Evidence of photosynthesis on earth at least 4.1 billion years ago.

[Iphie]

The only explanation I've heard from young earth creationists isn't that they don't believe the evidence that the earth is billions of years old, but that they believe physical constants aren't constants. So those billions of years happened during the 7 days of creation. It won't effect them at all.

As far as I know being a young earth creationist means that you literally believe that the earth was created ~6000 years ago in 6 24hr days by god. (six days of creation, 1 day of rest)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Earth_creationism

you may be confused by old earth creationism, a form of creationism which isn't denying the evidence as much as YECs

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Earth_creationism

[khalltusk]

Methane does not require organisms. I know that's not what you said, but the way you're replying to the person you quoted makes it seem that's what you meant.

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The only explanation I've heard from young earth creationists isn't that they don't believe the evidence that the earth is billions of years old, but that they believe physical constants aren't constants. So those billions of years happened during the 7 days of creation. It won't effect them at all.

For some they literally think its 10k years old or younger etc. Obviously it may help some others might reject it entirely. You are right it may well not affect any of them at all. One can hope

@Endus indeed its not a back to the drawing board moment. Purely a "Oh it's earlier than we thought? Cool" moment. Any new knowledge of our world is always cool in my book.

[Endus]

@Endus indeed its not a back to the drawing board moment. Purely a "Oh it's earlier than we thought? Cool" moment. Any new knowledge of our world is always cool in my book.

Oh, definitely still in the "neat!" category. Abiogenesis is a fascinating topic, and one that we really don't concretely understand; until we can create new forms of life from amino acids and such in a lab, we haven't cracked that concept. There's a lot of interesting theory that the wild conditions of early Earth were pretty instrumental, which is why it's been so difficult to replicate (and apparently hasn't occurred since).

[DocHibb]

Very interesting! Science/knowledge just for the sake of it is my favorite kind <3

[Deleted]

So, basically, if the giant impact hypothesis is true, and Theia smashed into Earth around 4.5 billion years ago, basically turning the then already cooled down Earth back into a ball of molten rock and flinging stuff everywhere, it took only a few hundred million years for Earth to reform, cool down, and for life to appear on it. Then again, I don't know if a few hundred million years is a long time for a planet to basically have to still form, cool down and all that, but, it would suggest that life could've basically existed all over the place for billions and billions of years now, assuming of course that otherwise the materials were there and the circumstances were favorable.

[khalltusk]

Oh, definitely still in the "neat!" category. Abiogenesis is a fascinating topic, and one that we really don't concretely understand; until we can create new forms of life from amino acids and such in a lab, we haven't cracked that concept. There's a lot of interesting theory that the wild conditions of early Earth were pretty instrumental, which is why it's been so difficult to replicate (and apparently hasn't occurred since).

Indeed, I think a good term for it is we know the ingredients but not the recipe for life (what needs to be done in what order with exact conditions etc and how long). Sometimes I wish I had a magical time machine to go take a look. It is interesting that if its all accurate that it formed that early, was it a one off freak occurrence? I would be interested if we ever found evidence of life being wiped and restarted more than once on this planet. That would be one hell of a bit of information.

[Zabatakis]

Did photosynthesis happen by random chance or was it the plant's destiny to develop photosynthesis? That everything needed was there and photosynthesis was inevitable? Why haven't animals developed it?

My 5th grade science game is pretty weak by now, but is not co2 needed for, and oxygen a byproduct of photosynthesis? Probably needed something to consume the oxygen and give back co2.

[khalltusk]

My 5th grade science game is pretty weak by now, but is not co2 needed for, and oxygen a byproduct of photosynthesis? Probably needed something to consume the oxygen and give back co2.

Plants take in co2 and produce oxygen as a by product. We in turn take in Oxygen and produce co2 as a by product. afaik.

[DocHibb]

Did photosynthesis happen by random chance or was it the plant's destiny to develop photosynthesis? That everything needed was there and photosynthesis was inevitable? Why haven't animals developed it?

Like most things it nature, it was likely random chance. When the organism that could perform photosynthesis because of random mutations was more suited to pass on its genetic code, it did, and was more successful than organisms that relied solely on external nutrients. Animals probably didn't develop the ability to perform photosynthesis because it is easy enough to consume an autotroph.
I think plants evolved with the ability to do photosynthesis because their ancestors engulfed organisms that could do photosynthesis. Through the magic of science, that DNA got incorporated into the plant's own DNA.

[Pterodactylus]

My 5th grade science game is pretty weak by now, but is not co2 needed for, and oxygen a byproduct of photosynthesis? Probably needed something to consume the oxygen and give back co2.

CO2 was abundant in the early earth - O2 was not. O2 did not build up in the atmosphere until about 2.3 billion years ago. Any O2 that was produced by photosynthesis was immediately taken up by reduced iron to form oxidized iron. Reduced iron is soluble in water, so abundant in the early oceans.

[Belize]

Did photosynthesis happen by random chance or was it the plant's destiny to develop photosynthesis? That everything needed was there and photosynthesis was inevitable? Why haven't animals developed it?

Why did the first Prokaryotic cell decide to turn sugars into ATP?

[Malachi256]

This is a decent site for seeing what YECs think about radiometric dating http://www.icr.org/rate/

A look at the wikipedia page on photosynthesis would also be worth a little time. It's an incredibly complex reaction and I haven't seen any decent attempts to explain its evolution.

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Did photosynthesis happen by random chance or was it the plant's destiny to develop photosynthesis? That everything needed was there and photosynthesis was inevitable? Why haven't animals developed it?

That evolution was "inevitable" is the strongest secular argument for it - because there are no other naturalistic options.

Animals don't do photosynthesis* because their metabolisms require much higher inputs than photosynthesis could provide.

* - There is at least one animal that I know of, some kind of sea slug, that uses photosynthesis that it more-or-less steals from algae that it eats. But the PS just supplements its nutrient input at best, I'm sure.

[Ripster42]

Oh, definitely still in the "neat!" category. Abiogenesis is a fascinating topic, and one that we really don't concretely understand; until we can create new forms of life from amino acids and such in a lab, we haven't cracked that concept. There's a lot of interesting theory that the wild conditions of early Earth were pretty instrumental, which is why it's been so difficult to replicate (and apparently hasn't occurred since).

It's possible we never will. The space+time involved in having random chance (millions of years and a 'lab' the size of the earth, and, depending on how prevalent life is, billions of earths and billions of years) develop life could still be more likely directed creation.

[Pterodactylus]

Oh, definitely still in the "neat!" category. Abiogenesis is a fascinating topic, and one that we really don't concretely understand; until we can create new forms of life from amino acids and such in a lab, we haven't cracked that concept. There's a lot of interesting theory that the wild conditions of early Earth were pretty instrumental, which is why it's been so difficult to replicate (and apparently hasn't occurred since).

Or it could be even simpler than that. It could be that life, once it exists, makes it impossible for life to spring into being. Either consuming the needed ingredients, or preventing more complex reactions from occurring. This is of course, me just talking out my ass, but I tend to think that life has a tendency form, and will form where conditions are such to support it. The evidence I present in this is simply the fact that life is here on earth and formed, as far as we can tell, as soon as conditions were such to support it.

[Ripster42]

As far as I know being a young earth creationist means that you literally believe that the earth was created ~6000 years ago in 6 24hr days by god. (six days of creation, 1 day of rest)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Earth_creationism

you may be confused by old earth creationism, a form of creationism which isn't denying the evidence as much as YECs

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Earth_creationism

Meh, I was paring the arguments I heard from Ken Hamm in the debate he had. Which was essentially that physical constants aren't actually constants. I don't care enough to make a distinction between the two.

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Or it could be even simpler than that. It could be that life, once it exists, makes it impossible for life to spring into being. Either consuming the needed ingredients, or preventing more complex reactions from occurring. This is of course, me just talking out my ass, but I tend to think that life has a tendency form, and will form where conditions are such to support it. The evidence I present in this is simply the fact that life is here on earth and formed, as far as we can tell, as soon as conditions were such to support it.

It's hard to make real conclusions about the prevalence of unique origins of life until we see another unique origin of life, or planets with conditions like ours. It's possible there are billions of planets 'exactly' like ours, but that life is so rare ours is the only one that developed life.

[minteK917]

The discovery is not that new, but it does shed light on one thing, considering Earth condition in that Era it leads to 2 idea. Life is much more resilient then we even thought possible (we know for a fact even when earth will be a wasteland in a couple more billion years, simple life forms will still be on the ocean floor.) Second one is that life could have much easier start then we expected, meaning eradication does not render a planet lifeless if the condition of its start can still be met, because its a process that can be replicated.

[Pterodactylus]

It's hard to make real conclusions about the prevalence of unique origins of life until we see another unique origin of life, or planets with conditions like ours. It's possible there are billions of planets 'exactly' like ours, but that life is so rare ours is the only one that developed life.

Of course. You'll notice I said I was simply talking out of my ass because I have ZERO data to support my position beyond what we can observe here on Earth. However, as a geologist a major tenant I embrace is "the present is the key to the past" and an extension of that can be applied to the idea of life in the universe. In other words, if life formed on earth at its likely earliest ability to do so, life would form all over in its likest ability to do so. Again, just speculation on my part - but I feel confident in my speculation.

[Adam Jensen]

so what humans gain from this discovery? useless...

Simply because a discover may not yield immediate progress to human development, doesn't make it "useless." Added knowledge builds up and down the road can lead to all sorts of new developments we never think possible now.

[minteK917]

Simply because a discover may not yield immediate progress to human development, doesn't make it "useless." Added knowledge builds up and down the road can lead to all sorts of new developments we never think possible now.

Yeah the beginning of life is such a useless knowledge.... Its almost as if Terraforming was not a thing!

[zox2]

OK guys, lot's of science to clean up in this thread.

So, this discovery puts the possibility of early life to 4.1 billion years, but it is by no means confirmed.

There are several different types of photosynthesis. The one green plants use to generate oxygen is a relative latecomer, and requires a pretty complex enzymatic system. Earlier versions of it were capable of harnessing energy from light, but could not "split" water, so didn't generate O2.

Modern photosynthesis was "invented" by the cyanobacteria. Some ancestral cyanobacteria were picked up by eukaryote cells and became the green plastids seen in modern green plants.

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Now, can life exist in lakes of methane or a similar hazardous to life element on earth? If so, life is probably everywhere.

If life could exist in methane lakes, it would be very different from life observable on earth. Methane lakes pose several important problems for life, one of which is temperature, which would make most chemical reactions rather slow.

I would wager that most likely life can only exist in water solvent environments.