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El origen de la vida
La historia nos muestra que el problema del origen de la vida ha atraído la atención de la humanidad ya desde los tiempos más remotos. No existe un solo sistema filosófico o religioso, ni un solo pensador de talla, que no haya dedicado la máxima atención a este problema, lo que ha ha constituido el centro de una lucha acerba entre dos filosofías irreconciliables: el idealismo y el materialismo. Hasta los inicios del siglo xx, las ciencias naturales habían sido incapaces de encontrar una solución racional y científica a este problema, atrapadas como estaban en el callejón sin salida al que llevaba el principio de la generación espontánea. Los estudios de Oparin, cuyos primeros resultados publicó en la presente obra, fueron pioneros en su época y, pese a la fuerte oposición inicial que recibieron, serían base y estímulo para la investigación en este campo.
172 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1924
57 people are currently reading
383 people want to read
About the author
Aleksandr Ivanovich Oparin
13 books4 followersAlexander Ivanovich Oparin was a Soviet biochemist notable for his theories about the origin of life, and for his book The Origin of Life. He also studied the biochemistry of material processing by plants and enzyme reactions in plant cells.
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December 7, 2018
Es un libro muy importante para el curso de la biología. Sin embargo, tiene muchos conceptos ya obsoletos. Se lo recomendaría a personas que ya tienen bien sentadas las bases de la biología y no se confundirán por el uso de conceptos que ya no están a la vanguardia.
March 23, 2021
Me encantó la introducción, como estudiante de biología lo considero ahora un libro imprescindible. Súper sencillo de entender y explica muchísimas cosas del lado bioquímico y de metabolismo, que es sumamente interesante.
January 26, 2010
ya wanna know where we have come from?! read this!
January 11, 2019
Es un excelente libro para iniciarse en el profundo concepto de la evolución no sólo biológica sino química. Oparin da una breve pero concisa descripción de cómo la materia se organizó desde antes de la existencia del planeta tierra hasta formas de vida complejas. Es necesario tener el contexto histórico en el que la obra fue escrita, pues no es de ignorar su sesgo hacia solo citar investigadores soviéticos y desprestigiar en cierta medida a científicos occidentales. No obstante, definitivamente este libro ha cambiado mi forma de percibir la vida como un nivel complejo de organización de la materia.
October 5, 2011
Oparin has a pretty good idea about the subject. It is very interesting the premise EXCEPT it is so boring and I totally hated his soviet nationalism be because he tried to discredit world scientist's works saying thee best studies about life were on the soviet union.
April 21, 2023
Un libro escrito por un científico Ruso 38 años antes de que yo naciera. Es interesante volver a leer este libro después de 25 años. Cuando estaba en mi carrera, pude comprender conceptos que me ayudaron en la misma; actualmente regresar a leer este libro, me deja sin ninguna duda. Para una mujer fiel a la lectura de la palabra de Dios, con una fe firme en "la teoría de la creación", no me deja caminar con firmeza en las enseñanzas de este libro.
Se que la explicación científica expuesta en este libro es real en varios aspectos, pero dejar a la imaginación, que por una suerte del destino un coacervado evoluciono para formar las primeras células, y después estás evolucionaron hasta formar los primeros organismos complejos, no me convence por nada, si tienes conocimientos de química lo vas a disfrutar en sus primeros capítulos, si quieres leer el pensamiento científico ruso inicial en los albores de los 1900, está recomendable.
Se que la explicación científica expuesta en este libro es real en varios aspectos, pero dejar a la imaginación, que por una suerte del destino un coacervado evoluciono para formar las primeras células, y después estás evolucionaron hasta formar los primeros organismos complejos, no me convence por nada, si tienes conocimientos de química lo vas a disfrutar en sus primeros capítulos, si quieres leer el pensamiento científico ruso inicial en los albores de los 1900, está recomendable.
August 29, 2023
historicamente muito interessante :-) meu orientador me emprestou! acho que se não tivesse sido o caso jamais teria conseguido um exemplar desse livro.
January 5, 2025
A ‘CLASSIC’ IN THE FIELD OF ATTEMPTS TO DESCRIBE THE CHEMICAL ORIGIN OF LIFE
Russian biochemist Aleksandr Ivanovich Oparin wrote in his Foreword to the English edition of this 1936 book, “For a long time I have been greatly intrigued by the question as to how life on Earth began and for more than fifteen years have been actively engaged in searching for a solution of the problem … The fruits of the meditations … have been presented in a series of scientific articles and popular essays…Subsequently I attempted to develop this idea further and to substantiate it with data derived from … astronomers, geologists, biochemists, and others… The information … has been incorporated in 1936 in my book… a translation of which is now offered to the reader.”
He asserts, “Engels shows that a consistent materialistic philosophy can follow only a single path in the attempt to solve the problem of the origin of life. Life has neither arisen spontaneously nor has it existed eternally. It must have, therefore, resulted from a long evolution of matter, its origin being merely one step in the course of its historical development.” (Pg. 33) Later, he adds, “We must… once and for all give up the idea that life germs floated towards or Earth from the outside cosmic spheres. We must, instead, search for the sources of life within the boundaries of our own planet.” (Pg. 44)
He asserts, “artificial models have scientific value only to the extent to which the phenomena they manifest are based on the same physico-chemical causes which determine these in living cells… Unfortunately, however, investigators have often been deluded by external superficial resemblances between models and living things, and have been led to extremely simplified mechanistic conclusions.” (Pg. 55-56)
He acknowledges that to some, “it [seems] highly improbable that … a complex apparatus could have arisen fortuitously… These arguments are of … significance only if we … assume that at some definite period in the Earth’s existence…the living organism has originated all at once from non-living matter… All these difficulties, however, disappear, if we discard once and for all that the simplest living organisms originated gradually by a long evolutionary process of organic substance and that they represent merely definite mileposts along the general historic road of evolution of matter… a definite protoplasmic organization and fitness of its inner structure to carry out definite functions could easily be formed in the course of evolution of organic matter just as highly organized animals and plants have come from the simplest living things by a process of evolution. Later we shall attempt to trace this evolution and to picture the gradual formation of living things from non-living matter. In this evolution … new properties developed ultimately resulting in the emergence of systems which are already subject to biological laws.” (Pg. 59-61)
He admits, “to accomplish this transformation from substance to organism requires a very long time. At the present time such a transformation is entirely out of the question because, if organic substance originated anywhere on the Earth’s surface, it would be extremely rapidly devoured and destroyed by the countless microorganisms inhabiting the soil, air and water… However strange this may seem at first sight, a sterile, life-less period in the existence of our planet was a necessary condition for the primary origin of life. This condition prevailed only in the remote past but does not exist now…” (Pg. 63)
He explains, “It is beyond doubt that during the epoch under consideration… the physical conditions on the Earth’s surface were different than now: the temperature was much higher, the atmosphere had a different composition… etc., but in this there is nothing unusual or mysterious… The main difficulty in effecting this sort of reconstruction arises from the overwhelming variety of chemical transformations and reactions of which hydrocarbons and their derivatives are capable. However, for the solution of our problem it is not necessary to reproduce the process in all its details. It is important only to form a definite conception of the fundamental tendencies, of the basic trends of the behavior of organic matter in its continual evolution on the Earth’s surface. In this respect modern organic and biological chemistry furnish us with sufficient factual material for arriving at thoroughly well founded conclusions.” (Pg. 105-107)
He states, “To the student of protein structure the spontaneous formation of such an atomic arrangement in the protein molecule would seem as improbable as would the accidental origin of the text of Virgil’s ‘Aeneid’ from scattered letter type. What we wish to consider here, however, does not concern itself with the origin of the protein molecule… We shall concern ourselves simply with the question whether protein substances … could have arisen in the primitive hydrosphere together with other complex organic substances.” (Pg. 133)
He argues, “protein is by no means living matter, but hidden in its chemical structure is the capacity for future organic evolution which, under certain conditions, may lead us to the origin of living things. In this sense, it seems to us, we should interpret Engel’s formula: ‘Life is a form of the existence of protein bodies.’” (Pg. 136)
He observes, “The tremendous power of enzymatic activity must be attributed exclusively to a favorable arrangement of components in this complex, which, of course, would not have arisen fortuitously but only as a result of a long evolution of living organisms.” (Pg. 174)
He summarizes, “The simplest organic coazervates with their unstable elementary structure were destined sooner or later to disappear from the face of the Earth, to disintegrate and to return to the original solution state… Only those systems continue to grow and evolve whose structure has undergone profound changes and which have developed a complex enzymatic apparatus enabling them to transform with extraordinary rapidity... But the further the growth process of organic matter advances and the less free organic material remains dissolve in the Earth’s hydrosphere, the more exacting ‘natural selection’ tends to become. A straight struggle for existence displaces more and more the competition in growth velocity. A strictly biological factor now comes into play… new inner mechanisms came into existence which made possible such transformations of matter and of energy which hitherto were entirely unthinkable. Thus systems of a still higher order, the simplest primary organisms, have emerged… With the appearance of primary organisms the question of the origin of life on Earth is, properly speaking, closed.” (Pg. 194-196)
He summarizes, “studying the separate stages in the gradual development of contemporary organisms we may, with a certain measure of probability, draw analogous conclusions also with regard to the course of evolution even before living organisms appeared… From our point of view, therefore, the modern process of evolution of living organisms is fundamentally nothing more than the addition of some new links to an endless chain of transformations of matter, a chain the beginning of which extends to the very dawn of existence of our planet.” (Pg. 244-245)
He concludes, “one must first of all categorically reject every attempt to renew the old arguments in favor of a sudden and spontaneous generation of life…. It would be senseless to expect that such an organization could originate accidentally in a more or less brief span of time from simple solutions or infusions. However, this need not lead us to the conclusion that there is an absolute and fundamental difference between a living organism and lifeless matter… the numerous attempts to discover some specific ‘vital energies’ resident only in organisms invariably ended in total failure… That being the case, life could not have existed always. The complex combination of manifestations and properties so characteristic of like must have arisen in the process of evolution of matter.” (Pg. 246)
He continues, “the gradual evolution of organic substances and the manner by which ever newer properties, subject to laws of a higher order, were superimposed step by step upon the erstwhile simple and elementary properties of matter… gradually as a result of growth and increased complexity of the molecules new properties have come into being and a new colloid-chemical relations… Even this configuration of organic matter was still insufficient to give rise to primary living things… If organic matter would appear at the present time, it could not evolve for very long because it would quickly consumed and destroyed by the innumerable microorganisms inhabiting the earth, water, and air.” (Pg. 250-251)
He admits, “For this reason, the process of evolution of organic substance, the process of formation of life sketched in the preceding pages cannot be observed directly now. The tremendously long intervals of time separating the single steps in this process make it impossible to reproduce the process as it occurred in nature under available laboratory conditions.” (Pg. 251)
This book will be of keen interest to anyone studying origin-of-life research.
Russian biochemist Aleksandr Ivanovich Oparin wrote in his Foreword to the English edition of this 1936 book, “For a long time I have been greatly intrigued by the question as to how life on Earth began and for more than fifteen years have been actively engaged in searching for a solution of the problem … The fruits of the meditations … have been presented in a series of scientific articles and popular essays…Subsequently I attempted to develop this idea further and to substantiate it with data derived from … astronomers, geologists, biochemists, and others… The information … has been incorporated in 1936 in my book… a translation of which is now offered to the reader.”
He asserts, “Engels shows that a consistent materialistic philosophy can follow only a single path in the attempt to solve the problem of the origin of life. Life has neither arisen spontaneously nor has it existed eternally. It must have, therefore, resulted from a long evolution of matter, its origin being merely one step in the course of its historical development.” (Pg. 33) Later, he adds, “We must… once and for all give up the idea that life germs floated towards or Earth from the outside cosmic spheres. We must, instead, search for the sources of life within the boundaries of our own planet.” (Pg. 44)
He asserts, “artificial models have scientific value only to the extent to which the phenomena they manifest are based on the same physico-chemical causes which determine these in living cells… Unfortunately, however, investigators have often been deluded by external superficial resemblances between models and living things, and have been led to extremely simplified mechanistic conclusions.” (Pg. 55-56)
He acknowledges that to some, “it [seems] highly improbable that … a complex apparatus could have arisen fortuitously… These arguments are of … significance only if we … assume that at some definite period in the Earth’s existence…the living organism has originated all at once from non-living matter… All these difficulties, however, disappear, if we discard once and for all that the simplest living organisms originated gradually by a long evolutionary process of organic substance and that they represent merely definite mileposts along the general historic road of evolution of matter… a definite protoplasmic organization and fitness of its inner structure to carry out definite functions could easily be formed in the course of evolution of organic matter just as highly organized animals and plants have come from the simplest living things by a process of evolution. Later we shall attempt to trace this evolution and to picture the gradual formation of living things from non-living matter. In this evolution … new properties developed ultimately resulting in the emergence of systems which are already subject to biological laws.” (Pg. 59-61)
He admits, “to accomplish this transformation from substance to organism requires a very long time. At the present time such a transformation is entirely out of the question because, if organic substance originated anywhere on the Earth’s surface, it would be extremely rapidly devoured and destroyed by the countless microorganisms inhabiting the soil, air and water… However strange this may seem at first sight, a sterile, life-less period in the existence of our planet was a necessary condition for the primary origin of life. This condition prevailed only in the remote past but does not exist now…” (Pg. 63)
He explains, “It is beyond doubt that during the epoch under consideration… the physical conditions on the Earth’s surface were different than now: the temperature was much higher, the atmosphere had a different composition… etc., but in this there is nothing unusual or mysterious… The main difficulty in effecting this sort of reconstruction arises from the overwhelming variety of chemical transformations and reactions of which hydrocarbons and their derivatives are capable. However, for the solution of our problem it is not necessary to reproduce the process in all its details. It is important only to form a definite conception of the fundamental tendencies, of the basic trends of the behavior of organic matter in its continual evolution on the Earth’s surface. In this respect modern organic and biological chemistry furnish us with sufficient factual material for arriving at thoroughly well founded conclusions.” (Pg. 105-107)
He states, “To the student of protein structure the spontaneous formation of such an atomic arrangement in the protein molecule would seem as improbable as would the accidental origin of the text of Virgil’s ‘Aeneid’ from scattered letter type. What we wish to consider here, however, does not concern itself with the origin of the protein molecule… We shall concern ourselves simply with the question whether protein substances … could have arisen in the primitive hydrosphere together with other complex organic substances.” (Pg. 133)
He argues, “protein is by no means living matter, but hidden in its chemical structure is the capacity for future organic evolution which, under certain conditions, may lead us to the origin of living things. In this sense, it seems to us, we should interpret Engel’s formula: ‘Life is a form of the existence of protein bodies.’” (Pg. 136)
He observes, “The tremendous power of enzymatic activity must be attributed exclusively to a favorable arrangement of components in this complex, which, of course, would not have arisen fortuitously but only as a result of a long evolution of living organisms.” (Pg. 174)
He summarizes, “The simplest organic coazervates with their unstable elementary structure were destined sooner or later to disappear from the face of the Earth, to disintegrate and to return to the original solution state… Only those systems continue to grow and evolve whose structure has undergone profound changes and which have developed a complex enzymatic apparatus enabling them to transform with extraordinary rapidity... But the further the growth process of organic matter advances and the less free organic material remains dissolve in the Earth’s hydrosphere, the more exacting ‘natural selection’ tends to become. A straight struggle for existence displaces more and more the competition in growth velocity. A strictly biological factor now comes into play… new inner mechanisms came into existence which made possible such transformations of matter and of energy which hitherto were entirely unthinkable. Thus systems of a still higher order, the simplest primary organisms, have emerged… With the appearance of primary organisms the question of the origin of life on Earth is, properly speaking, closed.” (Pg. 194-196)
He summarizes, “studying the separate stages in the gradual development of contemporary organisms we may, with a certain measure of probability, draw analogous conclusions also with regard to the course of evolution even before living organisms appeared… From our point of view, therefore, the modern process of evolution of living organisms is fundamentally nothing more than the addition of some new links to an endless chain of transformations of matter, a chain the beginning of which extends to the very dawn of existence of our planet.” (Pg. 244-245)
He concludes, “one must first of all categorically reject every attempt to renew the old arguments in favor of a sudden and spontaneous generation of life…. It would be senseless to expect that such an organization could originate accidentally in a more or less brief span of time from simple solutions or infusions. However, this need not lead us to the conclusion that there is an absolute and fundamental difference between a living organism and lifeless matter… the numerous attempts to discover some specific ‘vital energies’ resident only in organisms invariably ended in total failure… That being the case, life could not have existed always. The complex combination of manifestations and properties so characteristic of like must have arisen in the process of evolution of matter.” (Pg. 246)
He continues, “the gradual evolution of organic substances and the manner by which ever newer properties, subject to laws of a higher order, were superimposed step by step upon the erstwhile simple and elementary properties of matter… gradually as a result of growth and increased complexity of the molecules new properties have come into being and a new colloid-chemical relations… Even this configuration of organic matter was still insufficient to give rise to primary living things… If organic matter would appear at the present time, it could not evolve for very long because it would quickly consumed and destroyed by the innumerable microorganisms inhabiting the earth, water, and air.” (Pg. 250-251)
He admits, “For this reason, the process of evolution of organic substance, the process of formation of life sketched in the preceding pages cannot be observed directly now. The tremendously long intervals of time separating the single steps in this process make it impossible to reproduce the process as it occurred in nature under available laboratory conditions.” (Pg. 251)
This book will be of keen interest to anyone studying origin-of-life research.
August 10, 2021
A los 18 años comencé a pensar sobre el origen de la vida. Conocía, de manera superficial, el trabajo de Charles Darwin, y a pesar de hacer muchísimo sentido, veía que la dificultad sobre el origen de la vida seguía ahí. ¿Como es posible transmutar materia `inerte´ a materia `viva´? Por mas que me esforzaba no se me ocurría ninguna solución racional, así que utilice esto como justificación de mis antiguas creencias judeocristianas bajo la premisa de que el origen de la vida era un milagro.
Durante mis años de estudio en la universidad planteé el problema a algunos de mis maestros y compañeros, que al igual que yo, no tenían respuesta, aludían a Dios o decían que era un milagro. Hace tan solo 8 meses, un buen amigo me introdujo a las ideas sobre el caldo primitivo, las cuales no me parecían, inicialmente, contundentes (por carecer el contexto que te provee un libro); así que me recomendó leer a Oparin, y... bueno, me quedo sin palabras, su explicación sobre el origen de la vida es fenomenal! Es el análogo de Darwin de la biología molecular; recicla sus principios, y utiliza descubrimientos contemporáneos de la cosmología, geología y bioquímica para fundamentar el paso de química inorgánica a química orgánica, y de ahí, el salto a lo que conocemos como organismos vivos. Como extra, esta escrito en un lenguaje accesible, conciso y planteado desde una perspectiva filosófica. ¿Qué mas se le puede pedir a este hombre!?
Como Darwin, Oparin trazó un camino para nuevas investigaciones, el libro fue escrito previo al descubrimiento del ADN, por lo que aún hay preguntas que no me he contestado. ¿Cómo es qué el ADN adquirió el rol de determinar el orden de los aminoácidos en las proteínas? (Surgió de un estadio de la materia ya bastante avanzado, sujeto a las reglas evolutivas, me imagino que me contestaría Oparin) No obstante, falta dilucidar muchísimo detalle, que, claro, puede que ya esté descrito y yo no me haya dado cuenta...
Durante mis años de estudio en la universidad planteé el problema a algunos de mis maestros y compañeros, que al igual que yo, no tenían respuesta, aludían a Dios o decían que era un milagro. Hace tan solo 8 meses, un buen amigo me introdujo a las ideas sobre el caldo primitivo, las cuales no me parecían, inicialmente, contundentes (por carecer el contexto que te provee un libro); así que me recomendó leer a Oparin, y... bueno, me quedo sin palabras, su explicación sobre el origen de la vida es fenomenal! Es el análogo de Darwin de la biología molecular; recicla sus principios, y utiliza descubrimientos contemporáneos de la cosmología, geología y bioquímica para fundamentar el paso de química inorgánica a química orgánica, y de ahí, el salto a lo que conocemos como organismos vivos. Como extra, esta escrito en un lenguaje accesible, conciso y planteado desde una perspectiva filosófica. ¿Qué mas se le puede pedir a este hombre!?
Como Darwin, Oparin trazó un camino para nuevas investigaciones, el libro fue escrito previo al descubrimiento del ADN, por lo que aún hay preguntas que no me he contestado. ¿Cómo es qué el ADN adquirió el rol de determinar el orden de los aminoácidos en las proteínas? (Surgió de un estadio de la materia ya bastante avanzado, sujeto a las reglas evolutivas, me imagino que me contestaría Oparin) No obstante, falta dilucidar muchísimo detalle, que, claro, puede que ya esté descrito y yo no me haya dado cuenta...
November 17, 2018
It is rather long, outdated and speculative.
Oparins most pertinent ideas can be summarized quite concisely, but we end up with over 250 pages due to an overabundance of examples and critiques of other theories (which was, nevertheless, a very enjoyable part of the book).
If you like to have a nice overview of what people were thinking at the time, I highly recommend it. If you wish to know more about Oparin's main contribution to the field, the concept of coacervates, try reading a summary or an article on coacervates instead.
Oparins most pertinent ideas can be summarized quite concisely, but we end up with over 250 pages due to an overabundance of examples and critiques of other theories (which was, nevertheless, a very enjoyable part of the book).
If you like to have a nice overview of what people were thinking at the time, I highly recommend it. If you wish to know more about Oparin's main contribution to the field, the concept of coacervates, try reading a summary or an article on coacervates instead.
October 30, 2020
Es muy complicado entender de qué habla si no entiendes mucho de biología, pero eso sí, las últimas 20 páginas son más digeribles y la conclusión ayuda mucho a que quede todo claro.
Lo malo de la edición es que la mayoría de las veces pusieron ilustraciones en medio de oraciones y dejaban la información incompleta, continuando hasta la siguiente página o dos páginas después.
Lo malo de la edición es que la mayoría de las veces pusieron ilustraciones en medio de oraciones y dejaban la información incompleta, continuando hasta la siguiente página o dos páginas después.
June 19, 2007
ye zamani asheghe zistshenasi boodam,cheghadr in ketab jaleb bood baram.
August 2, 2018
Protoplasma, protoplasma, protoplasma...
January 15, 2024
vintage pero interesante
November 10, 2023
A estas alturas donde bien o mal la gente cree en la evolución (no como algo autoevidente sino como idea en la que se vive), la importancia de este libro se infravalora. Sin embargo, cuando se tiene el contexto adecuado, no deja uno de maravillarse con esta obra. Durante el siglo diecinueve e incluso en gran parte del veinte, según Oparin, la biología en el mundo capitalista buscaba mantener un asidero en lo divino al aludir que la vida surgía de un espíritu divino o inmaterial. Es claro que para un ruso de la época soviética, inficionado de materialismo dialéctico, esto era un absurdo y a partir de este prejuicio buscó encontrar el origen de la vida en la misma materia.
La controversia no es baladí: desde el relato de la Creación hasta ahora, se estima que al menos el ser humano ha sido insuflado con un espíritu que le da la vida. Esta creencia idealista (por oponerla a otra materialista), permanece intacta hasta ahora, pero a principios del siglo XX se ocultaba con terminología barata. Oparin, al aludir a que la materia, al estar sometida a las leyes de la dialéctica (la evolución), termina por medio de combinaciones azarosas, por constituir formaciones químicas cada vez más complejas y consistentes, expulsa cualquier explicación metafísica o acientífica del origen de la vida. Esto es encomiable.
La controversia no es baladí: desde el relato de la Creación hasta ahora, se estima que al menos el ser humano ha sido insuflado con un espíritu que le da la vida. Esta creencia idealista (por oponerla a otra materialista), permanece intacta hasta ahora, pero a principios del siglo XX se ocultaba con terminología barata. Oparin, al aludir a que la materia, al estar sometida a las leyes de la dialéctica (la evolución), termina por medio de combinaciones azarosas, por constituir formaciones químicas cada vez más complejas y consistentes, expulsa cualquier explicación metafísica o acientífica del origen de la vida. Esto es encomiable.
December 30, 2017
Oparin presenta en su obra una explicación racional sobre el origen de la vida. Explica claramente como las teoría del origen de la vida han ido evolucionando con el pasar de los años; posteriormente presenta su teoría de como los seres vivos aparecieron sobre la Tierra. Es un buen libro sin embargo, recomiendo tener un conocimiento básico de química orgánica y biomoléculas para poder entenderlo en su totalidad.
March 23, 2019
Como explicación del origen de nuestra existencia, parece estar muy completo. Nos da una introducción buena al inicio de la vida como la conocemos, tomando al igual opiniones religiosas y filosóficas que han surgido a lo largo de los años.
Siendo sincera, yo ni entiendo mucho de ciencia, y es el primer libro del genero que leo.
Es sencillo de leer, entendible y lo mejor es que puedes aprender mucho, a pesar de ser una lectura corta.
Cualquiera puede y debería leerlo
Siendo sincera, yo ni entiendo mucho de ciencia, y es el primer libro del genero que leo.
Es sencillo de leer, entendible y lo mejor es que puedes aprender mucho, a pesar de ser una lectura corta.
Cualquiera puede y debería leerlo
September 8, 2020
Un libro difícil de interpretar debido a los términos físico - químico - biológicos, aunque en realidad es más complicado de aceptar la forma en la que Oparin demuestra la aparición de la vida en la tierra.
Este libro nos puede a cambiar nuestra forma de pensar e incluso refutar algunas teorías religiosas de la creación por medio de un dios.
Excelente libro que me dio mucho de qué pensar.
Este libro nos puede a cambiar nuestra forma de pensar e incluso refutar algunas teorías religiosas de la creación por medio de un dios.
Excelente libro que me dio mucho de qué pensar.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 4, 2023
Suele ser un tanto repetitivo en cuanto a diversos puntos que expone, aunque en parte colabora a un entendimiento continuo, es digerible y excelente para un estudiante de biología con buen conocimiento previo
May 13, 2019
Aburrido, solo repite y repite lo mismo
January 16, 2020
Un libro enseña como empezar la vida
March 11, 2021
Un libro que tienes que leer en el colegio, te dejará muchas consultas que deberás procesar, el origen de la vida desde el punto de vista científico.
July 24, 2022
I think I first heard about this book from my extraordinary well-read friend in the CSIRO (Mick F.). And that was in about 1968....we must have been discussing the origin of life. And over the years as my interest in the subject has never really wavered, I have heard more about Oparin's book. Well finally I have gotten around to reading it. It is now close to 100 years since it was first written (in Russian in 1936-7) and chemistry has moved on mightily since then. Oparin's book was written 20 years before the Watson Crick model of DNA was produced, so he was struggling with a lot of rather primitive chemistry. (Though I was actually surprised about what the chemists did know at that stage and it reminded me to never ignore the wisdom of earlier years. My son has just done a literature review for a science paper and made one of his exclusion criteria, "any paper over ten years old". Clearly, you are going to miss a lot of good stuff by doing this...and the assumption is that all the old findings are swept up in the new. But I don't think this is correct). Anyway, Opanrin makes some good points. In this review, to try and hit the main points of his story, it's hard to go past the last chapter which is really a summary of the whole book....and very well done. He initially starts with some cosmology and the origin of the elements and particularly the way that carbon is held in the sun as paired molecules ...or larger and on the earth as carbides.
He suggests an evolution on the cooling earth of a great variety of the simpler hydrocarbons (alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, organic acids etc.) through the oxidation by the oxygen component of water. These reacted with ammonia which appeared at that time and thus amides, amines and other nitrogenous derivatives.
He is at pains to rule out the spontaneous development of life and also makes the point that any complex organic molecules that might have developed after initial life had formed, would be instantly devoured by that life. Hence virtually impossible to replicate that situation today.
I was impressed that, with the knowledge of chemistry available at the time, that Oparin was able to put together a reasonable sort of story. I also learned that If some solutions were simply left that more complex chemicals might emerge: formaldehyde plus chalk gives some sugars; the ethyl ester of glycol ....allowed to stand by a window....produced slimy strands with several properties like proteins.....it was a polypeptide. He also emphasised something that I should have known (but didn't really): that all transformations of organic matter within the living cell are based on three principal reaction types:
1. Condensation (lengthening of the carbon chain and the reverse ...splitting the chain between two adjacent carbon atoms).
2.Polymerisation (the union of two organic molecules through an atom of oxygen or nitrogen.....and hydrolysis..the reverse process of splitting up such unions) and
3. Oxidation ( with the inevitable reverse process of reduction).
And water plays a major role in all these reactions...as do catalysts.
Oparin makes a lot of the formation of gels and sols and what he call coacervates...kind of like the situation where hyrophyllic and hydrophobic molecules line themselves up in a regular formation. (Today this is seen as the essence of creating a membrane..though Oparin doesn't seem to consider this).
Of course, Oparin has no concept of DNA at this time and seems to focus exclusively on the evolutionary development of organic molecules. He does make the interesting point that most processes are messy and involve mixtures of various sorts and mixtures will usually give different results to the pure molecules in test tubes, He also makes an interesting point about the energy released from three processes from 1 gm of sugar: From respiration ..674 calories; from Alcoholic fermentation...28 calories and from lactic acid formation 18 calories . (And with the lactic acid process it's not unusual for other products to be formed with the lactic acid). He suggests that alcohol and lactic acid are the more primitive mechanisms and probably evolved first. He also suggests that the processes of lactic acid and alcohol fermentation are outgrowths of the (rather messy and complicated) butyric acid fermentation ....and they represent advanced types of fermentation which have been passed on to the more highly evolved processes.
He also insists that organisms did not get their start from metabolising carbon dioxide. That came much later ...after various organic molecules developed on the earth.
It was also interesting to me to note that Oparin mentions the theory of symbiogenesis (quoting Kozo-Poljanski) with a cell nucleus consisting of the residues of a primitive living unit. I think Lynn Margulis is generally given credit for this concept ....though she wasn't born until 1938.
All in all, an interesting book. Obviously very dated but fascinating for ideas that are introduced and also fascinating for the chemistry that I was unaware of. I give it 4 stars.
He suggests an evolution on the cooling earth of a great variety of the simpler hydrocarbons (alcohols, aldehydes, ketones, organic acids etc.) through the oxidation by the oxygen component of water. These reacted with ammonia which appeared at that time and thus amides, amines and other nitrogenous derivatives.
He is at pains to rule out the spontaneous development of life and also makes the point that any complex organic molecules that might have developed after initial life had formed, would be instantly devoured by that life. Hence virtually impossible to replicate that situation today.
I was impressed that, with the knowledge of chemistry available at the time, that Oparin was able to put together a reasonable sort of story. I also learned that If some solutions were simply left that more complex chemicals might emerge: formaldehyde plus chalk gives some sugars; the ethyl ester of glycol ....allowed to stand by a window....produced slimy strands with several properties like proteins.....it was a polypeptide. He also emphasised something that I should have known (but didn't really): that all transformations of organic matter within the living cell are based on three principal reaction types:
1. Condensation (lengthening of the carbon chain and the reverse ...splitting the chain between two adjacent carbon atoms).
2.Polymerisation (the union of two organic molecules through an atom of oxygen or nitrogen.....and hydrolysis..the reverse process of splitting up such unions) and
3. Oxidation ( with the inevitable reverse process of reduction).
And water plays a major role in all these reactions...as do catalysts.
Oparin makes a lot of the formation of gels and sols and what he call coacervates...kind of like the situation where hyrophyllic and hydrophobic molecules line themselves up in a regular formation. (Today this is seen as the essence of creating a membrane..though Oparin doesn't seem to consider this).
Of course, Oparin has no concept of DNA at this time and seems to focus exclusively on the evolutionary development of organic molecules. He does make the interesting point that most processes are messy and involve mixtures of various sorts and mixtures will usually give different results to the pure molecules in test tubes, He also makes an interesting point about the energy released from three processes from 1 gm of sugar: From respiration ..674 calories; from Alcoholic fermentation...28 calories and from lactic acid formation 18 calories . (And with the lactic acid process it's not unusual for other products to be formed with the lactic acid). He suggests that alcohol and lactic acid are the more primitive mechanisms and probably evolved first. He also suggests that the processes of lactic acid and alcohol fermentation are outgrowths of the (rather messy and complicated) butyric acid fermentation ....and they represent advanced types of fermentation which have been passed on to the more highly evolved processes.
He also insists that organisms did not get their start from metabolising carbon dioxide. That came much later ...after various organic molecules developed on the earth.
It was also interesting to me to note that Oparin mentions the theory of symbiogenesis (quoting Kozo-Poljanski) with a cell nucleus consisting of the residues of a primitive living unit. I think Lynn Margulis is generally given credit for this concept ....though she wasn't born until 1938.
All in all, an interesting book. Obviously very dated but fascinating for ideas that are introduced and also fascinating for the chemistry that I was unaware of. I give it 4 stars.
April 20, 2023
Pilar para la carrera de biología, muchos datos curiosos pero ya pasaron de significados algunos conceptos. La verdad, entendí un poco más lo que estudio.
August 16, 2023
me sentí bien big brain leyendo esto pero como me lo dejaron para la escuela lo leí como en 3 días y mi cerebro ahora es como el caldo primigenio que describió oparin
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 28, 2024
3.7 ⭐ muy interesante y buen libro, algo redundante en algunos puntos otros muy importantes.
July 9, 2024
En general fue una lectura interesante pero aún quedaron algunos puntos demasiado sujetos a suposiciones para mi gusto.
February 22, 2025
Lectura imprescindible en el marco de la bioquímica moderna. Me ha sorprendido que no hiciera mención a los ácidos nucleicos.
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August 26, 2025*No Rating
*Did Not Finish
oparin te odio en tus tiempos no tenias mujee para culeartela o porq tan desocupado vale mia 😭
*Did Not Finish
oparin te odio en tus tiempos no tenias mujee para culeartela o porq tan desocupado vale mia 😭
June 18, 2022
Mira que soy un negado en la ciencia, pero un buen camarada me recomendó y prestó este libro (que salió en una de las míticas conversaciones fruto de viajes largos en el coche por páramos con centrales nucleares), y me ha encantado.
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