[Kryptid]

One is a closed hydrological system with freezing at the top for desalinization and radioactive heating at the bottom for convection. This concentrates the inorganic elements necessary for biology at the top.

Such a thing could also exist on Earth.

The second system is surface transport by impact ejection and UV induced electrostatic levitation. The latter process is important for small particles that collectively have a high surface area for absorption of small reactive organic molecules. e.g., HCN and HCHO.

So how do those molecules get into what you call a "closed" hydrological system?

The concentrations will still be quite low since they will have been diluted by the atmosphere.

Unless they are formed below the surface.

Carbonaceous chondrites have already undergone the process of forming high molecular weight molecules that I described in my section on underground aquifers.

Yes, things like amino acids, ribose and nucleotides (which are important for life). Ribose itself is a high energy molecule: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ribose-sugar-needed-life-has-been-detected-meteorites , https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11542462 , https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3161613/

Other simple organic molecules are known as well, such as acetone, acetaldehyde, and propionaldehyde: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/maps.13202

However, hydrogen cyanide can be found in meteorites: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2041-8205/754/2/L27 The same can be said for formaldehyde: https://www.nature.com/articles/236155a0

[larens (OP)]

One is a closed hydrological system with freezing at the top for desalinization and radioactive heating at the bottom for convection. This concentrates the inorganic elements necessary for biology at the top.

Such a thing could also exist on Earth.

I do not know of a single case. One could easily tell if there were one by the saline minerals formed.They are unlikely to form because the evaporative hydrological system is so dominant.

The second system is surface transport by impact ejection and UV induced electrostatic levitation. The latter process is important for small particles that collectively have a high surface area for absorption of small reactive organic molecules. e.g., HCN and HCHO.

So how do those molecules get into what you call a "closed" hydrological system?

The protobiological site is really between the hydrological system and the layer of dust with the molecules. That volume presumably had its own circulation system of Halloysite nanotubes, because primitive conserved structure in biology matches that of Halloysite.

The concentrations will still be quite low since they will have been diluted by the atmosphere.

Unless they are formed below the surface,

They do not inorganically form below the surface. There is no plausible energy source.

Carbonaceous chondrites have already undergone the process of forming high molecular weight molecules that I described in my section on underground aquifers.

Yes, things like amino acids, ribose and nucleotides (which are important for life). Ribose itself is a high energy molecule: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ribose-sugar-needed-life-has-been-detected-meteorites , https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11542462 , https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3161613/

Other simple organic molecules are known as well, such as acetone, acetaldehyde, and propionaldehyde: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/maps.13202

However, hydrogen cyanide can be found in meteorites: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/2041-8205/754/2/L27 The same can be said for formaldehyde: https://www.nature.com/articles/236155a0

Thank you for providing links that support my model. Enantiomeric excesses in some of the stones in these meteorites show that their parent body was the satellite I have been talking about. Note that the author said it was "surprising" to find so much hydrogen cyanide because of its reactivity. This specifically supports my unconventional dust transport system.

[Kryptid]

I do not know of a single case.

So I suppose you can point to a known case on an asteroid (or anywhere)?

They do not inorganically form below the surface. There is no plausible energy source.

This suggests that hydrogen cyanide can come from (or be formed by) hydrothermal vents: http://astrobiology.com/2019/01/origin-of-lifes-building-blocks-in-carbon-and-nitrogen-rich-surface-hydrothermal-vents.html

Enantiomeric excesses in some of the stones in these meteorites show that their parent body was the satellite I have been talking about.

How so?

[Bored chemist]

What maths?

The maths you can't refute so you are pretending it doesn't exist.

If there was enough 26Al to melt Vesta then what happened on Earth?
It's about 25 times bigger so (for the same composition) that's a 25 fold higher power density at the surface.
That needs to be radiated off as heat.
Radiative cooling scales as the 4th power of the temperature.
So 25 times more power per square meter needs a temperature 25^ 0.25= about 2.3 times higher
Rocks- quartz for example- melt at about 1700C or 2000 K
And if the temperature of VEsta reached that, the temperature of Earth should have reached about 4500K

But quartz boils at about 2300C
So, if the heat generation in Vega was high enough to melt it, the temperature of the Earth should have been high enough to boil it.
We are here.
It didn't boil.

[Bored chemist]

Vesta has hydroxyl radicals.

So has interstellar space.
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/157/3791/881
And so has Earth.
So their presence on Vesta is nothing special.

The moons of Mars have organic compounds plus Mars ejecta. These plus the orbits of the moons are indicative of the disruption of the satellite system by a close encounter with Mars.

So, there is some evidence that something hit Mars.

But your evidence is just as much supportive of an alien spaceship as it is of a satellite of Vesta.
I'm not saying it was aliens- I'm just pointing out that it could have been anything.

[larens (OP)]

I do not know of a single case.

So I suppose you can point to a known case on an asteroid (or anywhere)?

My complaint about your epistemology is that you are stopping progress by bringing up hypotheticals that are unknown in a highly studied environment. You then turn around and assert that if they are excluded from the highly studied environment they also must be excluded from a little studied environment of radically different character.

They do not inorganically form below the surface. There is no plausible energy source.

This suggests that hydrogen cyanide can come from (or be formed by) hydrothermal vents: http://astrobiology.com/2019/01/origin-of-lifes-building-blocks-in-carbon-and-nitrogen-rich-surface-hydrothermal-vents.html

You score one point for finding someone who thinks it is plausible, Given the lax requirements on probability of most of today's science papers such a thing is not too difficult. He assumes a hypothetical nitrogen rich magma without showing why it should exist. It is not based on the many studied hydrothermal vents. The comments express skepticism to its relevance. The basic objection is that quenching the HCN solution in the ocean would dilute it.

Enantiomeric excesses in some of the stones in these meteorites show that their parent body was the satellite I have been talking about.

How so?
[/quote]

Well technically life could have colonized another carbonaceous chondritic body. I was using Occam's razor. I have already addresses the issue of why life started on a satellite of Vesta.

[Bored chemist]

My complaint about your epistomology is that you are stopping progress by bring up hypotheticals that are unknown

What?
Like an unevinced extinct satellite of a distant rock?

My complaint, on the other hand, is that you can't spell epistemology

[Bored chemist]

Enantiomeric excesses in some of the stones in these meteorites show that their parent body was the satellite

Anything with quartz in it contains enantiomeric stone.
It is certainly not rare.

[Bored chemist]

You score one point for finding someone who thinks it is plausible,

OK, so you can't count.
Two authors
Paul B Rimmer, Oliver Shorttle
think it's plausible, the editor must have, and so do I.

I'm not saying I think much of the journal...
But the chemistry is plausible.
And if your molten Vesta's  satellite is allowed to have nitrogen, so is his magma.

[larens (OP)]

What maths?

The maths you can't refute so you are pretending it doesn't exist.

You still don't present me with a significant counterexample. Your scaling laws on the cooling time of planets is completed out of line, because cooling time is dominated by thermal conductivity, not radiation.

Vesta has hydroxyl radicals.

So has interstellar space.
https://science.sciencemag.org/content/157/3791/881
And so has Earth.
So their presence on Vesta is nothing special.

Except that Vesta is an igneous body without an atmosphere.

The moons of Mars have organic compounds plus Mars ejecta. These plus the orbits of the moons are indicative of the disruption of the satellite system by a close encounter with Mars.

So, there is some evidence that something hit Mars.

But your evidence is just as much supportive of an alien spaceship as it is of a satellite of Vesta.
I'm not saying it was aliens- I'm just pointing out that it could have been anything.

My complaint against your epistemology is similar to that with Kryptid. You stop progress by bringing up improbable hypotheticals. In this case you have gone on to explicitly assert hypotheticals in the abstract.

Enantiomeric excesses in some of the stones in these meteorites show that their parent body was the satellite

Anything with quartz in it contains enantiomeric stone.
It is certainly not rare.

Rocks with many independent quartz crystals, however, do not show enantiomeric excesses of biological chirality.

You score one point for finding someone who thinks it is plausible,

OK, so you can't count.
Two authors
Paul B Rimmer, Oliver Shorttle
think it's plausible, the editor must have, and so do I.

I only allow one point per article. With the large collection of people associated with today's articles it would be too hard to count otherwise.

And if your molten Vesta's  satellite is allowed to have nitrogen, so is his magma.

Wow! - Extending the nitrogen concentration of a never melted body to one that has been.

[Bored chemist]

because cooling time is dominated by thermal conductivity, not radiation.

Really?
Why?
Is it, in part,  because the heat generation process is slow?
What would happen if, instead of the billion year timescale of uranium, thorium and potassium, it was due to the million year timescale of 26Al ?

[Bored chemist]

I only allow one point per article. With the large collection of people associated with today's articles it would be too hard to count otherwise.

Obviously, counting as far as two is a problem for some people.

[larens (OP)]

because cooling time is dominated by thermal conductivity, not radiation.

Really?
Why?
Is it, in part,  because the heat generation process is slow?
What would happen if, instead of the billion year timescale of uranium, thorium and potassium, it was due to the million year timescale of 26Al ?

No, it is because the diffusion time associated with thermal conductivity is much longer than the lifetime of the planet. Going to the timescale of 26Al and a smaller planet will leave the situation basically the same.

I only allow one point per article. With the large collection of people associated with today's articles it would be too hard to count otherwise.

Obviously, counting as far as two is a problem for some people.

You mentioned the editor and yourself. I could have looked up how many editors there were, but I would not have known that you had read it before you told me.

[Kryptid]

My complaint about your epistemology is that you are stopping progress by bring up hypotheticals that are unknown in a highly studied environment.

There are quite a few areas of Earth that are not well studied, especially underground. Just how much of Antarctica's subsurface has been explored? Then you have to consider that such a hypothetical system would have necessarily existed at least 3.5 billion years ago and thus may no longer be around. I'm not ruling out such a system on an asteroid, but I'm also not ruling it out of the Earth's deep past. It's different to say that such a system could exist on an asteroid and that it probably existed on an asteroid.

You score one point for finding someone who thinks it is plausible,

If you're counting points for scientists who think life started on Earth, then I could earn an awful lot of points if I went looking for names. If there are biochemists (people who actually know how the chemistry of life works as their job) who think life originating on Earth is plausible, then I would tend to think that it is plausible.

He assumes a hypothetical nitrogen rich magma without showing why it should exist.

He speaks on that in his paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1901.08542 The gist seems to be that an accumulation of nitrogen over time in our atmosphere could be evidence of outgassing of nitrogen from magma billions of years ago.

The basic objection is that quenching the HCN solution in the ocean would dilute it.

A surface hydrothermal vent need not expel its contents into an ocean.

Well technically life could have colonized another carbonaceous chondritic body. I was using Occam's razor. I have already addresses the issue of why life started on a satellite of Vesta.

Those organic substances (particularly nucleobases) have been found in a wide variety of different meteorites belonging to different groups. Amino acids were found in both the Murchison and Allende meteorites, which belong to different groups as well. Without any good evidence to link them together, it's unlikely that they all originated from the same parent body.

[larens (OP)]

My complaint about your epistemology is that you are stopping progress by bringing up hypotheticals that are unknown in a highly studied environment.

There are quite a few areas of Earth that are not well studied, especially underground. Just how much of Antarctica's subsurface has been explored? Then you have to consider that such a hypothetical system would have necessarily existed at least 3.5 billion years ago and thus may no longer be around. I'm not ruling out such a system on an asteroid, but I'm also not ruling it out of the Earth's deep past. It's different to say that such a system could exist on an asteroid and that it probably existed on an asteroid.

Ice is melting at the bottom of  large glaciers, not freezing. Invoking the lack of knowledge of the Earth's deep past is again just invoking hypotheticals with no real support. On an asteroid there would definitely be freezing at night, because of the lack of atmosphere.

You score one point for finding someone who thinks it is plausible,

If you're counting points for scientists who think life started on Earth, then I could earn an awful lot of points if I went looking for names. If there are biochemists (people who actually know how the chemistry of life works as their job) who think life originating on Earth is plausible, then I would tend to think that it is plausible.

OK, follow the herd. They have never been good at assessing a radically new theory. In my next point I will show what type of flawed arguments they are willing to accept.

He assumes a hypothetical nitrogen rich magma without showing why it should exist.

He speaks on that in his paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1901.08542 The gist seems to be that an accumulation of nitrogen over time in our atmosphere could be evidence of outgassing of nitrogen from magma billions of years ago.

His determination of nitrogen from argon isotopes only says that originally it could not have been much greater than today. Lets forget that part. He says that the magma was "ultra reduced" and proposes that resulted from ingassing from the solar nebula. This ignores the fact that after the solar nebula dissipated, the Earth was in a collision that produced the Moon, melted again, and heavily outgassed. It also had ingassed He-3 from the nebula, but over 99% of that has since outgassed. Needless to say I find his argument very unconvincing.

The basic objection is that quenching the HCN solution in the ocean would dilute it.

A surface hydrothermal vent need not expel its contents into an ocean.

It will, however, have to exit into another body of water or will form a thermal plume that mixes it into the atmosphere. If might be reconcentrated in an endorheic lake, but with alI the minerals I want to see a plausible scenario where the reactive molecules survive long enough to be available for biochemistry.

Well technically life could have colonized another carbonaceous chondritic body. I was using Occam's razor. I have already addressed the issue of why life started on a satellite of Vesta.

Those organic substances (particularly nucleobases) have been found in a wide variety of different meteorites belonging to different groups. Amino acids were found in both the Murchison and Allende meteorites, which belong to different groups as well. Without any good evidence to link them together, it's unlikely that they all originated from the same parent body.

The enantiomeric excesses are what links them together. Differences in composition look like different stages in the development of the parent body. The meteorites are a mixture of different stones, probably from pebble accretion. Abiotic organic molecules are also found so that was going on in parallel.

[Kryptid]

Ice is melting at the bottom of  large glaciers, not freezing.

I didn't say anything about glaciers.

Invoking the lack of knowledge of the Earth's deep past is again just invoking hypotheticals with no real support.

The same could be said of your natural nuclear reactor on an asteroid. Mutations are not evidence for a reactor because mutations can have many different causes.

They have never been good at assessing a radically new theory.

So biochemists don't understand biochemistry? Okay then...

It also had ingassed He-3 from the nebula, but over 99% of that has since outgassed.

Helium is significantly more volatile than nitrogen. Nitrogen has also been detected from modern volcanic gases: https://phys.org/news/2020-04-tool-volcanic-eruptions.html And even minus naturally-sourced nitrogen, organic molecules delivered on carbonaceous chondrites (like the kind I've posted about before) can still supply a source for them on early Earth.

It will, however, have to exit into another body of water or will form a thermal plume that mixes it into the atmosphere. If might be reconcentrated in an endorheic lake, but with alI the minerals I want to see a plausible scenario where the reactive molecules survive long enough to be available for biochemistry.

Unless it happened in a spring without those minerals.

The enantiomeric excesses are what links them together. Differences in composition look like different stages in the development of the parent body. The meteorites are a mixture of different stones, probably from pebble accretion. Abiotic organic molecules are also found so that was going on in parallel.

And another possibility is that they look different because they came from different sources. Whatever you propose could cause enantiomeric excesses on your satellite could also cause them on other asteroids. Since that is a distinct possibility, then there is no particular reason to assume that they came from your hypothetical satellite.

Your argument rather reminds me of someone here earlier who was posting data of coal fly ash in the atmosphere as evidence for chemtrails. His hypothesis predicted the existence of coal fly ash in the atmosphere, and, when he found it, he claimed that this was support for his hypothesis that chemtrails exist. Yet coal fly ash is also produced by coal power plants. Thus, his data was not evidence that the ash came from chemtrails in particular. So results being consistent with a hypothesis are not necessarily supporting evidence for that hypothesis.

Likewise, although all of those meteorites coming from your satellite would be consistent with your hypothesis, they do not support it because there is no way of knowing that they didn't come from the other millions of asteroids that are out there (unless, perhaps, they all had identical isotopic ratios).

[larens (OP)]

Ice is melting at the bottom of  large glaciers, not freezing.

I didn't say anything about glaciers.

You asked about Antarctica. It is almost completely covered in a giant glacier.

Invoking the lack of knowledge of the Earth's deep past is again just invoking hypotheticals with no real support.

The same could be said of your natural nuclear reactor on an asteroid. Mutations are not evidence for a reactor because mutations can have many different causes.

Large increases in mutation rate are basically caused by chemicals or radiation. There is no reason to believe that the amount of mutagenic chemicals would increase greatly for a long period of time.The mutation age for Photosystem I, assuming a typical rate of mutation, is enormous - over 10 billion years. Cosmic radiation would not have been much larger, because both Earth and Mars had magnetic fields. Only a natural nuclear reactor is plausible to create such great mutation. It served another vital function - keeping circulation going between the end of major aluminum-26 heating and the hardening of the crust of Mars.

They have never been good at assessing a radically new theory.

So biochemists don't understand biochemistry? Okay then...

The large majority of biochemists study the biology of today. A minority studies the last 3.5 billion years. Only a few have tried to seriously understand the origin of life because there has been a scarcity of data and no good models. What you have mostly been getting is a lot of half baked speculation.

It also had ingassed He-3 from the nebula, but over 99% of that has since outgassed.

Helium is significantly more volatile than nitrogen. Nitrogen has also been detected from modern volcanic gases: https://phys.org/news/2020-04-tool-volcanic-eruptions.html And even minus naturally-sourced nitrogen, organic molecules delivered on carbonaceous chondrites (like the kind I've posted about before) can still supply a source for them on early Earth.

We are talking about hydrogen, not nitrogen. The author said that hydrogen is nearly insoluble in magma. If that statement is true, its outgassing rate should be similar to that of helium. Since that would kill his hypothesis, he just ignored the second molten stage of the Earth. Of course, I could also assume incompetence.

Is it not a much more reasonable hypothesis that the precursor chemicals in carbonaceous chondrites developed into life on their parent body, rather than having fragments fall on the Earth and having their chemicals diluted into the terrestrial environment?

It will, however, have to exit into another body of water or will form a thermal plume that mixes it into the atmosphere. If might be reconcentrated in an endorheic lake, but with alI the minerals I want to see a plausible scenario where the reactive molecules survive long enough to be available for biochemistry.

Unless it happened in a spring without those minerals.

A hydrothermal vent is far too hot for life. The life that lives near vents depends on large flows of oceanic cooling water. Around the vents are large deposits of transition metal minerals. The standard assumption is that somehow the zones near the vents become structured to produce life. They do not, however, have structurally interesting minerals for that, such as, clay.

The enantiomeric excesses are what links them together. Differences in composition look like different stages in the development of the parent body. The meteorites are a mixture of different stones, probably from pebble accretion. Abiotic organic molecules are also found so that was going on in parallel.

And another possibility is that they look different because they came from different sources. Whatever you propose could cause enantiomeric excesses on your satellite could also cause them on other asteroids. Since that is a distinct possibility, then there is no particular reason to assume that they came from your hypothetical satellite.

As I said before I am using Occam's razor. If forced by the data to admit that life spread from its initial location to other carbonaceous chondritic bodies, it would have essentially no effect on my model.

Your argument rather reminds me of someone here earlier who was posting data of coal fly ash in the atmosphere as evidence for chemtrails. His hypothesis predicted the existence of coal fly ash in the atmosphere, and, when he found it, he claimed that this was support for his hypothesis that chemtrails exist. Yet coal fly ash is also produced by coal power plants. Thus, his data was not evidence that the ash came from chemtrails in particular. So results being consistent with a hypothesis are not necessarily supporting evidence for that hypothesis.

The difference is that my model does not have an obvious alternative source. People keep claiming that the Earth is an alternative source, and I keep showing that hypothesis is only supported by half baked speculation. In his case one can just take a few photographs of coal plants.

Likewise, although all of those meteorites coming from your satellite would be consistent with your hypothesis, they do not support it because there is no way of knowing that they didn't come from the other millions of asteroids that are out there (unless, perhaps, they all had identical isotopic ratios).

There are not millions of alternative asteroids because they are basically too cold, barren, and/or small to have developed life.

[Bored chemist]

Except that Vesta is an igneous body without an atmosphere.

Did you hear about the guy who opened a pub in interstelar space?

[Bored chemist]

There are not millions of alternative asteroids because they are basically too cold, barren, and/or small to have developed life.

To be a satellite of Vesta, the place you have in mind must have been smaller than Vesta- with in principle- practically no lower limit in size.

How come it isn't "too cold, barren, and/or small to have developed life."?

[larens (OP)]

There are not millions of alternative asteroids because they are basically too cold, barren, and/or small to have developed life.

To be a satellite of Vesta, the place you have in mind must have been smaller than Vesta- with in principle- practically no lower limit in size.

How come it isn't "too cold, barren, and/or small to have developed life."?

Because at the time it was inside the orbit of Mars, made of carbonaceous chondritic material, large enough to heat up enough to release water, and not so large that it melted. It was also orbiting Vesta which brought a lot of dust from the Solar nebula onto its surface.