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The Stairway to Life: An Origin-of-Life Reality Check
Spontaneous generation of living organisms—life arising without progenitor or seed—was a common belief in the time of Aristotle. Over the next two thousand years, support for spontaneous generation slowly retreated to its final stronghold: spontaneous formation of the first living organism.
From recently acquired insights into the complexity of the simplest organisms, Tan and Stadler specify requirements for spontaneous formation of life and evaluate the prospects for natural processes to satisfy these requirements. The Stairway to Life is a thought-provoking inquiry that breaches the final stronghold of spontaneous generation.
From recently acquired insights into the complexity of the simplest organisms, Tan and Stadler specify requirements for spontaneous formation of life and evaluate the prospects for natural processes to satisfy these requirements. The Stairway to Life is a thought-provoking inquiry that breaches the final stronghold of spontaneous generation.
267 pages, Paperback
First published March 12, 2020
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About the author
Rob Stadler
3 books5 followersRob Stadler received a BS in biomedical engineering from Case Western Reserve University, an MS in electrical engineering from MIT, and a PhD in medical engineering from the Harvard/MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology. As a scientist in the medical device industry for over twenty years, he has obtained more than 140 US patents, has been elected fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biomedical Engineers, and has contributed to medical devices that are implanted in millions of patients worldwide.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
May 16, 2023
A SUMMARY AND CRITIQUE OF SOME RECENT ‘ORIGIN-OF-LIFE’ RESEARCH
Authors Change Laura Tan and Rob Stadler wrote in the Introduction to this 2020 book, “This book examines new insights into abiogenesis, as prompted by a substantial milestone in molecular biology: the creation of ‘the first self-replicating species that we’ve had on the planet whose parent is a computer.’ This milestone was announced in May 2010 by Cragi Venter and his colleagues… the Venter team set out to understand life by synthesizing life… For some supporters of abiogenesis, Venter’s work implied that spontaneous initiation of life is a real possibility. Publication of the first self-replicating synthetic life (a single-celled organism … known as ‘Synthia’) sent ripples throughout the scientific community… [In this book] we combine the learnings from Venter with other recent discoveries in biology to arrive at a fundamental set of requirements for life, organized into a structure called ‘the Stairway to Life’ … each of the twelve required steps is profoundly unlikely to occur in a prebiotic world, and the improbabilities of each step must be multiplied to arrive at the infinitesimal overall likelihood of abiogenesis.” (Pg. 15-17)
After outlining the Venter work, they observe, “The Venter team constructed a very large Synthia genomic DNA, starting with reagents that were extremely pure… and were selectively activated and inactivated… Protein enzymes and other components found only in living organisms were required for synthesis of the Synthia genome… E. coli … and yeast… rely on DNA replication and transcription machineries that are not exchangeable, yet controlled manipulation of these incompatible processes was required to make a Synthia genome… None of the DNAs made by the Venter team … could replicate themselves, nor could they make RNA, a protein, or a living cell without existing cellular components designed to utilize the information in those DNAs. Even yeast cells… were incapable of reading or using the Synthia genomic DNA to make a Synthia cell.” (Pg. 42-43) They add, “Having synthesized the complete Synthia genome, the next step was to combine the DNA with the required cellular components to arrive at a fully functional cell. For this, the Venter team again had to seek help from existing life-forms.” (Pg. 45)
They summarize, “Ultimately, interpretation of Venter’s accomplishment will be left to the individual. Our goal is to apply the lessons learned from Venter’s efforts to the concept of spontaneous generation of life. We learned that each step of the synthesis of Synthia required processes that could only be performed by existing living organisms or an intelligent agent… The observations that the simplest known life-forms have approximately four hundred essential genes in Synthia resulted in death call into question the possibility that any natural process could start life.” (Pg. 59)
They present their ‘Stairway to Life’ illustration, which includes steps such as: “Formation and concentration of building blocks… Consistent linkage of building blocks… Biopolymer reproduction… Nucleotide sequences forming useful code… Means of gene regulation… Interdependency of DNA, RNA, and proteins…” (Pg. 67)
They state, “a prebiotic solution to the first step in the Stairway to Life has received a great deal of attention in the last sixty years but is far from complete. Some hints of encouraging results have been obtained in controlled laboratory environments, but these experiments are built upon layers of assumptions about prebiotic Earth---assumptions that cannot be validated---and require pure reagents and careful supervision by intelligent agents (i.e., scientists)… such hints of encouragement are increasingly rare as we climb the remaining eleven steps.” (Pg. 85)
They assert, “most of the information accumulated thus far in the Stairway to Life is a dead end. Progressing from our hypothetical RNA-based life to arrive at the central dogma of molecular biology (i.e., the residue-by-residue transfer of sequential information from DNA to RNA to protein) requires more than just additional innovation; it requires starting over with different information, combined with the arrival of new molecular machinery for processing the information.” (Pg. 163)
They conclude, “In this ‘bacteria-in-a-blender’ scenario, we know that the result, every time, will be chaos and decay, not life… Life is more than a soup of biomolecules. Life also requires the orchestrated operation of those molecules toward a unified purpose---the highest level of cellular organization and information content. Like an ant colony, life has an inborn purpose that coordinates all activity. This inborn purpose simply cannot be obtained by random arrangement and natural selection; it must be inherited from the parent cell. Life is not possible without it, and collections of molecules simply cannot evolve into it. The last insuperable step in the Stairway to Life is the climax, the greatest challenge for a materialistic explanation.” (Pg. 174-175)
They contend, “we feel the need to reiterate that every atheist… must believe that purely natural processes could surmount every step on the Stairway to Life… One purpose of this book is to call out and clarify the leap of faith that atheism implies. “ (Pg. 185)
Later, they add, “Under the assumption of methodological naturalism, origin-of-life research does not seek absolute truth; rather, it is constrained to seek the best explanation that exclude God or any other intelligent cause.” (Pg. 195-196)
This book will be of great interest to those with an Intelligent Design/Creationist perspective, who are studying recent work on the origin of life.
Authors Change Laura Tan and Rob Stadler wrote in the Introduction to this 2020 book, “This book examines new insights into abiogenesis, as prompted by a substantial milestone in molecular biology: the creation of ‘the first self-replicating species that we’ve had on the planet whose parent is a computer.’ This milestone was announced in May 2010 by Cragi Venter and his colleagues… the Venter team set out to understand life by synthesizing life… For some supporters of abiogenesis, Venter’s work implied that spontaneous initiation of life is a real possibility. Publication of the first self-replicating synthetic life (a single-celled organism … known as ‘Synthia’) sent ripples throughout the scientific community… [In this book] we combine the learnings from Venter with other recent discoveries in biology to arrive at a fundamental set of requirements for life, organized into a structure called ‘the Stairway to Life’ … each of the twelve required steps is profoundly unlikely to occur in a prebiotic world, and the improbabilities of each step must be multiplied to arrive at the infinitesimal overall likelihood of abiogenesis.” (Pg. 15-17)
After outlining the Venter work, they observe, “The Venter team constructed a very large Synthia genomic DNA, starting with reagents that were extremely pure… and were selectively activated and inactivated… Protein enzymes and other components found only in living organisms were required for synthesis of the Synthia genome… E. coli … and yeast… rely on DNA replication and transcription machineries that are not exchangeable, yet controlled manipulation of these incompatible processes was required to make a Synthia genome… None of the DNAs made by the Venter team … could replicate themselves, nor could they make RNA, a protein, or a living cell without existing cellular components designed to utilize the information in those DNAs. Even yeast cells… were incapable of reading or using the Synthia genomic DNA to make a Synthia cell.” (Pg. 42-43) They add, “Having synthesized the complete Synthia genome, the next step was to combine the DNA with the required cellular components to arrive at a fully functional cell. For this, the Venter team again had to seek help from existing life-forms.” (Pg. 45)
They summarize, “Ultimately, interpretation of Venter’s accomplishment will be left to the individual. Our goal is to apply the lessons learned from Venter’s efforts to the concept of spontaneous generation of life. We learned that each step of the synthesis of Synthia required processes that could only be performed by existing living organisms or an intelligent agent… The observations that the simplest known life-forms have approximately four hundred essential genes in Synthia resulted in death call into question the possibility that any natural process could start life.” (Pg. 59)
They present their ‘Stairway to Life’ illustration, which includes steps such as: “Formation and concentration of building blocks… Consistent linkage of building blocks… Biopolymer reproduction… Nucleotide sequences forming useful code… Means of gene regulation… Interdependency of DNA, RNA, and proteins…” (Pg. 67)
They state, “a prebiotic solution to the first step in the Stairway to Life has received a great deal of attention in the last sixty years but is far from complete. Some hints of encouraging results have been obtained in controlled laboratory environments, but these experiments are built upon layers of assumptions about prebiotic Earth---assumptions that cannot be validated---and require pure reagents and careful supervision by intelligent agents (i.e., scientists)… such hints of encouragement are increasingly rare as we climb the remaining eleven steps.” (Pg. 85)
They assert, “most of the information accumulated thus far in the Stairway to Life is a dead end. Progressing from our hypothetical RNA-based life to arrive at the central dogma of molecular biology (i.e., the residue-by-residue transfer of sequential information from DNA to RNA to protein) requires more than just additional innovation; it requires starting over with different information, combined with the arrival of new molecular machinery for processing the information.” (Pg. 163)
They conclude, “In this ‘bacteria-in-a-blender’ scenario, we know that the result, every time, will be chaos and decay, not life… Life is more than a soup of biomolecules. Life also requires the orchestrated operation of those molecules toward a unified purpose---the highest level of cellular organization and information content. Like an ant colony, life has an inborn purpose that coordinates all activity. This inborn purpose simply cannot be obtained by random arrangement and natural selection; it must be inherited from the parent cell. Life is not possible without it, and collections of molecules simply cannot evolve into it. The last insuperable step in the Stairway to Life is the climax, the greatest challenge for a materialistic explanation.” (Pg. 174-175)
They contend, “we feel the need to reiterate that every atheist… must believe that purely natural processes could surmount every step on the Stairway to Life… One purpose of this book is to call out and clarify the leap of faith that atheism implies. “ (Pg. 185)
Later, they add, “Under the assumption of methodological naturalism, origin-of-life research does not seek absolute truth; rather, it is constrained to seek the best explanation that exclude God or any other intelligent cause.” (Pg. 195-196)
This book will be of great interest to those with an Intelligent Design/Creationist perspective, who are studying recent work on the origin of life.
September 16, 2020
As someone who is not involved in biology, most of the contents on this book is "over my head". However, I did benefit from the plain English conclusions listed in each chapter. The Epilogue is especially clear in explaining the logical process leading the author Tan to her conclusions about Abiogenesis.
November 6, 2020
The book is technical but it needs to be.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews