So you're saying there's a chance . . .

You think Lloyd Christmas had some long odds? Wait till you hear this . . .

No doubt you've heard the scientific theory about how life began on Earth? Supposedly a long time ago in a warm pond a chance alignment of amino acids created the first primitive bacteria.

Well I'm hear to tell you that there's trouble in Evolution City. We evolved, for sure. The fossil record is there for all to see, but how life began and subsequently evolved is being looked at in a whole new light these days.

In May of 2001 Chandra Wickamasinghe and Fred Hoyle co-authored an article on the Action Science website entitled Evolution of Life: A Cosmic Perspective. As an introduction to the problems being encountered by evolution theory, I want to highlight section 12 of that article where the authors calculated the odds of amino acid molecules randomly lining up to form that first primitive bacteria. The odds are 1 in 10^500,000! Those are unimaginably low odds. Forget about Lloyd Christmas. If ever there was absolutely no chance of something happening, this is it.

Now Lloyd wouldn't give up that easy so we won't either. Let's have a look at just how long these odds are. After all, there could be trillions upon trillions of amino acids molecules, in billions and billions of ponds all over the Earth. The odds are long, yes, but over many many years, couldn't it still happen?

Nope, nadda, forget it . . . and I'll do a little example to help you (and Lloyd) see the light:

Assumption 1: let's suppose that the entire Earth's surface is covered in a 100km deep warm pool of amino acid molecules,

Assumption 2: let's take a guess that there are 100 trillion amino acid molecules in each millilitre of liquid (I actually have no idea how many would fit in a millilitre but that should be enough for our purposes),

Assumption 3: the amino acid molecules will be moving around in this warm liquid providing numerous opportunities for just the right alignment to occur. So lets say for each 600,000 amino acid molecule (the approximate number needed for a simple bacteria) they will move into a new position, or 'give it the old college try', about 1 million times a second (again I have no idea how fast these little things move but that should suffice).

Assumption 4: how about we let this soup steep for 50 billion years which is 10 times the approximate age of the Earth.

So what's the odds of this example producing a simple bacteria? The number of 'tries' is about 10⁵³ (I won't bore you with the math). Because of the large difference in magnitude between 10^500,000 and 10⁵³, the resulting odds can be approximated as the ratio of the two yielding 1 in 10^500,000/10⁵³ = 1 in 10^499,947!

Sorry Lloyd, but all those tries don't have any meaningful impact on those long odds.

So if a chance alignment of amino acid molecules is not possible then how did life start and evolve on Earth? I'm putting my money on a theory called Cosmic Ancestry. Cosmic Ancestry states that the genetic material needed for life was already present in the materials that formed Earth and that this material was the source of the beginings of life on Earth. It also states that evolution was driven by this original material as well as continual genetic seeding from microbes carried to Earth by comets. There's a lot of research going on right now to test this theory and the evidence is steadily mounting. Indeed, the theory maintains that this process continues today.

Cosmic Ancestry . . . it's got a nice ring to it doesn't it.

I'll have a lot more to say about this in the days to come.

Cheers.

What does 'black' mean?

Can someone tell me what the term 'black' means. Is this an anthropological term? If so, what does it mean anthropologically?

Obama, who, up to this point, is my most written-about subject, is called America's first black president. Using information from Wikipedia's main entry on Obama; his mother was of mainly English descent, which presumably would mean she was Caucasoid (I'm using anthropology terms here), and his father was Kenyan, which presumably means he was Negroid. Now keep in mind ethnic origin does not at all guarantee racial origin so if anyone has further information about the racial origin of Obama's parents please speak up. (Obama apparently writes a lot about race in his books so if you have copies of any, you could help out here.)

So in today's vernacular, using the above assumptions, Obama is half white. So why is he referred to as 'black'. Wouldn't a more apt description be mixed race or half black and half white?

Another perplexing example is Tiger Woods. He is often referred to as black. In the words of Wikipedia he is 'one-quarter Chinese, one-quarter Thai, one-quarter African American, one-eighth Native American, and one-eighth Dutch'. Again, ethnic origin does not guaratee racial origin so if you have any further racial info about Tiger, please speak up. But using his ethnic origins as a basis, his racial makeup is presumably five-eighth's Mongoloid (that's the Thai, Chinese, and Native American), one-quarter Negroid (African American), and one-eighth Caucasoid (Dutch).

Or in other words, Tiger is one-quarter black. So why do some people call him 'black'.

I believe the currently accepted word for Mongoloid is 'brown'. Since he has more than twice as much brown in him than any other race, why don't people call him 'brown'? Personally I prefer not to call people any colour. To me, Tiger is just Tiger, and he's AWESOME!! But his awesomeness is a topic for another day.

Tiger's wife is Swedish and she certainly appears to be mostly Caucasoid. If so, this would make Tiger's kids one-eighth black. I'm wondering if anyone will refer to them as 'black'.

Why do I care about this? I look forward to the day that a person's colour, that is, their race, is irrelevant, period. We are getting there. I hear less and less references to Tiger being black. He's just Tiger, one of the most amazing people on the planet. And to his credit, I think he has had a hand in that. He never seems to grind the axe on race and it's good on him. Instead he puts his money where is mouth is with the Tiger Woods Foundation and helps countless underpriviledged kids . . . of all races.

Now, ethnicity is fine. I'm proud of my ethnic background as most people are. And the richness of ethnic cultures around the world justs adds to our collective charm. But race? It has no place.

Race has no place. That's my motto for the day.

Cheers.

"Words, words, words, I'm so sick of words . . . "

Today, Barack Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize . . . for his words. I've been reading some of the objections to his win. One overwhelming sentiment is that all he has done, in his short 8 months in office, is make three speeches; one in Germany, one in Cairo, and one at the United Nations.

My belief is that our political leaders have very little direct power, either domestically or internationally. Their power lies in their ability to convince people to think the way they think. How do they do this? If they are good at making speeches, as Obama is, then that would be a very good method.

I can think of a few people who used public speaking to advance their agenda; Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, Martin Luther King's 'I have a Dream' speech, JFK's inaugural address where he says 'Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country'. Even Ronald Regan's 'Gorbechev teared down this wall' speech.

It's a pitty that 'the great communicator' fumbled that line but what he did to inspire and influence not only his friends but his enemies is a matter of record.

By the way, how come Ronald Regan didn't win the Nobel Peace Prize but two notoriously unsuccessful democratic leaders did. I'm thinking of Jimmy Carter, and that idiot who claimed he invented the internet. What was his name? Oh, right, Al Gore. Ronald Regan's contributions to tearing down the Iron Curtain make Carter and Gore's accomplishments, in comparison, laughably insignificant. But I digress.

Can a president win the Nobel Peace Prize by making three speeches? Sure. Our former Canadian Prime Minister, Lester B. Pearson, did it with one; to the UN.

I haven't listened to Obama's three speeches but I'm going to check them out and see if I agree with the Nobel Prize committee. (Do speeches count when you use a teleprompter? Just kidding.)

Obama's speech in Germany

Obama's speech in Cairo

Obama's speech to the UN