Evolution and Creationism

[rossum]

Cytosine is a problem. It readily decomposes under solar UV radiation, which means that prebiotic synthesis should be carried out in the dark.

There is this thing called the sea. The bottom of the sea is dark in deeper waters. Those are where you find hydrothermal vents as well. You might want to do some research on the potential link between hydrothermal vents and abiogenesis.

Did you really not know that sunlight can only penetrate the surface layer of the oceans? Or is it that your creationist sources “forgot” to remind you of that fact?

Whatever site you are copying this chemistry from has led you into error. It is not reliable.

 

[rossum]

NS acting on protein formation? Enlighten me.

You are assuming a protein first process for abiogenesis. That is a minority position.

You appear also to be forgetting the size of the target you want to hit. If you want a protein to perform task X, then one of the (name removed by moderator)uts into your calculations is the number of different proteins that can perform task X. Your calculation appears to be assuming that only 1 single amino acid sequence can do the job. That is not, in general, the case.

With abiogenesis the relevant tasks would have been much simpler than those needed in a complex living organism. With those very simple tasks, many relatively short proteins would have been able to do the job, even if not very well.

Take a task like a ligase: assembling two short strands to make a single longer strand. There are many different possible ligases, some more effective than others. The more effective ones would have an advantage. That is the start of natural selection.

 

[rossum]

Although tiny amounts of some of the right amino acids were made, the conditions set up for the experiment could never have occurred on Earth; for example, any oxygen in the ‘atmosphere’ in the flask would have prevented anything from forming

Your source, which you do not give a reference for, is grossly misinforming you. There was no free oxygen on earth for about the first 2.5 billion years. This is a spurious point apparently intended to fool people who have not heard of the Great Oxidation Event.. I am surprised you did not notice the error before you posted this.

Amino acids, sugars, and many other biochemicals, being 3-dimensional, can usually be in two forms that are mirror images of one another; ‘chirality’.

Now living things are based on biochemicals that are pure in terms of their chirality (homochiral): left-handed amino acids and right-handed sugars, for example. Here’s the problem. Chemistry without enzymes (like the Miller–Urey experiment), when it does anything, produces mixtures of amino acids that are both right-and left-handed.

Yes, this is a real problem. Scientists like to find problems so they can solve them. This one has had a lot of work done on it, and has produced papers like: Noorduin et al (2008) Emergence of a Single Solid Chiral State from a Nearly Racemic Amino Acid Derivative. That is a partial solution to get us chiral amino acids, though not sugars.

Your source appears to be at least twelve years behind the times. That is a long time in science.

 

[buffalo]

You are assuming a protein first process for abiogenesis. That is a minority position.

Hmmmm. story telling.

It is now apparent that natural selection is your god. It can do anything.

 

[buffalo]

There was no free oxygen on earth for about the first 2.5 billion years.

so you say. There is no evidence and is speculation. Over the years there was no oxygen, then there was, now there wasn’t.

 

[Techno2000]

There is this thing called the sea

rossum…you can’t try and extrapolate what goes on now in a rich oceanic ecosystem to what might of happen so-called billions of years ago.

 

[Gigantals]

Forgive me. Earlier in this post I was talking with someone else about chemical evolution; how it had apparently occurred in brackish water near the surface of the sea or in ponds. Which is why I was so focused on that. A lot of people seem to favour this idea over hydrothermal vents.

Researchers in Japan tried to simulate such conditions found in hydrothermal vents in a flow reactor. They circulated 500 ml of a strong solution of glycine (at 0.1 M) through several chambers at a high pressure of 24.0 MPa. The first chamber was heated to 200–250°C; then the liquid was injected at the rate of 8–12 ml/min into a cooling chamber kept at 0 ° C. Then the liquid was depressurised before samples were extracted at various intervals. The whole cycle was completed in 1–1.3 hours. In some of the runs, 0.01 M CuCl2 was added to the 0.1 M glycine solution, which was also acidified to pH 2.5 by HCl at room temperature.

In the tests with copper ions, the Cu2+ ions catalyzed the formation of tetraglycine (with a yield of 0.1%). Even some hexaglycine formed (yield 0.001%). But the product with the highest yield was the cyclic dimer, ‘diketopiperazine’, which peaked at about 1% yield, then dropped.

The concentration of glycine of 0.1 M was far higher than could be expected in a real primordial soup. In reality, prebiotic simulations of glycine production produce far lower yields. Also, any glycine produced would be subject to oxidative degradation in an oxygenic atmosphere. Or else, if there was a primitive oxygen-free atmosphere, the lack of an ozone layer would result in destruction by ultraviolet radiation. Also, adsorption by clays, precipitation or complexation by metal ions, or reactions with other organic molecules would reduce the concentration still further. A more realistic concentration would be 10^–7 M.

While the hydrothermal conditions might be right for this experiment, they would be harmful in the long term to other vital components of life. Polymers are too unstable to exist in a hot prebiotic environment. RNA bases are destroyed very quickly in water at 100°C. Adenine and guanine have half lives of about a year, uracil about 12 years, and cytosine only 19 days. Intense heating also destroys many of the complex amino acids such as serine and threonine. Yet another problem is that the exclusive ‘left-handedness’ required for life is destroyed by this heating. But this was not put to the test because the Japanese team used the simplest amino acid, glycine, which is the only achiral amino acid used in living systems. After designing such an experiment, other amino acids were not tested. The fact that they are all known to undergo various non-peptide bond reactions has surely not escaped the researchers’ attention.

The longest polymer (or rather, oligomer) formed was hexaglycine. Most enzymes, however, have far more than six amino acid residues—usually hundreds. And even the hexaglycine produced was found only in minuscule amounts.

 

[Gigantals]

(Sorry, I ran out of space above)

This experiment gave a simple homo-oligomer. But life requires many polymers in extremely precise sequences of 20 different types of amino acids. Thus these experiments do not offer the slightest explanation for the complex, high-information polymers of living organisms.

The date of the Great Oxidation Event is still being decided.

A report reinforces the idea that the atmosphere contained oxygen well before the GOE, about one billion years before, apparently some 3.46 Ga ago within the evolutionary/uniformitarian timescale. Primary haematite, directly deposited, was found in iron rich sedimentary rocks in northwest Australia dated at apparently 3.46 Ga. Such haematite can form in two ways. In an oxygen-less atmosphere, ultraviolet light reaching the earth’s surface strikes iron hydroxide minerals and triggers a reaction that drives the water away, forming haematite.

However, haematite can also form by the oxidation of iron without ultraviolet light. This is the type of haematite formation claimed for the haematite/chert sedimentary rocks supposedly formed about 3.5 Ga ago. These sedimentary rocks were sandwiched between two thick volcanic layers (greater than 3 km) that strongly suggest they were formed in deep water, at least 200 m, and possibly up to 1,000 m, deep. This deduction was based on:

1. the lack of erosion surfaces in the rocks,
2. the absence of textures from waves or currents,
3. the lack of features associated with subaerial volcanism,
4. the lack of bubbles in the volcanic rocks suggesting the layers all formed under high water pressure, and
5. the virtual absence of aerosols, detrital minerals, and volcanic ash.

So, if there was oxygen in the seawater to form haematite, there was also oxygen in the atmosphere:

Pushing back an oxygen atmosphere by a billion years also pushes back the evolution of photosynthetic bacteria a billion years or more, since evolutionists believe the oxygen had to come from these bacteria. This result does not leave much time for the supposed evolution of these complex bacteria.

Furthermore, the haematite was in the form of single crystals indicating that they were not made by ultraviolet light. The researchers go on to say that geochemical analysis of the haematite crystals suggests that they formed at temperatures greater than 60°C from hydrothermal discharges rich in ferrous iron that spewed into cooler oxygenated waters.

 

[rossum]

There is no evidence and is speculation. Over the years there was no oxygen, then there was, now there wasn’t.

Yes, there is evidence. Some minerals cannot form in the presence of oxygen; we find those minerals in early rocks. The banded iron formations are also evidence. The reason for the appearance of oxygen is the evolution of photosynthesis. One of the byproducts of photosynthesis is oxygen. Your assumptions about science are wrong, buffalo.

 

[rossum]

rossum…you can’t try and extrapolate what goes on now in a rich oceanic ecosystem to what might of happen so-called billions of years ago.

I can do better than a literal reading of a late Bronze Age text, especially when I am assisted by scientific research. Have you tried reading about hydrothermal vents?

 

[rossum]

Earlier in this post I was talking with someone else about chemical evolution; how it had apparently occurred in brackish water near the surface of the sea or in ponds. Which is why I was so focused on that. A lot of people seem to favour this idea over hydrothermal vents.

Yes, abiogenesis is still a work in progress. A number of different hypotheses have been proposed, and science is in the process of knocking them down, if possible. Once the number has been reduced to a few reasonably compatible hypotheses then an overall theory of abiogenesis becomes a possibility. Until then we just have to wait and collect more data.

Evolution is a well established theory. Abiogenesis has not yet advanced to the stage of even a preliminary theory.

 

[Techno2000]

reading about hydrothermal vents?

Yes, I know that they are interconnected to a well established complex ecosystem…which is the opposite of a barren wasteland that was the Earth of four billion years ago.

 

[Freddy]

Freddy:

what you consider the alternative …

An alternative to what? You posted an act of faith. Faith is subjective. I can’t argue with how you feel. Get back to me when you have a factual and rational argument that macroevolution is a scientific hypothesis. Cut the deflections, Fred. Try to start cutting the mustard, instead.

You seem to be missing something. You (and Buff and the usual suspects) spend all your time decrying evolution. You spend all your time saying ‘this is wrong…that’s nonsense…that can’t work’. Ad nauseum. Although to be fair, Buff does propose his views on what the alternatives might be.

So you know what is being proposed as you spend all your time rejecting it. So please, no bulldust about needing to know what everyone else is actually proposing. You spend all your time denying what’s being explained to you.

So we know that you don’t think that macroevolution takes place. We know that you don’t think it’s a scientifically valid proposal. OK, we get that despite all the explanations. And we know you’re going to reject any further explanations so it’s a waste of time repeating them.

What we don’t know, you having rejected all explananations offered, is what YOUR explanation is. And this has been asked I don’t know how many times. Bit all we get is ‘well, what’s your best shot…what’s your definition of science…what’s your proof for macroevolution’.

Good heavens above, it’s been given over thousands of posts. Literally thousands. And how many posts have we had where you give your version?

None.

 

[Freddy]

Thank you for correcting that, I misread what you put up.

But due to RNA being more unstable than DNA, would it not be less likely that it could create such large structures? The sheer problems required for it to even form…

1. First…

You’ll find that it’s good form to use quotes when you cut and paste from someone else’s work. And to reference the original author. Not to do so when you are putting papers forward for your geology exams will get you into very serious trouble. Might be an idea to start now.

So can you let everyone know where you got those arguments from?

Likewise this one:

I believe they all do, except for part of 15; since both require the formation of one strand before DNA requires the second complementary one.

Cytosine

Cytosine is a problem…

Whatever site you are copying this chemistry from has led you into error. It is not reliable.

Creationist sites never are. We await Raul’s confirmation that he is indeed simply cutting and pasting large chunks of information from said sites and using them as his arguments.

 

[Noose001]

Hence the RNA world hypothesis of abiogenesis. Neither DNA nor proteins are required, just active RNA chains: ribozymes.

We have Physico-chemical processes and Bio-chemical processes.

You might also want to know what life means because whatever process happens in a living organism are what we call Biochemical processes; they are life driven, purposeful and timely meaning that they have a life clock on their side.

Chemicals reacting (Physico-chemical) in a lifeless setting will never become alive in a Trillion years. It is easier for a dead body to resurrect than an RNA or a non living thing to become alive.

 

[rossum]

Yes, I know that they are interconnected to a well established complex ecosystem…which is the opposite of a barren wasteland that was the Earth of four billion years ago.

They supply the energy to run an ecosystem, which also means that they are one of the potential points where the energy to start life, abiogenesis, was available.

 

[rossum]

We have Physico-chemical processes and Bio-chemical processes.

You might also want to know what life means because whatever process happens in a living organism are what we call Biochemical processes; they are life driven, purposeful and timely meaning that they have a life clock on their side.

Chemicals reacting (Physico-chemical) in a lifeless setting will never become alive in a Trillion years. It is easier for a dead body to resurrect than an RNA or a non living thing to become alive.

Vitalism was shown to be wrong back in the nineteenth century. The chemistry of life is just that: chemistry.

 

[Techno2000]

Techno2000:

Yes, I know that they are interconnected to a well established complex ecosystem…which is the opposite of a barren wasteland that was the Earth of four billion years ago.

They supply the energy to run an ecosystem, which also means that they are one of the potential points where the energy to start life, abiogenesis, was available.

rossum…there are a million other things involved in an ecosystem, the food chain works from the top down…not the bottom up.Everything had to be put place first for it to work in perfect harmony.

 

[Gigantals]

LET’S PLAY A GAME

(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

When genes are transcribed into a chain of amino acids to become a protein, there are occasional errors. Now that you’ve successfully found the original genome, how many mutations can you find?

10 points for each mutation found!

Notice that thanks to the fact that some codons can code for the same amino acid, isn’t it fortunate that the overall protein isn’t affected (multiple variations of the same word) and functions normally?

When trying to assemble previous pieces (of the argument) myself, even with a template (the site), there were multiple errors in the final piece that confused many who looked over it. So I instead spliced part of the genome (during the replication process, so there’s still a completed genome back in its location) to remove all possible transcription errors for it to be looked at in this lab (civilised forum) here.LET’S PLAY A GAME
When genes are transcribed into a chain of amino acids to become a protein, there are occasional errors. Now that you’ve successfully found the original genome, how many mutations can you find?
10 points for each mutation found!

Notice that thanks to the fact that some codons can code for the same amino acid, isn’t it fortunate that the overall protein isn’t affected (multiple variations of the same word) and functions normally?

When trying to assemble previous pieces (of the argument) myself, even with a template (the site), there were multiple errors in the final piece that confused many who looked over it. So I instead spliced part of the genome (during the replication process, so there’s still a completed genome back in its location) to remove all possible transcription errors for it to be looked at in this lab (civilised forum) here.

 

[Gigantals]

I just want to publicly thank Freddy here for being extremely responsible on this forum, by reminding us that we all need to remember to reference our work (and hunting down our source when we forget to).

If you wish to know where I got these completely neutral scientific answers from (you can read it over if you want; I only used the information that didn’t mention ‘God’, ‘Creationism’, and I think I left ‘evolution’ out too) without using any personal ‘conclusory’ interpretations here; then here’s the link:

https://creation.com/

They currently do a much better job at referencing than me, so feel free to check out those references.

Thing is, to make a judgement about Creationist sites before even reading what they put forward isn’t the best option you can make. You ask for grounding for our arguments against evolution, but you’ll need to read them at least before complaining about it (most people don’t which is why there are a lot of misconceptions about us). I’m not foolish enough to assume that there isn’t a single drop of information on an atheistic science site (I mean come on, we both usually use the same evidence with different interpretations).

That list? Came from here: Cairns-Smith, A.G., Genetic Takeover: And the Mineral Origins of Life, Cambridge University Press, 1982. The only thing they changed was adding a list formatting.

That quote used against me is taken out of context. I was questioning the concepts of one theory, and had yet to focus on an alternate theory (I had been focusing on abiogenesis in shallow brackish water, and had yet to focus on hydrothermal vents).

So what now? Will you investigate the results? Or will you throw a tarp over this argument and pretend it doesn’t exist? If this is a weed, then you must be really looking forward to watching it grow and kill your flowerbed.

This is a Catholic Apologetics site, surely we should all know by now that when it comes to theological or scientific debates, you’ll need to do more than just push your side across? You’ll need to undermine the other’s perspective to make it collapse. Which is why attacking a Creationist site (in this case, a messenger) will not achieve anything. Why do you think I’ve been spouting science since you put your scientific evidence into play? I may not be smart enough to end this debate in one move, but you’re certainly teaching me how to lock horns.