[grey_whiskers]

Interesting thoughts on the Spiegelman monster -- your link said that the length of the chain selected for shorter and shorter chains, as that reduced replication time; and that there were a couple of 'optimal' chain lengths of (too lazy to re-open the site) I *think* 54 and 48 nucleotides.

Given that real cells have all kinds of lengths, what is it about the matrix ('primordial soup'), the early cells, or the 'competing moieties' which prevented such behaviour in "real" cells?

Cheers!

[js1138]

Spiegelman’s monster isn’t a candidate for the origin of life. It is simply a demonstration of interesting chemistry.

And perhaps a warning for those who doubt that there can be a transition from chemistry to life.