Have Scientists Ever Created Life in a Laboratory?

[the iron horse]

I believe Old Earth Creationism best explains the origin of the universe and life on earth. OECs (like Young Earth Creationism) believe that God created the universe, but we differ in interpretation of Genesis chapter one.

YECs view the 6 days as 24 hour days. OECs interpret the days as long periods of time. I say this not to be critical of YECs, but just to let you know where I'm coming from with my question.

OECs accepts much of what science supports as facts regarding the age and life on earth. Evolutionist claim it was a random/natural process over long periods of time.. OECs claim it was designed by a creator over long periods of time. Humans, instead of random/natural, OECs believe humans were created in God's image. a body / soul / spirit and freewill

From my understanding, evolutionist assert that life began billions/millions of years ago as a "Primordial Soup" from which life first developed.

Have scientists duplicated this "Primordial Soup" in a lab and created life?

Try to keep replies and post on topic. My mention of God was to only explain OECs. I really hope a debate on whether God exists or does not exists does not erupt. All views welcome. Lets just don't debate about God here.


I found the following quote to get started:

"As of the time of this writing, no, scientists have never created cellular life in a laboratory from scratch. The technology simply does not yet exist to manipulate molecules with the precision required to create all of the inner workings of a cell, built one atom at a time.

However, many of the important building blocks of life have indeed been created in a laboratory, including amino acids, self-replicating RNA molecules, and self-sealing and self-replicating lipid bubbles (ie, cell membranes) which are profound steps toward the goal of one day creating fully-synthetic life."

Frequently Asked Questions | Evolution FAQ

[bigjohn2441]

Scientists aren't real. God put them here to test our faith.

[Pearl]

Have Scientists Ever Created Life in a Laboratory?

Perhaps not, but I'm sure they're working on it.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by the iron horse

Have scientists duplicated this "Primordial Soup" in a lab and created life?

I'm not sure the point of this question, it doesn't seem to have much to do with the rest of the post. You seem to be talking about the different beliefs or understandings of the beginning of humanity, but if one has created it in a laboratory or not doesn't really validate anything.

So maybe you can elaborate?

[the iron horse]

Originally Posted by BVS

I'm not sure the point of this question, it doesn't seem to have much to do with the rest of the post. You seem to be talking about the different beliefs or understandings of the beginning of humanity, but if one has created it in a laboratory or not doesn't really validate anything.

So maybe you can elaborate?

Yes, that's a good question. Reading it, I did not make it clear. I'll go back and edit tomorrow.

Here's what I meant to ask:
From my understanding, evolutionist assert that life began billions/millions of years ago as a "Primordial Soup" from which life first developed.

Evolutionist claim this happened by random chance to begin life and we should accept this as a scientific fact.
but have scientists been able to duplicated this "Primordial Soup" in a lab and create life in a controlled experiment?

Still not clear let me know.

[BVS]

Originally Posted by the iron horse

Evolutionist claim this happened by random chance to begin life and we should accept this as a scientific fact.
but have scientists been able to duplicated this "Primordial Soup" in a lab and create life in a controlled experiment?

Still not clear let me know.

Have they've been able to duplicate a mountain in a lab in a controlled experiment? Yet we understand mountains.

Your premise shows that you don't understand science.

[Kieran McConville]

My understanding is they kind of have. Not 'life' exactly, but replicating in a controlled setting some of the processes that are believed to have led naturally over time to the building blocks of early life, perhaps yes (if my limited reading and my memory aren't fooling me). It's not like there was 'no life' and then suddenly 'life'; there may be intermediate steps. False starts even. Viruses are perhaps one surviving example.

[Galeongirl]

No, because that is not possible. There are so many factors that determined the big bang, we don't have the skills or items to reproduce that. Also it happened over millions of years, so that's kinda hard to reproduce.

[LJT]

Depends what you mean by 'life'. We have created human life (of course that can be debated in itself) outside of the body if you count IVF. Which I think always brings up interesting questions of those of a religious persuasion about when the soul comes about.

I think the question has been asked just simply to confirm the OP own assumptions. Scientists can't create life therefore must be God. Why not go before the primordial soup. We needed a planet in a specific range from the sun to exist at all. We've not been able to create a planet yet either.

There really isn't much debate to be had here.

[Galeongirl]

Originally Posted by LJT

Depends what you mean by 'life'. We have created human life (of course that can be debated in itself) outside of the body if you count IVF. Which I think always brings up interesting questions of those of a religious persuasion about when the soul comes about.

I think the question has been asked just simply to confirm the OP own assumptions. Scientists can't create life therefore must be God. Why not go before the primordial soup. We needed a planet in a specific range from the sun to exist at all. We've not been able to create a planet yet either.

There really isn't much debate to be had here.

That was my initial thought as well.


But that raises another question. Can the creationists prove it did not happen? Cause since their argument that god exists is that we can't disprove his existence....

[the iron horse]

Originally Posted by the iron horse

I believe Old Earth Creationism best explains the origin of the universe and life on earth. OECs (like Young Earth Creationism) believe that God created the universe, but we differ in interpretation of Genesis chapter one.

YECs view the 6 days as 24 hour days. OECs interpret the days as long periods of time. I say this not to be critical of YECs, but just to let you know where I'm coming from with my question.

OECs accepts much of what science supports as facts regarding the age and life on earth. Evolutionist claim it was a random/natural process over long periods of time.. OECs claim it was designed by a creator over long periods of time. Humans, instead of random/natural, OECs believe humans were created in God's image. a body / soul / spirit and freewill

From my understanding, evolutionist assert that life began billions/millions of years ago as a "Primordial Soup" from which life first developed.

Have scientists duplicated this "Primordial Soup" in a lab and created life?

Evolutionist claim this happened by random chance to begin life and we should accept this as a scientific fact.
but have scientists been able to duplicated this "Primordial Soup" in a lab and create life in a controlled experiment?


I found the following to get started:

"As of the time of this writing, no, scientists have never created cellular life in a laboratory from scratch. The technology simply does not yet exist to manipulate molecules with the precision required to create all of the inner workings of a cell, built one atom at a time.

However, many of the important building blocks of life have indeed been created in a laboratory, including amino acids, self-replicating RNA molecules, and self-sealing and self-replicating lipid bubbles (ie, cell membranes) which are profound steps toward the goal of one day creating fully-synthetic life."

Frequently Asked Questions | Evolution FAQ

I edited my post to make the topic and question a bit clearer.

[Galeongirl]

... so what exactly became clearer with this?

What is the point here?

[anitram]

"Have Scientists Ever Created Life in a Laboratory?"

Yes, for about $15K a pop at your neighbourhood fertility clinic.

[digitize]

Originally Posted by anitram

"Have Scientists Ever Created Life in a Laboratory?"

Yes, for about $15K a pop at your neighbourhood fertility clinic.

I read OP's question as being more along the lines of: "Have scientists ever created life from non-living material?"

[LJT]

Technically I don't think by the generally held definition of alive that the egg and sperm count.

[anitram]

Originally Posted by LJT

Technically I don't think by the generally held definition of alive that the egg and sperm count.

No, but according to iron horse's definition, they sure do.

[Irvine511]

Why do you feel as if OEC "best" explains the origin of life on earth?

[digitize]

Originally Posted by LJT

Technically I don't think by the generally held definition of alive that the egg and sperm count.

Do they not contain cells?

(Note: this question is not supposed to argue that human life begins at conception. It is not supposed to make any political statements about abortion, or about anything. But I'm reading OP's question [is it a question?] as more or less "have scientists created biological matter from entirely non-biological components". Maybe I'm misreading it.)

[LJT]

No your right in how you're approaching it, but egg and sperm cells single cell, but that doesn't make them a complete organism . They do not divide like bacteria, exhibiting growth or reproduce themselves, and as of recent times they do not adapt.

I'm arguing this of course from a general definition of life. You could create your own categorisation of it if you wish, it's not something that is a hard and fast rule, but it is useful. But from what is widely accepted as life, the sperm and egg do not count.

Anyway I'm not sure what's the use in the non-biological components term, if we create life it will likely be with the components, the same elements that currently make up life. I mean its unlikely we will create life out of plastic.

[Dfit00]

Cloning humans and animals has been successfully done according to numerous sources.

Defining if whether cloning humans is creating life inside of a laboratory is something worthy to think about.