one tiny ameoba

Origins of Text Deep Background 1 Origins of Life

Before this can go any further it's necessary (well, that's a matter of opinion but I'm in charge) to discuss some origins issues. Starting way way back...

Discussing the origins of life is tricky stuff. I'm always reminded of Bugs Bunny, you know, "one tiny ameoba..." There are three basic theories on where life came from:

1. Inexplicable divine intervention. Well, maybe inexplicable is not a term all so called Creationsists would agree with. The point is, and despite arguments to the contrary, at the point you bring an omnipotent deity or pantheistic life force into the picture, you've left the realms of science. This is not a value judgement. I am scientifically trained but I am also quite religious (although some of my views are considered heretical by various churches). Science is a discipline of knowledge and one of its accepted tenants is that that which is not subject to testable theorization, a category under which the concept of God certainly falls, cannot be addressed by scientific consideration. This doesn't stop anyone trying but there it is. Anyway, you get the picture: preexistant First Cause-type entity, hoodoo magic and there's life. Unsearchable, paths beyond tracing out, etc.

2. Life arose from undirected chemical/physical interactions occuring naturally because of the environmental conditions that existed in an as-yet undetermined point in the geological history of the Earth. That's a moderately scientific hypothesis: It can't really be proven, few statements about the extremely remote past can. But if it could be shown that there are processes by which protean life forms and subsequent primitive unicellular organisms are formed which are consistent with the established prinicples of physical and organic chemistry and with what knowledge we posess about the conditions of early Earth, I think most scientists would view this as an acceptable proof. It should be noted that science has not yet acheived this, or even close. At best, inquiry along these lines has not excluded the spontaneous generation of living constructs from a nonliving material matrix. The questions of the mechanisms of formation of living systems is very much an open one and a matter of debate. The reason most scientists and most people who believe in science take this relatively unsupported view for granted is because they just can't come up with a more reasonable explanation. And that's okay, its an Occam's Razor sort of solution. For now.

3. Life arrived from an extraterrestrial source. This is not, as some would contend, an unscientific theory. Certainly it's no less scientific than the spontaneous generation view. The notion of a universe inhabited with star-faring lifeforms or protolifeforms is well established as a theory and has many respected proponents. However, just like number two it's far from proven, and there is no solid or direct evidence that it's true. The fact is, there are some tricky problems with the theory of life originating from spontaneous physical phenomena on prehistoric Earth, and this theory, while it doesn't actually address the basic life origin problem, does move it off of the Earth. This puts it beyond formal scientific study until we reach other planets with life or we find some living or almost living stuff floating around in space.

klik if you demand tedious explanations of every little thing.