Francis Crick and Leslie Orgel co-authored an article entitled “Directed Pansmermia” in which they advocated consideration of infective* theories for the origin of life on earth in addition to the moribund (then and now) search for a materialist terrestrial origin. In that article the following sentence stands out:
It has also been argued that ‘infective’ theories of the origins of terrestrial life should be rejected because they do no more than transfer the problem of origins to another planet.
ID proponents frequently get similar push back. Indeed, Crick and Orgel’s sentence could be modified only slightly to reflect that materialist objection:
It has also been argued that ID theories of the origins of terrestrial life should be rejected because they do no more than transfer the problem of origins to a designer.
In their article Crick and Orgel responded to this criticism as follows:
This view is mistaken; the historical facts are important in their own right. For all we know there may be other types of planet on which the origin of life ab initio is greatly more probable than on our own.
This response too could be quoted almost verbatim by an ID proponent:
This view is mistaken; the historical facts are important in their own right. For all we know there may be other pathways for development on which the origin of life ab initio is greatly more probable than mechanical, undirected ones.
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*”Infective” as in “life reached the earth as an ‘infection’ from another planet.”