Hidden Concepts in the History and Philosophy of Origins-of-Life Studies: a Workshop Report

Mariscal, Carlos; Barahona, Ana; Aubert-Kato, Nathanaël; Aydınoğlu, Arsev Umur; Bartlett, Stuart; Cárdenas, Marí­a Luz; Chandru, Kuhan; Cleland, Carol E.; Cocanougher, Benjamin T.; Comfort, Nathaniel; Cornish‐Bowden, Athel; Deacon, Terrence W.; Froese, Tom; Giovannelli, Donato; Hernlund, J. W.; Hut, Piet; Kimura, Jun; Maurel, M.C.; Merino, Nancy; Moreno, Álvaro; Nakagawa, Mayuko; Peretó, Juli; Virgo, Nathaniel; Witkowski, Olaf; Cleaves, Henderson James

doi:10.1007/s11084-019-09580-x

Cited by 27 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 198 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…All of the above disciplines rely heavily on engineering, mathematics and informatics. Finally, philosophy provides a structure that allows scientists to ask the right questions following the rules of reasoning and argumentation, avoiding the traps of non-sequiturs and other logical fallacies [2,49].…”

Section: Pressing Questions In Ool Are Interdisciplinarymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…OoL research involves a large number of diffuse concepts cornering several natural sciences and philosophy, such as entropy, information and complexity. Despite evidence that untangling this knot will require a concerted and collaborative effort between different disciplines, technologies, individuals and groups [2], division in OoL research is still marked, concerning both theories (e.g., RNA world vs. metabolism-first) and approaches (e.g., bottom-up vs. top-down). What causes these on-going divisions, and how can heated debates be moderated?…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The Future of Origin of Life Research: Bridging Decades-Old Divisions

Preiner

Asche

Becker

et al. 2020

Life

Self Cite

116

150

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Research on the origin of life is highly heterogeneous. After a peculiar historical development, it still includes strongly opposed views which potentially hinder progress. In the 1st Interdisciplinary Origin of Life Meeting, early-career researchers gathered to explore the commonalities between theories and approaches, critical divergence points, and expectations for the future. We find that even though classical approaches and theories—e.g., bottom-up and top-down, RNA world vs. metabolism-first—have been prevalent in origin of life research, they are ceasing to be mutually exclusive and they can and should feed integrating approaches. Here we focus on pressing questions and recent developments that bridge the classical disciplines and approaches, and highlight expectations for future endeavours in origin of life research.

show abstract

Section: Pressing Questions In Ool Are Interdisciplinarymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Future of Origin of Life Research: Bridging Decades-Old Divisions

Preiner

Asche

Becker

et al. 2020

Life

Self Cite

116

150

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…How life emerged from inanimate chemistry is an unresolved scientific question and an area of active research [1][2][3]. Contemporary biochemistry uses a relatively small set of building blocks, e.g., only 20 coded amino acids, four ribonucleotides, four deoxyribonucleotides, etc., out of a large number of possibilities [4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…How, why, and at what stage of chemical and/or biological evolution the selection and canonicalization of the biomolecules occurred remains unclear. Much of origins of life (OoL) research is oriented towards synthesizing or reproducing biomolecules or processes under presumed primitive Earth conditions [2].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Life 2020, 10, x FOR PEER REVIEW 2 of 16 origins of life (OoL) research is oriented towards synthesizing or reproducing biomolecules or processes under presumed primitive Earth conditions [2]. While such approaches are logical given the evidence available from contemporary biology, and appear to be a sound application of "Occam's razor," they are also often based on a number of assumptions.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Polyesters as a Model System for Building Primitive Biologies from Non-Biological Prebiotic Chemistry

Chandru

Mamajanov

Cleaves

et al. 2020

Life

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

A variety of organic chemicals were likely available on prebiotic Earth. These derived from diverse processes including atmospheric and geochemical synthesis and extraterrestrial input, and were delivered to environments including oceans, lakes, and subaerial hot springs. Prebiotic chemistry generates both molecules used by modern organisms, such as proteinaceous amino acids, as well as many molecule types not used in biochemistry. As prebiotic chemical diversity was likely high, and the core of biochemistry uses a rather small set of common building blocks, the majority of prebiotically available organic compounds may not have been those used in modern biochemistry. Chemical evolution was unlikely to have been able to discriminate which molecules would eventually be used in biology, and instead, interactions among compounds were governed simply by abundance and chemical reactivity. Previous work has shown that likely prebiotically available α-hydroxy acids can combinatorially polymerize into polyesters that self-assemble to create new phases which are able to compartmentalize other molecule types. The unexpectedly rich complexity of hydroxy acid chemistry and the likely enormous structural diversity of prebiotic organic chemistry suggests chemical evolution could have been heavily influenced by molecules not used in contemporary biochemistry, and that there is a considerable amount of prebiotic chemistry which remains unexplored.

show abstract

A Fresh Start on the Problem of the Origin of Life

2024

Origin of Life via Archaea

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Hidden Concepts in the History and Philosophy of Origins-of-Life Studies: a Workshop Report

Cited by 27 publications

References 198 publications

The Future of Origin of Life Research: Bridging Decades-Old Divisions

The Future of Origin of Life Research: Bridging Decades-Old Divisions

Polyesters as a Model System for Building Primitive Biologies from Non-Biological Prebiotic Chemistry

A Fresh Start on the Problem of the Origin of Life

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About