Messages

"Oh baby, bond with that benzine ring.  Oh yeah, thats right, you like your reactions exothermic, don't you..."

Reading articles like this really torque my nice iron bars

I'm constantly surprised that while I can easily stick my head in models that include egrigores, invocations, aliens and Eris... I seem to have been so inoculated against the idea of abiogenesis that I tend to dismiss evidence out of hand as an initial reaction.

Fucking Prison.

On the other hand, I have a hard time sticking models in my head that include egrigores, invocations, aliens and Eris, while ideas like evolutionary biology and abiogenesis get stuck in my head hard.

The only difference between the two is that one has more evidence. Its STILL some ideas stuck in your head driving your thoughts.

Well sure, but my goal is model agnosticism... ANY MODEL, ANY TIME, ANY PLACE. I was inoculated against magic (from the devil!!) and drugs (the demons can possess you if you are on drugs!!) but abiogenesis, the life from unlife model just eludes me still. I know that we're talking about replicating proteins at that point, not frogs and rats and Cramuli, but still... 

Its alright. No one really knows the how. All we will ever have is some guesses to the how and the where, and we have some models for the what.

No one will ever know the why, if there is one, but lots of people will think they do.

Reading articles like this really torque my nice iron bars

I'm constantly surprised that while I can easily stick my head in models that include egrigores, invocations, aliens and Eris... I seem to have been so inoculated against the idea of abiogenesis that I tend to dismiss evidence out of hand as an initial reaction.

Fucking Prison.

On the other hand, I have a hard time sticking models in my head that include egrigores, invocations, aliens and Eris, while ideas like evolutionary biology and abiogenesis get stuck in my head hard.

The only difference between the two is that one has more evidence. Its STILL some ideas stuck in your head driving your thoughts.

Actually, while that is cool, I am still not completly satisfied. I can't find a link to a peer reviewed journal, and the articles only hint at the possibility of there being a melanin radiosynthetic pathway.

Do you know of one?

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0000457
You ask and you shall receive.

THAT is what I was looking for! 

Huh.  My database seems to think it is.  Oh well.

To be completely honest, I had to check some lists myself, because I wasn't sure. Nature is on there, but I couldn't find Natural History on any lists.

Sorry, Natural History, the magazine publication of the National Museum of Natural History, while a good publication, is not peer reviewed.

Actually, while that is cool, I am still not completly satisfied. I can't find a link to a peer reviewed journal, and the articles only hint at the possibility of there being a melanin radiosynthetic pathway.

Do you know of one?

http://unitedcats.wordpress.com/2007/05/29/major-biological-discoveryinside-the-chernobyl-reactor/

Citation Granted.

OFUK Now I see! 

Very very very cool.

That...thats actually more cool that deep cave living radiosynthetic bacterium.

Most perturbatory.  It reminds me of that fungus found inside chernobyl's reactor that uses gamma radiation as a food source.

I haven't heard of that. Thats pretty cool too. Still, its a fungus, so that was a secondary addition...

Which is a cool thought, too. It means that things like chemosynthesis and radiosynthesis aren't as difficult to derive as we may think.

I read that the fungus was using melanin the same way plants use chlorophyll.  Freaky shit.

Okay, the radiosynthetic fungus I can believe, but for this one .

As far as I know, there are no photosynthetic fungus.

It's amazing how life can be found just about everywhere on earth.  Evolution is such a damn powerful process.

I'm amazed too. I'm amazed and awed at the emergent capacity for life on this planet.

I was reading recently from one of those books I've been gabbing about on here, Reinventing the Sacred. Kauffman was talking about some experiments with self replicating RNA molecules and how when you reach a threshold complexity of the molecules themselves, once the chains have a codon sequence that can independently put proteins together, then all kinds of crazy shit starts happening. Its amazing and exciting stuff, wish I could back it up with some journal articles.

Most perturbatory.  It reminds me of that fungus found inside chernobyl's reactor that uses gamma radiation as a food source.

I haven't heard of that. Thats pretty cool too. Still, its a fungus, so that was a secondary addition...

Which is a cool thought, too. It means that things like chemosynthesis and radiosynthesis aren't as difficult to derive as we may think.

http://www.overcomingbias.com/2008/10/behold-our-ance.html

A community of the bacteria Candidatus Desulforudis audaxviator has been discovered 2.8 kilometres beneath the surface of the Earth in fluid-filled cracks of the Mponeng goldmine in South Africa. Its 60C home is completely isolated from the rest of the world, and devoid of light and oxygen.


D. audaxviator gets its energy from the radioactive decay of uranium in the surrounding rocks. It has genes to extract carbon from dissolved carbon dioxide and other genes to fix nitrogen, which comes from the surrounding rocks. ... D. audaxviator has genes to produce all the amino acids it needs.  D. audaxviator can also protect itself from environmental hazards by forming endospores - tough shells that protect its DNA and RNA from drying out, toxic chemicals and from starvation. It has a flagellum to help it navigate.

From http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/dn14906-goldmine-bug-dna-may-be-key-to-alien-life.html

Also, http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/322/5899/275


I thought this organism was worth a second look it its own thread and a different context.

However, why oh WHY do people have to go on and on and on about seeding from outer space? I mean, sure it sounds cool, but isn't it so much cooler to contemplate how life might have arisen on our own planet, that this whole diversity is home grown and endemic? The nearest planets are dead lifeless rock, and even then, why is it more likely that life arose there rather than here? What is it about elsewhere that makes it seem so much more probable than right here on this planet, with so much water, low impact cosmic radiation and relatively happy temperatures? Furthermore, why is it so much more attractive?

I think its because people want to find "intelligent life" elsewhere. They want to be reassured that they we are not alone in this sector of the universe, or want to relive their childhood science fiction fantasies. Besides, saying life came from elsewhere doesn't help us understand how life arose, and unless you buy into a creator deity, it arose somewhere, sometime, somehow, and it arose spontaneously.

As fun as aliens may be sometimes, it is really really TRULY time to use Occam's Razor.

Now, back to the organism. Chemosynthetic, from URANIUM. Thats a new one. Chemosynthetic organisms that make use of sulfur are relatively common. Some of the most ancient of these (we suppose) are those living in deep sea vent environments, mostly because there is very little way that these could have gotten there if they had not arisen there in the first place. This bacteria is doing pretty well for its self too, with a flagellum and full ammino acid ability, plus, it can go cryptobiotic. Lots of bacteria have these abilities, but few have them in this combination, and none that I know of have these characters together, especially the whole Uranium radiation pathway.

So, we have two possible pathways for the metabolisms of the earliest bacteria now. Very cool.

i had the american dream last night
lots of apple pies and cherry colas
there were smells of cedar
and sounds of songbirds
there was the sweet taste of freedom
and the lingering aura of safety
and then i was awaken by a feeling of dampness
fucking box is leaking again

I liked it.

Not really that original though.

No problem.

I should dig up his "how many dimensions are there?" riff.

This IS a certain relative of yours, is it not?

Or am I thinking of the wrong person?

Also, the Discordian Power Elite?

Isn't that what Palin's been warning the American people about? 

SPREAD THAT!