"Artificial Life Likely in Three to Ten Years"

The USA Today story is here.

"Around the world, a handful of scientists are trying to create life from scratch and they're getting closer.

"Experts expect an announcement within three to 10 years from someone in the now little-known field of 'wet artificial life.'"

...

"Szostak is also optimistic about the next step — getting nucleotides, the building blocks of DNA, to form a working genetic system.

"His idea is that once the container is made, if scientists add nucleotides in the right proportions, then Darwinian evolution could simply take over.

"'We aren't smart enough to design things, we just let evolution do the hard work and then we figure out what happened,' Szostak said."

It's going to be a fascinating thing to watch, to see what happens. Jonathan Wells has predicted,

"They will succeed only by re-defining 'artificial' and 'life.' For example, 'artificial' will cover any human manipulation of an existing organism -- so replacing a few genes or enzymes in an already-living cell will count as creating 'artificial life.' And 'life' will be anything that can undergo 'Darwinian evolution' -- such as an artificially engineered system of molecules -- even though it can be sustained only in a carefully controlled laboratory environment.

"But a free-living cell? I don't think so."

Wells's prediction for "artificial doesn't match up with what the article says they're working on, but we'll have to wait and see. As to the definition of life, I can't recall the source but I think that term is already being used by some. Definitions for life are being stretched.

Regis Nicoll addresses one aspect of this research, first quoting one of the researchers, and then answering:

"'This will remove one of the few fundamental mysteries about creation in the universe and our role' [says the researcher].

"Indeed--except the mystery of where all those chemicals came from in the first place, and how they ended up in 'just right' proportions in 'just-right' conditions for a 'just-right' period of time to produce that primordial cell."

And Melinda at Stand to Reason notes,

"The very strange thing here is that Szostak can't see the parallel the scientist plays to the Designer. He's not relying on evolution to create life; he's the designer, not evolution. It's scientists who are doing the creative, purposeful work, not relying on blind, random forces. It's strange how presuppositions can hide what's quite obvious."

Posted: Sat - August 25, 2007 at 09:06 PM |

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"Artificial Life Likely in Three to Ten Years"

Thinking Christian by Tom Gilson