Scientists say we may have been wrong about the origin of life

Knight

Knight

Well-known Member
Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story:

In a peer-reviewed analysis, scientists quantify amino acids before and after our “last universal common ancestor.”
The last universal common ancestor (LUCA) is the single life form that branched into everything since.
Earth four billion years ago may help us check for life on one of Saturn’s moons today.

MSN

Read the article learned that science continues to work on discovering the way life began on our planet. Not there yet but as time passes more is learned. Over 4 billion years fossils do show evolution on our planet
 
I read once that evolution is the most tested and most supported scientific theory we have. I suppose there could be similar claims for arguments claiming similar status in physics and chemistry etc, but the theory of evolution probably ranks in the top 5 most highly supported. But Abiogenesis, the study of how life started is hardly understood at all. At best there are speculations, none which have been widely accepted, and those only give us some things to think about, but we don't appear to be even close yet. We probably have more solid theories about quantum mechanics than abiogenesis, and the quantum realm is hardly understood at all, although I've heard it described as a "good bet."

One thing that is almost surprising about the beginning of life on Earth is that it started in an environment that wouldn't support life as we know it today, and once it started, it hardly evolved at all for the next billion years, and then went completely wild during the Cambrian Explosion. As per the thread title, I don't think we ever were right, or had enough knowledge to even be wrong about how life started.
 
Science has interesting stories to tell also. Actually we do know something about how life started, that is after that first bag of chemicals twitched. What caused the first twitch is still a mystery. Life is an astounding chemical process. Humans almost glorify it. Some do outright glorify it. But it's just chemicals doing what chemicals do when they come across each other.

I must have been three or four years old when my father, a fundamentalist at heart, took me to the zoo. I found myself face to face with some species of small monkey. We were inches away from each other separated by a glass wall, and other monkeys were doing their monkey stuff in the back ground, but for some reason that monkey seemed as interested in me as I was of him. I think it was the first monkey I ever saw. We were starring at each other.

My father said something like, "You know some people say humans came from monkeys." Right away I accepted that. It seemed obvious. I was already amazed by our similarities. If he would have said we came from dogs, I would not have believed him. Of course he was using the word "monkey" in very loose terms. I wasn't old enough to understand taxonomy and classification, and would not have been interested, anyway.
 
smiley said:
So what about all the bible stories?? -kids tales for sleeptime??
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I think those bible stories are nice but not factual. Looking to science to solve the mystery is an ongoing process. Questioning what is written The phrase "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" is found in Genesis 1:1 The creation of the heavens and the earth in seven days, as described in the Book of Genesis.

Just as what is written the explanation of how that could be is in the imagination of those attempting to explain. What science is showing about our universe.

Observable Universe
The observable universe is the region of space from which light has had time to reach Earth since the Big Bang, about 13.8 billion years ago. Due to cosmic expansion, this region extends roughly 46.5 billion light-years in every direction, giving a diameter of about 93 billion light-years. This boundary, called the cosmic horizon, is not a physical wall but a limit imposed by the finite speed of light and the universe's age, making the observable universe a finite, measurable volume of space.
is our universe infinite or finite - Bing

It takes blind faith to accept what the bible story says & that isn't wrong. Just different than questioning how it could be possible.
 
Evolution is indisputable. If you're so inclined, you can prove it yourself at home. You can use fruit flies, roses, or other living things. We change over time, we take on traits of our ancestors, this simply seems indisputable to me.

As to our origin, we need to know what we're dealing with. Science is never definitive. The door is always open to new findings. Science doesn't try and tell you how something are with 100% certainty. It tells you, based on the per-ponderous of evidence, what seems to be. This is why the scientific method is vital to our understanding of things. It is the best explanation of what we know.

If new evidence comes to light, what "Science" says will change. This is to be expected. Where things like religion fails is in the method - proof, evidence, repeatable experiments.

There is no such thing as "science" in terms of there being an organization. Science is simply a process. It is the best process human kind has been able to devise. You either belief in that process, or not. If not, then I'd need to understand what. Blind faith is, explicitly, contrary to science. It's a belief in something that has no evidence.
 
Knight said:
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It takes blind faith to accept what the bible story says & that isn't wrong. Just different than questioning how it could be possible.
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Believing in the Bible's story of creation might be tolerable if it didn't come with other mythological beliefs and that lead to suffering and the destruction of our planet, and wars after war. The God of Daivd is a war God and who can not see using these stories as a way to justify war.
 
MarciKS said:
I hope for your sake believing in science is the answer.
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You probably would not be alive if it were not for science. Not that long ago, our life expectancy was only 45 years, not because people didn't live longer, but because extremely few of them did. Most died in early childhood. This angry God who cursed us was fearsome, jealous, and revengeful, and He really outdid himself in punishing us.

I am not sure where the ice ages fit in the Bible stories, but I am sure we almost didn't survive because that is what science tells us. Science also tells us the gene pool needs more people than one large family if humans are going to survive, and just as there are different breeds of dogs, there were different breeds of humans.

I like the explanation of reincarnation better than the notions of heaven and hell. I think reincarnation is much more just.
 
Vida May said:
I am not sure where the ice ages fit in the Bible stories, but I am sure we almost didn't survive because that is what science tells us. Science also tells us the gene pool needs more people than one large family if humans are going to survive, and just as there are different breeds of dogs, there were different breeds of humans.
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Aboriginals from Australia wrote that the sea level got way higher, so that must have been after an ice age.

Science says there was a mitochondrial Eve.

https://science.howstuffworks.com/life/evolution/female-ancestor.htm

And that there was a bottleneck and humanity nearly got wiped out.
 
Science doesn't have all the answers but as information continues to be analyzed eventually there will be an answer to the question how did mankind come to be.

The nice bible story or whatever science might eventually prove?

This article is longer than just this opening.

A "potentially hazardous" asteroid contains all of the "letters" that make up DNA, suggesting that these key ingredients for life may be common in the solar system.

Researchers made the discovery after analyzing samples collected from asteroid Ryugu, a 3,000-foot-wide (900 meters) space rock shaped like a spinning top.

The scientists detected a complete set of canonical nucleobases, which are the building blocks for DNA — the genetic foundation for all life on Earth — and its lesser-known cousin RNA, according to a new study published Monday (March 16) in the journal Nature Astronomy.

MSN
 
smiley said:
So what about all the bible stories?? -kids tales for sleeptime??
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A lot more than that. The Bible is a collection of stories, many of which were handed down from generation to generation orally. This is particularly true of the Old Testament. Many of the OT books are allegories, some are oral histories. None are meant to be scientific theories.

What is an Allegory?​

An allegory is a longer, more complex narrative in which characters, events, and settings symbolize abstract ideas, moral qualities, or societal issues. Unlike metaphors, allegories often span an entire story, novel, or film. For instance, Plato’s Allegory of the Cave uses the cave and its prisoners to represent human perception and enlightenment. Allegories convey deeper meanings, often addressing moral, political, or philosophical themes, and require readers to interpret the symbolic layers.
 
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OP Title is:
Scientists say we may have been wrong about the origin of life

OP Title should be:

Some scientists, (an increasing minority) may have been wrong about the origin of life

Anyone following panspermia discussions will find that except for a few media news people that make statements like it new news, those promoting Earth biogenesis have been receding into the dark as tartigrades, extremophiles, and large amounts of biochemicals are spectroscopically remoted sensed elsewhere in our truly vast universe by our new high tech astronomical instruments.

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