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from the out-with-the-old-priors-and-in-with-the-new dept.
New Theory Concludes That the Origin of Life on Earth-Like Planets Is Likely:
Does the existence of life on Earth tell us anything about the probability of abiogenesis — the origin of life from inorganic substances — arising elsewhere? That's a question that has confounded scientists, and anyone else inclined to ponder it, for some time.
A widely accepted argument from Australian-born astrophysicist Brandon Carter argues that the selection effect of our own existence puts constraints on our observation. Since we had to find ourselves on a planet where abiogenesis occurred, then nothing can be inferred about the probability of life elsewhere based on this knowledge alone.
[...] However, a new paper by Daniel Whitmire, a retired astrophysicist who currently teaches mathematics at the U of A, is arguing that Carter used faulty logic. Though Carter's theory has become widely accepted, Whitmire argues that it suffers from what's known as "The Old Evidence Problem" in Bayesian Confirmation Theory, which is used to update a theory or hypothesis in light of new evidence.
[...] As he explains, "One could argue, like Carter, that I exist regardless of whether my conception was hard or easy, and so nothing can be inferred about whether my conception was hard or easy from my existence alone."
In this analogy, "hard" means contraception was used. "Easy" means no contraception was used. In each case, Whitmire assigns values to these propositions.
Whitmire continues, "However, my existence is old evidence and must be treated as such. When this is done the conclusion is that it is much more probable that my conception was easy. In the abiogenesis case of interest, it's the same thing. The existence of life on Earth is old evidence and just like in the conception analogy the probability that abiogenesis is easy is much more probable."
Journal Reference:
Daniel P. Whitmire. Abiogenesis: the Carter argument reconsidered [open], Int J Astrobio, 2022. DOI: 10.1017/S1473550422000350
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday October 06 2022, @02:37PM
>"There is not enough evidence to reach a conclusion. Therefore, here is my best guess." And then they proceed to act as if that guess is worth more than a bucket of warm piss.
You realize that's basically step one of almost all real-world scientific inquiry?
Step two is rigorously studying and expanding on the logical implications of your guess until you come up with something you can perform an experiment to test that will give different results than if the commonly accepted wisdom is true.
Step three is actually building and performing the experiment to find out if your guess was correct. To *generate* the evidence needed to reach a conclusion.
Step four is to publish and thoroughly examine the results of both your logic and experiments, looking for any flaws in either that could deliver the results you got despite your hypothesis being (in)correct.
Though usually the publishing bit only happens if your results confirm your guess, to the lament of a great many scientists. Among other things it means that the next person to make the same guess has to unknowingly replicate all your work rather than just looking up your results. But between ego and journals that are far more interested in positive results, that's the current reality.