Re: The Evolutionist: Liar, Believer In Miracles, King of

Arthur V. Chadwick (chadwicka@swau.edu)
Thu, 05 Nov 1998 06:55:36 -0800

At 10:16 PM 11/4/98 -0700, Kevin wrote:
>
>As for Art's statement that the proteinoid experiments make use of
>biotically derived ingredients, he is absolutely correct. Nonetheless, his
>statement is irrelevant. The purpose of the proteinoid experiments were to
>test an abiotic method of creating proteinaceous molecules with catalytic
>activity, and they were successful. The fact that the ingredients, the
>experimental setup, even the experimenter were all derived biotically does
>not invalidate the fact that Fox was able to create proteinaceous catalysts
>without the direct aid of any biological system. In other words, he created
>these catalysts abiotically. And the Miller-Urey experiment is an even
>better demonstration of modern laboratory abiogenesis, because in that case
>the ingredients were inorganic.

Ok, Kevin, where was Fox when this was all presumably taking place on the
primitive earth? Who obtained and purified the amino acids, and measured
and mixed the purified amino acids, and maintained the conditions and
temperature just right? As for catalytic, that certainly is not
demonstrated to my satrisfaction. One of his grad students who was
involved in the experiments urged Fox to use sterile conditions for the
experiments, but he didn't. The student calculated that the presence of
one bacterium in the mixture could have accounted for all the catalytic
activity observed by Fox. Asa for relevance, most paleobiogeochemists
reject Fox's work as irrelevant to abiogenesis. You should join them.

>
>As for the question of control, I assume that, clever biochemist though he
>was, Fox could not control the physiochemical mechanisms of nature, and
>therefore could not force amino acids to polymerize against their will into
>catalytic molecules. But since you were a student of his you would know him
>better than I would, so I guess I could be wrong.

Sounds to me like Fox was doing exactly that: manipulating the
physicochemical mechanisms of nature to produce a result that could not
have occurred in an abiogenic setting at all. You decide whether you are
wrong.
Art
http://biology.swau.edu