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To: jennyp
IOW, as I read it, Morowitz is saying that after the universe experiences its heat death . . .,

I think you are reading it wrong which it isn't hard to do since it rather poorly written. The article you posted is basically a criticism of James Coppedge who cited Morowitz, -- a biophysicist and Robinson Professor in Biology and Natural Philosophy at George Mason University, with a Ph.d from Yale where he was an associate professor of biophysics, something not noted in the link.

A direct attack on Morowitz's assumption of a 239-minimum protein genome can be found in the critic of Coppedge at your link.

Since the link you provided has a very strong evolutionary bias let me give you a different view which expounds on Morowtiz's position and features his math.

614 posted on 06/14/2002 8:34:50 PM PDT by Tribune7
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To: Tribune7

IOW, as I read it, Morowitz is saying that after the universe experiences its heat death . . .,

I think you are reading it wrong which it isn't hard to do since it rather poorly written. The article you posted is basically a criticism of James Coppedge who cited Morowitz, -- a biophysicist and Robinson Professor in Biology and Natural Philosophy at George Mason University, with a Ph.d from Yale where he was an associate professor of biophysics, something not noted in the link.

Well, after re-reading it, I think my interpretation is correct. the 10340,000,000 odds figure that you quoted came from Morowitz's Energy Flow in Biology, and Morowitz's specialty seems to be the thermodynamics of living systems.

I wonder what "The Thermodynamics of Pizza" is all about! I also see an intriguing title: "Beginnings of Cellular Life, Metabolism Recapitulates Biogenesis". I assume this means that the metabolic pathways of current living things reflect the history of how abiogenesis happened. (You do realize of course that Morowitz is an evolutionist?)

A direct attack on Morowitz's assumption of a 239-minimum protein genome can be found in the critic of Coppedge at your link.

Yes, the discovery of self-replicating RNA (ribozymes) about 20 years ago is what got RNA-world theory started, as I understand it. That really reduces the required number of genes in a self-supporting cell.

621 posted on 06/14/2002 10:26:02 PM PDT by jennyp
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