# God & Physics **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 10, 2005, 11:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/god-physics/293813 "2005-03-10T11:38:26Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![JasonFin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/4af34b/32.png) [@JasonFin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JasonFin)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2005, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/god-physics/293813/41 "2005-03-12T23:48:04Z")
> [@hyjyljyj](#): > > “Astronomer Hugh Ross comes up with a much more outlandish figure for the probablility that life could have evolved by pure chance. Reasoning that the simplest possible form of life is a virus, Ross proceeds to calculate the odds for the spontaneous evolution of the simplest conceivable type of virus. He assumes that such a creature would have to possess a bare minimum of 239 protein molecules in order to reproduce itself, each possessing an average of 445 amino acids, and all precisely positioned with regard to all the others. He further assmes that each amino acid must first be activated by the appropriate set of enzymes, and that the only amino acids that can be used are of the left-handed variety (all of which are very reasonable biochemical assumptions). When all of these factors are taken into consideration, Ross comes up with the spectacular figure of 1 in 10 to the 15,000,000,000th power for the spontaneous evolution of the first living creature” (pp.32-33). Since no one else has addressed this directly, it’s worth pointing out that in this context the assumptions made are not, in fact, reasonable biochemical assumptions. The person who came up with this figure effectively assumed that something as complex as the simplest currently-existing life forms would have spontaneously arisen, **instantly** , through shear chance variation of molecular arrangement in a thermal mixture. This is an extreme straw-man. I doubt anyone with significant knowledge of molecular biology seriously believes that life-forms as complex as any we recognize today are likely to have originated in such a fashion. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/god-physics/293813.md?page=2)