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Was Darwin wrong?

Curious layman
in Science News

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Quote

Legendary English biologist Charles Darwin believed that life might have formed in a warm shallow pool of water, with proper chemical makeup. Most of the research conducted all across these years was based on this theory, but a new study conducted by experts at University College of London has proposed a different theory.

https://www.ibtimes.sg/charles-darwin-wrong-research-suggests-life-might-have-formed-hydrothermal-vents-deep-sea-33979

It's bad headline writing to couch this as right vs wrong. AFAIK it was a conjecture, not a conclusion. Did Darwin even know about hydrothermal vents?

(Plus the idea they had a role in abiogenesis is old. It's bad to present this as a new idea. Here's an article from 1988. It's against the idea, but it shows it was being discussed.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11536607)

1 minute ago, swansont said:

It's bad headline writing to couch this as right vs wrong.

I also think it's particularly bad to imply that most of the research done since Darwin's time is now somehow untrustworthy. Is the author a closet creationist?

Famous person says X. 

Famous person says Y. 

Famous person is famous for Y. 

Sometime later X is shown to be wrong. Headline: "famous person was wrong". It's just lazy and annoying. Even if Y was"wrong" if it allowed for the thinking that resulted in what we know now it was valuable. 

Knowledge changes and develops. Most new ideas which most people (even the clever ones) say will be shown to be wrong in 200 years. For most new ideas, the time to being shown to be wrong is minutes. 

einstein.png

28 minutes ago, Phi for All said:

I also think it's particularly bad to imply that most of the research done since Darwin's time is now somehow untrustworthy. Is the author a closet creationist?

Headlines are not usually written by the authors of the articles. The editor may be a creationist, a sensationalist or just ignorant.

 

It's a business publication (the International Business Times), so the factor by which one needs to temper their expectations from a pop-sci publications has to be squared.

The only difference between Darwin's hypothesis and hydrothermal vents is that the latter are kinetically active.

4 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

The only difference between Darwin's hypothesis and hydrothermal vents is that the latter are kinetically active.

That's not a difference, if brownian motion is a thing...

14 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

That's not a difference, if brownian motion is a thing...

I should have said "... more kinetically  active". A bit more than Brownian motion.

Edited by StringJunky

Since they are both guesses, I'm not sure how ' more active' is more correct...

Edited by dimreepr

11 minutes ago, StringJunky said:

I should have said "... more kinetically  active". A bit more than Brownian motion.

That's a small effect, though. Thermal motion is far more energetic than typical translational energy. 

(It ties in with why running water, e.g. a river, can freeze. The translational energy is small compared to the thermal energy)

5 hours ago, swansont said:

That's a small effect, though. Thermal motion is far more energetic than typical translational energy. 

(It ties in with why running water, e.g. a river, can freeze. The translational energy is small compared to the thermal energy)

Yes. Right. Cheers.

  • 1 month later...
22 minutes ago, Avy213 said:

Maybe he was wrong

why?

5 minutes ago, dimreepr said:

why?

He was took theoretically....😁

9 minutes ago, Avy213 said:

He was took theoretically....😁

what does that mean?

1 minute ago, dimreepr said:

what does that mean?

Am sorry... I mean he was too theoretically

  • Author

Charles Darwin's work was based on observation and research over many years. 

Quote

Darwin published his theory of evolution with compelling evidence in his 1859 book On the Origin of Species...

His five-year voyage on HMS Beagle established him as an eminent geologist whose observations and theories supported Charles Lyell's conception of gradual geological change, and publication of his journal of the voyage made him famous as a popular author.[18]

 

1 hour ago, Avy213 said:

Am sorry... I mean he was too theoretically

then Im guessing your visit here will be short... please show Im wrong.

Edited by dimreepr

2 hours ago, Curious layman said:

Charles Darwin's work was based on observation and research over many years. 

 

And exactly the same conclusions were reached (at the same time) by Alfred Wallace, looking at the evidence on the other side of the world.

So the idea it is "too theoretical" is obviously wrong.

3 hours ago, Avy213 said:

He was took theoretically....😁

Darwin is renowned as a great botanist and biologist because the enormously detailed observations he made, in many fields (literally, in some cases!)

 

More importantly...
I can't believe you couldn't get a good sandwich in Princeton, New Jersey, in 1947.

On 12/23/2019 at 8:56 PM, Strange said:

And exactly the same conclusions were reached (at the same time) by Alfred Wallace, looking at the evidence on the other side of the world.

So the idea it is "too theoretical" is obviously wrong.

Darwin is renowned as a great botanist and biologist because the enormously detailed observations he made, in many fields (literally, in some cases!)

 

I agree....but he failed in some areas like how variation among organisms occur...

On 12/23/2019 at 6:15 PM, dimreepr said:

then Im guessing your visit here will be short... please show Im wrong.

Maybe u are right

Edited by Avy213

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