They aren’t saying two totally different independent life creating event, they are saying that the earliest life depending on some external chemicals for parts of what is now covered by metabolism, and the tree of life diverged before those metabolic paths evolved inside the organism, so not totally the same emergence of life twice, but more stuff that reproduces and evolves but doesn’t meet modern standard for life.
replyThe science alert article should make this more clear, as its easy to get that impression.
replyThe article does make it clear, though the headline misleads.
replyWell, it's Science Alert - not exactly a bastion of level-headed reporting.
replyYes I saw that, but the concept of "life" being quite blurry, I feel it still has an impact on the equation.
replyHonestly just more “biology has enormous areas without enough data that need filling in” causing previous generalizations (e.g. the central dogma of information flow being replaced by protein regulation of gene expression, non-coding DNA, even neurons and egg cells being produced thru life) to be overthrown, more than anything, IMO.
replyI have absolutely no doubt that the next LLM/ML startup will be able to confidently, rapidly, productively and correctly fill in the missing data. Onward science!
replyYep, now the probability of alien civilisations is completely unknown, but half the completely unknown it was before.
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