29 NOV 2013 by ideonexus
The Origin of Life from Molecules
The account of the origin of life that I shall give is necessarily speculative;
by definition, nobody was around to see what happened. There are a
number of rival theories, but they all have certain features in common.
The simplified account I shall give is probably not too far from the truth.
We do not know what chemical raw materials were abundant on earth
before the coming of life, but among the plausible possibilities are water,
carbon dioxide, methane, and ammonia: all simple compounds ... 1 
notes
notesHighlights from Dawkin's description of how molecules evolved through natural selection to eventually form life.
23 APR 2012 by ideonexus
The Lifetime of DNA
The messages that DNA molecules contain are all but eternal when seen against the time scale of individual lifetimes. The lifetimes of DNA messages (give or take a few mutations) are measured in units ranging from millions of years to hundreds of millions of years; or, in other words, ranging from 10,000 individual lifetimes to a trillion individual lifetimes. Each individual organism should be seen as a temporary vehicle, in which DNA messages spend a tiny fraction of their geological lifeti... 1 notes
notesIt exists in living messengers for brief periods of their lifetimes, but communicates across millions of years throughout all life.
