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ABSTRACT
"Cause of Cambrian Explosion - Terrestrial or Cosmic?" is based on the work and theories of Rhawn Joseph, first published in 2000. In books and articles published by Joseph (2000, 2009a,b,c,d, 2010ab, 2013; Joseph & Schild 2010a,b), a comprehensive, detailed genetic theory was presented which explained 1) the extraterrestrial origins of life on Earth, (2) the evolutionary biology of extraterrestrial interplanetary horizontal gene exchange; (3) how the genetic information for the evolution of life on Earth has extraterrestrial origins, (4) how extraterrestrial genes, including "silent genes" and the genetic material for the generation of additional genes, were transferred by viruses and prokaryotes into the eukaryotic genome and that these genes (5) contained all the genetic information necessary for the evolution of every species which has walked, crawled, swam or slithered across this planet--including species which never evolved on Earth. 6) It was further detailed as to how various species genetically and biologically altered the environment, which (7) acted on gene selection and "silent gene" activation thereby initiation the evolution of "new" species adapted to a world which had been genetically engineered for their survival. 8) Hence, according to Joseph's theory, when sufficient oxygen, calcium etc. had been secreted or liberated, silent and other genes were activated giving rise to the Cambrian explosion, 9) and the evolution of the eye, brain and skeletal system. (10) As detailed in these books and article by Joseph: Bacteria, archae, and viruses, and perhaps even more complex species, continually fall from space and (11) continue to insert genes, via horizontal gene transfer, into the eukaryotic genome thereby effecting the trajectory of evolution. (12) All these factors explain the step-wise, punctuated equilibrium which characterizes evolution on this planet, and (13) can be summed up as "evolution and metamorphosis." (14). Prior to the research and theorizing of Joseph (2000-2013), no scientist had ever before provided an extraterrestrial-genetics-based theory as to the evolution of life on Earth or the Cambrian Explosion.
Although Steel, Wickramasinghe and the coauthors of "Cause of Cambrian Explosion - Terrestrial or Cosmic?" attributed this theory to themselves and to Hoyle and Wickramasinghe, there is no evidence to support this claim, particularly in that Hoyle and Wickramasinghe repeatedly attributed evolution to a god-like extraterrestrial intelligence and only used "key" and "lock" metaphors to explain the role of viruses in evolution. (15). It is obvious that the 2018 article, "Cause of Cambrian Explosion - Terrestrial or Cosmic?" is based on the work and theories of Rhawn Joseph, first published in 2000. Key Words: Genetics, Extraterrestrials, Cosmic, Evoluti
Looking at the paper by Steele et al., titled, Cause of Cambrian Explosion - Terrestrial or Cosmic? 1, the following paragraph leaps out:
Evidence of the role of extraterrestrial viruses in affecting terrestrial evolution has recently been plausibly implied in the gene and transcriptome sequencing of Cephalopods. The genome of the Octopus shows a staggering level of complexity with 33,000 protein-coding genes more than is present in Homo sapiens (Albertin et al., 2015). Octopus belongs to the coleoid sub-class of molluscs (Cephalopods) that have an evolutionary history that stretches back over 500 million years, although Cephalopod phylogenetics is highly inconsistent and confusing (see Carlini et al., 2000; Strugnell et al., 2005, 2006, 2007; Bergmann et al., 2006). Cephalopods are also very diverse, with the behaviourally complex coleoids, (Squid, Cuttlefish and Octopus) presumably arising under a pure terrestrial evolutionary model from the more primitive nautiloids. However the genetic divergence of Octopus from its ancestral coleoid sub-class is very great, akin to the extreme features seen across many genera and species noted in Eldridge-Gould punctuated equilibria patterns (below). Its large brain and sophisticated nervous system, camera-like eyes, flexible bodies, instantaneous camouflage via the ability to switch colour and shape are just a few of the striking features that appear suddenly on the evolutionary scene. The transformative genes leading from the consensus ancestral Nautilus (e.g. Nautilus pompilius) to the common Cuttlefish (Sepia officinalis) to Squid (Loligo vulgaris) to the common Octopus (Octopus vulgaris, Fig. 5) are not easily to be found in any pre-existing life form – it is plausible then to suggest they seem to be borrowed from a far distant “future” in terms of terrestrial evolution, or more realistically from the cosmos at large. Such an extraterrestrial origin as an explanation of emergence of course runs counter to the prevailing dominant paradigm.
1. The paper from Albertin et al. doesn’t back up Steele et al.'s claim that octopuses have 33,000 more protein-coding genes than humans do. Instead, Albertin et al. write that based on their research they “predicted 33,638 protein-coding genes” after sequencing the Octopus bimaculoides genome. The number of protein-coding genes in the human genome is 19,000 to 20,000, so that means octopuses have 14,000 more protein-coding genes than we do.
2. In any case, the notion that the number of protein-coding genes corresponds in any way with an organism’s complexity is debunked in a 2008 paper by Leslie Pray, titled, Eukaryotic Genome Complexity (Nature Education 1(1):96). Pray points out that the number of genes in an organism’s genome “has nothing to do with the organism’s complexity,” and lists several organisms which have more protein-coding genes than we do: among them the laboratory mouse, Mus musculus (30,000 protein-coding genes), the rice plant Oryza sativa (51,000) and the protozoan parasite and STI Trichomonas vaginalis (60,000).
3. The claim that scientists believe that there was a lineage leading “from the consensus ancestral Nautilus (e.g. Nautilus pompilius) to the common Cuttlefish (Sepia officinalis) to Squid (Loligo vulgaris) to the common Octopus (Octopus vulgaris, Fig. 5)” is flat-out wrong, as Carnall points out in his critical review:
Nautilus, especially the one living species referred to, is absolutely not ancestral, definitely not consensus ancestral to common cuttlefish etc. They’re modern representatives of a long-lived-more-diverse-in-the-past group but ain’t nothing primitive or ancestral about them. The broader group, Nautiloidea, maybe, but there is a lot that needs resolving about stem coleoid relationships. The simplification here is misleading.
4. Steele et al. haven’t done their homework on cephalopod phylogenetics: the papers they cite are more than ten years out-of-date (Carlini et al., 2000; Strugnell et al., 2005, 2006, 2007; Bergmann et al., 2006). They never even mention the article published in 2017 by Tanner et al., titled, Molecular clocks indicate turnover and diversification of modern coleoid cephalopods during the Mesozoic Marine Revolution(Proceedings of the Royal Society B, 15 March 2017, Volume 284, issue 1850), which provides an up-to-date phylogeny. Incidentally, Tanner et al. describe Nautilus as a “sister group to coleoids,” not an ancestor.
5. Steele et al. also get their chronology wrong: they seem to think that octopuses appeared suddenly about 270 million years ago, with all of their modern features:
Thus the possibility that cryopreserved Squid and/or Octopus eggs, arrived in icy bolides several hundred million years ago should not be discounted (below) as that would be a parsimonious cosmic explanation for the Octopus’ sudden emergence on Earth ca. 270 million years ago.
Wrong on two counts. For starters, the oldest known octopus fossil is not 270 million years old but 296 million years old 1, as Wikipedia points out. Second, as Tanner et al. point out, the really interesting features possessed by modern cephalopods evolved much later, during the Jurassic period. Here’s how the Daily Mail summarized their findings (Mysterious genetic origins of the squid, octopus and cuttlefish revealed: Creatures had a common ancestor 100 million years ago by Harry Pettit, 1 March 2017):
‘We found that cephalopods evolved during a time of great ecological change, due to competition with fish and their predators,’ study lead-author Al Tanner, a molecular biologist at the University of Bristol, told MailOnline.
'Cephalopods shifted from being slow, armoured organisms into rapid jet-propelled oceanic species, able to compete with fish.
'Their ancestors, the heavily-shelled ammonites and belemnites, probably went extinct because their predators evolved to defeat their armour, and so were easy pickings compared to the increasingly-swift squid, and increasingly well-hidden octopuses.
The period that the octopus, squid and cuttlefish split from their common ancestor was known as the ‘Mesozoic Marine Revolution’ and occurred around 100 to 160 million years ago, the researchers claim."
discourse.peacefulscience.org...
To be con't..........
SPACE
An Insane Paper Tests The Limits of Science by Claiming Octopuses Came From Space
MIKE MCRAE 16 MAY 2018
www.sciencealert.com...
A summary of decades of research on a rather 'out-there' idea involving viruses from space has recently been published, and it's raising 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 every now and then a paper like this comes along, leaving us blinking owlishly, unsure of where to even begin.
A total of 33 names are listed as authors on this review, which was published by Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology. 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 already 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, recognised 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 argues, 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 hypothesised 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 write.
originally posted by: HarbingerOfShadows
a reply to: Phantom423
No offense but this sounds like deflection.
If you have the proof you claim what does it matter how much he wants?
The continuing antagonism to the panspermic implications of Pasteur's dictum led the way to the emergence of the dominant biological paradigm - abiogenesis in a primordial soup. The latter idea was developed at a time when the earliest living cells were considered to be exceedingly simple structures that could subsequently evolve in a Darwinian way. These ideas should of course have been critically examined and rejected after the discovery of the exceedingly complex molecular structures involved in proteins and in DNA. But this did not happen. Modern ideas of abiogenesis in hydrothermal vents or elsewhere on the primitive Earth have developed into sophisticated conjectures with little or no evidential support.
Significance
Arguments for an abiotic origin of organic compounds in deep-sea hot springs are compelling because of their potential role in the origin of life and sustaining microbial communities. Theory predicts that warm H2-rich fluids circulating through serpentinizing systems create a favorable thermodynamic drive for inorganic carbon reduction to organic compounds. We show that abiotic synthesis proceeds by two spatially and temporally distinct mechanisms. Abundant dissolved CH4 and higher hydrocarbons are likely formed in H2-rich fluid inclusions over geologic timescales. Conversely, formate production by ΣCO2reduction occurs rapidly during subsurface mixing, which may support anaerobic methanogenesis. We confirm models for abiotic metastable organic compound formation and argue that alkanes in all ultramafic-influenced vents may form independently of actively circulating serpentinizing fluids.
Abstract
Although it is not known when or where life on Earth began, some of the earliest habitable environments may have been submarine-hydrothermal vents. Here we describe putative fossilized microorganisms that are at least 3,770 million and possibly 4,280 million years old in ferruginous sedimentary rocks, interpreted as seafloor-hydrothermal vent-related precipitates, from the Nuvvuagittuq belt in Quebec, Canada. These structures occur as micrometre-scale haematite tubes and filaments with morphologies and mineral assemblages similar to those of filamentous microorganisms from modern hydrothermal vent precipitates and analogous microfossils in younger rocks. The Nuvvuagittuq rocks contain isotopically light carbon in carbonate and carbonaceous material, which occurs as graphitic inclusions in diagenetic carbonate rosettes, apatite blades intergrown among carbonate rosettes and magnetite–haematite granules, and is associated with carbonate in direct contact with the putative microfossils.
Collectively, these observations are consistent with an oxidized biomass and provide evidence for biological activity in submarine-hydrothermal environments more than 3,770 million years ago.
Abstract
Over the last 70 years, prebiotic chemists have been very successful in synthesizing the molecules of life, from amino acids to nucleotides. Yet there is strikingly little resemblance between much of this chemistry and the metabolic pathways of cells, in terms of substrates, catalysts, and synthetic pathways. In contrast, alkaline hydrothermal vents offer conditions similar to those harnessed by modern autotrophs, but there has been limited experimental evidence that such conditions could drive prebiotic chemistry.
In the Hadean, in the absence of oxygen, alkaline vents are proposed to have acted as electrochemical flow reactors, in which alkaline fluids saturated in H2 mixed with relatively acidic ocean waters rich in CO2, through a labyrinth of interconnected micropores with thin inorganic walls containing catalytic Fe(Ni)S minerals. The difference in pH across these thin barriers produced natural proton gradients with equivalent magnitude and polarity to the proton-motive force required for carbon fixation in extant bacteria and archaea. How such gradients could have powered carbon reduction or energy flux before the advent of organic protocells with genes and proteins is unknown.
Work over the last decade suggests several possible hypotheses that are currently being tested in laboratory experiments, field observations, and phylogenetic reconstructions of ancestral metabolism. We analyze the perplexing differences in carbon and energy metabolism in methanogenic archaea and acetogenic bacteria to propose a possible ancestral mechanism of CO2 reduction in alkaline hydrothermal vents. Based on this mechanism, we show that the evolution of active ion pumping could have driven the deep divergence of bacteria and archaea.
originally posted by: cooperton
What supposed illogical arguments have you refuted?
Which if you would have read my article, or even your OWN article, you would have realized that 521 years is the half-life for DNA inside bone. You tried to refute this by posting an article, which actually agreed with the same number:
originally posted by: vasaga
Link me one. I didn't read the whole thread, only the pages after I posted, and direct replies to me, because, you know, I have a life.
HA. We're the one with the catch phrases... Uhuh...
At this point there is nothing to indicate that it is possible. You should at least be able to admit that. That I can throw a ball 100 feet in the sky doesn't mean that I can throw it to the moon, even if there is evidence of the ball moving in the direction of the moon.
First time I've seen you 'admit' that.
originally posted by: vasaga
Still the same drivel of the appendix that talks about evolution and not abiogenesis.
originally posted by: Phantom423
a reply to: vasaga
We know that there is insufficient evidence for it, and when a paper clearly states it, you dismiss it with an excuse that it has no experiments, completely dismissing all the other papers that DO have experiments that were referenced. It's called evidence of absence.
The paper NEVER said that - and you clearly ignore all the important points that the paper suggests including the Appendix. You're hellbent on rewriting that paper to suit your agenda. That's why you're an ignoramus with no sense of integrity.
The paper said that MULTIPLE times. I quoted them all here;
www.abovetopsecret.com...
originally posted by: vasaga
Aaaaand none of the even contain the word Abiogenesis. Good job
originally posted by: Barcs
It directly said that the half life is different when frozen. You tried to pretend like the half life of DNA made it impossible to be found after X amount of years. You were wrong, as usual.
So the question remains, if all 3,200,000,000 base pair bonds are decayed after 16,451 years, how are they finding:
Which they claim is 300,000 years old??? Stop avoiding the obvious. Stop moving the goal posts. Stop changing the subject when you are backed against a wall. It is straight-forward empirical science that proves that these samples are nowhere near as old as scientists speculate they are.
originally posted by: Phantom423
DNA... doesn't have a half life. Like any other organic compound, the rate of degradation is dependent on the environment from which the DNA was extracted.
Why don't you get yourself a good molecular biology laboratory manual. Man, do you need it.
Are we talking evolution or abiogenesis in this thread?
originally posted by: Barcs
originally posted by: vasaga
Still the same drivel of the appendix that talks about evolution and not abiogenesis.
originally posted by: Phantom423
a reply to: vasaga
We know that there is insufficient evidence for it, and when a paper clearly states it, you dismiss it with an excuse that it has no experiments, completely dismissing all the other papers that DO have experiments that were referenced. It's called evidence of absence.
The paper NEVER said that - and you clearly ignore all the important points that the paper suggests including the Appendix. You're hellbent on rewriting that paper to suit your agenda. That's why you're an ignoramus with no sense of integrity.
The paper said that MULTIPLE times. I quoted them all here;
www.abovetopsecret.com...
LMAO! And you call ME dogmatic!
originally posted by: vasaga
Aaaaand none of the even contain the word Abiogenesis. Good job
The sheer dishonest of this post....
You are literally just hunting for catch phrases. You don't read any research or experiments, you just ignore them all. Phantom explained it and you ignored it all!! Abiogenesis is not one single hypothesis, it is dozens of them. You are completely lost and don't know anything at all about science.
originally posted by: Phantom423
a reply to: cooperton
Wrong. Show me an example of "half life" for an organic molecule which doesn't include conditions - i.e. temperature, atmospheric pressure, the presence of other compounds like gases. You can't do it. Because you don't have a clue what you're talking about.