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NASA discovers new life!

Coded-Dude

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Hours before their special news conference today, the cat is out of the bag: NASA has discovered a completely new life form that doesn't share the biological building blocks of anything currently living in planet Earth. This changes everything.

At their conference today, NASA scientist Felisa Wolfe Simon will announce that they have found a bacteria whose DNA is completely alien to what we know today. Instead of using phosphorus, the bacteria uses arsenic. All life on Earth is made of six components: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulfur. Every being, from the smallest amoeba to the largest whale, share the same life stream. Our DNA blocks are all the same.
source - full article

so is this alien bacteria?
 
M

McX

Guest
so, this alien bacteria, can we eat it or burn it in our cars?
 

John Pierce

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so, this alien bacteria, can we eat it or burn it in our cars?

No. This is the bacteria that was long ago fortold. It will lead to the arsenic-zombie uprising. :monkey


Sorry ... I couldn't help myself. Too many hours reading sci-fi. :)


John
 

gsx1138

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I've held the theory that life 'happens' everywhere. Life is a natural state and can and will happen if given even the remotest possibility. With this I'd say our universe is probably teaming with life. From single celled organisms to more complex lifeforms. Of course, given the distances I doubt we'll ever contact any for a long long time.
 
M

McX

Guest
No. This is the bacteria that was long ago fortold. It will lead to the arsenic-zombie uprising. :monkey


Sorry ... I couldn't help myself. Too many hours reading sci-fi. :)


John

I knew it! Zombozies in the livingroom at 3 am coming soon!

added on edit; figures, new life, and they got no free gasoline either.
 
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Daylen

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I've held the theory that life 'happens' everywhere. Life is a natural state and can and will happen if given even the remotest possibility. With this I'd say our universe is probably teaming with life. From single celled organisms to more complex lifeforms. Of course, given the distances I doubt we'll ever contact any for a long long time.

don't you mean hypothesis? or have you proven your hypothesis with empirical results or observations? or seen others results or observations to show that the idea that life happens everywhere is worthy of the title of theory? Hypothesis can be just general observation, logic, extrapolation and the like. Theories have proof.
 

Tawnos

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don't you mean hypothesis? or have you proven your hypothesis with empirical results or observations? or seen others results or observations to show that the idea that life happens everywhere is worthy of the title of theory? Hypothesis can be just general observation, logic, extrapolation and the like. Theories have proof.
No, theories have evidence and can be used to explain or predict natural phenomena. You're probably thinking of a theorem :)
 

Dreamer

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A life form that uses arsenic instead of phosphorus as a basic building block for DNA would have a very low probability happening--about the same low probability that life forms considered "normal" would have.

Arsenic is a heavy metal and is relatively common in the universe--it is made from fusion in stars, and gets spread around when those stars go super-nova. It is estimated that Arsenic is the 39th most common element in the universe.

It is poisonous to phosphorus-based life forms because it is very siilar to phosphorus and it interrupts or inhibits phosphorus-related metabolic processes.

On a planet like Earth, which has a very diverse chemical makeup in it's crust, and a very diverse set of environments, life forms like this are actually more likely to occur than not. Life is precocious and pernicious, and tends to adapt to adverse environments.

To think that such a life form might occur out in space on some other planet isn't a big stretch. The stretch is to believe that all life in the universe must be just like the majority of life on earth. The universe is chemically much more variable than Earth, so it only stands to reason that life forms on other planets may very well be COMPLETELY different from ours, biochemically.

The big mystery with this bacteria is why did it take them this long to find it. The answer to that mystery is simple--nobody thought to look for it before...
 

Daylen

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No, theories have evidence and can be used to explain or predict natural phenomena. You're probably thinking of a theorem :)

no a theorem is:
# a proposition deducible from basic postulates
# an idea accepted as a demonstrable truth

I see them in math more than anything else.
 

Daylen

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Evidence, not proof.

I hesitate to say any more, lest someone point out a word I got wrong. :D

I stand corrected. Remember though, words have meaning and far too many people use theory in place of hypothesis. Gravity is "just a theory". String BS is a hypothesis (yes note that even well known physicists will name things falsely to try and make people believe) The earth being 6000 years old is a hypothesis.

Now I just hope this doesn't devolve the thread into an argument about the gravity of earth being only 6000 years old.:uhoh:
 

usmcbess

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A life form that uses arsenic instead of phosphorus as a basic building block for DNA would have a very low probability happening--about the same low probability that life forms considered "normal" would have.

Arsenic is a heavy metal and is relatively common in the universe--it is made from fusion in stars, and gets spread around when those stars go super-nova. It is estimated that Arsenic is the 39th most common element in the universe.

It is poisonous to phosphorus-based life forms because it is very siilar to phosphorus and it interrupts or inhibits phosphorus-related metabolic processes.

On a planet like Earth, which has a very diverse chemical makeup in it's crust, and a very diverse set of environments, life forms like this are actually more likely to occur than not. Life is precocious and pernicious, and tends to adapt to adverse environments.

To think that such a life form might occur out in space on some other planet isn't a big stretch. The stretch is to believe that all life in the universe must be just like the majority of life on earth. The universe is chemically much more variable than Earth, so it only stands to reason that life forms on other planets may very well be COMPLETELY different from ours, biochemically.

The big mystery with this bacteria is why did it take them this long to find it. The answer to that mystery is simple--nobody thought to look for it before...

Wow I would say about that almost 100% of your reply is speculative. I take it you are of the cult of evolution.?
We really don't know to much about the rest of the universe so to say anything is common or uncommon outside of our galaxy is a stretch of the imagination.
We do not know what stars are from impiricle evidence. All we can observe of stars is there light and signals they give off. For that matter we cannot even be sure that our sun is a star (although it most likely is) because we have no other "star" close enought to make visual and other observations. We have no clue what goes on in stars only speculations. Most scientists cant even agree if the sun is burning by fussion or not!

But overall the real question when you break it down is how did life arise from non-living matter?
 

eye95

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I am a Christian. I take the Bible literally. I believe that God created everything we can observe. I also taught high school physics.

That being said, it is foolish to dismiss science, its observations, and its conclusions.

Our Sun is a star. The observations of the electromagnetic radiation it emits as compared to other stars establishes this as a proposition that would be foolish to deny.

As Bible-believers, it is incumbent upon us defend our faith from narrow-minded assaults based on science. But, neither can I stand narrow-minded assaults on science.

The narrow-mindedness arises out of a belief that science and faith are at irreconcilable conflict with each other. They aren't. When those who would defend the faith attack science, they foster the misimpression of the existence of that conflict and end up hurting the faith by making science appear to be a faith-slayer.

Instead, we should be looking to faith where it provides answers, and science where it does. I don't look to science to determine what God wants me to do. And I don't look to faith find out how to safely navigate steps.

God created the rules about how our physical universe works. I kinda thinks He wants us to learn as much about them as we are able, in order that we are effective in using His universe to bring about His will. To dismiss valid science is to work against God's will.
 
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Tawnos

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Wow I would say about that almost 100% of your reply is speculative. I take it you are of the cult of evolution.?
We really don't know to much about the rest of the universe so to say anything is common or uncommon outside of our galaxy is a stretch of the imagination.
We do not know what stars are from impiricle evidence. All we can observe of stars is there light and signals they give off. For that matter we cannot even be sure that our sun is a star (although it most likely is) because we have no other "star" close enought to make visual and other observations. We have no clue what goes on in stars only speculations. Most scientists cant even agree if the sun is burning by fussion or not!

But overall the real question when you break it down is how did life arise from non-living matter?
Obligxkcd
science.jpg


beliefs.jpg
 
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