Re: Crystalline ancestry: Vegetative growth
- From: verulam <johnhewitt22@xxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 13 Feb 2009 12:59:57 -0500 (EST)
Dear Tim,
As you will recall, we discussed Cairns Smith's ideas on the mineral
origin a week or two ago, during which I expressed my extreme
skepticism about his ideas. I do believe that my own work is far more
plausible - given its relative freedom from the implausible
assumptions inherent in Cairns Smith's work.
In particular, I wondered about why you, and Cairns Smith, would stand
by a mechanism based on silicon chemistry even though life as we now
know it, and whose origin and existence you purport to explain, is
carbon-based. That does seem to me a reasonable, even inevitable
question and I was hoping that you might reply to it. Unfortunately,
you have not yet done so.
In the cirumstances, I am puzzled by this latest thread that you
intitiated. I am unsure as to whether your video was intended as a
reply to my query, or whether it had some other purpose. Could you
clarify that for me?
Sincerely
John Hewitt
darwin.ediacara.org...
A recent video of mine:
"Crystalline ancestry: Vegetative growth"
"A video about the crystalline ancestry hypothesis, and the
possibility
that the first organisms propagated themselves using a vegetative
growth pattern."
-http://originoflife.net/vegetative_growth/
Interesting. =3DA0The pictures of crystal-structure-models were very
helpful, but I have to complain that you didn't have pictures for
the heart of this presentation - the 1-D of information crystal,
which can have multiple genotypes in a single crystal. =3DA0So,
I am not really sure what such a beastie or colony of beasties
would look like.
The front of the AGCS paper has a picture of one type:
http://originoflife.net/vegetative_growth/graphics/agcs.png
It looks like seaweed. =A0As for "multiple genotypes" it is
easy to imagine mutations. =A0The only problem is when you
think about how to keep them at managable low levels.
That is a big deficiency, because it makes it difficult to imagine
how each genotype would have its own phenotype, and hence
be independently selected from all of the other genotypes in
the same crystal. =3DA0And I have no idea at all of what it would
look like at the stage where there are multiple genes involved
in each selectable phenotype.
There has to be strong enough selection to counter the mutation
rate. =A0AGCS discusses what the phenotype of such crystals
would look like a bit. =A0Much of it is down to thickness. =A0Thicker
crystals grow more slowly, but break less easily. =A0However,
thickness is only a handful of bits. =A0The layer sequence information
has other effects. =A0The layers are not a perfect fit for each other -
so the flat crystals naturally curve into concave shapes, tubes,
saddle
shapes, etc. =A0That influences their mechanical properties, their
liklihood of tearing, how eaisily they fold, crumple, etc.
Enough to specify a particular sequence against the force of
selection? =A0Maybe - or maybe not - but the evolutionary requirement
is that *some* information is transmitted across deep time - not
necessarily all of it. =A0That information might be statistical in
nature.
The detailed sequence of layers might be less important that
other properties, the number of layers of each type - or
some such.
--
__________
=A0|im |yler =A0http://timtyler.org/=A0t...@xxxxxxxxxxx =A0Remove lock to
reply.
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- References:
- Crystalline ancestry: Vegetative growth
- From: Tim Tyler
- Re: Crystalline ancestry: Vegetative growth
- From: Perplexed in Peoria
- Crystalline ancestry: Vegetative growth
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