The Origin of Life and the Irony of Darwin's Origin of the Species

PhysOrg’s Lisa Zyga takes a look at research just published in the International Journal of Astrobiology on just why life “emerged” in the first place. Unsurprisingly, the evolutionary presuppositions are apparent from the very beginning (pardon the pun), since scientists are trying to find evidence for what they already believe took place.

In this case, the scientists are a Finnish father-and-son duo who use principles from thermodynamics to try to explain how life evolved. Zyga writes:

Although the researchers don’t speculate on the specific chemical reactions that created life, they explain that the molecules involved most likely underwent a series of more and more complex reactions to minimize mutual energy differences between matter on Earth and with respect to high-energy radiation from Sun. The process eventually advanced so far that it cumulated into such sophisticated functional structures that could be called living.

This sort of evolutionary storytelling is simple enough that it doesn’t even require a Ph.D. nor any scientific tests, but rather just evolutionary faith and an imagination.

Since the scientists don’t even speculate—let alone try to support—any chemical reactions that could have obeyed thermodynamic laws and slowly morphed into life, the hypothesis seems almost entirely worthless. After all, all scientists who believe life spontaneously generated out of primordial chemicals believe that physical forces somehow (that’s the part they can’t explain) self-organized.

The same comments apply when Zyga reports:

Due to random variations stemming from the chemical reactions, some novel compounds may have emerged in the primordial system. Some of these compounds (such as those involving carbon) might have been exceptionally good at creating energy flow, enabling the system to diminish energy differences very efficiently and reach a higher level of entropy. Compounds with these advantages would have gained ground during this period of primitive chemical evolution. But the scientists emphasize that identifying which exact compounds were key players during this period would be very difficult to determine.

This sort of evolutionary storytelling is simple enough that it doesn’t even require a Ph.D. nor any scientific tests, but rather just evolutionary faith and an imagination. For instance, let’s hypothesize that life originated when chemicals obeyed not the laws of thermodynamics, in particular, but instead the laws of gravity. Perhaps we, too, could publish our speculation in a scientific journal. Obviously it would be an untested scenario, without any supporting evidence; nonetheless, could it be much more absurd than any other unspecific imagining of how the simplest life (supposedly) evolved? And when Zyga points out that the study “focuses on why life emerged, not how,” we wonder how the two could be separated.

Also strange is that the scientists’ idea is centered on life forming to dissipate energy and thus increase entropy within a system—even though life as we know it, and certainly human behavior, involves processes that both increase and decrease entropy.

One of the scientists told PhysOrg, “The most important idea in our study is that there is no distinction between animate and inanimate. Processes of life are, in their principles, no different from any other natural processes.” This also means that our only “purpose,” Zyga explains, is to “redistribute energy on the Earth.”

Sadly, these comments remind us of the 2007 school massacre (motivated by a belief in evolution) in the scientists’ own country. When people believe we are no different than animals, or no different than rocks, what authoritative code of morality could they possibly accept, and why? And if our only purpose is to redistribute energy, is all the rest of human behavior just a strange and meaningless accident? Sadly, under the influence of Darwinism, this attitude only continues to expand.