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N&PD Moderators: Skorpio
Why cant you make life ?
- Thread starter webbykevin
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webbykevin
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23536
Bluelight Crew
How do you synthesize a ribosome from scratch? It seems that would be the rate-limiting step. Unless they find another way for the cell to assemble its own proteins.
23536
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webbykevin
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Hyperthesis
Bluelighter
...which is blatant nonsense! The fusion of a sperm cell with an ovum does not pose creation of life but is merely just another cellular transformation, one out of many in living nature. Therefore, a novel creation of life per definition demands the conversion of non-living matter into living one. For this topic I refer to post #2 & #24.
23536
Bluelight Crew
I'll repeat, though, that in order for life to be synthesized from non-life, you have to assemble the machinery that assembles proteins, and those machinery are themselves proteins. Start with ribosomes, for instance:
How do you assemble something as complex as a ribosome without enlisting the help of yeast or bacteria? And once you do enlist their help, is the product no longer synthetic?
P A
Bluelighter
And to further the previous analogy: How would one go about assembling a streamlined, fully-functional automobile without the aid of raw material foundries and, whats more, the complex machinery of the assembly line? Beakers and test tubes can only proffer so much if one wants to initiate repetitive, self-sustaining signaling cascades and independent protein synthesis in a laboratory.Last edited:
Altered Perception
Bluelighter
Because thats the defining line between religion and science.
Hyperthesis
Bluelighter
The (mammalian) ribosom consists of a large and a small subunit, each one consisting of several separate protein- and RNA-chains (large subunit: 49 proteins, 3 RNAs; small subunit 33 proteins, 1 RNA). See e.g. Structure 16, 535–548, April 2008 for further details.235360287471352662 said:
Both proteins and RNA can be synthesized with purely chemical means (i.e. literally in vitro): RNA is accessible with chain lenghts of up to 20-40.000 base pairs by using PCR. Proteins are accessible by automated synthesis. Chain lenghts of 300 amino acids and more are offered regularly by synthesis-on-demand companies; if higher chain lenghts are required then it's possible to prepare several smaller chains first and assemble then at a later stage. I admit, the correct folding and assembly is problematic, but there are several working groups who research this problem and I'm convinced that this will be solved in the future.
PCR is technically not a purely synthetic method, as it relies on the usage of enzymes, which have to be isolated from other living organisms first, but for the ones who insist, this 'problem' can be avoided by using other RNA synthesis methods (more complicated, even higher costs, but not impossible). The entire process is extremely costly if one aims at preparing only microgram-amounts, but technically it is possible. And I think as soon as the folding-problem is overcome, somebody will try it.
As Vecktor said earlier, viruses are already synthetically available. This is the very first step in the novel creation of life. Once you have created the most simply procaryont from scratch you can use this one to build more complicated ones. As these successor rely all on a synthetical organism, they would count as "man-made", too.
Oxycondone
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Computers will be the first to synthesise intelligent life, and they will turn against us and it will be terminator/battlestar gallactica all over again.biocloudy
Bluelighter
Life.. us biochemists/biologist types cant even agree what life is.
For me, the Stanley Miller-Urey experiment answers this question. They were able to synthesise 11 amino acids, given enough time and activity the rest likely could be made. IMHO, that's life, its created in the lab for less then a few hundred dollars. Although I personally do not subscribe to some peoples interpretation that this is "how life got here". I personally find the data from the NASA stardust mission to be more compelling finding Glycine (an amino acid) out in the dust of a comet.
I highly recommend taking general biology (usually split into two semesters) as your nearest centre of learning even if its a community college. You'll really enjoy it.
webbykevin
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that is exactly what i am about to do, I figured general biology would be a good place to start....
Bluelighter
2nd year or so, try taking a physiology type course in which you get to dissect humans. Some universities won't feature this, though they should. It seems like learning spikes when you get some hands-on experience with your own species.averagetool
Greenlighter
There is only one form of life on this planet. DNA. It chooses to express itself in many ways.
negrogesic
Bluelight Crew
Many years ago I tried to use a Bayesian probability model to determine the probability of the formation of a simple dipeptide (and yes electronegative variables can only be assumed, again this is why I used a Bayesian assumption).
I am by no means a master mathematician or statistician, but I gathered all the many variables known and inferred (obviously I had to use a computer due to the amount of data), and I came up with a probability that was something to the effect of 1: e10 x 10^44 power. That odds of such a huge number occurring spontaneously is mind numbing.
Now, the "universe", by the most modern estimate years is a around 13.6 billion years old, give or take a hundred million years. The earth is around a mere 4.5 billion years old, give or take up to around 90 millions years (likely not 90s million years). These are from what I remember, they may have changed since last year, my numbers might be off a little, but its largely irrelevant.
If my calculations were even remotely accurate, that would still mean that ~ e10 x 10^44 is a number so enormous, that even if one were to assume the universe is actually 14 billion years old, not enough time has elapsed to make even the random, non-theistic formation of a simple dipeptide probabilistically statistically significant and is highly improbable. And yes we know of infinity, and yes, 0 x infinity would equal zero, but on a more abstract level, 0 on its own is potentially infinite.
If my calculations were even remotely accurate, that would still mean that e10 x 10^44 (even with a massive standard error, and large deviations) is a number so enormous, that if one were to assume the universe is actually 14 billion years old, STILL not enough time has elapsed to make even the random, non-theistic formation of a simple dipeptide probabilistically extremely implausible. Since we know of infinity (mathematically), we must realize that anything is technically possible.
Is it possible that life formed on its own, yes; but is it probable? No, not really. This would in turn mean that there is some sort of intelligent design involved, anyone who has experience with a PCR and has peeked into a genome will can see that evolution is of an other worldly design, and metaphysics are really the only plausible answer of which I am capable of comprehending.
Does this mean there is a puppeteer in the voids of space and time, probabilistically, this is seems likely (the alternative, atheism is a religion in of in itself, and anyone who denies the POSSIBILITY of intelligent design is either delusion or uneducated .
Does evolution exist; yes, I do not "believe" in evolution, it has nothing do with belief I have witnessed it with my own eyes in a laboratory setting. So what can be said of "God"......metaphysics is over my head.....and I am not going to propagate ideas that I myself am not aware. "Beliefs" cannot be proved or disproved by science, and they should remain separate.
I hear evangelistic Christians, some Doctors of Theology, spew ignorance, and denounce evolution when they have not even read the "Original of Species". I also hear them say that Muslims are evil and haters of Christians; have the not read the Koran? Of all the major religions outside of Christianity, Islam speaks directly, by name, of "Jesus Christ", a fellow prophet of the God of Abraham (Allah) and consider him a supernatural man of great importance and holiness. If you read the bible closely, in Romans, it actually describes evolution rather specifically.
People should NOT speak of things of which there are ignorant, and if Christianity is perhaps the "way", I believe the Christian church is in need of a SECOND reformation. It is sickening to see all these Christians, proud and self-righteous, with closed minds and full of hate. They "pick and choose" certain verses from the bible, but most have not read it cover to cover. I am reading it again in its entirety, for what will be the 7th time I have done so. I also read (in its entirety) the Koran, the book of Mormon (this is SERIOUSLY flawed, it makes no sense and the text seems to be written by someone with a mental illness).
While I have not read the many far eastern books in their entirety (there are ALOT of books) I did read the various nonsense written by the perverted, mentally-ill L. Ron Hubbard, who interesting personally amassed hundreds of millions of dollars through Scientology, and I have read the Talmud in its entirely, but especially in the mystic Kabbalah, it seems to suggest dualism.
Polytheism or dualism seem to (for me) inherently illogical; if there is a God, why would there be competing or "evil" Gods. I am not a theologian so I can say anything with surety. Here is a glimpse of his reasoning.
If you are interesting in probabilities look at the following Bayesian deduction:
I cannot honestly say I am a christian, I am stuck in agnosticism, because I cannot scientifically deny a possibility.
atara
Bluelighter
I don't know how to make life, but I do know how to make DEAD.
Hyperthesis
Bluelighter
Bullshit! DNA per se is not alive but just a very large double-helix polymer.
I have not seen your calculation but I'm convinced the approach is flawed from the very beginning. And in contrary to subjective 'believing' is this assumption based on experimental evidence and objective logic, IMHO still the best ways to prove a theory.
First, it is hardly possible to perform such a calculation because many variables are not all known. Second, there were numerous experiments published during the last decades that showed succesfully that under the conditions of the very early Earth it was indeed possible that small molecules are formed, including amino acids, simple lipids, nucleic acids and sugars. Look up Miller & Urey! And this includes simple dipeptides, too. If this impressive evidence proves something than its that your calculation must be wrong.
You summarized in short and very eloquently what humans are not able to comprehend for hundreds of years, that is: This universe, our planet and the life on it can not be explained in simple terms. This is really nothing personal, please don't me wrong here, but only because you are not capable of comprehending how e.g. life evolved - than this means nothing. I have a vague idea but in the end I can not imagine it, too. The human mind, at least of the vast majority of our specimen, is simply not able to grasp complex constructs like the creation of life, the dimensions of our universe or what "time" means (in physical terms), just to cite some of the main riddles of modern times. To assume that - therefore - some kind of intelligent design must have been evolved is nothing else than to surrender to the mind-baffling complexity of nature/the universe/call it as you like.
Woooooow... now that is some heavy stuff. One of the most common misconceptions (usually of religious people) is to sort atheism into the multitude of other religions. This is so entirely wrong, it simply defies description. Atheism is not just another religion on its own, but the absence resp. denial of religion!!! Thus, it represents the counterpart to all other religions, and does not dwell amongst their ranks.
It is neither delusional nor uneducated to deny the existence of any supernatural being, may it be elves, fairies, ghosts or Mr. God himself. It is rather the thoughtful choice pro science and sanity, and contra biased dogmas, supernatural explanations of all kinds and simply unprovable rubbish.
The Bible can be taken at most, very much like the Thora, the Koran or any other 'holy' book or writing, as an abstract code of ethics and moral beliefs (many of them highly questionable and/or obsolete), interspersed with some historical details. Personally, I consider it nothing else than a book of fairytales for folks whos can not stand the complexity of this universe resp. the part which science has discovered to date. Yes: SCIENCE! The 'church' of atheists like me.
Come on, please don't try to preach to same bullshit-elitism to us like all major religions. How can every religion seriously try make people believe that all other believes must be wrong to some extend, and that there's only one truth?! Why is the book of Mormon flawed but the Bible is not? Both were created by men, written by men and are propagated by men. How come that one can claim the ultimate truth when there is no objective evidence for either belief? Literally every holy book is interlaced with political, ethnical (sometimes even racist) and moral standards of the times when it was written. If I had to decide for any of these writings, I surely preferred a more modern piece and not one that propagates the dealth penalty for adultery or homosexuality or for believing in another religion, cruel punishments like stoning; or that forbids the use of condoms and contraceptives despite >7 billion humans on this planet, ca. 33 millions of them bearing HIV. WTF?!
