How life began????

How Life Began

©2002 by Thomas F. Heinze
Reproduced by permission

Chapter 2
Could Cell Parts Get Together?

Hot Ocean Bottom Vents and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

Many today believe that the first life formed in hot submarine vents where water comes out of the earth in the bottom of the ocean, but there are good reasons why this is unlikely:

"It is also unlikely that the first living systems formed in a high-temperature environment, because this is where the decomposition of organic compounds proceeds most rapidly."1

Heat, like water, causes amino acids, proteins, DNA, and RNA to break down more rapidly.2

M. Levy and the famous Stanley Miller write that tests have been made on the nucleotides which form RNA and DNA. Since each type of nucleotide breaks down at a different speed, if the temperature is that of the boiling point of water at sea level, the half-lives of the various nucleotides range from 19 days to 56 years. If the water is even hotter, at 250 C their speed of breakdown ranges from one minute to 35 minutes.3

The crushing pressure at the bottom of the sea allows water to actually come out of the earth this hot without boiling. Some odd small creatures have the ability to live in water this hot, but Miller's observations show that outside of living things, the nucleotides of which DNA and RNA are formed break down rapidly in hot water. Miller believes this would keep them from becoming concentrated enough to get together.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics, one of the fundamental laws of science, contributes to Miller's observations. One way of stating it, called entropy, has been called the mother of all Murphy's Laws. Evolutionist Isaac Asimov referred to this when he wrote:

"Another way of stating the Second Law, then, is: 'The universe is constantly getting more disorderly.'"4

He means the universe as a whole. Not that every local spot within it is becoming more disorderly at any one time, but things will tend toward disorder if they are left completely alone. "The universe is constantly getting more disorderly."

The Second Law of Thermodynamics is science. To believe that long ago, ever more complex molecules built up until they were living cells which kept building up in complexity, forming fish, monkeys and men, is not science. No one was there to observe chemicals become ever more complex until a living cell was formed, and the process cannot be reproduced in the lab. Abiogenesis and evolution are imaginative speculations about what happened in prehistoric times. For some, they have also become a religion to defend passionately, but they are not science. Their direction from simple chemicals to the most complex and highly organized organ in the world, the human brain, is the opposite of of a tendency toward disorder. Prof. Lambert has explained how the disorder described by entropy works:

"Whenever an adequate amount of energy flows through a system of objects, it tends to scatter them."5

Entropy is explained by complex mathematical calculations most of us don't understand, so people tend to exaggerate. Some would make it seem that entropy would not allow any complex molecules to form. Actually, energy must be added or many complex molecules can't form at all. Other people leave the impression that the energy which is always coming to the earth from the sun would have kept the nucleotides which compose DNA and RNA on the primitive earth from breaking down. However, heat still comes to earth from the sun today, and the components of RNA and DNA really do break down more rapidly in hotter water, just as Miller states.

Miller avoided the possible problems with those who argue Second Law theory. He did not say what the Second Law would or would not do. He just measured what actually happens. The more the components of DNA are heated, the faster they break down. The same is true of amino acids, proteins and RNA. Heat tends to scatter the atoms. Adding undirected energy by increasing the heat favors randomness over order.

Having shown that the rate of breakdown really does increase as the heat increases, Miller suggests that if the water were hot, a cell could not form because the nucleotides, etc. would break down too fast to build enough of a concentration to form RNA or DNA. To give more time for the nucleotides to accumulate, Miller suggests that the temperature of the oceans must have been around freezing. At that temperature the breakdown is much slower.

That is much colder than average ocean temperatures today. However, most people who believe in an old Earth, feel that Earth started out so hot that it took around a half billion years just to cool enough so the heat would not kill any life that might have started to form. Could it have cooled to around freezing that soon?

Compounding the problem of cooling the ocean, radioactive elements in the earth give off heat as they break down. Billions of years ago, when many believe the first life originated, not nearly as much radioactive material would already have broken down, so much more heat would have been added by radioactivity than is being added today. If de Duve was right that the window of time available for life to start was more, "a matter of millennia or centuries, perhaps even less, than in millions of years,"6 the time would seem to be too short for the oceans to have cooled to almost freezing. Yet Miller suggests that unless it were that cold, nucleotides would not build up. (He is assuming there would have been some way for the nucleotides to form, and that when formed they would get together to make DNA or RNA).

Another observation of nature brings out an additional problem with life starting spontaneously. Brig Klyce calls this "logical entropy."7 While waiting for a better term for the concept, I will use his and mention the evidence for it right here, below the entropy of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. What I am talking about has to do with the fact that certain patterns are observed to form by ordinary natural processes, and others not to form except by intelligent design.

• We see patterns in the sand on the shore because the water sorts the sand by size and the waves move it back and forth.

• We have all marveled at the intricate patterns of crystals, so beautiful in snow flakes viewed under a microscope and in slices of thunder eggs.

However, certain areas of science, notably anthropology, are largely based on the observation that certain other patterns don't happen except by deliberate intelligent design. When an anthropologist finds an ancient library, he recognizes it. The books may be written with ink on skins or papyrus, or pressed into clay when it was soft, but there are recognizable differences between patterns produced by intelligent design to contain written messages and those produced by other natural processes. If not, the whole science of anthropology would long ago have crumbled into the dust.

Archeologists also study ancient dwellings. Things can get fuzzy as you pass from libraries to broken down houses. A truck load of bricks dumped from a dump truck never falls into the shape of a house with mortar holding each brick together. The bricks fall from the truck in a heap on the ground. However, in the course of time, the mortar of even a carefully built house may weather out from the bricks, and the bricks may fall into the more probable position of a heap on the ground. If an ancient house is not broken down, but still holds the shape of a house, archeologists recognize it as something that did not happen by chance. Someone built it.

A beautiful vase is easy to recognize as an artifact made by an intelligent being, but the slightly shaped scrappers used by primitive societies are hard to distinguish from natural rocks. The fact that the distinctives are sometimes blurred does not invalidate the science of anthropology. Some patterns are only caused by intelligent design.

The speculation that concentrated chemicals could organize themselves, get inside a cell membrane, and form a living cell is not scientific. It is contrary to the Laws of Probability, Cause and Effect, the principle of Biogenesis (life only comes from life), to the direction described by the entropy of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, and to the observational evidence which Klyce calls "logical entropy."

The belief that the first cell came about when very complex hard to form substances: RNA, proteins, etc. somehow formed, and then became concentrated in a hot organic broth is in conflict with scientific principles:

• The complex molecules which form the components of life tend not to form, but to break down in the presence of water. The hotter the water, the faster they break down, and the less their chance of becoming concentrated enough to get together.

• The speculation that concentrated chemicals could organize themselves, get inside a cell membrane, and form a living cell is not scientific. It is contrary to the Laws of Probability, Cause and Effect, the principle of Biogenesis (life only comes from life), to the direction described by the entropy of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, and to the observational evidence which Klyce calls "logical entropy." It is also contrary to experimental evidence: Neither proteins nor DNA nor RNA form in nature outside of living cells; not even the nucleotides of which DNA and RNA are made will form under simulated natural conditions. The chemicals DNA and RNA are so complex and hard to form that at this point, complete strands cannot even be made in the lab. Even if a cell could be formed, it would only function if it contained information programmed very specifically to direct that particular type of cell.

Do Proteins in the Ocean Concentrate?

Authors who believe that the first life started in the ocean usually claim that proteins, DNA, RNA, and lipids formed in the ocean, and became concentrated to form an organic broth. In real life, none of these substances form by themselves, particularly in water. According to many books promoting evolution, however, they did, and then got together to form the first living cell. Other authors say they would not concentrate:

"The idea of such a 'soup' containing all desired organic molecules in concentrated form in the ocean has been a misleading concept against which objections were raised early."8

If they did not both form and concentrate, the necessary substances could never have gotten together to make the first cell. (Other environments for the spontaneous formation of life have also been suggested. We will deal with them as well).

Concentration or dispersion, which side should you believe? The experiment is simple. Find out for yourself! It is obvious that a chicken egg has all the proteins necessary to form life, just as the organic soup is claimed to have had. Break an egg in a big bowl. Separate the yolk which contains less protein from the protein-rich white. Beat an eighth of the egg white into several gallons of water until it is very thin and watery, as if it had been formed in the ocean. Before you quit beating it, add a bottle of ink or food coloring to dye your protein mixture so you can see where it goes.

Now take an eye dropper and your colored protein solution, wade out into the ocean and drop one drop at a time over a large area. This will put your protein near the surface, the part of the ocean where lightning passing through the right atmosphere might have formed amino acids. It is also the depth at which waves would most effectively mix your protein into the water. Now watch to see if your protein comes together to concentrate in one spot or disperses.

If you don't have an ocean handy, you can simulate the experiment in your bathtub. Use just a drop or two of egg white. Mix it well in a quart or more of water and color it. Put one drop of the watered down protein mixture in each corner of the tub full of water, and stir to simulate the action of the waves and tides. If the protein spreads out instead of concentrating into one brightly colored spot, no first cell could ever have formed. If you have done the experiment, you just destroyed the entire sand castle of many first life theorists. You have seen for yourself that the protein does not concentrate. It spreads out.

Think about it. If any one of the steps which lead to the evolution of the first life is scientifically impossible or would not happen in practice, none of the steps following could have taken place.

Let's drop back a step to the amino acids. They too, would spread out and become more and more diluted. The same would be true for the components of DNA or RNA. No concentration, no organic broth! Something other than chemical evolution must have produced the first life. This is simple, and must have been known by the authors of textbooks which taught the exact opposite to generations of students. If they had valid arguments, why did they use this?

Some schoolbooks, recognizing that the components of cells would disperse rather than concentrate, have tried to get around the problem by claiming that the entire: "sea had the composition of 'hot dilute soup.'"9 The ocean, however, is huge and some elements which are necessary for living things are not available in such large quantities. These, if spread throughout the ocean, would have been much too diluted to form anything. Elements like salt, and whatever else was most plentiful in the ocean at that time, whether useful or not, would have tended to predominate.

As to the next step, Dr. Susan Aldridge, published by Cambridge University Press, repeats the standard position of the optimistic group of first life advocates:

"Once there were nucleic acids (DNA and RNA) and proteins around, however primitive, they would have tended to organize themselves into cells."10

In her dreams! She would be one of the most famous people on earth if she could make this happen in a laboratory, even starting with perfect DNA, RNA and proteins which were bought in a chemical supply house.

She comes back down to earth a few pages later when speaking of the difficulty of finding pieces of DNA long enough to examine in an Egyptian mummy:

"Over the course of time, DNA is degraded, as are other biomolecules such as proteins. Much of this degradation occurs shortly after death... The main feature of old DNA is that it is fragmented into small pieces…"11

Aldridge then says that water in liquid form (not ice or vapor) is necessary for protein production, but after proteins have been produced, they and DNA are best preserved in dry places rather than wet.

When put in oceans, lakes, etc., proteins and DNA disperse, degrade, and deteriorate rather than "organize themselves into cells." They deteriorate most rapidly when in something wet (like "organic broth").

The overly optimistic idea that by chance ever more complex chemicals built up, became concentrated in the ocean, and came together to become the first life, is scientifically impossible at every step. Why has it been taught in science classes? Was it to keep people from believing that God created? This is certainly the effect it has had on many. Undeniably, statements that are known to be false should not be taught as science in schoolbooks, no matter how important the people are who feel that the end justifies the means.

The overly optimistic idea that by chance ever more complex chemicals built up, became concentrated in the ocean, and came together to become the first life, is scientifically impossible at every step. Why has it been taught in science classes?

The belief that amino acids, proteins, the components of RNA, or whatever, became concentrated in the ocean and got together to form a cell is not belief in science, but a commitment to a particular theory about ancient history. Science Now quotes Orgel, one of the most important scientists doing first life research:

"'But nailing down exactly what preceded RNA will be difficult,' Orgel says, because 'it's like any history-one can't be absolutely sure since you weren't there.'"12

Chemical Dilution

Sea water is not the only thing that can dilute chemicals, and render the formation of proteins and DNA impossible. Of the over 100 different amino acids which occur naturally, only 20 are commonly used to make the proteins of living things.13 Of the chemicals produced in Miller's experiments, only 2% to 4% were amino acids of any kind. The rest were mostly tars. But assume for a moment that all of the 20 useful amino acids had been formed, and that all of these were left-handed. Even if they had not been diluted by water, they would have been diluted 96% to 98% by the non-useful chemicals produced by the same spark. Some of the chemicals needed to make proteins would not be identical to those needed for RNA and vice versa. The right ingredients for one would have diluted those for making the other.

In addition, 20 amino acids are used in making proteins and they have to be linked in the right order, so of the 20, only one would be the next to link at any one moment. The presence of all those other amino acids would make it harder to find the one in 20 which would have to link next. One reason why living cells are able to make protein is because a form of RNA called transfer RNA lines up amino acid molecules in the order in which they must be inserted into the new protein chain. This eliminates two problems:

• Including chemicals that don't belong in the protein.

• Linking the right amino acids in the wrong order.

All available evidence indicates that proteins do not form by chance. If they did form, proteins are not like amino acids which only come in 20 useful types. There are millions of possible proteins, so even if they formed and became concentrated, the ones needed for the first cell would have been hopelessly diluted by the millions of possible proteins that were not called for in that particular cell.

Coacervates

Coacervates have often been identified as a step in the evolution of the first living cell, largely because outwardly they look somewhat like cells. They are small spheres that form when some large molecules are mixed with water. If you put a little oil in some water in a clear glass container with a good lid and shake it hard you may see the very small spheres.

When coacervates are formed by heating amino acids, they are called microspheres, but more often when the term "coacervate" is used it refers to droplets of lipids (fat) in water:

"When mixed with water, certain lipids will form a bubble that is called a coacervate (koh AS uhr vayt)."14

Because coacervates outwardly resemble cells, when microscopes were still too crude to give any idea of the complexity of cells, they became accepted as a step in the evolution of the first cell. When a coacervate breaks into two pieces, it outwardly resembles a cell dividing. Real cells split when the information in the cell commands specialized proteins called enzymes to split them in a very complex manner. Coacervates do not contain DNA or RNA, but just break apart.

Iris Fry, philosopher and science historian, in her book The Emergence of Life on Earth, sums up the findings of the most important first life researchers. Notice what she says about lipids (fats), the building blocks of most coacervates:

"Though a few organic substances-for instance certain simple amino acids-can form fairly easily under prebiotic conditions, other biochemical building blocks such as nucleotides and lipids, require for their synthesis a 'real factory.' (Cairns-Smith 1985:48). The synthesis of these substances involves a series of reactions, each reaction following the previous one in utmost accuracy."15

Though the lipids from which coacervates are made can only be formed by a "real factory" such as a living cell, evolutionists often claim that coacervates were a step in the spontaneous generation of the first cell:

"When mixed with water, certain lipids will form a bubble that is called a coacervate (koh AS uhr vayt)... Over millions of years, coacervates that could survive longer by taking in molecules and energy from their surroundings would have become more common than the here-today-gone-tomorrow kind. When a means arose to transfer this ability to "offspring" coacervates, probably through self-replicating RNA, life had begun."16

Did you notice how this textbook elevated the theory over the facts?

• There were no lipids before already living things made them.

•Coacervates are still the "here-today-gone-tomorrow kind." They have not evolved beyond that because they have neither RNA nor DNA and cannot self replicate.

Another high school biology book not only admits lipids do not form in nature, but adds that neither do carbohydrates, proteins, or nucleic acids (DNA and RNA):

"Living cells are composed of four major classes of complex organic molecules: lipids, carbohydrates, proteins, and nucleic acids. Atoms do not put themselves together into these complex organic molecules on modern earth."

The solution suggested is to accept the atmosphere that Miller used in his famous experiment as that of the early earth, and infer that such an atmosphere would have resolved the problem. Miller's experiment, however, has been repeated hundreds or thousands of times and the products measured. Neither lipids, proteins, RNA, or DNA will form, not even the nucleotides from which RNA and DNA are made.

Fry's previously quoted statement that it would take "a real factory" explains why it won't work. Coacervates can be made today, but only because the lipids used were formed by real live cells!

Because I believe in heaven and hell, I am very grieved whenever I see fake science being used by our tax supported schools to convince kids that they have no Creator.

If you still believe that coacervates were a step in the evolution of life, please note that your faith, no matter how strong, is contrary to the scientific evidence. The term "coacervate" usually refers to lipids, and lipids are made by cells that already exist.

A Cell Needs a Membrane

Cells membranes have two layers which are made of lipids.17 A cell membrane by itself is extremely thin and fragile. It would require nearly 10,000 cell membranes laid on top of one another to achieve the thickness of a sheet of paper.18

What does the cell's two layered membrane do?

"A living cell is a self-reproducing system of molecules held inside a container. The container is the plasma membrane-a fatty film so thin and transparent that it cannot be seen directly in the light microscope. It is simple in construction, being based on a sheet of lipid molecules… Although it serves as a barrier to prevent the contents of the cell from escaping and mixing with the surrounding medium… the plasma membrane does much more than that. Nutrients have to pass inward across it if the cell is to survive and grow, and waste products have to pass outward. Thus the membrane is penetrated by highly selective channels and pumps, formed from protein molecules, that allow specific substances to be imported while others are exported. Still other protein molecules in the membrane act as sensors to enable the cell to respond to changes in its environment."19

Had there been one first cell, its membrane would have had to do at least the things mentioned in the above quote. Without a membrane that could provide these and other essential services, a cell could not exist. A lipid membrane without the help of the protein pumps and channels lets water enter the cell, but keeps nutrients out.20

Which came first, a first cell that could not form without the specialized membrane holding it together and maintaining livable conditions inside, or the membrane that is only produced by a living cell? Remember, neither the lipids of cell membranes nor the proteins that make up their pumps and channels will form in nature apart from living cells.

Which came first? A first cell that could not form without the specialized membrane holding it together and maintaining livable conditions inside, or the membrane that is only produced by a living cell? Remember, neither the lipids of cell membranes nor the proteins that make up their pumps and channels will form in nature apart from living cells.

How Many Parts Does a Cell Need?

Now that we have an idea of how a cell works, I want to show that in order to function, even the simplest cell would have required a minimum number of essential parts. This is the theme of the book, Darwin's Black Box, by Michael Behe, associate Professor of Biochemistry at Lehigh University. Behe is not speaking of parts like arms and legs, but of parts on the molecular level. He uses as an illustration the common mouse trap, the kind with a base, a wire that snaps down, etc. If even one part of a mouse trap is eliminated it will not catch a mouse. It has as few parts as it can have and still work. Behe called this irreducible complexity because the machine will not work if even one part is taken away. The first cell would also have needed a certain number of essential parts. All must have been present from the first, because none of these parts would work without being properly connected with the others. This is strong evidence against the idea that a cell could have been put together in a mindless fashion from an "organic broth."

Because Behe's book is devastating to the theory that the first living cell was put together by accident, many have attacked it and ridiculed both the book and Behe. However, no one has disproved it.

Just as a mouse trap will not work without all of its essential parts, a cell cannot live unless it contains a minimum number of essential parts. Most cell parts are made of specialized proteins which are formed according to instructions that the RNA brings from the DNA. Proteins, DNA, and RNA all break down fairly rapidly, so all would have to have gotten into the proposed first cell before any of them had broken down. Not even one has a long shelf life at normal temperatures.

Scientists have tried to determine how many parts the simplest cell would have needed to live. They started with the simplest one celled organism known to exist, a bacteria called Mycoplasma genitalium that can live with less parts than most bacteria because it lives in other living things.

The instruction sets in DNA are called genes. They are the basic units of heredity. Since the parts of any cell are made according to the information in its genes, the scientists knocked out one gene at a time to get a rough idea of just how simple a cell could be and still live:

"The analysis suggests that 265 to 350 of the 480 protein-coding genes of M. genitalium are essential under laboratory growth conditions…"21

According to these scientists, the information necessary to build the simplest cell requires 265 to 350 genes (each of which contains the information necessary to direct the construction of one or more of the essential proteins). The minimum number of proteins usually considered necessary for cells capable of living independently (not as parasites supported by a more complex animal) are in the thousands.

Contrast this with the evolutionary speculation of how life started with a simple blob as presented by the astrobiologists who authored the book Rare Earth:

"We start with a cell membrane enclosing DNA-a simple bag of protoplasm and DNA-and then evolve…"22

Other parts of this book, published in the year 2000, are very up to date, but to make the first life palatable, the authors revert to the simple blob. It is like referring to the most complex computer chip with many millions of transistors, etc. all wired to work together, as a simple piece of resin with silica inside. The DNA, however handles millions of times as much information as a chip. Calling the first life, or something they think came before it "a simple bag of protoplasm and DNA," is simplistic.

DNA is useful only if programmed with the right information. If it were simple, scientists would be able to make a whole functioning DNA in the lab. Even if it is correctly programmed, DNA can only pass on instructions to RNA. It can't make anything itself. If "a simple bag of protoplasm and DNA" could live, scientists would have put a strand of DNA in a bag of protoplasm and made life long ago!

We can compare DNA to a computer that controls a machine in a factory. Neither the machine nor the computer can do anything without the other. Compare their "simple bag" propaganda with three true statements from another part of the same book:

"No one has yet discovered how to combine various chemicals in a test tube and arrive at a DNA molecule."23

"Some of the steps leading to the synthesis of DNA and RNA can be duplicated in the laboratory; others cannot."24

"… no one has yet succeeded in creating RNA."25

Statements about a simple form of life coming about by chance must be understood for what they really are: Religious wishes about ancient history, not science.

If a simple bag had been formed by chance, where would it have gotten its DNA? Like a telephone, the importance of DNA is as a carrier of information. Only DNA which was already programmed with the exact information to operate that specific first cell would have worked. Where would the DNA have gone to get programmed?26

Not even the exterior "simple bag" could be simple. The membrane would not work, you will recall, unless it was complex enough to:

• let in the things the cell needs,

• keep out what it does not need,

• expel its waste products.

The membranes of even the simplest cells are made of lipids which we have seen "require for their synthesis a 'real factory,'" and to function must be "penetrated by highly selective channels and pumps, formed from protein molecules, that allow specific substances to be imported while others are exported."27

All known living things have Proteins, DNA, RNA, and a cell membrane. All of these components, with the exception of some of the simpler proteins, are too complex to be made in the laboratory, so the odds are highly against them having formed spontaneously in nature. Some people who realize this write me and say, "Your problem is that you just don't understand how simple the first life was."

Neither does anyone else! All known life is DNA based, though some viruses have only RNA. (Viruses are not classed as living because they depend on cells for food and reproduction.) It is true that DNA is too complex to have been generated spontaneously, but the idea (which we will examine later) that life started with a simple pre-RNA, or any other simple substance is based entirely on imagination!

Simple things, however, can be made in nature or the laboratory and experimented with much more easily than the complex ingredients of living things. Scientists have been doing experiments for years, searching for something simple that could be made to live. They have eliminated the substances that seemed most likely, but still cannot make a living thing, or even a chemical that will self replicate in a natural habitat.

Cells will not work without complex molecular machines directed by real information. This evidence points to an intelligent Creator who designed the complex cell parts which work together and provided the information to make them work. Those who instead continue to believe in a mythical simpler substance that arose with no intelligent input have chosen to embrace a faith which is contrary to the evidence and several fundamental laws of science. It is a belief system whose foundation rejects the existence of an intelligent Creator.

If you are an atheist and want to stay that way, that is your privilege. However, the evidence indicates that living things have always been:

• Composed of materials too complex to form in nature.

• Designed to work together.

• Guided by huge amounts of information.

If, on the other hand, you are not an atheist, why should you follow their leap of faith in the impossible? Kids in tax supported public schools should not be taught that it is scientific to believe that life started when RNA, DNA, and proteins got together inside a membrane. It is not scientific because it is contrary to the evidence.

People have protested to me: "In the future researchers may find evidence that supports a naturalistic origin of life." This only underlines the fact that their faith is contrary to the evidence which is now available.

So what are the bare essentials of the simplest cell? At the very least it would need:

• The information necessary to build the cell.

• A container for the information (DNA and/or RNA).

• The materials which DNA must have at hand to do the work of making the cell (left-handed amino acids, ribosomes, proteins, and other components).

• The essential minimum number of molecular machines that do much of the work of the cell. What good would half made ribosomes be that could not yet make proteins? About as useful as bumble bees that had only evolved one third of the wing surface needed to fly!

• A way to get the necessary information from the DNA to the parts which do the work of the cell.

• A source of energy as well as something that converts this energy to a usable form.

• A membrane that will hold the cell's parts together while letting the materials the cell needs pass in, and its waste products out.

• Life! Think about it. Right after dying, many dead cells still contain the necessary parts, but they are dead cells, not living cells.

All known cells are constructed in such a way that no one part by itself can make any of its proteins, the DNA, the RNA, or the external membrane that a cell must have. Therefore, no known cell can function without at least some minimum number of simultaneously existing parts, each designed to work with the others.

The belief that some primitive ancestor to the cell could do this in the past is not based on observation or having repeated the process in the lab. It may be part of a philosophic belief system, a religion, or an opinion about ancient history, but science it is not!

Getting the Parts Together

We have seen that the simplest cell known needs at least a few hundred parts. These parts are too complex to form without intelligent instructions. In addition, once formed they break down rapidly.

Now we are ready to move on to the next fatal flaw in the theory of the chance formation of the first life: The parts would have had to get together. The cell would not work if the DNA were floating in the China Sea, while the proteins were in the Mediterranean and the membrane which was to enclose them was in the Atlantic off the New England coast.

If even one of the hundreds of really necessary proteins had not been together with the RNA and the pre-programmed DNA inside that microscopically small cell membrane, a functioning cell would not have formed. To make the lucky accident even less plausible, all the parts would have to have gotten together inside that cell membrane at about the same time, before even one essential part had broken down.

Forget the good old days and the bad old microscopes. Calling a cell a simple blob or a "simple bag of protoplasm and DNA" may be a useful ploy to manipulate minds, but in the real world, cells are composed of many parts that work together. Even if something was able to form RNA, DNA, and the hundreds of proteins necessary to form the first cell, they could only have become part of the cell if they were all in the same spot at the same time inside a microscopically tiny cell membrane. If you still believe all this happened with no Creator to direct the project, please recognize that it does not happen in nature or even in the laboratory, so the evidence and the odds are very strongly against it. Those who believe it do so because of faith in a teacher, a book, or a religious viewpoint.

Spontaneous Generation Doesn't Happen

It was once believed that life just came about. Rats were generated by piles of old rags, maggots by meat, etc. Many felt the Bible's teaching that God long ago created living things that brought forth according to their kind was naive and pre-scientific. They thought that they possessed a higher, more advanced knowledge. Actually they believed in pre-scientific fables which were laid to rest by the famous experiments of Louis Pasteur in 1860. By boiling and then maintaining sterile conditions, Pasteur established the Principle of Biogenesis: living things come only from living things, spontaneous generation does not happen. It is a foundational principle of biology, upon which much of today's food preservation industry is based.

Many today, however, believe this principle of science must have been circumvented to permit the evolution of the first life. They usually avoid the term "spontaneous generation," since everyone knows that spontaneous generation cannot happen, and use the word "abiogenesis" instead. Why use a term that might prejudice people against the idea that life spontaneously arose from chemicals?

Two schoolbooks I found admit that what was being proposed was spontaneous generation. One claimed it could happen in the past because the atmosphere was different. The other because the environment was different. Scientists, however, have tried many different atmospheres and environments. Life does not form! Not only do rats not come from rags, a living cell has never arisen from any mixture of amino acids; or even from perfectly formed DNA, RNA, and proteins. When kids are taught the opposite, they should also be informed that what they are being taught is an opinion about what happened in prehistoric times. It is not supported by evidence, and is contrary to the most basic laws and principles of science.

Lets look at some specific problems with the idea of spontaneous generation, and the attempts that have been made to provide solutions.

Problem
Oxygen in the air is very active chemically. Chemicals claimed to have combined with each other to form protein, DNA, and RNA would have combined with the oxygen instead.

The proposed solution
The atmosphere was different than today, and did not contain oxygen.

First problem with the proposed solution

"But many researchers now hold that the ancient Earth's atmosphere, compared with the earlier view, had more oxygen and less hydrogen-as the atmosphere does today."28

"It was puzzling, but geologists know from their analyses of the oldest known rocks that the oxygen level of the early atmosphere had to be much higher than previously calculated. Analyses of these rocks, estimated to be more than 3.5 billion years old, found oxidized iron in amounts that called for atmospheric oxygen levels to be at least 110 times greater, and perhaps up to one billion times greater than otherwise accepted."29

Second problem with the proposed solution
Life could not exist on earth if it not for a protective layer of ozone, a form of oxygen in the stratosphere which shields us from the harmful ultraviolet rays. The ozone layer is formed from oxygen in the air. If there had been no oxygen in the atmosphere, there would have been no ozone, and without the ozone, any life that began would have been killed by ultraviolet rays.

Proposed solution
The first life formed deep enough in the ocean so the water would shield it from the ultraviolet rays.

Life on earth could not exist if it were not for a protective layer of ozone, a form of oxygen in the stratosphere which shields us from the harmful ultraviolet rays. The ozone layer is formed from oxygen in the air. If there had been no oxygen in the atmosphere, there would have been no ozone, and without the ozone, any life that began would have been killed by ultraviolet rays.

Problem
Any amino acids in the ocean would spread out rather than concentrating and could never have gotten together to form proteins.

Solution
Life began in a shallow lagoon or a puddle where evaporation concentrated the chemicals into an organic broth.

Problems with the solution
• The warmer temperature of the water in a lagoon or puddle leads to the rapid breakdown of amino acids, RNA, DNA, and proteins. It has to do with the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

• If life had formed in a shallow lagoon, ultraviolet rays would have killed it.

Solution
The first cell formed in water deep within the earth or in a deep sea vent where hot water wells up out of the earth.

Problem
Water from these locations is very hot, so the entropy of the Second Law of Thermodynamics kicks in with a vengeance. While some living cells get along just fine in hot water, their components RNA, DNA, and proteins break down in minutes or hours outside of a cell. They are only protected inside some living cells. No concentration of these materials could possibly have built up.

Another problem
RNA and DNA will not form outside already living cells. If they did in the prehistoric past as is claimed, they would have to have been formed already programmed to direct the formation of each of the specific proteins needed by the first cell.

Solution
RNA formed on clay. The molecular structure of the clay served as a template to build the RNA molecule.

Problems

Clay does not have the same molecular structure as RNA, and will not serve as a template to form RNA. In addition, the purpose of RNA is to carry information. To be anything other than a microscopic speck of goo, RNA would have needed very specific information not contained in clay.

Life only comes from life. This is a basic principle of science, the Principle of Biogenesis. The unscientific belief that the first living cell must have been an exception to that principle is based only on faith and is contrary to the evidence.

Conclusion
No matter what evolutionary proposal one might be tempted to accept, spontaneous generation never happens, not even in a sophisticated laboratory and no matter what oxygen-free atmosphere is tried. In fact, not even one of the hundreds of necessary proteins has ever been known to form outside of a living cell in conditions that might exist in nature. Why? Life only comes from life. This is a basic principle of science, the Principle of Biogenesis. The unscientific belief that the first living cell must have been an exception to that principle is based only on faith and is contrary to the evidence.

If spontaneous generation (or abiogenesis as its proponents prefer to call it) must be taught in schools supported by the taxes of those who do not believe in it, would it not be more honest to teach it as philosophy, or an opinion about an unobserved event in history, rather than as science?