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Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

nationalgeographic.com

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Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#11

Post by DanBC »

angst_ridden wrote: post #10
Ericson2314 wrote: post #5

Considering that the first proto-computers were not programmable, I can't help but be skeptical that the first life needed genetic material. Certainly there were lipid membranes. Maybe there were spontaneous proteins, maybe there was purely-catalytic RNA. I guess it's also a matter of line drawing. I'm OK with calling crystals life, for example. One should feel bad about breaking up big ones the same as one should fe…

I think you've got a minority opinion calling crystals "alive," although it does jibe with one definition of life that I heard: "any self-sustaining system that reduces internal entropy."

Dawkins doesn't call crystal structures alive, but he does mention them as a potential hypothetical source for life.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/earth/story/20160823-the-idea-that-life...

> Cairns-Smith found a more eager audience in science journalists and the popular press. Other scientists showed interest, too: the evolutionary biologist and writer Richard Dawkins discussed the crystals-as-genes hypothesis in his 1986 book The Blind Watchmaker.

[...]

> His aim was to find a system much simpler than modern life, but which had some of the crucial properties of a living system. He found an answer in an unlikely place: clays.

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#12

Post by kevmo »

angst_ridden wrote: post #10
Ericson2314 wrote: post #5

Considering that the first proto-computers were not programmable, I can't help but be skeptical that the first life needed genetic material. Certainly there were lipid membranes. Maybe there were spontaneous proteins, maybe there was purely-catalytic RNA. I guess it's also a matter of line drawing. I'm OK with calling crystals life, for example. One should feel bad about breaking up big ones the same as one should fe…

I think you've got a minority opinion calling crystals "alive," although it does jibe with one definition of life that I heard: "any self-sustaining system that reduces internal entropy."

That's one place where my "What is Life?" college class landed.

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#13

Post by sydd »

rtatay wrote: post #4

If someone figures out how to create life, the theological and ethical consequences will be insane.

I don't think so either. We will likely be able to create something that self-replicates under similar circumtances what we think were in the primordial soup. And we will call this thing (or after some more research things) as possible first evolution steps.

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#14

Post by m12k »

rtatay wrote: post #4

If someone figures out how to create life, the theological and ethical consequences will be insane.

What do you think the ethical consequences will be? Genuinely curious, because I don't really see what they would be, or why there would be any. At least not compared to something like e.g. creating an actual artificial intelligence, and then needing to decide if it has rights, and what kind and so on. Creating a novel type of microorganism out of non-living components doesn't really seem to come with the same kind of can of worms, but maybe I'm overlooking something?

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#15

Post by proc0 »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #5

Considering that the first proto-computers were not programmable, I can't help but be skeptical that the first life needed genetic material. Certainly there were lipid membranes. Maybe there were spontaneous proteins, maybe there was purely-catalytic RNA. I guess it's also a matter of line drawing. I'm OK with calling crystals life, for example. One should feel bad about breaking up big ones the same as one should fe…

How would you define genetic material? I think some kind of movement and a metabolism can already be called alive. It's not so much about the material but rather the interaction between the materials that gives rise to behavior and then natural selection.

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#17

Post by glouwbug »

rtatay wrote: post #4

If someone figures out how to create life, the theological and ethical consequences will be insane.

But we already do know how, through means of reproduction, and that on it's own already has millions of philosophical, ethical, and theological debates

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#18

Post by kvetching »

Related to this; Check out the book The Revolutionary Phenotype.

"The Revolutionary Phenotype is a science book that brings us four billion years into the past, when the first living molecules showed up on Planet Earth. Unlike what was previously thought, we learn that DNA-based life did not emerge from random events in a primordial soup. Indeed, the first molecules of DNA were fabricated by a previous life form. By describing the fascinating events referred to as Phenotypic Revolutions, this book provides a dire warning to humanity: if humans continue to play with their own genes, we will be the next life form to fall to our own creation. "I am VERY impressed with this book—very important topic very well treated." - Robert Trivers"

https://www.amazon.com/Revolutionary-Phenotype-amazing-story...

fyi: I'm not the author

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#19

Post by phkahler »

dudeman13 wrote: post #9
Ericson2314 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think so. Primitive proto-life has little moral value, just as vegans eat plants, hypothetical super-vegans only eat blue-green bacteria, and hypothetical hyper-vegans have a 500 year deadline to be electrically powered. I don't believe in a hard barrier between life and non life, so any discrete moral function would be non-computable, and therefore I reject it outright.

>I don't think so [...] and therefore I reject it outright That's not a problem. There can be insane theological and ethical consequences for everyone else.

Not really. They'll just say a chemistry experiment isnt life.

Re: Tibor Gánti's ideas about the origins of life

#20

Post by mannykannot »

m12k wrote: post #14
rtatay wrote: post #4

If someone figures out how to create life, the theological and ethical consequences will be insane.

What do you think the ethical consequences will be? Genuinely curious, because I don't really see what they would be, or why there would be any. At least not compared to something like e.g. creating an actual artificial intelligence, and then needing to decide if it has rights, and what kind and so on. Creating a novel type of microorganism out of non-living components doesn't really seem to come with the same kind o…

Well, for those whose ethics are founded on their religious beliefs and whose religious beliefs are dependent on the premise that only God can create life, then there might be some adjustment to be made - but people are very good at dealing with inconvenient facts in ways both rational and irrational.
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