The Miller-Urey Experiment Revisited

Almost six decades ago, when Stanley Miller was just a 22-year-old PhD student, he and his professor Harold Urey did an experiment that became legendary in science: Miller mixed basic chemicals that were present in primordial earth and added electric sparks to stimulate a thunderstorm. The result? Miller found traces of amino acids - the building blocks of proteins.

After Miller died last year, his former student found a (scientific) treasure trove: the vials containing dried samples from his groundbreaking 1950s experiment. And when they tested the samples using today's more sophisticated equipments, they found a lot more stuff:

"We found not only did these make more of certain amino acids than in the classic experiment, but they made a greater diversity of amino acids."

Miller, using the old methods, had found five amino acids; Jeffrey Bada and his teams tracked down 22. What is more, the overall chemical yields were often higher than in the first set of experiments - the mixture appeared to be more fertile.

Professor Bada points out that today, almost all volcanic eruptions are accompanied by violent electric storms. The same could have been true on the young Earth. "What we suggest is that volcanoes belched out gases just like the ones Stanley had used, and were immediately subjected to intense volcanic lightning.

"And so each one of those volcanoes could have been a little, local prebiotic factory. And so all of that went into making the material that we refer to as the prebiotic soup."

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Miller Urey experiment ignored many conditions in the atmosphere that would breakdown the chemical synthesis they did achieve e.g. cytosine - has no chemical pathway during earth's primordial past, the gases Miller relies upon - consume the chemicals that create this necessary component of nucleic acids. Ribose, phosphate compounds also create problems in Miller's scenario.
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deep sea hyrdothermal vents would actually inhibit life formation. Experiments show that amino acids could form in these vents but only have a a half life of a few minutes - some sugars last only a few seconds. No RNA/DNA, peptide formation - and, worse, ammonia can not exist in levels necessary for life in these vents. What characteristics of these vents that would allow life - also destroys life. Schoonen, Xu - Astrobiology 1, (2001) pg 122-123.
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The creationist claim that an oxygen rich atmosphere invalidates Miller's evidence for abiogenesis is based on a ( likely intentional ) misreading of a 2004 paper titled " U-rich Archaean sea-floor sediments from Greenland - indications of >3700 Ma oxygenic photosynthesis. "

The paper discusses the transportation of uranium through oxygen rich water 3.7 billion years ago, indicating that photosynthetic organisms existed some 200 million years earlier than previously believed. Instead of invalidating the experiment, the paper only pushes the origin of life back a little, geologically speaking.

Lacking valid peer reviewed alternatives, the creationist community simply relied on one of their usual tactics, misrepresentation, to create yet another straw man in their unflagging efforts to discredit the truth of evolution.

Back to the drawing board for the creationists.
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While a fascinating experiment, it has since been proven that the primordial Earth's atmosphere was CO2 and repetition of the Miller-Urey experiment under these conditions yielded no results. :(

back to the drawing board....
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So what does tradition say about a bouquet that is not caught, but is instead sucked into the engine of a plane? Will none of the women get married? Will the marriage end in a divorce? It makes worrying about a ceiling fan seem pitiful.
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That's why you don't skydive? I was going to say the only thing you should ever fling off an airplane is yourself. There's a method to that madness, not this tripe. This is a tale of Italian extravagance, and nothing at all to do with the joy of skydiving. Just for the record, Him, when you jump, you're behind the engines on the plane.
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Beats me why people do this sort of thing at weddings. Isn't getting married to the one you love enough? Why add frills and thrills to what's already the best day of your life?
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What a bunch of old ladies we have here. Why add frills and thrills? That's why I don't skydive? (afraid of getting sucked into an engine, are we?) And the best... Serves them right. You know, it probably could have been planned better, but who the he11 are you to judge what a couple wants for their wedding? You just wish your wedding had been half as exciting.
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@7 OK - who the hell are you to judge me for having an opinon? ~(removes tonge from cheek, insert smiley of choice here)

See - that just leads to playground taunts. We all have opinions, and many of us voice them. No one is immune to criticism and we all have the right to judge other people, that's what holds society together. If no one were allowed to voice criticisms anyone could do just anything they like - that's not a great place to live.

Where did this attitude that it's not OK to judge people come from, anyway? Why can't I say it's silly? I don't mind other people saying things I do are silly - if we were only allowed to be nice to people we'd soon have someone complaining that we weren't being nice /enough/ or were nice in the wrong sort of way.
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wow... someone got really hurt out of this and everyone wants to be a comedian... someone wanted to have fun at their wedding and you all beat her down verbally for it. shame on you all.
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Weddings should be fun. Why make it the most stressful day of your life?

The turkey give-away episode of WKRP was the funniest sitcom episode EVER!!!
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Hey that is a real classic. That will never happen again ever.Uh life is good and God has a snese of humor. Maybe the Bride should go out for baseball. That is a good one. Should have been there brings a whole new translaton to it . No one will ever forget that day as long as they live. Feel for the Birde lol. hey a good move there Bride. She will not ever live that down.
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Oh thats great, so now it is Italians who are excessive instead of just human egos, huh? What about the AMERICAN couple who spent so much money on their zero-gravity wedding that they admitted they would probably be paying for it for the rest of their lives? What about all of the stupid couples on those "reality" shows like Bridezillas and Wild Weddings, ect. Humans from all over the globe are excessive and ego-driven enough to put on these kinds of ostentatious displays at their weddings, don't try to characterize Italians as the ones who are excessive.
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People should do exactly what THEY want at their wedding, not what some of you think they should do. This is incredibly sad and tragic, strange time to criticize someone's taste.
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I am retired wedding photographer and never saw a bouquet from a plane. 30 years of traditional weddings and the most I ever saw was a drunk groom pass out. Fell like a tree.

But then I was a blue collar photographer not many extravagant weddings in my portfolio. Sorry someone got hurt but it's still funny, just not as funny as wkrp and the flying turkey.
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