Abstract
A sudden transition in a system from an inanimate state to the living state—defined on the basis of present day living organisms—would constitute a highly unlikely event hardly predictable from physical laws. From this uncontroversial idea, a self-consistent representation of the origin of life process is built up, which is based on the possibility of a series of intermediate stages. This approach requires a particular kind of stability for these stages—dynamic kinetic stability (DKS)—which is not usually observed in regular chemistry, and which is reflected in the persistence of entities capable of self-reproduction. The necessary connection of this kinetic behaviour with far-from-equilibrium thermodynamic conditions is emphasized and this leads to an evolutionary view for the origin of life in which multiplying entities must be associated with the dissipation of free energy. Any kind of entity involved in this process has to pay the energetic cost of irreversibility, but, by doing so, the contingent emergence of new functions is made feasible. The consequences of these views on the studies of processes by which life can emerge are inferred.
Highlights
The problem of the origin of life can be approached from two directions; from biology back or from chemistry forward
Irreversibility and the kinetic power of reproduction seem to be, at least in principle, sufficient to allow the emergence of life and there is no need to seek out some hitherto unknown physical law to explain the origin of the specific behaviour associated with living organisms
The hypothesis that the origin of life may have proceeded stepwise through states of partial ‘aliveness’, which is the obvious consequence of a scientific view that a sharp transition is not physically realizable because of its improbability, is sufficient 7 to outline the nature of the process leading to life as we know it, one grounded solely on established laws of physics and chemistry
Summary
A sudden transition in a system from an inanimate state to the living state— defined on the basis of present day living organisms—would constitute a highly unlikely event hardly predictable from physical laws. From this uncontroversial idea, a self-consistent representation of the origin of life process is built up, which is based on the possibility of a series of intermediate stages. Any kind of entity involved in this process has to pay the energetic cost of irreversibility, but, by doing so, the contingent emergence of new functions is made feasible The consequences of these views on the studies of processes by which life can emerge are inferred
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