A new theory of evolution proposed that actually makes sense

[Underseer]

I was going to correct you on the abiogenesis thing and it looks like everyone else already did.

 

[dystopian]

Isn't a scientific theory just an hypothesis that has not been falsified? So both 'hypothesis' and 'theory' would be correct.

No, a scientific theory includes a lot more than just the central hypothesis. A scientific theory includes a functional, predictive, and falsifiable model; is supported by ample evidence; and is generally accepted as valid and accurate by scientific consensus. In other words, it isn't 'just a hypothesis that has not been falsified', it's something that started out as a mere hypothesis, but then developed into a more comprehensive model that has been strengthened by consecutive rounds of rigorous testing and observation.

So they are not both correct.

And I guess the hypothesis does or doesn't make sense. 'Might' is not right.
EB

We can only say whether it does or does not make sense after it has been thoroughly investigated by other, independent, experts who can judge whether the hypothesis makes sense (which itself doesn't say anything about whether its true). I am not an expert, and I don't think anyone here is either, so unless I hear from a credible expert, "might" make sense is the only correct thing I can say about it.

 

[untermensche]

The understanding of origin to self replication through something like RNA is basically a black hole in biology. Very little is known for certain.

This hypothesis is interesting only if it can be supported by experiment.

On it's own without any data to support it, who can say if it makes sense or not? A few physicists might have an opinion.

It apparently makes sense to the physicist who thought it up, so maybe he or someone else will figure out a way to support it through experiment, create self replicating life in the lab.

If he is right, it would change our perception of the likelihood of life on other planets, not much more.

It is already taken as a given in biology that life had a natural beginning of some kind.

 

[Emily Lake]

I think that one of the questions this raises (at least for me) is where life begins and non-life ends. What is the difference between a self-replicating machine and a living organism? At what point does a clump of complex molecules capable of reproduction actually constitute a living thing?

It's easy enough to say that a duck is alive and a rock is not. I've never been certain, however, whether or not a virus is alive.

So perhaps it's more of a spectrum and less of a bright line.

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

I think that one of the questions this raises (at least for me) is where life begins and non-life ends. What is the difference between a self-replicating machine and a living organism? At what point does a clump of complex molecules capable of reproduction actually constitute a living thing?

It's easy enough to say that a duck is alive and a rock is not. I've never been certain, however, whether or not a virus is alive.

So perhaps it's more of a spectrum and less of a bright line.

When I hear "life" I think "complex chemistry." But then again, a single atom is pretty darn complex to me.

 

[Speakpigeon]

Isn't a scientific theory just an hypothesis that has not been falsified? So both 'hypothesis' and 'theory' would be correct.

No, a scientific theory includes a lot more than just the central hypothesis. A scientific theory includes a functional, predictive, and falsifiable model; is supported by ample evidence; and is generally accepted as valid and accurate by scientific consensus. In other words, it isn't 'just a hypothesis that has not been falsified', it's something that started out as a mere hypothesis, but then developed into a more comprehensive model that has been strengthened by consecutive rounds of rigorous testing and observation.

I still don't see the difference since a theory seems to remain hypothetical.

You could say perhaps that theories are more elaborate hypotheses.

You could say perhaps that hypotheses come before predictive models.

You could say perhaps that a theory provide better predictions that a hypothesis.

You could say perhaps that a hypothesis becomes a theory when most or all scientists come to accept it as best current explanation.

But as long as a theory is falsifiable, I don't see that it is not ipso facto a hypothesis.

Hypothesis
1. a suggested explanation for a group of facts or phenomena, either accepted as a basis for further verification (working hypothesis) or accepted as likely to be true. Compare theory (5)

Theory
5. a set of hypotheses related by logical or mathematical arguments to explain and predict a wide variety of connected phenomena in general terms: the theory of relativity.

And I guess the hypothesis does or doesn't make sense. 'Might' is not right.

We can only say whether it does or does not make sense after it has been thoroughly investigated by other, independent, experts who can judge whether the hypothesis makes sense (which itself doesn't say anything about whether its true). I am not an expert, and I don't think anyone here is either, so unless I hear from a credible expert, "might" make sense is the only correct thing I can say about it.

So nothing I experienced personally makes sense, right?

And for that matter, let me guess, nothing that most people are experiencing makes sense.

An interesting conception...
EB

 

[ronburgundy]

Actually, it's a theory explaining why justifying abiogenesis isn't a sensible question. The claim is that the defining feature of life actually exists as a continuum of energy dissipation phenomena.

Can you translate this to english please?

In short, there is not as much difference as people presume between what non-living and living matter is and does, thus the "great mystery" of how life arose isn't that great. IOW, life and non-life are not fundamentally different. its just a matter of the way matter is arranged and matter rearranges all the time.

 

[fromderinside]

Did you read the article?

“This means clumps of atoms surrounded by a bath at some temperature, like the atmosphere or the ocean, should tend over time to arrange themselves to resonate better and better with the sources of mechanical, electromagnetic or chemical work in their environments,” England explained.

Self-replication (or reproduction, in biological terms), the process that drives the evolution of life on Earth, is one such mechanism by which a system might dissipate an increasing amount of energy over time.

As England put it, “A great way of dissipating more is to make more copies of yourself.”

...

The chemistry of the primordial soup, random mutations, geography, catastrophic events and countless other factors have contributed to the fine details of Earth’s diverse flora and fauna. But according to England’s theory, the underlying principle driving the whole process is dissipation-driven adaptation of matter.

This principle would apply to inanimate matter as well. “It is very tempting to speculate about what phenomena in nature we can now fit under this big tent of dissipation-driven adaptive organization,” England said. “Many examples could just be right under our nose, but because we haven’t been looking for them we haven’t noticed them.”

...

Besides self-replication, greater structural organization is another means by which strongly driven systems ramp up their ability to dissipate energy. A plant, for example, is much better at capturing and routing solar energy through itself than an unstructured heap of carbon atoms. Thus, England argues that under certain conditions, matter will spontaneously self-organize. This tendency could account for the internal order of living things and of many inanimate structures as well. “Snowflakes, sand dunes and turbulent vortices all have in common that they are strikingly patterned structures that emerge in many-particle systems driven by some dissipative process,” he said. Condensation, wind and viscous drag are the relevant processes in these particular cases.

“He is making me think that the distinction between living and nonliving matter is not sharp,” said Carl Franck, a biological physicist at Cornell University, in an email. “I’m particularly impressed by this notion when one considers systems as small as chemical circuits involving a few biomolecules.”

This does not make your post clearer.

Think of it this way. Englander knows something of clumps of atoms in water including sea water. He see analogies in biological replication in water. So what he does is put the two sets of data up on a screen and blurs the focus so a single curve is seen. He speaks of that function as being the inanimate observed function seen with clumps of atoms, dissipation-driven adaptive organization, Wallah a single functional relationship is seen.

 

[fromderinside]

So nothing I experienced personally makes sense, right?

And for that matter, let me guess, nothing that most people are experiencing makes sense.

An interesting conception...
EB

Right. What makes sense to me, you, any one of us probably doesn't make scientific sense since each of us are experiencing phenomena through more or less unique perspective filters. What science requires is standardization of experience. That requires multiple samples of experience data under control related to other scientific knowledge in a regular, repeatable way.

 

[dystopian]

I still don't see the difference since a theory seems to remain hypothetical.

You could say perhaps that theories are more elaborate hypotheses.

You could say perhaps that hypotheses come before predictive models.

You could say perhaps that a theory provide better predictions that a hypothesis.

You could say perhaps that a hypothesis becomes a theory when most or all scientists come to accept it as best current explanation.

But as long as a theory is falsifiable, I don't see that it is not ipso facto a hypothesis.

Not really. A theory is as close as we can get to fact in science. A theory being falsifiable doesn't mean it's really just a better supported hypothesis; it means that there's an identifiable way for the theory, *should* it be wrong, to be proven false.

If you say that you own a red sweater with the words "I am a helicopter" printed on it and that it's sitting in your closet, then that's a falsifiable claim; I could track you down and go through your closet. Upon finding no such sweater present, I'd have falsified your claim.

If I say that I own a blue sweater with the words "I am a submarine" printed on it, and that it has a mind of its own that makes it teleport to someplace else whenever someone other than me is about to lay eyes on it; then that is an *unfalsifiable* claim.

One of these claims can be investigated, the other can not. You will never get an unfalsifiable theory in science, because such a thing would by definition be unscientific.

A hypothesis is merely a guess; a theory on the other hand must necessarily have a degree of accuracy or it couldn't produce the complex results our scientific theories provide us with. It would be silly to put the two on anywhere near the same footing; guesswork doesn't enable one to build a nuclear reactor.

So nothing I experienced personally makes sense, right?

Everything makes sense. What may or may not make sense is people's interpretations thereof.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I think that one of the questions this raises (at least for me) is where life begins and non-life ends. What is the difference between a self-replicating machine and a living organism? At what point does a clump of complex molecules capable of reproduction actually constitute a living thing?

It's easy enough to say that a duck is alive and a rock is not. I've never been certain, however, whether or not a virus is alive.

So perhaps it's more of a spectrum and less of a bright line.

If there's somehow a continuum between a rock and a duck and the rock is not a living thing while the duck is then there should definitely be a line between living and non-living.

Once we find the line then maybe we can tell on which side of the line machines would be. Or possibly, which machines are non-living things and which are living things.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

Not really. A theory is as close as we can get to fact in science. A theory being falsifiable doesn't mean it's really just a better supported hypothesis; it means that there's an identifiable way for the theory, *should* it be wrong, to be proven false.

If you say that you own a red sweater with the words "I am a helicopter" printed on it and that it's sitting in your closet, then that's a falsifiable claim; I could track you down and go through your closet. Upon finding no such sweater present, I'd have falsified your claim.

If I say that I own a blue sweater with the words "I am a submarine" printed on it, and that it has a mind of its own that makes it teleport to someplace else whenever someone other than me is about to lay eyes on it; then that is an *unfalsifiable* claim.

One of these claims can be investigated, the other can not. You will never get an unfalsifiable theory in science, because such a thing would by definition be unscientific.

A hypothesis is merely a guess; a theory on the other hand must necessarily have a degree of accuracy or it couldn't produce the complex results our scientific theories provide us with. It would be silly to put the two on anywhere near the same footing; guesswork doesn't enable one to build a nuclear reactor.

I still don't see that you are not just informally deciding to call "theory" more complex sets of hypotheses. When exactly did Einstein's General Relativity become a theory? Was it even ever a hypothesis according to you?
EB

 

[dystopian]

I still don't see that you are not just informally deciding to call "theory" more complex sets of hypotheses. When exactly did Einstein's General Relativity become a theory? Was it even ever a hypothesis according to you?
EB

Of course it was. Back when it was first proposed and the evidence hadn't yet accumulated. If you want you can differentiate the two this way; a hypothesis is an idea that tries to explain something. A theory is an explanation established as valid by the accumulated evidence.

 

[Speakpigeon]

The articulation of this new theory with the theory of evolution may have been best summed up at the end of the Business Insider article:

“the reason that an organism shows characteristic X rather than Y may not be because X is more fit than Y, but because physical constraints make it easier for X to evolve than for Y to evolve,”

EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

I still don't see that you are not just informally deciding to call "theory" more complex sets of hypotheses. When exactly did Einstein's General Relativity become a theory? Was it even ever a hypothesis according to you?
EB

Of course it was. Back when it was first proposed and the evidence hadn't yet accumulated. If you want you can differentiate the two this way; a hypothesis is an idea that tries to explain something. A theory is an explanation established as valid by the accumulated evidence.

So there's never any "new theory".

There are just hypotheses that are granted the status of theory.

And when exactly does this happen? Did General Relativity suddenly became a theory in 1918? And when exactly did Darwin's hypothesis on evolution became the Theory of Evolution?
EB

 

[dystopian]

So there's never any "new theory".

There are just hypotheses that are granted the status of theory.

And when exactly does this happen? Did General Relativity suddenly became a theory in 1918? And when exactly did Darwin's hypothesis on evolution became the Theory of Evolution?
EB

Are you just trolling now?

 

[J842P]

I still don't see that you are not just informally deciding to call "theory" more complex sets of hypotheses. When exactly did Einstein's General Relativity become a theory? Was it even ever a hypothesis according to you?
EB

Basically that is right. A "theory" is simply a comlex set of interrelated hypothesis that generally are thought to be correct. The use of the terminology is a loose one, and there is no rigorous definition, especially not one that applies across all the domains of science.

 

[fromderinside]

I still don't see that you are not just informally deciding to call "theory" more complex sets of hypotheses. When exactly did Einstein's General Relativity become a theory? Was it even ever a hypothesis according to you?
EB

Basically that is right. A "theory" is simply a comlex set of interrelated hypothesis that generally are thought to be correct. The use of the terminology is a loose one, and there is no rigorous definition, especially not one that applies across all the domains of science.

Or a hypothesis is specific measurable proposal with which to test and alternative theory set against against the dominant theory set.

 

[Emily Lake]

I think that one of the questions this raises (at least for me) is where life begins and non-life ends. What is the difference between a self-replicating machine and a living organism? At what point does a clump of complex molecules capable of reproduction actually constitute a living thing?

It's easy enough to say that a duck is alive and a rock is not. I've never been certain, however, whether or not a virus is alive.

So perhaps it's more of a spectrum and less of a bright line.

If there's somehow a continuum between a rock and a duck and the rock is not a living thing while the duck is then there should definitely be a line between living and non-living.

Once we find the line then maybe we can tell on which side of the line machines would be. Or possibly, which machines are non-living things and which are living things.
EB

I'm not so certain. There's definitely a spectrum of colors, wouldn't you say? And it's pretty easy to say that green is not red, they're categorically different. But that doesn't necessarily imply that there's a dividing line between orange and yellow, such that we can absolutely and without error say that everything on one side of the line is yellow, and everything on the other side is orange.

Things on opposite ends of the spectrum can easily be identified as belonging or not belonging to the category in question. But things in the middle aren't so easy. Where, for example, is the dividing line between black and white below?

 

[Clivedurdle]

For a machine to be on the living side of the line does it not have to respire, reproduce, self repair etc?