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Does peer-reviewed research support a naturalistic origin of life?

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There was a recent debate between Dr. James Tour and Professor Dave, an atheist with a bachelors degree who makes YouTube videos. The atheist spent his entire opening speech attacking Tour’s character. When Tour asked him to show him origin of life chemistry, he refused. The atheist shuffled through papers he apparently found by Googling, and read the titles. When asked what was in them, he said that he couldn’t remember.

But I was trying to decide who won the debate. There was one place where the atheist claimed that the early Earth had no molecular oxygen. He needs that to be true, in order for the chemistry that creates the building blocks of life to work. So I thought I would talk about a paper that refutes that. After my argument, I’ll talk about another mistake that the atheist made in the debate. Based on those two mistakes, I concluded that the atheist was speaking errors either intentionally or unintentionally, and therefore lost the debate.

Here’s a paper published in the prestigious peer-reviewed science journal Nature, entitled “The oxidation state of Hadean magmas and implications for early Earth’s atmosphere”.

Evolution News explains what the paper is about.

Excerpt:

A recent Nature publication reports a new technique for measuring the oxygen levels in Earth’s atmosphere some 4.4 billion years ago. The authors found that by studying cerium oxidation states in zircon, a compound formed from volcanic magma, they could ascertain the oxidation levels in the early earth. Their findings suggest that the early Earth’s oxygen levels were very close to current levels.

[…]Miller and Urey conducted experiments to show that under certain atmospheric conditions and with the right kind of electrical charge, several amino acids could form from inorganic compounds such as methane, ammonia, and water. Several experiments have been done using various inorganic starting materials, all yielding a few amino acids; however, one key aspect of all of these experiments was the lack of oxygen.

If the atmosphere has oxygen (or other oxidants) in it, then it is an oxidizing atmosphere. If the atmosphere lacks oxygen, then it is either inert or a reducing atmosphere. Think of a metal that has been left outside, maybe a piece of iron. That metal will eventually rust. Rusting is the result of the metal being oxidized. With organic reactions, such as the ones that produce amino acids, it is very important that no oxygen be present, or it will quench the reaction. Scientists, therefore, concluded that the early Earth must have been a reducing environment when life first formed (or the building blocks of life first formed) because that was the best environment for producing amino acids. The atmosphere eventually accumulated oxygen, but life did not form in an oxidative environment.

The problem with this hypothesis is that it is based on the assumption that organic life must have formed from inorganic materials. That is why the early Earth must have been a reducing atmosphere. Research has been accumulating for more than thirty years, however, suggesting that the early Earth likely did have oxygen present.

[…]Their findings not only showed that oxygen was present in the early Earth atmosphere, something that has been shown in other studies, but that oxygen was present as early as 4.4 billion years ago. This takes the window of time available for life to have begun, by an origin-of-life scenario like the RNA-first world, and reduces it to an incredibly short amount of time. Several factors need to coincide in order for nucleotides or amino acids to form from purely naturalistic circumstances (chance and chemistry). The specific conditions required already made purely naturalist origin-of-life scenarios highly unlikely. Drastically reducing the amount of time available, adding that to the other conditions needing to be fulfilled, makes the RNA world hypothesis or a Miller-Urey-like synthesis of amino acids simply impossible.

If you read the paper’s abstract, it finds that molecular oxygen would have been present by the end of the Hadean era. The earliest signs of life we have are from just after the end of the Hadean era. So, its undeniable that molecular oxygen was present. Did professor Dave lie, or was he just ignorant? One thing for sure, he pronounced that there was no oxygen in the same confident, insulting voice that he used for the rest of his presentation.

OK, so with that out of the way, Professor Dave also cited a paper in the journal Science. And there is an article on Creation.com by Johnathan Sarfati, who has a PhD in chemistry, about that very paper.

His post says:

It’s likely that the media reports you mention were referring to the paper in Science journal by Tracey Lincoln and Gerald Joyce.1 Quite often, the media hype just doesn’t match what was actually discovered. To be fair, Joyce, a well known chemical evolutionist, made it clear that he and his Ph.D. student Lincoln had not produced life, despite the headlines.2 Much earlier, Joyce admitted:

“The most reasonable assumption is that life did not start with RNA … . The transition to an RNA world, like the origins of life in general, is fraught with uncertainty and is plagued by a lack of experimental data.”3

Joyce and Lincoln started off with a fairly long RNA molecule. Given that nothing like RNA appears in Miller–Urey experiments, this already shows unjustified interference from an intelligent investigator. In fact, not even the building blocks, ribonucleotides, appear in such experiments, and they do not spontaneously form RNA. In fact, there are numerous chemical difficulties with obtaining RNA by blind undirected chemistry, the only sort allowed on the hypothetical primordial earth, as chemical evolutionist A.G. Cairns-Smith points out in his book Genetic Takeover4 (see extract at Cairns Smith: Detailed criticisms of the RNA world hypothesis). And it’s a huge step from RNA to the genetic code, its major use today.

Furthermore, this paper didn’t demonstrate replication but ligation—joining two small RNA pieces, previously designed to be a match to the longer strand. So this research already assumed not just one but three RNA strands. For this to be relevant to chemical evolution, the two pieces just by chance had to have pretty close to the complementary base pairs of the first piece—natural selection could not be invoked before reproduction.

Furthermore, since polymerization is unfavorable, the RNA pieces must be chemically activated in some way. Note that a catalyst merely accelerates the approach to equilibrium; it doesn’t change it (see diagram and explanation in Dino proteins and blood vessels: are they a big deal?). The paper states that one of the two joining RNA strands has a triphosphate group on the end. This is very reactive, so would be an unlikely component of a primordial soup, and would not last long even if it appeared. So a supply of matching activated RNA pieces likewise shows unacceptable investigator interference.

See also Does ribozyme research prove Darwinian evolution? for a critique of an earlier Joyce paper on alleged ribozyme evolution, as well as Self-replicating peptides? which has many similarities to the recent Joyce claim.

Now Tour seemed to let this problem drop in the debate. It just seems that Professor Dave was assuming from the titles of the papers that they were relevant to the problem of life. Well, scientists always sound optimistic in their papers. I know, I had to write one for my masters degree thesis, and it was published. That’s why you have to look at the data and be skeptical. Sadly Dave wasn’t able to be skeptical. He wanted something to be true, so he just didn’t bother to interact with challenges to his view. The whole problem with the origin of life is that there are many counter-factual conditions, experimenter interferences, etc. that have to be done to make things work at all. Dave reads the titles of papers, but he just isn’t aware of how the experimenters have adjusted the experiments in ways that are not true to the conditions on the early Earth.

Dr. Tour lost his temper and shouted a lot during the debate, so I don’t think the debate is worth watching. However, if you want to watch a good debate on the origin of life, try this one between Dr. Fazale Rana vs Dr. Michael Ruse. And if you want to see a good explanation of the sequencing problem, check out this lecture by Dr. Stephen C. Meyer. (who has also debated atheists who didn’t lie, shout or insult him – and they even had doctoral degrees)

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Can you trust the police in Britain to enforce the law fairly?

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On this blog, I often complain about how left-wing ideology leads to situations where taxpayers are actually paying the government to persecute them. Well, people pay the police force to protect them from criminals. And that works in a lot of small towns in America’s red states. But in Britain, it’s different. And I have a couple of examples to show you how it doesn’t work.

First, from the UK Daily Mail:

A furious row has broken out after Metropolitan Police officers were filmed pulling down posters of Israeli children kidnapped by Hamas during the terror group’s barbaric October 7 attack.

Two officers stripped the outside of Cullimore Chemist in Edgware, North London of flyers of the missing innocents after receiving calls from residents concerned about tension within the community.

Some locals in the area, which is home to a sizeable Jewish community, have slammed the officers over their ‘disgusting actions’.

[…]The controversy comes as the Met has come under fire for failing to clampdown on Islamism and extremism at pro-Palestine protests on the streets of London. Last weekend, protesters were seen carrying effigies of dead babies, and earlier this month extremists led a rally calling for ‘jihad’.

So, in Britain, they have a very effeminate society. They believe in “don’t judge” and that every culture is equal to every other one. I read about it the books of Theodore Dalrymple, e.g. – “Life at the Bottom”, and in the works of Douglas Murray. Dalrymple (not his real name) worked in a prison as a doctor and psychiatrist. Douglas Murray wrote a book called “The Strange Death of Europe”, where he explained how different European decided to import millions of unskilled men of Middle Eastern origins. In that book, Murray talked about the Jewish Minister of Immigration, Barbara Roche, who opened up the borders, arguing that restraints on immigration were “racist”. She liked diversity, and wanted to see the majority-Christian population of the UK thinned out.

So now, they have this:

It comes after the Metropolitan Police were accused of allowing Central London to become a ‘no-go zone’ for Jews after thousands of people marched in support of Palestine with some seen carrying effigies of dead babies and chanting ‘globalise the Intifada.’

Saturday’s demonstrations marked the third week in a row that the capital has been consumed by the Middle East protests and was marred by several shocking incidents.

In full view of police officers, protesters chanted for the massacre of Jews, bounced effigies of dead babies on flags and called for ‘global intifadas.’

[…]In another shocking clip, a collection of young people from the Socialist Workers Party can be seen chanting ‘From London to Gaza. Globalise the intifada.’

And the government’s response is appeasement – don’t make the protesters mad. By the way, they’ve also banned guns and self-defense in the UK, so if a criminal attacks you, then you can’t do anything about it. That’s more “don’t judge” in action.

But wait, there’s more. Here’s an article from the far-left extremist UK Guardian, which talks about some more activities of Barbara Roche’s friends:

Five men from Rochdale have been sentenced to between eight and 20 years in prison after being found guilty of grooming and abusing two girls between 2004 and 2006.

The longest sentence was given to the oldest defendant, Jahn Shahid Ghani, a 50-year-old care worker. He was at least 30 when he took advantage of the girls when they were 14 or 15. He would pick them up from school while they were still in uniform and ply them with drink and drugs before exploiting them.

[…]It was at Ghani’s flat, above a butcher’s shop in Rochdale, that Girl A was passed around “like a piece of meat” between Ghani younger half-brother, Mohammed Faisal Ghani, and his friends. She said she was “trapped like a prisoner” in the flat and forced to have sex with numerous men on a stained single mattress with no sheets.

[…]The court heard that on one occasion he persuaded Girl A to have sex with his cousin, a man in his 30s, who was visiting from Pakistan. “He’s never had sex with a white girl before,” he told her, urging her to “do it for the team”. He then asked her to marry the cousin for £5,000 so that he could get a UK visa, but she refused.

[…]On one occasion, another defendant, Insar Hussain, now 38, challenged her to a drinking contest at the flat above the butcher’s shop. She drank so much vodka that she passed out, the jury heard. The next day she was shown a video of one of the men sexually assaulting her with a brandy bottle as Hussain and others laughed. The bottle was on display in the bathroom “like a trophy”, the court heard, and the video was distributed around Rochdale.

[…]A fourth defendant, Ali Razza Hussain Kazmi, 36, was described by Girl A as an “intimidating and aggressive figure” when he sexually assaulted Girl B when she was just 13. He went on to rape Girl B when she was 14 and he was 16 or 17, in an underpass near Hopwood Hall college in Rochdale.

And this was interesting – the mothers complained to the police a lot:

Kazmi was the youngest defendant, aged 15 or 16 when he first abused Girl B, who was reported missing from home by her mother at least 83 times as a teenager.

There were many complaints, but the police didn’t do anything. They were scared of being accused of “racism”. Just like Barbara Roche accused people who didn’t like her open borders policy of “racism”.

As a non-white skilled legal immigrant, I don’t think that immigration policy should introduce risks to the taxpayers who pay the salaries of these government and police people. Because this sort of “diversity” immigration and policing is not safe for taxpayers.

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Issues in educating children to be effective and influential Christians

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So, in this post I’m going to briefly go over three challenges to producing effective, influential children. First, choose a better spouse. Second, Christian classical schools. Third, socialist countries make homeschooling and private Christian schools effectively illegal.

1. Choose a better spouse

So let’s start with the first one. Christian parents and pastors need to educate young people to choose spouses who are equipped educate to produce effective and influential children.

So in the case of choosing a man who will be involved in producing effective, influential children, here are some tips:

  • don’t choose a man based on attraction to his appearance or displayed wealth
  • whether homeschooling or private Christian schools, the man should have chosen a major and a career that allows him to pay to avoid public schools
  • it’s better to choose a man whose career allows him to work from home, so that he is available to supervise the education, and discipline the children as they grow
  • he should demonstrate his ability to move people in his circle of influence to greater effectiveness and influence, for example making them try harder at school and work, or get better at defending the Christian worldview, especially on controversial issues

So in the case of choosing a woman who will be involved in producing effective, influential children, here are some tips:

  • don’t choose a woman based on attraction to her appearance or sexual availability
  • children need their their mothers at home from birth to age 5, so if a woman has a career, then she needs to put it on hold during that time. If a woman wants to do a career to benefit the Christian community as a whole, e.g. – Supreme Court justice, then she should probably not have children between those ages
  • it’s better to choose a woman who has demonstrated the ability to do hard things, so that she has the ability to take responsibility and be accountable for producing results, e.g. – a degree in computer science, and two years of private sector coding experience
  • she should demonstrate her ability to move people in her circle of influence to greater effectiveness and influence, for example making them try harder at school and work, or get better at defending the Christian worldview, especially on controversial issues

It’s no good to complain when the children arrive that your spouse isn’t involved in spiritual and moral education. The time to settle that was when you were training to evaluate and choose your spouse. And Christian parents and pastors have a role to play in equipping young people to make better choices.

2. Classical Christian schools

I’ve looked over the curricula of a number of these classical Christian schools, and I am not convinced that they are useful for producing effective, influential Christians.

Suppose I were trying to educate my child to be the next Jay Richards or the next Stephen C. Meyer or the next Kristen Waggoner or the next Clarence Thomas. Are classical Christian schools useful for producing results like that?

Education has two goals. 1) educating the person in valuable skills, so that they can earn a lot of money without sacrificing family engagement, and without violating their conscience. 2) it should teach young people to resist the culture on the basis of reason and evidence. If we are talking about God’s existence or origins, then we are dealing with mainstream science. If we are talking about gospel reliability or the resurrection, then we are making historical arguments using mainstream evidence. If we’re talking about religious pluralism or the problem of evil, then we’re talking about mainstream philosophical theology and philosophy of religion. Etc.

I have yet to meet anyone involved with classical Christian schools who was steering young people into careers where they would make a lot of money, working from home, and not exposing themselves to cancel culture. You would think that these classical Christian schools would be focused on careers like developing software with open-source components, but they don’t have the skills. Secondly, apologetics is poorly handled in these curricula. If there is any, it’s presuppositional – an approach that is used by none of the most effective and influential Christian scholars. The ones who actually debate non-Christians and move the ball downfield in the culture.

3. Move to a conservative state in a conservative country

Many Christian men and women often pooh-pooh my seriousness about marriage and parenting planning. They say “I was born in Washington, and it’s a fine state. The public schools are great here. And I’m sure the government, although entirely Democrat, will respect my rights as a parent and as a Christian. After all, I pay their salaries.” But this is just laziness and ignorance. The people who say this don’t want the burden of having to make plans, and execute plans in order to produce effective, influential children.

Consider this article from Daily Wire, about Germany – a secular socialist state:

Home education has been outlawed in Germany for more than a century; four years ago, the European Court of Human Rights ruled against a family from Darmstadt, Germany, which had asserted the right to homeschool their children. Private religious schools, although legal, must follow state-mandated curricula from the area in which they are located.

Tobias Riemenschneider, a pastor at Evangelical Reformed Baptist Church in Frankfurt, Germany, said in an interview with The Daily Wire that the nation’s restrictive education laws present “great difficulty to parents who are convinced by their Christian faith that it is God’s will for them to raise their children themselves in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” He noted that parents who defy government sanctions against home education risk incurring considerable fines, prison sentences, and the possibility that authorities will take their children.

The same kind of stuff is happening now, in states like Washington and California.

It’s just like those Christian-owned business in SOGI states. SOGI states elevate sexual orientation and gender identity to be a protected category, like race. Christian businesses in those states think “well, I was born here, and my family is here, so I’m going to start a business here, and keep right out of politics. I’m sure God will make my laziness and ignorance work out”. They are taken by surprise by being persecuted by secular left tyrants. A much better plan is to be serious about moving to a state with low taxes, high liberty, and support for the plans of Christian parents. It’s better to spend your own money on educating your kids, rather than to spend it on legal defense.