[Dan Day]

So you're saying this accident called evolution somehow learned from its mistakes?

Only in the sense that its mistakes get weeded out, and thus its successes accumulate, providing a "step up" for the next cycle of trial and error.

[Southack]

"Only in the sense that its mistakes get weeded out, and thus its successes accumulate, providing a "step up" for the next cycle of trial and error."

And what would that process look like for the formation of the very first functional DNA strand?