From: me22over7@gmail.com   
      
   On 8/02/2026 4:27 am, RonO wrote:   
   > On 2/6/2026 11:34 PM, MarkE wrote:   
   >> The following seems to be a significant challenge for the naturalistic   
   >> origin of life. Thoughts?   
   >>   
   >> PROCESS   
   >>   
   >> OoL assumes a progression from simple inorganic chemicals to a   
   >> population of protocells and then on to the first population of free-   
   >> living cells (pre-LUCA).   
   >>   
   >> Protocells provide encapsulation, replication and heritable variation,   
   >> but are not "alive" in that they require feedstock supplies from the   
   >> environment. The feedstock dependence tapers from protocells to pre-LUCA.   
   >>   
   >> ENVIRONMENT   
   >>   
   >> This process of chemical evolution and then Darwinian evolution   
   >> requires the environment to supply nucleotides, lipids, sugars, amino   
   >> acids, polyphosphates, metal ions, etc, in certain concentrations,   
   >> with substantial homochirality, etc.   
   >   
   > Who makes this claim?  We do not know what the first self replicators   
   > required.  Things like nucleotides are required by the RNA world   
   > scenario, but that likely came after the first self replicators existed.   
   >   To get everything started the first self replicators would not just   
   > replicate themselves, but do things like make nucleotides in order to   
   > facilitate their self replication.  My guess is that nucleotides evolved   
   > to do what they still do today.  They are a highly useful energy coin   
   > for the cell.  They store chemical energy and transfer the chemical   
   > energy.  Polymers of nucleotides likely evolved to store nucleotides   
   > inside the cells and keep them from diffusing out of the cells.   
   >   
   > Lipids may have been among the first simple self replicators.   
   > Conglomerations of lipids can have enzymatic activity that makes more   
   > lipid, so the enzymatic lipid structures would get bigger and be able to   
   > split.  Lipids could evolve other enzymatic functions as they self   
   > replicated, different lipids could be made etc.   
   >   
   > Chirality would be set by the self replicators.  The enzymatic functions   
   > of the self replicators would likely work for one chiral form or the   
   > other.  Just like many enzymes do today.   
      
   Note that I'm not assuming or preferring any particular model here. But   
   the paper "The RNA world hypothesis: the worst theory of the early   
   evolution of life (except for all the others)" remains the frontrunner   
   as far as I'm aware, though now extended to "RNA + messy" world.   
   https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3495036/   
      
   What other options are there? Autocatalytic sets can't provide symbolic   
   or digital inheritance, which you need make real progress. Peptide   
   polymers? Again, can't do templated duplication. It seems that RNA/DNA   
   has to be central and early.   
      
   >   
   >>   
   >> The environment must also provide sufficient temperature stability,   
   >> pH, mechanical agitation, structure (e.g. niche separation), wet/dry   
   >> cycling, feedstock recycling, waste removal, etc.   
   >>   
   >> LINEAGE   
   >>   
   >> OoL assumes countless locations working in parallel as described,   
   >> possibly with localised cross-pollination. However, there must be an   
   >> unbroken lineage (or lineages) to from start to finish. Which implies   
   >> the persistence and stability of the environmental requirements   
   >> described.   
   >   
   > There would be no such thing as an unbroken lineage during the origin of   
   > life on earth.  There is nothing keeping any lineage from joining with   
   > another, splitting and or joining with others.  There would be no   
   > genetic code, no genome early life was likely a mess of self replicating   
   > molecules.  Once a shell or membrane formed multiple replicators could   
   > join together as proto cells.  They could start assisting each other in   
   > replication.  There would be no cell lineages until you evolve a genome   
   > for the RNA world where you need to maintain the complementary sequence   
   > for the functional RNAs, and even after that there is no reason that RNA   
   > based cells could not fuse and split off new lineages.  Horizontal   
   > transfer of genetic material occurs today.   
   >   
      
   What I mean by "unbroken lineage" is this. The pathway from simple   
   chemicals to LUCA had to be a continuous process, with successive   
   generations of populations of molecules and then presumably protocells.   
   As I indicated, this may well include cross-pollination between other   
   local colonies of molecules/protocells. But operative word here is   
   "local". These incubators must have been delicately balanced systems,   
   with very limited mobility.   
      
   For example, let's say you have a local hot spring system that has given   
   rise to protocell population that has reached RNA replication. How might   
   this genetic information be transferred non-locally? Perhaps a flood   
   washes these far away? The transported remnant needs to arrive in a new   
   location that immediately provides a similar environment with ready   
   supply of feedstock etc. Without constant replication replenishment your   
   RNA quickly degrades. The problem is, a flood event is almost certainly   
   going to do the opposite: disperse the population and deposit what   
   remains in hostile locations.   
      
   What I'm doing here is identifying a point at which prebiotic chemistry   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)