Earthsky Interviews
Paul Davies on how life on Earth began
11-16-2009 - Space
Paul Davies: There’s been a lot of research on the setting in which life on Earth may have begun. And there are various fashions. One of these is that it might have started hot and deep.
Astrophysicist Paul Davies of Arizona State University studies the origins of life on our planet.
Paul Davies: It may well have started one or two kilometers beneath the sea bed near one of the volcanic vents that are so common where the internal heat of the Earth comes up and meets the ocean and creates thermal pandemonium.
Tiny microbes, called extremophiles, have been discovered living in the extreme heat of these sea vents.
Paul Davies: I think that offers a possible setting. Life may have begun deep down under the ground and then only later evolved and adapted to cooler surface conditions on Earth.
Davies added that scientists still know little of how life started.
Paul Davies: Scientifically, we’re no better off now than we were off 30 or 40 years ago. The scientific facts are more or less the same. We still have no theory of how life began. It could be that it is an exceptionally rare thing. Or it could be that it is something that is more or less automatic and what happened where there were the right conditions. So the obvious way to test that is to look for it happening many times on Earth.
Paul Davies said that life on Earth might not have even originated from Earth, but possibly from another planet.
Paul Davies: It could be that life didn’t even start on Earth. It may have started in space. It may have started, in fact, in very cold conditions and have been delivered to Earth in micrometeorites or comet impacts or something of that sort, and then established itself on Earth and evolved to spread to the deep, hot subsurface.
He said that Earth may have been sterilized by enormous, heavy bombardments early in its history.
Paul Davies: Only the things that lived deep underground in the hot temperatures got through that genetic bottleneck. And so it could well be that the descendants of life on Earth descended from these from organisms that survived that impact. But the origin of life, we have no idea, it could have been somewhere else entirely.
Davies said scientists have connected about diverse settings for the origin of life, from raindrops and drying lagoons and deep subsurface pores of rocks.
Paul Davies: Or on Mars, it’s entirely likely life began on Mars and came later to Earth, Mars was actually a more favorable planet for life to get going in the early history of the solar system. Again, we don’t have to be restricted to Earth. But wherever it started, what we’re interested in is, did it start more than once, and how can we best test that? It seems to me the best way is looking for multiple forms of life right here on Earth.
Paul Davies talked more about his investigations of life’s origins and the possible connection with extraterrestrial life.
Paul Davies: We’re all used to the idea of life on other worlds, and think of this as alien life, as having a separate origin, as being weird, different from us, not only what it looks like but also its biochemistry. A lot of thought’s been given to, well, if you find life on Mars or Europa what will we look for? It could be completely different from nucleic acid and protein life that we find here on Earth.
But, he said, this assumes that life is going to form readily in Earth-like conditions all around the universe.
Paul Davies: It could be that it’s a stupendously incredible freak, it could be that life is just confined to Earth, it’s happened only once, and we’re it. So how can we discriminate between these two different extremes?
Written by Jorge Salazar
11 Responses to “Paul Davies on how life on Earth began”
Leave a Reply
Paul Davies
Paul Davies, British-born theoretical physicist, cosmologist, astrobiologist and best-selling author, earned his Ph.D. from University College London. He moved to Australia in 1990, where he helped found the Australian Centre for Astrobiology in Sydney, then came to the U.S. in 2006. Dr. Davies is director of the BEYOND Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science and ... >>
Basically Paul -you are saying nothing… it could be lava, it could be aliens.
I have an idea… READ the first chapter of the Bible… and there you have it, how does the life started, and the meaning of life.
Not everything come just about by chance… there is a creator – GIVE him a credit.
I agree with you completely Daughter of The Sun. Evolution is a theory, based and proven by other “theories” which we created and formed in to science. You can’t prove evolution as fact therefore. Yes, it’s common sense that adaptation has occurred in this world, but try reading the bible- testimonials from our creator about basic values and morals held within the human heart (known as the ten commandments), and just try to say the bible is any less of a valid theory than evolution. God is our savior, and wants to become a part of all of our lives- try the bible first please without shunning away that theory Paul Davies
Well, yes, sort of, Roho Don Poho, if you choose to ignore all of modern science and choose instead the oral tradition of ancient sheep herders. But then there is another problem. Your pre-modern view seems to satisfy you as you take into account Genesis I but then there is that rather pesky Genesis Ch. 2 wherein one finds yet another creation story but with the order of creation completely different from that found in Chapter I. To be polite, I could give you one of those stories but both cannot be true since they are different and if one of them can be false—as it surely has to be—then both of them could be wrong. There is no evidence for either of the Genesis stories other than the existence of the universe and that works just as well, nay much better, for the rational explanation–science–because at least there is a great deal of evidence however incomplete as Davies points out.
Secondarily, evolution is a fact not a theory. We have had ample verification of evolution since before Darwin. The “theory” about which you speak refers to Darwin’s theory that “natural selection,” acting randomly over vast eons of time, is the engine by which evolution works. Stpehen Gould, among others, has taken issue with Darwin’s notions of time and its role in evolution–he favors a theory referred to as “punctuated equilibrium” which states that evolutionary change happens in fits and starts–in fact rather quickly in geological time. Still, Gould considered himself a Darwinist even with his challenges to some of the details. That is the way Science works–each scientist building upon the work of all the others through rational processes.
If you are correct in your belief in a creator god, then you must believe that the human mind, the rational human mind, also comes from that god so our human reason ought to be a reflection of that god’s greater glory—greater than that of some carnival magician-god waving a celestial wand. You make your god so very small and limited. Anytime a human presumes to define his/her god, the act of “defining” is a limitation which presumably runs counter to the humanly incomprehensible god of the bible. And, if it is the use of the term “theory” that bothers you, ask yourself how you feel about the “theory of gravity” or ask the Japanese about the “atomic theory.” Virtually all of science—most of which you live and experience everyday–falls under the rubric of one theroy or another. As basic as it is, apparently some making these and similar comments need to be reminded that “theory” and “hypothesis” are not synonomous. The doubts non-rationalists express toward “theories,” scientifically organized systems of phenomena which work quite handily, are obviously confusing it with “hypothesis,” a scientific proposal which remains to be proven.
I agree with you ROJO DON POHO, but i have a better idea;
try to read tho whole Qoran, then you will know that this book is telling us the full story of the begining of life on earth, and the ceation of the Universe.
Thank you for your research Mr.Davies, but the begining of life is much more than an equation or random events.
it is possible science is just trying to theorize the means by which “The Creator” worked his magic. No ones saying God doesn’t exist so chill out!
Mr. Davies, i’ve heard these same theories before (mostly on PBS and nature/history/discovery channels and in NatGeo magazines) and I completely agree.
there is no real way as of yet to know exactly HOW life began. I was always tempted by the thought of meteorites bringing microorganisms of some sorts to our planet and having them be transformed, evolved, by our atmosphere.
the possibilities are endless and we are sure to be surprised years from now when truth is discovered. Until then it is fun to pick and choose for oneself. Thank you very much for your insight!
I would have to agree with Rojo Don Poho, i mean i myself am a christian which did influence my thought of how life started and yes Paul Davies does make a strong point but it is completely impossible to say.. and i strongly doubt WHOMEVER’s differing theory.
I fail to see why these must be mutually-exclusive occurrences. God created all OUT of NOTHING, meaning He supplied the materials [carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, etc] AND the blueprints or genetic commands. Then, evolution took care of the gradual unfolding of the PLAN, which is STILL going on. So, what is the dilemma? Where is the contradiction? Either God took clay [carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, etc] and formed Mankind. Or he created these things and WILLED them and they happened in time…what’s the difference? I DO enjoy learning of all the possible ways in which this ‘unfolding of His PLAN’ may have happened! It’s fun!
In Support of Uncertainty
The desire to have answers is not the same as the desire to learn. The former is often simplistic, rigid, and frequently promotes arrogance. The latter is complex, fluid, and often promotes humility and awe.
While I usually associate the desire for answers with religion, and the desire to learn with science, the border between religion and science is very porous. There are plenty of arrogant scientists and many humble followers of faith.
In the end, however, I believe that the desire for answers does cause more harm than the desire to learn. Once a person is sure they have the answers to whatever questions are important to them, they frequently stop looking and become hostile to those who continue to search. Also, this certainty often gives such people “permission” to act in very hurtful and destructive ways.
Uncertainty can be unsettling, but it is an effective way to avoid such disasters as the Spanish Inquisition, the Salem Witch Trials, Pat Robertson and the late Jerry Falwell.
David, I think I agree completely with your sentiment here but may I argue a point—which I think is a bit more than one of semantics. Would I be misinterpreting your comments if I were to modify your them to the extent of making a distinction between “scientific answers” and the “immutable answers” we are given through the received wisdom of religion and dogmatic philosophies? In other words, as a rationalist and advocate of the scientific world-view, I believe that I, too, am looking for answers. BUT, in science all answers are tentative and are often revised or even culled upon the discovery of new data or an epiphany into a better way of analyzing the earlier data. That, to me, is the greatness of science–it provides answers that we can use in our quest to understand life, the universe and ourselves. But, no scientific “answer” is so –may I say “sacred”–that it can never be revisted, challenged and even disproven. The Church—usually the Christian church— has so often been in error simply because it does not recognize the possibility that its theology can be wrong. That may work in matters of the theological notions of good and bad, right and wrong and the like but it has failed miserably every time its theology has ventured into cosmology. (The science of cosmology, not referring to a philosophy of life as is the church’s wont and privilege.)
Although I am trained as a historian, science and especially cosmology are my great loves and the avenues through which I seek “answers,” but always with the caveat that my answers are never immutable.
Can you agree with me or have I misinterpreted your comments?
I loved this interview if anyone could tell me what the know about space i would love to hear it i already know alot about space so i might not respond to everything.