Some Mathematical Light on the Origin of Life [Video]

A recent episode of Long Story Short lampoons popular science coverage on the origin of life. The coverage tends to be strong on storytelling but weaker on fact. As if narrating an explorer’s journey, complete with pith helmet, Long Story warns, “The first sort of made-up thing you should be on the lookout for is what we call Imagination Story-Time Land.” There’s also “Half-Truthiland” and “Outright Falsehood Jungle.”

A scan of recent science news seems to confirm Long Story on this. Researchers are presented as making confident progress in solving the mystery of how life arose…while being at the same time all over the scientific map.

• “On the Origin of Life: How the First Cell Membranes Came to Exist” (UC San Diego Today)
• “How did life begin on Earth? A lightning strike of an idea” (Harvard Gazette)
• “New research suggests rainwater could have helped form the first protocell walls” …