Recently scientists were able to come very close to fabricating a self-replicating molecule - without outside intervention - and with chemicals scientifically believed to be present on our primordial earth, about 4 billion years ago. Was that life? A bunch of molecules that, obeying physical and chemical laws from the environment - began to self-replicate. This is called "abiogenesis". We are closing on reproducing the exact mechanisms that allowed inanimate matter become animated and developing. Scientists have also been able to create laboratory conditions that caused primitive cell membranes to form, along with primitive molecular mechanisms to transport other chemicals through these membranes. We'll soon have reproduced the mechanism for primitive life to form primitive proteins. As far as your other question - you're referring to how species evolve from other species. Evolution was already a known theory in Darwin's time - but the mechanism was unknown as well as how all species were related to each other. Darwin envisioned a "tree of life" with many branches, where mutations in replication caused the next generation to have survival benefits against a harsh environment - to stay alive long enough to reproduce - early reproduction was by prokaryotes - using binary fission. Cell components, like mitochondria, were most likely other organisms in symbiosis with the new lifeforms - trading energy for survival - eventually becoming part of the cell (mitochondria organelles have their own separate DNA). Keep in mind that every generation over millions of years produces a myriad of mutations - at the genetic level. Darwin suspected the mechanism, but it was much later that we discovered genes, genetics, variation, adaptation, and speciation. Go to Amazon and run a search on evolution and / or Darwin - for a more detailed explanation. Keep in mind that the religious will oppose your getting exposed to this research as it contradicts a fundamental, literal interpretation of the Bible - much easier to understand - you just have to surrender your intellectual curiosity and believe in the supernatural. Good luck with that.
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Welcome to life 101 my friend. If we had all of the answers then we would be the Gods. Trust in faith and when you read something try not to take it so seriously. If you question something then read three different sources to see if they agree. Then believe only half of it. Good luck with the philosophical musings.
I just went to a museum in ma they had a chart on evolution. facts are facts. I tend to belive in the hard core facts and still in something higher than myself.
The theories you are talking about are called "abiogenesis" but nobody has demonstrated this in a lab so far. There are many competing theories and no reason to accept any particular one right now.
Evolution deals with things that can reproduce and pass traits to their children.
Nothing is ever exactly the same in nature. There is always a range, and any kind of feature of any being will appear within a range. For example .. height, the length of a limb, the strength of your eyes, etc.
A being can inherit such features from its parents.
So .. if a feature .. however small .. by chance is different enough from the majority of the population, and also gives an advantage to the being then that being and others like it .. will have a better chance of survival or breeding than similar beings with more normal traits, and that feature may be passed on to children.
Over a very long time this can lead to totally new features .. or even a completely different species.
examples:
1) fins of an early fish became large and strong enough to support the body allowing the creature to walk .. eventually becoming legs of a later creature that left the water and walked on land
2) light sensitive membranes of an early creature developed over millenia into fully functioning eyes of later creatures
3) posture and limbs changed allowing a early land creature to stand upright on two legs
etc
We did not evolve from apes. Trust me!
Those above have detailed already so I'll give you the 6th grade basics. Single celled organisms became vertebrates( a backbone/spine) those diversified, some ventured on land and became amphibians(frogs) those changed more and some became birds, reptiles mammals and dinosaurs. Some were evolutionary dead ends and others continued to evolve, eventually apes evolved in the mammal family and diversified, one branch became the Homo family and evolved into homo-sapians(us). What you have to grasp is the time, 3,800,000,000 years have passed since this began, homo-sapians have been around for about 500,000 years, civilization has existed for some 8,000 years a human life lasts around 80 years. divide 3.8 billion by 80, this will give you an idea of the vast amount of time involved.
They can't - it's a simple as that. In order for this to happen, we have to get the right amino acids - this has never happened. Then these amino acids have to make DNA - but we can't even get the right amino acids. An interesting thing about DNA is that it is a kind of code that biologists are just beginning to crack. DNA is, basically, a language. Language only comes from intelligence. It's been estimated that all the information in your DNA, three feet of it in every one of the trillions of cells in your body, were written down, that it would fill the Grand Canyon with books, 500 pages each, multiple times. Get some monkeys together with typewriters sometime and try to fill that many books with a sequence of letters that make a language - it's never going to happen. After we get the information, we have to get a cell. (See Comments)
Hope this helps - Zack
Estimated by who? Using what method? This is science; please cite references or show your work.
Cell->bacteria->slime->slime worms->worms->fish->lizards->dinosaurs->all kinds of dinos->all kinds of animals (incl.humans). Read some articles about the evolution of the whale, they were land animals at first.
If you believe adaptations then evolution is just a long process of adaptations , the originally single cells that when tried to reproduce stuck together they became better at surviving so more of them came around , and so forth , look up why you should always finish your antibiotics ,
You are wise to question. Truth is never afraid of questions. Your textbook will present one view based on naturalistic evolution. For some reason, this view hates to be questioned. Consider this question.
The Cambrian explosion, which apparently is not being taught in science class, or it would raise legitimate skepticism.
As one author has stated, assume the entire history of the world (use 3.8-4 billions years) on a 24-hour clock. For the first 21 hours, only single-cell life is found. Suddenly, in the equivalent of 2 MINUTES, a variety of complex life forms appeared. Yes, in geological terms, the Cambrian explosion is very very short. And still puzzling to paleontologists and biologists worldwide. And it is certain Darwin himself would be even more puzzled today than when he called the Cambrian explosion an inexplicable mystery. Paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould said, "Nothing distressed Darwin more than the Cambrian explosion." Even atheist R. Dawkins admits, "it is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history."
need more space in comments...
Doug Axe, molecular biologist, wrote an article for Journal of Molecular Biology, detailing his research of the odds of a DNA producing amino acids producing a working protein based on random mutation and selection. He estimated the odds at 1 in 10 to the 74th power. Trillions and trillions and trillions, much longer by many orders of magnitude than any accepted age of the earth, much less the time of the Cambrian period. And that is just one protein. There is more information necessary to produce a complex organism. Simply put...it is not only improbable but impossible and totally illogical.
