[datadeft]

The evolution theory of origin of life just got a kick in the wrong spot?

It is kind of weird how defensive is that crew. It is very much possible that life on Earth has extraterrestrial origins. I do not see why somebody would try to discard this idea.

[drbojingle]

Evolution is a description of what we see happening in animals over time. That's all. This is about the formation of life.

[datadeft]

"Historically, ideas on the origins of life have been mingled with evolutionary explanations. Darwin avoided discussing the origin of the very first species in public although he acknowledged the possibility that life originated by natural causes. Some of his followers adopted this materialistic position and advocated some sort of spontaneous generation in the distant past. Nevertheless, Pasteur’s experiments were a major obstacle for scientific acceptance of the sudden emergence of life. The scientific study of the origin of life, established in the 1920s, required abandoning the idea of a unique chance event and considering a view of life emerging as the result of a long evolutionary process."

https://evolution-outreach.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.100...

[drbojingle]

That's nice but there's still no reason to talk about things that reproduce and the origins of the building blocks of things that reproduce using the same word. Might as well say both the grocery store and the celery you bought are both stew. Or that shopping is cooking.

[User23]

I think “how did non-living matter become alive” and “how do populations of organisms change over time” are two very different questions.

[krapp]

I don't think you understand what "very much possible" means. It isn't a synonym for "I very much believe."

We have actual evidence of evolution as a real and active process and can (and have) studied and mapped that process across species and across time - including in humans - and we find absolutely no evidence of nor the necessity for extraterrestrial influence anywhere.

And even if some flavor of is assumed true for the sake of argument, that still wouldn't somehow negate evolution. It's entirely possible for life to have an extraterrestrial origin and to have evolved on Earth after that origin, having first evolved somewhere else.

[datadeft]

I am not saying it would negate evolution. I am saying origins of life could be extraterrestial and then life goes on a evolutionary process.

[literalAardvark]

This finding invalidates the idea that Bennu was seeded with molecules by biological life: biological life would have created chiral molecules, but the mix on Bennu is racemic, which suggests that the molecules were created by run of the mill geological processes and simply wouldn't require extraterrestrial seeding.

Tldr the finding is that abiogenesis may be easier to get to than previously thought.

[pfdietz]

> Tldr the finding is that abiogenesis may be easier to get to than previously thought.

It doesn't really mean that, though. We already knew synthesis of simple amino acids was pretty easy. Urey-Miller did that decades ago. Making the easy part of a multistep process easier doesn't make the whole process much easier.

IMO, the rate-limiting step for OoL is later, when by some means the enormous complexity barrier is reached between abiotic stuff like this and the simplest self-replicating system capable of evolution. Of the latter, the simplest we know (the most stripped down cell) still contains billions of atoms.

[oh_fiddlesticks]

The Urey-Miller experiments did it, but not without investigator interference to separate the product from the toxic byproduct. The experiments have aged poorly and offer no solutions to abiogenesis.

[pfdietz]

How separated were these asteroidal amino acids from toxic byproducts?

[8bitsrule]

I wouldn't discard the idea, but OTOH, life -had to happen somewhere first-. That first clearly happened, and without extraterrestrial seeding. So that life either evolved, or ... because of the chemical makeup of the universe ... life is inevitable given the necessary conditions. This latter is a simpler and sufficient model.

[JohnMakin]

Uh, no? And I think you’re confusing abiogenesis with the process of evolution - they are different processes.