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Examining the requriements and the evidence


A. The primitive Earth

1. Energy source—the sun (with its destructive UV rays)
2. Nature of the atmosphere—must have been very different from today's atmosphere for molecules to have formed:

a) It needed to have no oxygen
b) It needed hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, nitrogen, ammonia, and water vapor

Evidence from geology:

a) no methane or ammonia; oxygen was present;
b) the atmosphere seems to have been similar to today's

Oxidation of basement rocks

Geologic Evidence of Oxygen in the "Primordial" Atmosphere (Sidebar 2)

Did The Early Earth Have A Reducing Atmosphere?

B. Generation of proteins, DNA, and RNA

1. The quantities of bases and sugars must have been incredibly enormous (millions of tons) to counter the diluting effect of the ocean
2. The combinations of nucleotides must form meaningful chains
3. There are 20 different amino acids that combine to make proteins

a) two variations occur spontaneously: 50% "left-handed" and 50% "right-handed"
b) the left-handed and right-handed amino acids combine randomly
c) all proteins in living systems are composed of only left-handed amino acids in precise orders

Molecular Evolution?
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4. Stanley Miller's experiment and its problems

a) it must have energy, but it must also be protected from the same source of energy
b) no oxygen

RNA World (Sidebar 3)

C. Protein (enzyme) formation

1. The average protein has 400 amino acids arranged in precise order
2. The enzyme ribonuclease is a 124 amino acid protein. The probability of its formation is 1:21160—impossible, even in 5 billion years
3. To form just one cell by naturalistic origins, billions of tons of each component would be required: billions of tons for each of the hundreds of different proteins, for the DNA, for the RNA and for the complex carbohydrates.

Each of these impossible steps had to happen (by chance) many times, until there was an accidental combination that moved the process to the next step. That step also had to happen many times, until a lucky combination moved it up to the next step. This multitude of impossible combinations had to continue through every step of the process.
This impossible process had to continue until all of the combinations that were required had accumulated into a self-reproducing organism. Until it was able to reproduce itself, each dead-end meant the entire process had to start again from the very beginning.

D. Living Cell

1. Needs properly organized genetic material, energy factors, and membranes and hundreds of enzymes and other proteins
2. 2 Law of Thermodynamics—there is a natural tendency to break down, not to build up
Thermodynamics And The Origin Of Life (Part I)
Thermodynamics And The Origin Of Life (Part II)

3. If evolution is true, these molecules floating around must have gotten together to form metabolic pathways, genetic materials and proteins
4. Sir Fred Hoyle and Dr. Chandra Wickramasin conclude that, based on statistics, there must be a god because naturalistic evolution is virtually impossible.
Not According To Hoyle

The Origin of Life—Theories on the Origin of Biological Order (Sidebar 4)



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