wrote in message
news:ci7mqj$24p3$1{at}darwin.ediacara.org...
> Shapiro, in Origins, says,
> "In other environments, with different
> circumstances, other chemical paths would be
> followed and different forms of life would arise..."
>
> I don't think there are other forms of life,
> and  I don't think there are other chemical
> paths. I think there is only variation
> on a single path.

I take Shapiro's quote as hypothetical and would think (panspermia aside)
that if life exists off this rock that it would be almost exclusively "other
forms" (non-DNA, possibly non-carbon) with other chemical paths.  But we'll
likely never know without positive SETI results or exploration.  (Perhaps
I'm misreading you.)

> I suggest that no matter its form,

(but this statement implies other forms(?))

> any life is first a production of, and then a
> reaction to, a heat cycle, and because
> the basic driving force (the sun heat cycle)
> and the initial structures of life are
> always the same, the chemical
> outcome is the same = life.

I think you're likely right about the heat cycle, but how can you guess at
the initial structure of alien life (even of Eath's life) or the raw
materials.

> To say otherwise is to suggest you can
> cook a cake with each time using completely
> different ingredients cooked in
> completely  different temperatures
> Comment?

No.  Many different ingredients make for a very wide variety of cakes (there
will not be an infinite variety of chemicals that can produce life, but
there's probably >1 - a wild guess.)  And even with the same chemicals, it
might be possible that some sort of non-DNA-based life could result (I even
think this would be "likely" - i.e. not necessarily likely that life would
result, but likely that IF life arose it would not be based on DNA.)  FWIW,
from an amateur.  Regards, Brett Aubrey.
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