought. RNA serves more of a regulatory function than was ever believed. And then there are epigenetic factors which also come into play.

Sort of ironic.
However, it simply means that there's always more to learn and this is encouraging rather than discouraging.

Remember how I asked you about Popper before? Popper equates science not to learning of facts or coming up with predictions, but with solving of problems. And solving problems effectively inevitably leads us to the understanding that there are ever greater problems to solve.

 

[valich]

Our understanding of protein's tertiary structures is really reaching a critical mass right now.

However, just when we begin to understand proteins so well, we're being made aware that proteins aren't the end-all and be-all of gene expression that we once thought. RNA serves more of a regulatory function than was ever believed. And then there are epigenetic factors which also come into play.

Sort of ironic. However, it simply means that there's always more to learn and this is encouraging rather than discouraging.

"Directed Evolution is a relatively new field which is gaining significant attention recently. This is largely due to important implications of the results of this research to basic science of evolution....The use of methods of Directed Evolution allow researchers to improve and "direct" such important biotechnological processes as biocatalysis. In addition, Directed Evolution allows scientists to address fundamental questions of adaptation, enzyme function and evolution.....Work on the creation of novel primer design strategies results in significant enhancement of the technique of PCR (polymerase chain reactions) and allows to dramatically augment the efficiency of the creation of synthetic genes"

The Bioinformatics Center at Rensselaer and Wadswort www.bioinfo.rpi.edu/research/directed_evolution.html
(lots of related web links)

I'm posting foundations of what we know. You're not providing any new information or discoveries that we can progress on to add to the cumulative information that we can build on from here.

 

[valich]

"global cooling" Funny you should mention this. It's now conjectured that oceans might have formed as early as 200 million years after the formation of the earth. Zircon crystals have been found in the Jack Hills of Australia that date back to 4.3 billion years ago. The conditions required to form those crystals are much cooler than what is thought. (I believe I've already mentioned this in this thread. I guess I can't blame you for not reading through the thread as I was talking more about justification of knowledge than biology per se. Maybe you'll read it this time though... Fingers crossed.)

By the way, I'll also admit that the grammar you've used is a touch on the slippery side. Not so slippery that I can't make out our general idea, but the nuances are a bit more difficult to grasp.e more along the lines of a hyperbole of the surface at the time.

I don't think you have any problem with my grammar, but because I type so fast with one hand I often make spelling errors that I don't realize until after posting. Sorry.

Crystal replication is not organic, but the process behind it is equally intriguing, and I would think that the process behind would have sometype of relation to RNA transcription and translation? Don't know.

 

[invert_nexus]

Valich,

I don't think you have any problem with my grammar, but because I type so fast with one hand I often make spelling errors that I don't realize until after posting. Sorry.

Umm. I was talking to Anonymous, actually. Sorta defending you on your miscomprehension of what he said about antithesis and all.

Funny. I defend your lack of understanding and you fail to understand my defense...
Muaha!
Seriously.
You seem to have problems grasping language at times. Perhaps this also lies at the heart of our interpretation of your own words.

Crystal replication is not organic, but the process behind it is equally intriguing, and I would think that the process behind would have sometype of relation to RNA transcription and translation? Don't know.

Yeesh.
I was telling Anonymous about zircon crystals being 4.3 billion years old which pushes ocean formation back about a half a billion years. This was specifically in regards to his conjecture that the early Earth was too hellish for these hydrocarbons supplied from space (conjectured) to stick around long before being denatured by the hellish conditions.

I wasn't talking about crystal replication...

I'm posting foundations of what we know. You're not providing any new information or discoveries that we can progress on to add to the cumulative information that we can build on from here.

Ok. If you want to.
I don't really see the relevance of this latest abstract either.
You've got a weird style, my man. Sure are handy searching for abstracts though...

Edit: There. I've edited my above post to show that I'm speaking to Anonymous. I usually do this, but neglected it in this instance because I thought the quote could be easily seen as coming from his post... I've gotten sloppy myself. I'll make sure that I address my posts better from now on. (Gotta give you all the help I can. Heh.)


Edit again:
Heh. You know. This is a really outrageous thought. But, for some reason, this constant state of not quite understanding simple statements is bringing to mind the Turing Test. If this is the case then... bravo. You'd have to be the best AI I've seen.

 

[valich]

"By constructing the evolutionary histories of today's proteins we have learned that they are highly adaptable molecules, at least on evolutionary time scales. Well illustrated by the panoply of enzymes catalyzing very different reactions that have evolved divergently from a common ancestral protein of the same general structure, acquiring diverse capabilities by processes of random mutation, recombination, and natural selection. We also know that enzymes sharing a common function (for example, all catalyzing a particular step in a metabolic pathway) in addition to three-dimensional structure can exhibit widely different properties (stability, solubility, tolerance to pH, etc.) depending on where they are found."
"DIRECTED ENZYME EVOLUTION," by Frances H. Arnold www.che.caltech.edu/groups/fha/

 

[valich]

The point is, we have gone from hydrocarbons to amino acids to proteins, to proteins with enzymes and catalysts, but we still have that missing jump/link to organic thermophile or halophile bacterium.

 

[cyber_indian]

Hydrocarbons are no problem, nor are amino acids as proved by Miller/Urey with methane (CH4), ammonia (NH3), hydrogen (H2), and water (H2O). So we have to find the "missing link" to thermophiles or halophiles.

What's up with hydrocarbons and you ... you both in love ?
Missing link methanogens ... missing enough

 

[valich]

What's up with hydrocarbons and you ... you both in love ?
Missing link methanogens ... missing enough

Read the above postings! This was brought up by Mr. Anonymous, not me!

 

[Ophiolite]

This is a really outrageous thought. But, for some reason, this constant state of not quite understanding simple statements is bringing to mind the Turing Test. If this is the case then... bravo. You'd have to be the best AI I've seen.

I still have him on ignore, but by AI I take it you mean Artificial Ignorance.