Re: David Deamer Response to my E-mail Comment

On Jul 9, 2:15 pm, John Edser <ed...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Tom Hendricks <tom-hendri...@xxxxxxx>

Surprisingly he sent back his comments within an hour.
He agreed with some, disagreed with some and at the
end, told me that if I could think of an experiment to
test my idea, let him know.  I'm thinking about that.

JE:-
Hi Tom,

The view that you stated was:

"I suggest that there was no origin moment. Instead
there was a long process of chemical REACTION to the
environment. And every step of the way the most stable
chemical reaction survived. Life then is the most
stable reaction to a specific environment."

What in fact you are advocating is that survival rates per molecular
reaction per population be defined as a pre-biological fitness maximand.
I will illustrate this with a proposed reaction between A and B compared
to a similar reaction between C and D. If the A and B reaction is the
more stable compared to the C and D reaction within a population
comprising of of both, then without replenishment the AB reaction will
be naturally selected over the CD reaction. Eventually a smaller
population containing only AB reactions will have evolved. Unless AB was
extremely stable eventually even that population will disappear. OTOH,
if the population was continually being replenished with AB and CD types
then the rate of resourcing must be balanced against reaction stability
rates because you can lose the natural selective race even if you are
the more stable if replenishment outstrips stability. Here the evolving
system will not necessarily select for the most stable reactions just
the most convenient begging the question: convenient for what exactly?
This can be just about anything. However, Darwinian theory makes it
crystal clear that just the one quality allows Darwinian evolution:
survival long enough to facilitate parental reproduction. In this
particular case this applies to the two competing reactions within the
same population. Of course both have to survive but once this is
achieved they now need to survive to satisfy a new reproductive
maximand. IOW, reproduction must eventually replace stability as a
single fitness maximand per selectee per population. What the new
reproductive maximand demands is a reaction which remains sufficiently
stable _but not too stable_. As we all know carbon based reactions were
naturally selected because they remained optimally stable for
reproductive purposes. Silicon did not have sufficient stability while
others had far too much stability making reproduction almost an
impossibility.

While I agree that stability would have been a pre-biotic fitness
maximand. However, unless this was replaced by a reproductive maximand
there is no evolutionary future.

Regards,

John Edser
Independent Researcher

ed...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Reproduction is one form of stability.
AB merging with CD is more stable than either separately.


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