The Mystery of Life’s Origin: Reassessing Current Theories
By addebook • Jun 28th, 2008 • Category: Biology •
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The Mystery of Life’s Origin: Reassessing Current Theories
by Charles B. Thaxton, Walter L. Bradley, Roger L. Olsen
The Mystery of Life’s Origin: Reassessing Current Theories
By Charles B. Thaxton, Walter L. Bradley, Roger L. Olsen
Publisher: Philosophical Library (New York)
Number Of Pages: 228
Publication Date: 1984-01-19
ISBN-10 / ASIN: 0802224474
ISBN-13 / EAN: 9780802224477
Binding: Paperback
Summary: Difficult to understand, but essential to read
Rating: 5
The authors are distinguished scientists holding advanced degrees in chemistry, materials science, and geochemistry. This book clearly reflects that, and if you’ve not studied any of these sciences, a primer is in order. They thoroughly rebut Miller’s infamous experiment which supposedly proved life can come from nonliving matter. This book explores the hypothesis of chemical evolution and what conditions would be required, as well as what conditions probably were like on the Earth prior to sentient life developing. Darwin’s point about wanting a “warm little pond” in which evolution would take place is delved into in the chapter “The Myth of the Prebiotic Soup.” Whether you believe in evolution, creation, or creationism, this book is a must-read for anyone with an interest in science.
Summary: A Classic, yet Accessible Scientific Treatise on the Deficiencies of Chemical Evolution
Rating: 5
A seminal work for the theory of intelligent design, this book provides a scientific critique of the prevailing paradigmatic theories of chemical evolution. The authors include Discovery fellows Charles Thaxton and Walter Bradley, and they conclude that the prebiotic soup from which the first cell supposedly arose is a myth. The Miller-Urey experiments employed an unrealistic gas mixture, and there is no geological evidence for its existence in Earth’s distant past. The “soup” faces a myriad of other problems, such as inevitable rapid destruction at the hands of radiation.
The authors also take aim at the dominant paradigm for chemical evolution using technical arguments from thermodynamics. The second law of thermodynamics has been misused by creationists who failed to treat the fact that Earth is an open system. But Thaxton, Bradley, and Olsen takes this point into account as they argue that thermodynamics is eminently applicable to assessing whether unguided chemical reactions can organize matter into life. Their conclusion is that natural laws cannot account for the encoded “specified complexity” inherent in biomolecules.
The epilogue looks forward to other possible explanations for the origin of life. The book was published in 1984 when the United States was immersed in debate over Genesis-based creationism. Yet these authors take a different approach that is ahead of its time. They recognize that science requires an observation-based understanding of cause-and-effect relationships. Thus they set aside biblical arguments and focus instead on observations about the natural world and intelligence. After demonstrating that various undirected causes lack the power to produce complex information, they note, “We have observational evidence in the present that intelligent investigators can (and do) build contrivances to channel energy down nonrandom chemical pathways to bring about some complex chemical synthesis, even gene building” (pg. 211). The authors then pose a simple question: “May not the principle of uniformity suggest that DNA had an intelligent cause at the beginning?” (pg. 211)
Summary: tom sullivan proves his opponent’s point….
Rating: 5
first of all, this is a very well written book, it presents its points well and does a very good job of defending its critics… however, the writing and explanations could have been better, but i gave this book five stars in order to make up for the ‘idiocy’ of tom sullivan
i did not buy this book from amazon, but looking at other’s reviews helps me understand other people’s viewpoints… to be honest mr. sullivan’s review was rather amusing, especially his example of the beethoven dog… while he accused creationism of this gap, i personally feel it is much more fitting for evolution, considering the fact that we are presented with amino acids, then complex organisms (such as ourselves) and then told that we came from those amino acids with some transfer point inbetween… which is exactly what is missing from the whole chain… and could be just as easily be interpreted as the fact that the dog never plays on the piano… so thank you mr. sullivan for providing an excellent illustration of the flaws within evolution
overall, get this book if you want an in-depth and unbiased understanding of the differences between evolution and creationism
Summary: The previous review must be bogus.
Rating: 5
He writes and I quote, “Only a moron would accept that as “proof,” and yet ID-iot Christians are more than happy to accept exactly that kind of “proof” from ID-iotic films like this”.
Obviously this man thinks it’s a film rather than a book, so much for reading it and a fair critical review.
Summary: Long on Details
Rating: 5
For 15 years, this book has been the first that I recommend for colleagues and friends wishing to evaluate the validity of evolution. Its value is that it focuses in ample detail on just one single, critical step in evolution: getting from non-life to life. The book describes work by 4 researchers who attempted to find the mechanism that led to the evolution of the first proto-cell. The authors detail their attempts to find this mechanism that would work against the known processes which the first step in biological evolution would have had to surmount (such as entropy). Each researcher brought a different expertise to the work, so the book is able to bring a number of perspectives to bear on this one relatively narrow issue.
This is not a book for individuals with merely secondary-school maths, biology or chemistry knowledge. The further one has studied in those disciplines (university, post-graduate), the better able he will be to appreciate the research.
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