Evolution

Answer

evolution  

Debate with a Creationist: Choose one Creationist argument from the list below. Write a short refutation
of your chosen argument, using citations from the textbook and the primary literature (available through
Google Scholar or Web of Science).
a. Nobody has ever seen a new species evolve.
b. Evolution is unscientific because it is not testable or falsifiable. It makes claims about
c. events that were not observed and can never be re-created.
d. If humans descended from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?
e. Evolution cannot explain how life first appeared on Earth.
f. Mutations are essential to evolution theory, but mutations can only eliminate traits. They cannot
produce new features

ANSWER

Evolution

            This essay refutes the creationist argument against evolution that evolution does not provide an explanation on how life first appeared on the earth. The question about the beginning of life remains one of the key unresolved scientific problems but there are scientific hypothesis that may shade light about the origin of life. The most primitive fossil evidence projects life of the earth before 3.35 Gigayears (Ga) ago. Molecular-clocks places life on earth to more the 3.9 Ga while creation theory claims that life on life was created just only about 2000 years ago (Preiner et al., 2020). Life emerged on earth from chemical processes that resulted into synthesis of molecular building blocks that subsequently self-assembled to form cells and life forms. Prebiotic chemistry must have been robust and natural extension of environmental and geochemical conditions that were readily available in the planet. Chemical processes and interactions resulted into formation of prebiotic synthesis of amino acids, nucleotides, and lipids (Sasselov, Grotzinger, & Sutherland, 2020).

Origin of life must have begun from a series of processes or long process, but not a sudden process as claimed by the creationist theory. Life must have originated from simple abiotic process, which involved more or one energy sources and matter; principally, hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, sulfur, nitrogen, and phosphorous. These are the six major ubiquitous elements in life forms on earth essential for driving inheritance, compartmentalization, and proto-metabolism (Preiner et al., 2020). 

            Scientific research has explained how abiotic geochemical constraints were transformed into self-assembling as well as self-sustaining interactive systems with evolving behaviors and patterns, and how they begun to evolve into living entities. This detailed explanation is not provided by the creationist theory (Krishnamurthy & Hud, 2020). The chemical origins of life have been tackled in prebiotic-chemistry, astrochemistry, and biochemistry. Once source molecules were formed from the most prevalent elements mentioned above there were then deposited on earth. These molecules include nucleobases, amino acids, and sugar building blocks, which was followed by reactions and interactions that resulted in formation of more complex molecules that are hypothesized as the natural part of the process under geochemical-constraints (Krishnamurthy & Hud, 2020).

            Phosphorylation is assumed that have played an important role in driving chemical evolution toward life on earth since it is a central reaction in the structural, replicative, and metabolic processes in biology (Krishnamurthy & Hud, 2020). Thermodynamics of prebiotic phosphorylation has demonstrated how various processes, sources, and geochemical environments contributed to conversion inorganic phosphorus compounds into organic phosphates. On the other hand, prebiotic peptides played an important role in development of interconnected molecular network (Krishnamurthy & Hud, 2020). In conclusion, origin of life on earth can be explained with chemical processes that resulted into formation of probiotic molecules that interacted to form complex molecules, cells, and life forms. With evolution in place, life forms begun to become more complex with time.