Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: Notesfiles $Revision: 1.6.2.17 $; site uiucdcsb.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!uiucdcsb!miller From: miller@uiucdcsb.UUCP Newsgroups: net.origins Subject: Re: SOR pamphlet #2 Message-ID: <32500010@uiucdcsb.UUCP> Date: Tue, 20-Nov-84 18:17:00 EST Article-I.D.: uiucdcsb.32500010 Posted: Tue Nov 20 18:17:00 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 22-Nov-84 05:23:06 EST References: <32500008@uiucdcsb.UUCP> Lines: 227 Nf-ID: #R:uiucdcsb:32500008:uiucdcsb:32500010:000:13979 Nf-From: uiucdcsb!miller Nov 20 17:17:00 1984 This is a repost of the second SOR pamphlet. Apparantly, it did not get to all sites. Furthermore, I have seen no replies to it, so please mail me your reply if you posted one to the net already. ihnp4 was down for a week; perhaps that explains the problem. A. Ray Miller Univ Illinois ORIGINS No. 2: The Origin of Life How did life begin? This question is fundamental in the study of origins. Even the simplest life form, the cell, is amazingly complex. ``Biologists have broken through the cell's barrier of invisibility and have charted its interior. They have found a forbiddingly small yet enormously complex world; its magnitudes, like those of the cosmos, astonish and confound'' [1]. Evolutionists believe that these amazingly intricate living sys- tems developed solely through time, chance, and natural processes. Creationists, on the other hand, believe the design and organization found in living organisms could only result from the acts of an intel- ligent Creator. What scientific evidence leads the creationist to this conclusion? TIME PLUS CHANCE The evolutionary scenario requires a long series of events lead- ing up to the origin of life. First, various elements must combine to form different compounds, such as methane, ammonia, dihydrogen, and water. These compounds then join to form more complex molecules such as sugars, amino acids, and nucleotides. These molecules combine to yield polymers, such as starches, proteins, and DNA. And these poly- mers are only the building blocks of the cell. What degree of complexity must these random chemical reactions achieve to produce life? Frank Salisbury, who is himself an evolu- tionary biologist, discusses the magnitude of the problem: ``Now we know that the cell itself is far more complex than we had imagined. It includes thousands of functioning enzymes, each one of them a com- plex machine itself. Furthermore, each enzyme comes into being in response to a gene, a strand of DNA. The information content of the gene (its complexity) must be as great as that of the enzyme that it controls ... A medium protein might include about 300 amino acids. The DNA gene controlling this would have about 1,000 nucleotides in its chain. Since there are four kinds of nucleotides in a DNA chain, one consisting of 1,000 links could exist in 4^1000 different forms. Using a little algebra (logarithms), we can see that 4^1000 = 10^600. Ten multiplied by itself 600 times gives the figure 1 followed by 600 zeros! This number is completely beyond our comprehension'' [2]. Given the vast complexities in even a simple cell, evolutionists are forced to appeal to long time periods in order to justify the ori- gin of life by means of chance chemical reactions. ``We need enzymes to make polynucleotides, and polynucleotides to make enzymes. As a possible way out of this quandary, I would like to suggest that we can trade geological time for DNA polymerase or polynucleotide phospho- rylase'' [3]. So the question becomes: ``are long time periods and random chance sufficient to produce the intricate systems found in a simple cell?'' It is estimated that the entire observable universe contains only about 10^80 electrons. To be generous, suppose there were 10^80 nu- cleotides, close enough together so that they could combine in chains of length 1000 at the rate of one million combinations per second. This process continues for five billion years (10^17 seconds). If each chain was different, then (10^80)x(10^-3)x(10^6)x(10^17) = 10^100 chains could be formed. What is the probability of obtaining any par- ticular DNA gene as described by Salisbury above? The unfathomable odds are (10^100)x(10^-600) = 10^-500 or 1 chance out of 1 followed by 500 zeros! The eminent astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle wrote that: ``Troops of monkeys thundering away at random on typewriters could not produce the works of Shakespeare, for the practical reason that the whole observ- able universe is not large enough to contain the necessary monkey hordes, the necessary typewriters, and certainly the waste paper baskets required for the deposition of wrong attempts. The same is true for living material. As our ideas developed, a monstrous spectre kept beckoning. Just as the brain of Shakespeare was necessary to pro- duce the famous plays, so prior information was necessary to produce a living cell. But information from where?'' [4]. NATURAL PROCESSES Clearly, time and chance seem insufficient to explain abiogenesis (spontaneous generation of life). Something more is required to transform disorganized matter into functioning, reproducing organisms. What about a natural affinity to combine? Is there scientific evi- dence for this? Ever since Miller's spark chamber experiments [5] where amino acids were synthesized, evolutionists have thought this to be the case. Close scrutiny, however, reveals many problems with Miller's ex- periments and with similar subsequent work. First, the simple amino acids and compounds produced so far are a long, long way from the com- plex system of coordinated macromolecules necessary to support life. Second, Miller's amino acids were a 50% 50% mixture of laevoro- tary (L-form) and dextrorotary (D-form). These two types are mirror images of each other, and can be thought of as left and right handed molecules. It has been found that the proteins which contribute to living protoplasm are, with very few exceptions, L-form. Even in an extremely long chain of L-form molecules, the presence of a single D- form can be lethal. Natural processes produce only racemates (50% 50% mixture) - a condition totally unsuitable for life's proteins. Third, the destruction rates of the components are far greater than the production rates. For example, Miller's spark chamber in- cluded a ``trap'' to remove the amino acids as soon as they were formed. Otherwise, the same environment which produced them would have quickly destroyed them. Similarly, cells contain amino acids, which are the components of proteins, and sugars, which are the components of DNA, RNA, and the larger carbohydrates. What natural affinities are present here? Ami- no acids have the natural tendency to react with sugars, resulting in non-biological components. If it were not for the compartmentalizing design already in the cell, which controls when and where reactions take place, the acids and sugars would destroy each other, and the construction of proteins, DNA, and RNA would be impossible. THERMODYNAMICS The evolutionary model's progressive chain of events is beset with many such barriers. It requires steps forward when scientific evidence shows that natural processes work in the opposing direction. A related phenomenon is known as the second law of thermodynamics. First, however, some predictions of the two models must be considered. The evolution model claims that organized life came from disor- ganized matter and having begun, progressed to more organized and com- plex structures. This process eventually reached the complexity we see in life today, including Homo sapiens. From this basic framework, the evolutionist, sitting in the theorist's chair, would expect to find a principle operating in nature of disorder giving rise to order and the simple giving rise to the complex. The creation model, on the other hand, claims that the world was created in perfect organization and fully functional. Any deviation from that initial state then, would be a downhill change towards less order. Thus, the creationist would expect to find a principle operat- ing in nature of order tending to disorder and complexity tending to simplicity. Which model's predictions fit the facts better? The second law of thermodynamics can be stated in several ways. One definition is: ``An isolated system, free of external influence, will, if it is initially in a state of relative order, always pass to states of relative disorder until it eventually reaches the state of maximum disorder'' [6]. The popular science writer Isaac Asimov writes: ``As far as we know all changes are in the direction of in- creasing entropy, of increasing disorder, of increasing randomness, of running down'' [7]. This well established law of science is predicted by the creation model, but conflicts with the basic predictions of the evolution model and must be explained by means of secondary modifica- tions. Some may wonder about the implications of the second law of ther- modynamics. Are there not instances of disorder being transformed into order? For example, a seed growing into a tree or a pile of bricks being built into a house represent examples of an increase in order and complexity. What is happening here? In every instance when order increases, several prerequisites must be met. First, the system must be open to available energy. Evolution meets this requirement, since it is open to energy from the sun. That, however, is a necessary but not sufficient condition. The transformation to a higher energy state must be accompanied by an en- ergy converting mechanism using a preset plan. Bricks only become a house as an intelligent human discriminantly orders them according to the blueprints. The seed grows into a tree as it follows the plan stored in its genetic code, the DNA. Evolution, however, depends upon chance chemical reactions and random mutations, and has no plan forc- ing its direction upwards towards greater complexity. Many evolutionist have recognized this problem for their model. ``The simple expenditure of energy is not sufficient to develop and maintain order. A bull in a china shop performs work, but he neither creates nor maintains organization. The work needed is _p_a_r_t_i_c_u_l_a_r work; it must follow specifications; it requires information on how to proceed'' [8]. Hubert Yockey analyzes the problem from an information theory viewpoint. After demonstrating that there is no scientific basis for evolutionary abiogenesis, he concludes: ``The `warm little pond' scenario was invented _a_d _h_o_c to serve as a materialistic reduc- tionist explanation of the origin of life. It is unsupported by any other evidence and it will remain _a_d _h_o_c until such evidence is found ... One must conclude that, contrary to the established and current wisdom a scenario describing the genesis of life on earth by chance and natural causes which can be accepted on the basis of fact and not faith has not yet been written'' [9]. Thus, the scientist examines the fields of probability, biochem- istry, thermodynamics, and information science only to find that time, chance, and the innate properties of matter are insufficient to ex- plain the astounding complexity and interrelationships of even the simplest living system. The conclusion is that matter and energy must have been organized into living systems by an intelligent Creator. REFERENCES [1] Rick Gore, ``The Awesome Worlds Within a Cell,'' _N_a_t_i_o_n_a_l _G_e_o_- _g_r_a_p_h_i_c, Sept. 1976, p. 358. [2] Frank Salisbury, ``Doubts About the Modern Synthetic Theory of Evolution,'' _T_h_e _A_m_e_r_i_c_a_n _B_i_o_l_o_g_y _T_e_a_c_h_e_r, Sept. 1971, p. 336. [3] Carl Sagan, article in _T_h_e _O_r_i_g_i_n_s _o_f _P_r_e_b_i_o_l_o_g_i_c_a_l _S_y_s_t_e_m_s: _A_n_d _o_f _T_h_e_i_r _M_o_l_e_c_u_l_a_r _M_a_t_r_i_c_e_s, ed. Sidney Fox (New York, Academic Press, 1965), p. 215. [4] Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinghe, _E_v_o_l_u_t_i_o_n _F_r_o_m _S_p_a_c_e (New York, Simon & Schuster, 1981), p. 148. [5] Stanley Miller, ``A Production of Amino Acids under Possible Prim- itive Earth Conditions,'' _S_c_i_e_n_c_e, Vol. 117, 1953, pp. 528-529. [6] Richard Weidner and Robert Sells, _E_l_e_m_e_n_t_a_r_y _C_l_a_s_s_i_c_a_l _P_h_y_s_i_c_s (Boston, Allyn & Bacon, 1973), pp. 393-394. [7] Isaac Asimov, ``Can Decreasing Entropy Exist in the Universe?,'' _S_c_i_e_n_c_e _D_i_g_e_s_t, May 1973, p. 76. [8] George Simpson and William Beck, _L_i_f_e: _A_n _I_n_t_r_o_d_u_c_t_i_o_n _t_o _B_i_o_l_o_g_y (New York, Harcourt, Brace & World, 1969), p. 292. [9] Hubert Yockey, ``A Calculation of the Probability of Spontaneous Biogenesis by Information Theory,'' _J_o_u_r_n_a_l _o_f _T_h_e_o_r_e_t_i_c_a_l _B_i_o_l_o_- _g_y, Vol. 67, Aug. 1977, p. 396. For more information on this topic: Henry Morris, _S_c_i_e_n_t_i_f_i_c _C_r_e_a_t_i_o_n_i_s_m (San Diego, Master Book Publish- ers, 1974). Henry Morris and Gary Parker, _W_h_a_t _i_s _C_r_e_a_t_i_o_n _S_c_i_e_n_c_e? (San Diego, Master Book Publishers, 1982). A. E. Wilder-Smith, _T_h_e _C_r_e_a_t_i_o_n _o_f _L_i_f_e (San Diego, Master Book Pub- lishers, 1970). A. E. Wilder-Smith, _T_h_e _N_a_t_u_r_a_l _S_c_i_e_n_c_e_s _K_n_o_w _N_o_t_h_i_n_g _o_f _E_v_o_l_u_t_i_o_n (San Diego, Master Book Publishers, 1981). Randy Wysong, _T_h_e _C_r_e_a_t_i_o_n-_E_v_o_l_u_t_i_o_n _C_o_n_t_r_o_v_e_r_s_y (Midland, Michigan, Inquiry Press, 1976). last revision: fall 1984 Students for Origins Research P.O. Box 203 Goleta, CA 93116-0203