[extropy-chat] ET is a Bacterium

[Damien Sullivan]

On Tue, Jul 19, 2005 at 12:08:37PM -0700, The Avantguardian wrote:

> simulated. In fact the spontaneous generation of life was specifically
> disproven by Louis Pasteur and other 19th century biologists. After over 200

No it wasn't, or you're confusing things.  "Spontaneous generation" back then
referred to life being frequently and ubiquitously formed in dead matter under
human-normal conditions; Pasteur showed that no, life did not spontaneously
arise in a flask of sterilized broth, nor did maggots come from screened meat.

This has no relevance to spontaneous generation in a planet-wide ocean subject
to UV, lightning, and tides, over 100 million years.

And the fact that it hasn't been done in the lab could be said of AI,
Drexlerian nanotech, or energy-positive fusion outside of stars and bombs.  It
could have been said of flight, or going to the moon.

> years of progress of biological study, one thing that biologists are certain
> of is that all existing life came from pre-existent life.   

But they aren't certain that life 3.8 billion years ago came from pre-existent
life.  In fact, they study how it could have formed.

> 3. Panspermia: Aside from experimental evidence for this (bacterial spore

But panspermian life had to be spontaneously generated somewhere else.

> for them to evolve to be THAT fast. But in endospore forming bacilli, we
> have bacteria that evolved high degrees of resistance to vacuum, temperature
> extremes, gamma rays, and other forms of ionizing radiation. If they WERE
> terrestrial in origin, what possible selective pressure would there be for
> them to develop vaccuum resistance and gamma radiation resistance? 

An adaptation can have unexpected effects.  An endospore evolved to survive
years of dehydration and temperature change -- say in a desert -- may also
find itself radiation resistant.  Once you've stabilized your structures for
decades, they're stabilized.

-xx- Damien X-)