Abiogenesis

Abiogenesis (Greek a-bio-genesis, "non biological origins") is, in its most general sense, the hypothetical generation of life from non-living matter. Today the term is primarily used to refer to hypotheses of the origin of life from a primordial soup. Earlier notions of abiogenesis, now more commonly known as spontaneous generation, held that living organisms are generated by decaying organic substances, e.g. that mice spontaneously appear in stored grain or maggots spontaneously appear in meat. (That idea, which has long been known to be incorrect, will be called "Aristotelian abiogenesis" in this article.)

Critics

Hoyle

Sir Fred Hoyle with Chandra Wickramasinghe was a proponent of Panspermia, first proposed by the Greek philosopher Anaxagoras. Hoyle became a staunch critic of hypotheses of chemical evolution to explain the naturalistic Origin of life.

Related Topics:
Sir Fred Hoyle - Chandra Wickramasinghe - Panspermia - Greek - Philosopher - Anaxagoras - Chemical evolution - Naturalistic - Origin of life

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Panspermia, per se, is not actually in conflict with the idea of abiogenesis, though Hoyle's interpretation of panspermia clearly does conflict. Panspermia simply moves the origin of life elsewhere in the universe.

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Schroedinger

Physicist Erwin Schroedinger, in his book What is life?, has shown that the mechanism of genetics defies the laws of thermodynamics, since a relatively small number of molecules, which form the genetic material, have such a huge influence on so many others molecules. Although not direct criticism of abiogenesis, Schroedinger's book asserts that life can't be explained by the laws of physics thus implying that it can't be created from lifeless matter.

Related Topics:
Erwin Schroedinger - What is life? - Thermodynamics

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This argument is generally understood to assert false presuppositions, namely that that Earth is in a closed system, which it is not since it receives energy from the Sun.

Related Topics:
Earth - Sun

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Yockey

Information theorist Hubert Yockey argued that chemical evolutionary research raises the question:

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:Research on the origin of life seems to be unique in that the conclusion has already been authoritatively accepted … . What remains to be done is to find the scenarios which describe the detailed mechanisms and processes by which this happened.

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:One must conclude that, contrary to the established and current wisdom a scenario describing the genesis of life on earth by chance and natural causes which can be accepted on the basis of fact and not faith has not yet been written. (Yockey, 1977. A calculation of the probability of spontaneous biogenesis by information theory, Journal of Theoretical Biology 67:377–398, quotes from pp. 379, 396.)

Related Topics:
Wisdom - Genesis - Life - Earth - Chance - Fact - Faith

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In a book he wrote 15 years later, Yockey argued that the idea of abiogenesis from a primordial soup is a failed paradigm:

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:Although at the beginning the paradigm was worth consideration, now the entire effort in the primeval soup paradigm is self-deception on the ideology of its champions. …

Related Topics:
Paradigm - Ideology

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:The history of science shows that a paradigm, once it has achieved the status of acceptance (and is incorporated in textbooks) and regardless of its failures, is declared invalid only when a new paradigm is available to replace it. Nevertheless, in order to make progress in science, it is necessary to clear the decks, so to speak, of failed paradigms. This must be done even if this leaves the decks entirely clear and no paradigms survive. It is a characteristic of the true believer in religion, philosophy and ideology that he must have a set of beliefs, come what may (Hoffer, 1951). Belief in a primeval soup on the grounds that no other paradigm is available is an example of the logical fallacy of the false alternative. In science it is a virtue to acknowledge ignorance. This has been universally the case in the history of science as Kuhn (1970) has discussed in detail. There is no reason that this should be different in the research on the origin of life. (Yockey, 1992. Information Theory and Molecular Biology, p. 336, Cambridge University Press, UK, ISBN 0-521-80293-8).

Related Topics:
History - Science - Textbook - Religion - Philosophy - Ignorance - Cambridge University

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Yockey, in general, possesses a highly critical attitude toward people who give credence toward natural origins of life, often invoking words like "faith" and "ideology". Yockey's publications have become favorites to quote among creationists, though he is not a creationist himself (as noted in this 1995 email http://www.asa3.org/archive/evolution/199602/0125.html).

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Religious criticism of the theory