Posted on 12/29/2021 5:57:37 AM PST by Red Badger
A summary of decades of research on a rather 'out-there' idea involving viruses from space raises questions on just how scientific we can be when it comes to speculating on the history of life on Earth.
It's easy to throw around words like crackpot, rogue, and maverick in describing the scientific fringe, but then papers like this one, from 2018, come along and leave us blinking owlishly, unsure of where to even begin.
A total of 33 names were listed as authors on this review, which was published by Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology back in August 2018. The journal is peer reviewed and fairly well cited. So it's not exactly small, or a niche pay-for-publish source.
Science writer Stephen Fleischfresser goes into depth on the background of two of the better known scientists involved: Edward Steele and Chandra Wickramasinghe. It's well worth a read.
For a tl;dr version, Steele is an immunologist who has a fringe reputation for his views on evolution that relies on acquiring gene changes determined by the influence of the environment rather than random mutations, in what he calls meta-Lamarckism.
Wickramasinghe, on the other hand, has had a somewhat less controversial career, recognized for empirically confirming Sir Fred Hoyle's hypothesis describing the production of complex carbon molecules on interstellar dust.
Wickramasinghe and Hoyle also happened to be responsible for another space biology thesis. Only this one is based on more than just the origins of organic chemistry.
The Hoyle Wickramasinghe (H-W) thesis of Cometary (Cosmic) Biology makes the rather simple claim that the direction of evolution has been significantly affected by biochemistry that didn't start on our planet.
In Wickramasinghe's own words, "Comets are the carriers and distributors of life in the cosmos, and life on Earth arose and developed as a result of cometary inputs."
Those inputs, Wickramasinghe argued, aren't limited to a generous sprinkling of space-baked amino acids, either.
Rather, they include viruses that insert themselves into organisms, pushing their evolution into whole new directions.
The report, titled "Cause of Cambrian Explosion – Terrestrial or Cosmic?", pulls on existing research to conclude that a rain of extra-terrestrial retroviruses played a key role in the diversification of life in our oceans roughly half a billion years ago.
"Thus retroviruses and other viruses hypothesized to be liberated in cometary debris trails both can potentially add new DNA sequences to terrestrial genomes and drive further mutagenic change within somatic and germline genomes," the authors wrote.
Let that sink in for a moment. And take a deep breath before continuing, because that was the tame part.
It was during this period that a group of mollusks known as cephalopods first stretched out their tentacles from beneath their shells, branching into a stunning array of sizes and shapes in what seemed like a remarkably short time frame.
The genetics of these organisms, which today include octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish, are as weird as the animals themselves, due in part to their ability to edit their DNA on the fly.
The authors of the paper make the rather audacious claim that these genetic oddities might be a sign of life from space.
Not of space viruses this time, but the arrival of whole genomes frozen in stasis before thawing out in our tepid waters.
"Thus the possibility that cryopreserved squid and/or octopus eggs, arrived in icy bolides several hundred million years ago should not be discounted," they wrote.
In his review of the paper, medical researcher Keith Baverstock from the University of Eastern Finland conceded that there's a lot of evidence that plausibly aligns with the H-W thesis, such as the curious timeline of the appearance of viruses.
But that's just not how science advances.
"I believe this paper justifies skepticism of the scientific value of stand alone theories of the origin of life," Baverstock argued at the time.
"The weight of plausible, but non-definitive, evidence, great though that might be, is not the point."
While the idea is as novel and exciting as it is provocative, nothing in the summary helps us better understand the history of life on Earth any better than existing conjectures, adding little of value to our model of evolution.
Still, with solid caveats in place, maybe science can cope with a generous dose of crazy every now and then.
Journal editor Denis Noble concedes that 'further research is needed', which is a bit of an understatement.
But given the developments regarding space-based organic chemistry in recent years, there's room for discussion.
"As space chemistry and biology grows in importance it is appropriate for a journal devoted to the interface between physics and biology to encourage the debates," said Noble.
"In the future, the ideas will surely become testable."
Just in case those tests confirm speculations, we recommend being well prepared for the return of our cephalopod overlords. Who knows when they'll want those eggs back?
This research was published in Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology.
A version of this article was first published in August 2018.
I have 4 starting words in 2 pairs. Each pair covers the 5 full-time vowels and 5 common consonants. The pairs cover slightly different consonants and I pick which one to use each day mostly at random.
In general, I don’t get enough information out of the first word to skip the second. So I may waste the second guess since it doesn’t use any letters found in the first word.
There is a “hard” mode you can set that will force you to use known letters once you know them. I haven’t tried that mode yet.
I ordered a bathing suit!
Oh, golly. How tough would that be? Although I do know a little about Cricket, the football eludes me, though the older sister seems to like it.
I like Australian Rules football, but I don’t think it’s anything like English football. (Rugby?)
But Monopoly? I was never good enough to like it, and it didn’t help that I had two brothers whose sole delight was to cheat their younger sisters.
I know a fair amount about American Monopoly, but not British.
YAY, you!!!
That’s good to hear! Woohoo! Don’t forget to bring it when you come!
I hope it will be much too big for me by the time that happens!
I hope mine is, too!
:o])
The dishes are done, and I just re-hung the wind chimes, and put the sign back on the door for delivery people to ring the doorbell. They seem to think that taking a photo of whatever they have left is an adequate safety measure to prevent porch pirates.
One of my neighbors came on Tuesday to let me know there was a package at my door. It was the rest of my Walmart order. I hate the way they do things here! GAH!
I must be missing something. Maybe it’s that I’m supposed to be “laid back.” Not gonna happen when money is involved.
I agree, haven’t noticed it much at all; however, I guessed “whack” yesterday because of it being a UK game...
I wouldn’t do well on that one.
I actually enjoy the “struggle” aspect of it... helps to clear away those brain cobwebs that build up...
Sounds wonderful!
It really was, so nearly 20 years on, the details are very clear. One caroler even said he would write about eating his first-ever homemade pumpkin pie in his journal! Now, of course, I wonder if he ever actually did. But what a tribute that would be!
Huh, who knew? I wonder if Canada has its own Monopoly with Toronto streets or something.
Tom finally came to take Vlad driving. He was grumping about having to find a place to practice backing and turning, but Oh Well!
I only remembered that because the late Igor thought it would be a game in which he could show off his prodigious knowledge. We bought it, played it and watched him go down in flames. He hated to lose, but when he lost to the kids, who were young adults at the time, he was ready to throw a tantrum. Needless to say, the game went into the next yard sale we had.
I’m sure that if you researched Monopoly, you might find a game with Canadian streets as an “anniversary” of some kind. Most games, no matter where they are sold, generally have the American street names, but often translated, although that’s not a hard and fast rule.
My goodness. Tom, grumping about finding a place to back and turn?? Maybe he needs to take up cooking for a hobby. ;o]
We use whack all the time.
The doorbell is out of whack. Do you think you can get it back in whack?
Normally, I probably would enjoy the “struggle” aspect, but one of the symptoms of CFIDS is not being able to find word substitutions or to spell correctly and being dyslexic when the disease is active.
I’ll just keep plugging away at it because I’m not going to give up! ;o]
We used to use “whack” a lot when I was growing up, and even into my married life, and beyond. Not so much any more because I’m the only one to notice when things are out of whack and there’s no one around to rectify the whackiness.
grab them while you can...
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