Origin of Life
Category archives for Origin of Life
Books On Fossils and Evolution
Posted by Greg Laden on November 25, 2015 
Over the last several months, a lot of great books on fossils and evolution (as in paleontology) have come out. I’ve selected the best for your consideration. These are great gifts for your favorite science-loving nephew, life science teaching cousin, or local school library. Actually, you might like some of these yourself. Let’s start off…
If a spider is in an Oreo Cookie, then evolution is true!
Posted by Greg Laden on March 14, 2013 
You know about the Atheists Nightmare, right? Also known as the Evolutionists Nightmare. No? It goes like this: That’s pretty darn convincing. Until someone opens up some closed thing and there is some new species in there, then EVOLUTION IS MADE UP!!!1!!! Well, it turns out, Evolution is True. Some guy on the internet opened…
Comments on Zimmer’s “Can A Scientist Define Life?
Posted by Greg Laden on January 11, 2012 Imagine a “primordial soup” on some planet somewhere from which there occasionally emerges a thing that could locomote, and as it locomoted around it would scrape up some of the dust that lay around on the planet, and occasionally eat other things that had come out of the “primordial soup” and it would thus grow.…
Is the origin of life different from evolution?
Posted by Greg Laden on June 28, 2011 I heard it said recently that “Evolution” and “Origin of life” are two separate issues. I know that this is a falsehood, and I’ll discuss in a moment how and why it is not true. But first, I checked around with a few people that I know and love, and found out that some of…
Lester Park Stromatolites
Posted by Greg Laden on March 29, 2011 Some years ago, I was asked by a friend to accompany him on a visit to a site in Saratoga Springs, New York, where we were to witness the activities of a gen-u-wine geomancer. I had never heard of a geomancer before. If you don’t know what one is, be happy. If you do, you…
NASA’s new organism, the meaning of life, and Darwin’s Second Theory
Posted by Greg Laden on December 2, 2010 In his highly readable book, One Long Argument, Ernst Mayr breaks down the body of thought often referred to as “Darwin’s Theory” into five separate and distinct theories, the second of which being “common descent.” Darwin’s second evolutionary theory (second by Mayr’s count, not Darwin’s) is really a hypothesis that could be worded this way:…