https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/01/090109173205.htm

"One of the most enduring questions is how life could have begun on Earth. Molecules that can make copies of themselves are thought to be crucial to understanding this process as they provide the basis for heritability, a critical characteristic of living systems. New findings could inform biochemical questions about how life began.

Now, a pair of Scripps Research Institute scientists has taken a significant step toward answering that question. The scientists have synthesized for the first time RNA enzymes that can replicate themselves without the help of any proteins or other cellular components, and the process proceeds indefinitely.

The work was recently published in the journal Science.

In the modern world, DNA carries the genetic sequence for advanced organisms, while RNA is dependent on DNA for performing its roles such as building proteins. But one prominent theory about the origins of life, called the RNA World model, postulates that because RNA can function as both a gene and an enzyme, RNA might have come before DNA and protein and acted as the ancestral molecule of life. However, the process of copying a genetic molecule, which is considered a basic qualification for life, appears to be exceedingly complex, involving many proteins and other cellular components.

For years, researchers have wondered whether there might be some simpler way to copy RNA, brought about by the RNA itself. Some tentative steps along this road had previously been taken by the Joyce lab and others, but no one could demonstrate that RNA replication could be self-propagating, that is, result in new copies of RNA that also could copy themselves."

I miss the days of primordial ooze. Life was simpler.

Once again
Is it more important to know how life began
Or is did I help another human being today
the more imortant

Agreed. Why the fixation on this stuff? I'm quite tired of this single source science posting. If one is interested in it, they can find it for themselves in the same place OP found it and probably quite a few more places.

I think OP thinks they are doing us some kind of service by posting this stuff....almost like they are on....a mission from god.....I mean nature.

Beats watching a garden movie in a toga where the naughty bits of Adam and Eve never show.

To-ga, to-ga, to-ga! Gave my son a DVD of Animal House last weekend!

Roy G Biv Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Agreed. Why the fixation on this stuff? I'm quite
> tired of this single source science posting. If
> one is interested in it, they can find it for
> themselves in the same place OP found it and
> probably quite a few more places.
>
> I think OP thinks they are doing us some kind of
> service by posting this stuff....almost like they
> are on....a mission from god.....I mean nature.

I just want to understand as many of the mysteries that have vexed us forever, as I possibly can, before I die.

I want to be able to answer Christians who say, “Oh really? Well if you believe in evolution, then where did life come from in the first place?”

Now I can say,”Our DNA tells a lot more convincing explanation for that than anything contained in the Bible. Have you heard of the RNA World model? Self replicating RNA? Well, two scientists synthesized RNA that can self replicate, indefinitely. Meaning this tiny strand of non-living RNA that is potentially the blueprint of all life on Earth, is capable of creating copies of itself, out of nucleic acids and enzymes. If they can do that, they can create DNA. If they can do that they can create proteins. If they can do that, they could perhaps create cells. If they can do that, it’s possible our creator is not an old Santa in the sky for adults, it’s RNA, carried by viruses, which are not ‘alive’

10% of our DNA comes from gene transfer from MRNA, from viruses and bacteria.

So when you get down on your knees tonight and pray to your creator for creating you, you might want to direct your prayers within yourself, because there are 10x’s more micro-biotic agents inside you for every human cell in you. Keep them happy, they keep you happy.”

No, you cannot say any of this. Read the linked article!

The authors greatly exaggerate the significance of all of this for the origin of life question. I assume they realize that that is where the money (research) is. Anyway, here are the main points:

"But the main value of the work, according to Joyce, is at the basic research level. "What we've found could be relevant to how life begins, at that key moment when Darwinian evolution starts." He is quick to point out that, while the self-replicating RNA enzyme systems share certain characteristics of life, they are not themselves a form of life."

COMMENT: Yes, they are not life; and not even close to life. Moreover, the RNA enzymes were artificially "synthesized" in the lab--in conditions far removed from any consideration of the appropriate pre-biotic environment.
__________________________________________

"The historical origin of life can never be recreated precisely, so without a reliable time machine, one must instead address the related question of whether life could ever be created in a laboratory. This could, of course, shed light on what the beginning of life might have looked like, at least in outline. "We're not trying to play back the tape," says Lincoln of their work, "but it might tell us how you go about starting the process of understanding the emergence of life in the lab."

COMMENT: Well, it has been over 10 years since the publication of this article, and the origin of life is still as elusive as ever--including in the lab! Moreover, even assuming a natural evolution of replicating RNA molecules (and related enzymes), you are still a very long way from a functioning, replicating, living cell, which involves autopoietic metabolic processes well beyond RNA and DNA alone.
________________________________________

"Joyce says that only when a system is developed in the lab that has the capability of evolving novel functions on its own can it be properly called life. "We're knocking on that door," he says, "But of course we haven't achieved that."

COMMENT: They are not even knocking on the door! The "system" in the lab must be more than just a glob of molecules that have been carefully, and artificially, synthesized to reproduce. Not even close to life at that point. This is complex biochemistry, not life.
_______________________________________

The subunits in the enzymes the team constructed each contain many nucleotides, so they are relatively complex and not something that would have been found floating in the primordial ooze. But, while the building blocks likely would have been simpler, the work does finally show that a simpler form of RNA-based life is at least possible, which should drive further research to explore the RNA World theory of life's origins.

COMMENT: Yes. Not in the "primordial ooze." See point made above. And it does not even show that "a simpler form of RNA based life is at least possible." What has been shown is that a self-replicating RNA molecules can be synthesized in the lab. That's it.

In addition to the above the "RNA first" or "RNA World" hypothesis for the origin of life is laced with problems that are independent of this research.

I do agree with you however that this topic is highly relevant to RfM-- assuming RfM is in part about the relationship between science and religion and thus relevant to post-Mormon worldviews.

Here are some relevant quotes from Addy Pross’ highly acclaimed book, *What is Life: How Chemistry Becomes Biology* (2012), which I highly recommend.

“The real challenge is to decipher the ahistorical principles behind the emergence of life, i.e., to understand why matter of any kind would tend to complexify in the biological direction. It is this ahistorical question, independent of time and place, which lies at the heart of the origin of life problem. In order to resolve the origin of life mystery, we need an understanding of the physicochemical processes that would have converted inanimate matter of whatever kind into a chemical system that we would categorize as living. *That* is the issue that kept the great twentieth-century physicists awake at night, not prevailing uncertainties with regard to the composition of the prebiotic atmosphere or the feasibility of synthesizing nucleotides under the prebiotic atmosphere or the feasibility of synthesizing nucleotides under prebiotic conditions, and the like. What laws of physics and chemistry could explain the emergence of highly complex, dynamic, teleonomic, and far-from-equilibrium chemical systems that we term life?” {Pross 2012:100}

The highly complex cell *structure* that we have already discussed is the most explicit and profound expression of that teleonomic character. Pretty well every element within that bacterium can be associated with a particular cell function, in much the same way that the individual components of a clock -- pendulum, cogs and wheels, springs, hands, cabinet, etc. -- can also be associated with a particular function, except that within the cell the structural complexity and intricacy is orders of magnitude greater.{Pross 2012:16}

“I am of the view that attempting to seek out life's molecular beginnings *before* we have adequately clarified the physicochemical principles that underlie biological complexification is tantamount to attempting to assemble a watch from its component parts -- springs, cogs, wheels, etc. -- without understanding the principles that govern watch function. Richard Feynman, the iconic Nobel physicist, once said: 'What I cannot create, I do not understand.' This truism might be usefully turned around: What I do not understand, I cannot create.” {Pross 2012:100-101}

For a well-argued religious perspective on this issue, from the standpoint of Intelligent Design, see Stephen Myer, Signature in the Cell.