|
First life on earth/universe
|
|
I was just pondering things like infinate succession and intelligent design after a some youtube comments got out of hand and turned into a thousand post long flame war. Do we have any evidence (possibly from the mars missions) on how the first bacteria were formed? If the big bang theory is in fact correct woudlnt the heat of the explosion eliminate any possibility of life ever forming on the mass that turned into our Earth without the bacteria being able to survive ungodly teperatures? But then again, they would have to be alive even before the big bang which dosent make sence unless "big bangs" happen , for our purpose, every centillion years? But that would mean the bacteria would have to be formed after the big bang before THAT. I havent had the chance yet to take many biology, physics, logic, philosophy, etc. classes yet so please forgive me if I am a blabbering idiot who hasn't mastered left and right yet. But please do fill me in on my question, whether it can't be answered or theres any information. Thanks :D
"Man fears the darkness, and so he scrapes away at the edges of it with fire." - Rei Ayanami
|
|
Re: First life on earth/universe
Link |
by
on 2006-08-01 23:28:45 (edited 2006-08-01 23:32:52)
|
|
Do we have any evidence ... on how the first bacteria were formed? There is no direct record of the origin of life on earth. There is, however, a compelling history-of-origins preserved in the DNA structure of all living things. I must point out that modern bacteria are as distantly related to life's origin as modern day humans (or any modern day life!). It may be true that under a microscope, bacteria would look quite similar to life on Earth some billions of years ago. Theories of life's origin range from the Primordial Sea to Panspermia. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE DO NOT LET ME HERE YOU SAY THAT INTELLIGENT DESIGN IS A THEORY!!! Theories can be tested, I.D. cannot. I.D. is a beleif, not a theory! Now, there is NO RAMIFICATION of big bang theory that is in contradiction with either of the aforementioned theories of life's origin! The earth was formed from atoms, many of which were previously ejected from the sun or other stars. During it's infancy, the Earth would have been hot with vulcanism and battered by interstellar debris. However, at the age of a billion years or so, the Earth would be visually similar to modern day Earth: liquid oceans, sparse vulcanism, protective atmosphere, etc. Please, before you get any more hair-brained ideas, read this article. You may want to glance over the rest of the timeline of the big bang, it will be enlightening for you (it was for me!). Let me make one thing ABSOLUTELY CLEAR: Life originated on Earth, or elsewhere, WELL after the present day structure of the universe had come to be. Nobody in their right mind would argue that life has it's origins BEFORE the big bang, because there simply WAS NO BEFORE the big bang! To say "before the big bang" is like saying "faster than the speed of light" or "dumber than a doornail" or "1+1=3". Utter nonsense. You are not a blabbering idiot, but you should start small before running off on some wild crazy theory. Now, this is not the "biology" topic, but I encourage you to explore biology here as well! One item that might be of interest to you is the boundary between Prokaryotes and Eukaryote. This boundary is demonstrative of the large-scale evolutionary changes that have happened over the course of life's history. 
|