Lee Cronin

All right. So you have a vacuum chamber. You have a little nose. The nose would have a packing material. So you would take your sample, add it onto the nose, add a solvent or a gas. It would then be sucked up the nose. And that would be separated using what we call chromatography. And then as each band comes off the nose, we would then do mass spec and infrared.

All right. So you have a vacuum chamber. You have a little nose. The nose would have a packing material. So you would take your sample, add it onto the nose, add a solvent or a gas. It would then be sucked up the nose. And that would be separated using what we call chromatography. And then as each band comes off the nose, we would then do mass spec and infrared.

And in the case of the infrared, count the number of bands. In the case of mass spec, count the number of fragments and weigh it. And then the further up in molecular weight range for the mass spec and the number of bands, you go up and up and up from the dead, interesting, interesting, over the threshold, oh my gosh, Earth life.

And in the case of the infrared, count the number of bands. In the case of mass spec, count the number of fragments and weigh it. And then the further up in molecular weight range for the mass spec and the number of bands, you go up and up and up from the dead, interesting, interesting, over the threshold, oh my gosh, Earth life.

And in the case of the infrared, count the number of bands. In the case of mass spec, count the number of fragments and weigh it. And then the further up in molecular weight range for the mass spec and the number of bands, you go up and up and up from the dead, interesting, interesting, over the threshold, oh my gosh, Earth life.

And then right up to batshit crazy, this is definitely alien intelligence that's made this life, right? You could almost go all the way there. Same in the infrared. And it's pretty simple. The thing that is really problematical is that for many years, decades...

And then right up to batshit crazy, this is definitely alien intelligence that's made this life, right? You could almost go all the way there. Same in the infrared. And it's pretty simple. The thing that is really problematical is that for many years, decades...

And then right up to batshit crazy, this is definitely alien intelligence that's made this life, right? You could almost go all the way there. Same in the infrared. And it's pretty simple. The thing that is really problematical is that for many years, decades...

What people have done, and I can't blame them, is rather they've been obsessing about small biomarkers that we find on Earth, amino acids, like single amino acids or evidence of small molecules and these things, and looking for those, looking for complexity. The beautiful thing about this is you can look for complexity without Earth chemistry bias or Earth biology bias.

What people have done, and I can't blame them, is rather they've been obsessing about small biomarkers that we find on Earth, amino acids, like single amino acids or evidence of small molecules and these things, and looking for those, looking for complexity. The beautiful thing about this is you can look for complexity without Earth chemistry bias or Earth biology bias.

What people have done, and I can't blame them, is rather they've been obsessing about small biomarkers that we find on Earth, amino acids, like single amino acids or evidence of small molecules and these things, and looking for those, looking for complexity. The beautiful thing about this is you can look for complexity without Earth chemistry bias or Earth biology bias.

So assembly theory is just a way of saying, hey, complexity and abundance is evidence of selection. That's how our universal life meter will work.

So assembly theory is just a way of saying, hey, complexity and abundance is evidence of selection. That's how our universal life meter will work.

So assembly theory is just a way of saying, hey, complexity and abundance is evidence of selection. That's how our universal life meter will work.

So we did this a few years ago when I was trying to convince NASA and colleagues that this technique could work. And honestly, it's so funny because everyone's like, no, it ain't going to work. And I was just like, because the chemists were saying, of course there are complicated molecules out there you can detect that just form randomly. I was like, really?

So we did this a few years ago when I was trying to convince NASA and colleagues that this technique could work. And honestly, it's so funny because everyone's like, no, it ain't going to work. And I was just like, because the chemists were saying, of course there are complicated molecules out there you can detect that just form randomly. I was like, really?

So we did this a few years ago when I was trying to convince NASA and colleagues that this technique could work. And honestly, it's so funny because everyone's like, no, it ain't going to work. And I was just like, because the chemists were saying, of course there are complicated molecules out there you can detect that just form randomly. I was like, really?

That's like, that was like, you know, it's a bit like a... I don't know, someone saying, of course, Darwin's textbook was just written randomly by some monkeys and a typewriter. Just for me, it was like, really? And I've pushed a lot on the chemists now, and I think most of them are on board, but not totally.

That's like, that was like, you know, it's a bit like a... I don't know, someone saying, of course, Darwin's textbook was just written randomly by some monkeys and a typewriter. Just for me, it was like, really? And I've pushed a lot on the chemists now, and I think most of them are on board, but not totally.

That's like, that was like, you know, it's a bit like a... I don't know, someone saying, of course, Darwin's textbook was just written randomly by some monkeys and a typewriter. Just for me, it was like, really? And I've pushed a lot on the chemists now, and I think most of them are on board, but not totally.