Oxygen, the Origin of Life, and Another Vindication of Creationists
In the evolutionary scheme of things, origin of life ideas require absence of oxygen on a primordial earth. Abiogenesis does not work, despite the claims of proponents of the failed Miller-Urey experiment. That's because oxygen will cause such life to cash in its chips. Creationists (and some evolutionists) have known for a long time that Earth has had, and must have, oxygen from the beginning. This deals aces and eights to origin of life conjectures. It also throws a wild card into the draw for speculations about extraterrestrial atmospheres.
Free oxygen is death to life trying to evolve, but it was present early on, being formed naturally from atmospheric carbon dioxide.Whoa, Wilberforce! To read the press release and the rest of the article, you'd be obliged to click on "Oxygen Was Present from the Start".
What is life? What is the meaning of life? Astrobiologist Chris McKay says it’s a tricky question, but on Astrobiology Magazine, he offers a contrasting challenge: “in the search for life in our solar system what is needed more than a definition of life is a definition of death.” And what does it mean to be dead? “It means that the organism was once alive and is composed of organic molecules that are specific to life — molecules such as DNA, ATP, and proteins.” Life, therefore, consists of many non-living parts, but just putting the parts together doesn’t make them alive.
Scientists at UC Davis didn’t say it directly, but origin of life research just got dealt a death blow. A press release from UC Davis says that oxygen forms naturally from carbon dioxide: