Dave Farina’s “Experts” completely DEBUNKED. The Religion of Prebiotic Soup - Lee Cronin Part 01

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The Religion of Prebiotic Soup & Extrapolations - Lee Cronin, Part 01

After looking back to how the prebiotic soup model is being taught in scientific textbooks, we review in this first episode an interview between Lee Cronin and Dr. James Tour that referenced a previous interview between Lee Cronin and Justin Brierley. In those interviews, Cronin explained his research—an algorithmic search for life—and how the search is for a semantically different type of "life"—a molecular system reduced to one that can move towards replicating itself and one that can be created randomly in a lab. Given the requirements for life as we know it today involve much more than Cronin's reduced definition, Dr. Tour questioned Cronin for a clarification to a statement he made to Brierley where Cronin affirmed that life arose as a result of chemical reactions in a prebiotic soup. Dr. Tour asked Cronin for evidence of such an extrapolated claim, and he reminded Cronin that, even if evidence of life exists in the fossil record, such evidence doesn't explain the “how”. How simple molecules transitioned from non-living matter into living matter—Dr. Tour reminds us that scientists are clueless on that. When ultimately pinned down on the question, Cronin agreed that we don’t know.

00:00 Once There Was A Chemist

01:09 Intro 01:58 A New Series on Abiogenesis

03:13 Dear Jim, Professor Dave Scorned

04:36 The Hype around OOL

05:50 Three Chemists Walk Into A Bar

11:12 Science Communicator

13:08 Primordial Soup 15:04 Lee Cronin

16:55 Let Cronin Speaks

21:31 Salad Dressing

25:01 How Did Life Come From Primordial Soup?

25:53 Give Me The Evidence

30:52 See You Next Time!

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If you do not watch this, I  cannot Blame You. I did, it Hurts...Bad.

Dec 2, 2022

James Tour is back at it, folks! He didn't like the humiliation I served him in debunking to smithereens his propaganda series against origin of life research, so after a year or so of licking his wounds, he's back with some more content. And if you were hoping that he has become even more delusional and unhinged in that time, you won't be disappointed. The guy is clearly keeping it together by a thread. One would think that a scientist of the caliber he pretends to be wouldn't be so concerned with some clueless YouTuber like he claims I am. Yet everything he says on this topic is fueled with rage for little old me, and the mudslinging is out in full effect. Complaining about being "personally attacked" while shamelessly attacking others, isn't fundamentalist hypocrisy delicious? Let's watch and laugh together, shall we?

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Dec. 12 2022

In this episode, we continue with Lee Cronin and turn to his chemistry. Facing accusations of being nefarious and of misquoting terms with an intent to mislead, Dr. James Tour corrects the record and shows how Cronin’s own statements ultimately mislead laypersons to falsely believe that today’s scientists can create life. With Cronin stating awareness of life’s vast requirements, Dr. Tour reminds us that Cronin’s autocatalytic experiments have not generated anything that resembles or moves towards satisfying those requirements. Dr. Tour then digs into published literature by Cronin and exposes how the experimentals lack prebiotic relevance, including a massive yield of products, intentional human removal, and the inability to use the vast array of isomers. Peptides in water (really in dry state), sterilization temperature requirements, and unprotected side chains — all such things lead to speculation if these are used in an abiogenesis narrative, agrees a peptide chemical expert.

 

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Dec.19 2022

THIS is Episode 3: Bursting Cronin's Bubble Chemistry - Lee Cronin, Part 03 

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Concluding the discussion on Lee Cronin, this episode peers into the manufactured oil bubbles from his lab, looking for any resemblance of life's necessary machinery, either in modern cellular life or some prehistoric, protocellular precursor. With characterization data clearly showing a human-engineered and chemically loaded system steered for autocatalysis to yield oil bubbles (and failing to comprise a cellular lipid bilayer), Dr. Tour questions how Cronin's lab and his experiments truly operate autonomously and how the formation of the bubbles has anything to do with biological life. Rolling back the clock, we then watch Cronin present the idea of creating "evolvable matter" in the lab, once the "right chemistry" has been "set up"—rather, "input"—by the chemists. With inorganic rust not holding water, and other reactions yielding billions of unusable stereo-scrambled compounds, Cronin's lab hasn't met their projected deadline, yet the religion of prebiotic soup extrapolations continues to be preached. Dr. Tour concludes this episode with a list of outstanding abiogenesis problems in need of a solution.

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Dec. 26 2022

Something definitely is in the water, and it’s not condensation reactions, but zwitterions. After observing the incorrect reference implying that Cronin’s oligopeptides formed in water, Dr. Tour corrects the record and shows how the reference demands quite the opposite—a dry, 130°C furnace for 15 hours. Reading beyond just the title of the paper, we see agreement from Lee Cronin as well—thermodynamic equilibrium shifts the reaction, not towards polypeptides, but back to amino acids. The “YouTube professor” was wrong again. We then meet Dr. Bruce Lipshutz, a friend of Dr. Tour, who also agrees with Tour, and in his synthesis, he uses hydrophobic pockets to remove the synthesis from occurring in water, while also adding human-made protecting groups to the amines to remove free amino acids and its active sidechains. With the YouTuber’s erroneous claim of peptide synthesis in water not being a problem now clearly exposed, Dr. Tour summarizes how Dr. Lipshutz’s experiment was not actually a showing of amino acid coupling in water at all, but a demonstration of the need to protect side-chains of the amines and esterify the carboxyl groups, which loaded the system for the chemistry to work—something early Earth could not enjoy.

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VIDEO INDEX

00:00 Dilation of a YouTuber's Initiative

01:32 Email Unraveling

03:26 Cronin on Peptide Synthesis in Water

06:31 Look Beyond the Title

07:50 YouTuber Brings on Bruce Lipshutz

10:48 Review: Amino Acids, Peptides & Synthesis

13:38 Bruce's Paper & Where the Chemistry Happens

14:49 Game Over — Waterworld 2-2

15:07 Attacking Amino Acid's Zwitterions

17:21 Not Amino Acid Coupling 18:56 No Active Sidechains

19:15 System: Totally Loaded

19:20 Summary

20:31 Misquoting, Twisting & Lying, He Says

20:59 Next Time: Bruce Lipshutz Part 02

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Jan. 2 2023

With evidence of a false portrayal in hand, have the tables now turned such that a YouTuber’s agenda to troll Dr. Tour has become elucidated? This episode discloses an email chain between Dr. Tour and his friend Dr. Bruce Lipshutz, and we see how Dr. Lipshutz never approved how the YouTuber elected to misappropriate Dr. Lipshutz’s video clip. Dr. Tour’s exposé uncovers how the YouTuber doctored a video to make it appear as if Dr. Lipshutz’s video clip was responding to Dr. Tour’s February 2021 Abiogenesis presentation, which included Tour’s invitation for collegial critique. Dr. Lipshutz clarifies that the video clip he provided the YouTuber indeed was not in response to Dr. Tour’s presentation, yet the YouTuber falsely portrayed it as such. Furthermore, the YouTuber is proven wrong yet again, as Dr. Lipshutz points out that his video clip was referring to peptide synthesis in a hydrophobic pocket, not synthesis “in water”—something even Dr. Lipshutz said would be “ridiculous thinking”. Dr. Lipshutz affirms his agreement with Dr. Tour regarding side-chain protection, and the two gentlemanly chemists demonstrate how to engage in civil, scientific dialogue. With this, Dr. Tour continues his invitation for scientific critique. Contrast the YouTuber, who, despite being oblivious to invalidation by his own chosen PhD chemistry expert/professor, mischaracterizes video material the good professor sent him, while advancing a bulveristic argument against Dr. Tour and denigrating the intelligence of Dr. Tour’s viewers. Even more, we see the YouTuber admit to canceling opposing thought under his social media profile, effectively monopolizing his own concocted science to his viewers, many who may be in search of chemistry expertise, but are denied true scientific inquiry. Interestingly, manipulation over scientifically uninformed viewers and denying science was falsely accused against Dr. Tour by the YouTuber. As the YouTuber once said, “Ah, sweet irony.”

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VIDEO INDEX

00:00 False Portrayal & Attempted Dismissal

02:46 Indeed, Let's "Chat with Bruce"

04:55 Ruh Roh, Bruce Never Saw It!

06:17 We Welcome Science Here

07:32 Who Throws Friends Under the Bus?

07:53 Who Determined “Dumb”?

08:41 "Deliberate Misrepresentations" He Says

09:01 Hydrophobic Domain Is Not Water

09:31 "Fine Young Man"

10:53 Responding & Asking Again

13:35 Both Fail To See Why

14:29 Ridiculous Thinking

15:57 Bruce Agrees with Jim

16:59 A Gentlemen & Real Scientist

17:49 Asking a 3rd Time

20:09 Jim Correct on Side-Chain Protection

21:12 Selected Expert Agrees with Jim

22:03 Bulverist Demonstration

23:13 "Team Jesus"

24:14 Invoking a Deity Scorecard

24:56 How to Discuss Science

26:37 Summary

27:34 "Show Paper & Confidently Yammer" He Says

28:07 Next Time: Steve Benner Part 01

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Jan. 9 2023

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VIDEO INDEX

00:00 Memoirs of a Synthetic Chemist

03:05 On Autocatalysis & Insufficient Backgrounds

05:16 Fairytale Island — No Problems, No Cry

06:15 "Group Think" Blunders of a Synthetic Chemist

06:28 Double Standards

07:21 Chemistry Theory vs Reality

07:47 Benner's World of G-D Problems

09:35 Extra, Extra! Autocatalysis!

11:43 The Lie Detector

14:24 God of the Gaps? No.

16:51 RE: Religion: What Jim Said

17:48 What Was Steve Watching?

18:07 RE: Atmospheres: What Jim Said

19:26 Putting Words In Jim's Mouth

20:40 Jim Wants What?

24:44 RE: Sutherland

26:14 RE: Richert: What Jim Said

26:17 TL;DR — Steve's Comments, Misdirected

27:55 Next Time: Steve Benner, Part 02

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Jan 9, 2023

What is a bad faith argument? One example: The "Lie Detector." According to Political and Science Communicator Aaron Huertas: "The hallmark of a bad-faith argument is that it disguises the core point of a debate rather than addressing issues, beliefs, and values head-on." https://medium.com/s/story/a-field-gu...

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Jan. 16 2023

After witnessing Dr. Steve Benner's misrepresentation of Dr. Tour and his statements on origin of life (OOL), in this episode, we now turn to Benner's chemistry. Looking beyond mere titles and abstracts, we dig into Benner's data, exploring how it suffers from excessive human involvement, despite Benner himself criticizing the notion. After reminding us of the Cannizzaro dilemma and how time presents a problem for synthetic degradation, Dr. Tour exposes how Benner's D-Ribose was just a needle in a haystack of other compounds, rendering it prebiotically irrelevant due to it being completely useless for further reactions. Nevertheless, Benner continues, claiming a "hands off" approach, but using "hands on" from other chemists, who provide the alleged missing human involvement and relay synthesis along the way, let alone, chemists whose papers reveal they purchased chemicals as by-products from living sources, rending those paths prebiotically irrelevant as well. Dr. Tour also exposes OOL's problem of picking and choosing molecules only when it strikes one's fancy, for example, magnesium chloride and all the amino acids, while abrogating DAP's OOL relevance to boot. Things are not so pure as they seem (and as the chemistry requires), and chemists who extrapolate their claims should simply know better.

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VIDEO INDEX

00:00 Striking One's Fancy

02:24 Review & Agenda

03:34 Beyond Abstract, See What They Made

05:02 Benner's Death Valley

05:48 Carbohydrates & Prebiotic Relevance

06:35 Cheating via Relay Synthesis

08:36 Cannizzaro? Hands Off?

10:56 Carbo Synthesis: On Titles & Time

14:41 "Totally Irrelevant" He Says

16:47 D-Ribose Against D-Clock

18:05 More like D'fective-Ribose

21:58 Benner's Intern*

23:40 Prebiotically Useless

24:21 OOL's Secret: Buy; Extract from Mess; Claim Relevance

26:13 Other Chemists — Not Human?

27:37 The Freelance Chemistry Gig

27:54 AmTP/DAP's Stare Decisis Flaw

29:43 "Not It"

31:06 MgCl2, When We Want It

32:25 "Hands Off" & Biological By-Products

35:07 Abrogating DAP's OOL Relevance

38:18 Common, err, "Closet" Knowledge

40:50 Impurities & Interventions

43:27 Summary

44:26 Next Time: Steve Benner, Part 03

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Jan. 24 2023

Episode 8 on January 24 - Dr. Tour is back! In an amazing second season on abiogenesis (origin of life), Dr. Tour enlightens us yet again. This time, not only does Dr. Tour thwart a YouTuber’s misguided understanding of chemistry, but he scrutinizes the details of chemists selected by the YouTuber for engagement.

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Feb 10, 2023  HILTON HEAD ISLAND
Dr. James Tour answered questions on January 30th, 2023 during a live webstream. We've added questions that were cut off during the initial broadcast. Let us know if we should do more Q&As in the comments!

How would Dr. Tour approach the field of Abiogenesis? Will you debate Dave Farina?
Dr. Tour speaks live from Hilton Head, SC to answer your questions!

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0:00:00 You want it? You got it!

0:01:34 Geocentric or heliocentric?

0:02:07 Bachelor's in Chemistry?

0:03:12 Who inspired you?

0:05:53 Hugh Ross

0:06:51 Allies in other synthetic chemists

0:08:48 What is the kingdom?

0:10:44 Intelligent Design

0:12:18 Problems for replication in abiogenesis?

0:13:54 Why don't you publish in peer reviewed science journals?

0:19:44 How would Dr Tour approach abiogenesis?

0:23:46 COVID vaccine?

0:28:01 Evolution?

0:31:21 Definition of Homochiral

0:34:49 ATP

0:35:56 Formose Reaction

0:38:28 Purification/Filtration problems in relay synthesis

0:41:40 Yeshua

0:46:45 Precision in modes

0:49:57 What's wrong with low yields?

0:53:50 Argument from incredulity

0:56:28 Stop funding for OOL? MythVision

1:00:59 Why are you so intense?

1:06:49 Should I watch the first abiogenesis series?

1:07:30 Aren't there only 4 sugars in Steve Benner's spectrum?

1:29:17 Are you qualified to speak on OoL?

1:29:59 Why did you ignore most of Dave's research?

1:33:12 How is the Discovery Institute involved?

1:37:19 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and abiogenesis

1:38:45 Physical resurrection of Jesus

1:39:20 Contact Dr James Tour

1:40:10 Will you debate Dave Farine aka ProfessorDaveExplains?

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Mar. 14 2023

UK Column's David Scott, interviews controversial and award-winning scientist James Tour.

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0:00:00 Dr James Tour Podcast

0:00:43 David Scott UK Column

0:06:41 Dr James Tour, Organic Chemist

0:07:36 What's a nanocar? Graphene Technology

0:11:19 Challenging mainstream science

0:16:07 Huge problems with current OOL research

0:23:12 Simple cell?

0:31:19 What is life?

0:35:29 Time is your enemy

0:39:31 Opponents resort to personal attacks

0:40:39 Have you written papers on OOL?

0:49:37 Scientists are fallible