boook cover of Jagged Environment

Jagged Environment

Origins

Mass extinctions
Science
Environmental and social time bombs
Origins
Progenesis - the simple to the complex
The stress of oxygen - antioxidants
Incorporation of organic building blocks into primitive cells
Hydrocarbon oxidation
Evolution of cell membranes
"Eat dirt"
A role for science?
Lifting the lid
Internal clock
Consequences
The influence of the extra-terrestrial
Essentials
Evolution of the individual
Can we save the planet?
Gaia
Predetermination - "fate"

Comets are now proclaimed the pseudo-scientific messengers which touch the Earth, in the same way as the hand of some unspecified god, and sprinkle its surface with essential molecules for life. But this is surely false logic: the one “heavenly body” which can bear such essential seeds is the Earth itself; all in-place and self-contained, and needing no other. It is more reasonable that the basic molecules of life (for example amino-acids and organic bases) should be constructed and assembled quite naturally within the Earth, than being dropped incontinently from the tails of comets.

Hydrocarbons are the fundamental “organic” compounds, which are implicit to Life. Since their formation is inherent and inseparable within the actions of the Earth, Life is expected as an intrinsic ultimatum of these actions.

Earth is an organic planet.

Copyright © 2001 Chris James

Last updated 12 March, 2005