james tour challenge

• YouTube icon

Evolution News & Science Today

Intelligent design, origin of life: james tour’s sensational 60-day challenge to ten top researchers.

This is a brilliant move by Rice University chemist James Tour. In a video that’s out now, he has issued a public challenge to ten top origin-of-life (OOL) researchers, by name. The deal is, if any of them can answer just one of five questions, relevant to solving the mystery of the origin of life, Professor Tour promises to shut up about the OOL and take down all his public material on the subject — all the YouTube videos, everything. He’s given them 60 days to do it and named three judges, from among the ten, to adjudicate whether the challenge has been met. Watch:

In other words, Dr. Tour will not be judging. The researchers themselves will. If they fail, by their own lights, then Tour reserves the right to maintain as he’s done that the we are “utterly clueless” about how life arose from non-life through unguided, material processes. No more letting random YouTubers like “Professor Dave” Farina carry the burden. If the OOL field isn’t the “scam” that Tour has said it is, definitely one of those ten will step forward in the next couple of months to answer one of Tour’s questions, just one, and that will be the end of James Tour as a public personality on a controversial, indeed ultimate question. 

The researchers are Steve Benner, Jack Szostak, Clemens Richert, Lee Cronin, Bruce Lipshutz, John Sutherland, Nicholas Hud, Ramanarayanan Krishnamurthy, Neal Devaraj, and Matthew Powner. The appointed judges are Dr. Benner, Dr. Szostak, and Dr. Richert. What a fantastic idea! I can’t wait to find out what happens in the next 60 days. I suppose someone could try to explain why the challenge is unfair or not relevant to the field. That would be very difficult to do once you hear the questions. I suppose the group could ignore the challenge and carry on as if Tour, a peer of theirs in the science world, had not said anything. But that, too, would be extremely revealing.

Of the ten, Lee Cronin at least is quite active on Twitter or X. I’m going to tweet this to him right now. You should too!

Rice’s James Tour and YouTuber ‘Professor Dave’ debate the origins of life

Jennifer Liu / Thresher

By Nayeli Shad     5/26/23 4:18pm

Dave Farina of the YouTube channel ProfessorDaveExplains came to Rice to debate organic chemistry professor James Tour on the topic of abiogenesis, the scientific theory that life on Earth originated from non-living compounds. The debate occurred May 19 in a full Keck Hall, with up to 2,800 viewers watching the event livestreamed on YouTube.

Farina, a science educator with a bachelor’s degree in chemistry, first made a video in 2020 critiquing Tour’s argument that scientists are clueless about the origins of life. Since then, the two have repeatedly posted video responses to each other. Tour was the first to propose that the two debate the subject face-to-face.

The debate, entitled “Are we clueless about the origin of life?” included dialogues on chemistry and religion, opening statements, back-and-forth questions between Farina and Tour and audience questions. 

Tour opened with his statement, saying that his religion does not influence his scientific beliefs.

“I believe that the Bible is God’s words. I never appeal to that book of authority in my academic lectures or scientific discussions,” Tour, also a professor of materials science and nanoengineering, said.

Tour, explaining why he does not believe in abiogenesis, said that scientists cannot experimentally determine how the essential building blocks for all life formed and assembled into cells in the conditions on early Earth. Tour said that many origin of life researchers that Farina cites in his videos said they would create life in the lab but have not yet done so.

“Mr. Farina, I respect your courage to be here tonight. It’s too bad that origin of life researchers are not here themselves to defend their data,” Tour said. “Maybe they know the shallowness of their own research.”

In his opening statement, Farina referenced Tour’s website, which states Tour’s belief that God created all life on Earth and that “faith and belief go beyond scientific evidence for [Tour].”

“[Tour] is openly admitting that there is no science that could ever convince him that life was not directly created by God,” Farina said. “He is ideologically bound to denying abiogenesis … He’s approaching the field not as a scientist but as a preacher.”

Farina continued by saying that Tour is an organic chemist who has never conducted origin of life research, only publishing what Farina called “blog posts” in non peer-reviewed publications. Farina listed several things he alleges Tour has lied about in his videos, including claims that the scope of the research in the abiogenesis field is limited and archaic.

“Today, finally, with no desk to hide behind, every tactic will be elucidated in real time and [Tour] will be made accountable for his lies for everyone to see,” Farina said. “I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I will.”

Tour asked Farina to demonstrate chemically how proteins could assemble in prebiotic conditions. Farina referenced papers about how proteins could form in water, but Tour alleged that the examples given did not work for every kind of amino acid. 

Farina’s questions centered around Tour being a “pathological liar,” asking Tour to explain previous alleged inaccuracies.

“This is important because [Tour] also lies about science that goes over most people’s heads,” Farina said. “So by proving to you what a liar he is, you are now primed to realize how he is lying about all the complex details of origin of life research as well.”

The debate was moderated by Wayne Guida, a chemistry professor at the University of South Florida at Tampa, whose role was to clarify chemical facts for the audience and hold the debaters to the time limits.

“Let’s try to have a dialogue instead of people shouting at each other,” Guida said during a portion of Farina’s questioning of Tour.

Farina then asked Tour about fully self-replicating ribozymes, RNA molecules that act as enzymes to increase chemical reaction rates. Farina said these molecules are key evidence of natural selection, while Tour alleged that Farina’s conclusions were inaccurate.

“You can’t address the research because you don’t want it to be true and we all know why,” Farina said in response to Tour refuting his evidence.

As he cut the men off for the last time, Guida summarized the spirit of the debate.

“If there is nothing else we can say, one thing we can say is that it has been a lively debate,” Guida said.

After the debate ended, Farina and Tour opened the conversation up to audience members who could pose questions to either person. One audience member asked Farina his thoughts on Tour yelling over him throughout the debate.

“The more he yells, the less I can say and the less I can prove him wrong,” Farina said. “It’s a pretty obvious tactic.”

Another audience member asked Tour why he has not tried to publish his critiques of origins of life research in reputable journals, instead opting for YouTube videos. Tour said that social media proved a broader and more accessible platform to convey scientific information.

“I am not trying to reach the origin of life researchers. I am trying to reach the masses,” Tour said. “There is something called social medium that is allowing me to reach the masses that never read the primary literature.”

“The translation of this is, ‘I can’t publish lies, so I show them to the public instead,’” Farina immediately countered.

When an audience member said that the debate had strayed from the original topic and asked each debater to summarize their arguments, Farina said that there are many prebiotically plausible pathways for abiogenesis demonstrated by research and reiterated how he believes Tour is misrepresenting the latest research.

“We certainly would never say we know exactly how life began — that would be ridiculous — but we are far from clueless. We have a mountain of research,” Farina said. “Will we ever figure out exactly how life began? Maybe not — honestly, probably not — but it’s only because we have so many ways it could’ve happened.”

Tour said that the lack of Nobel prizes given to origin of life research demonstrates that scientists have not been able to determine if abiogenesis is valid.

“You can’t answer this, you can’t answer that, that, that, that,” Tour said. “So I say we’re clueless.”

Simon Yellen, a Duncan College sophomore, attended the debate in person and said that, in a sense, both Farina and Tour “lost” the debate. Yellen said that Farina’s weaknesses came from his sarcastic comments and lack of familiarity with the literature. Meanwhile, Yellen said that Tour used “disingenuous debate tactics” like sidestepping Farina’s questions, interrupting frequently and asking for irrelevant details.

“While neither [Farina] nor Tour behaved well,” Yellen said, “Tour’s behavior has made it very clear he cannot engage in a productive conversation with those he disagrees with and has caused me, and I hope the university, to seriously question if that behavior is healthy in an academic environment.”

When asked to comment on the outcome of the debate, Farina said that while the debate was “complete chaos,” he had anticipated the aftermath.

“[Tour] planned to write ‘clueless’ in front of prompts on the chalkboard no matter what was said, and he baselessly denied all research presented that proved him wrong, knowing that the stacked audience in his rows of reserved seats would cheer on the dishonesty,” Farina wrote in an email to the Thresher.

In his response, Tour apologized for shouting over Farina and said that Farina could not answer questions without referring to a script.

“Real chemistry is discussed at a blackboard,” Tour wrote in an email to the Thresher. “Too bad [Farina] could not show any organic reagents of mechanisms for his explanation.”

Editor's Picks

• Jeremy Zucker is no longer a ‘sad-boy troubadour’
• Reflecting on four years: a heartfelt farewell to the Thresher
• Decoding the Texas Pornhub ban

Most Popular

• 1 Decoding the Texas Pornhub ban
• 2 7.5% acceptance rate marks lowest in Rice history
• 3 After discrimination complaint, Rice orders SA to table resolution divesting from Israel-aligned companies
• 4 To bike or not to bike? Beer Bike 2024 sees tents, possible wind
• 5 Senate debates resolution to boycott, divest SA funds from Israel-aligned companies

The Rice Thresher

More from The Rice Thresher

Rice Students for Justice in Palestine declares ‘liberated zone’ on campus

As student protests erupt across the country, Rice Students for Justice in Palestine launched a “liberated zone” on Rice campus, announced a two-day series of events and started construction on an “apartheid wall.”

Jeremy Zucker headlines second-ever Moody X-Fest

Jeremy Zucker headlined Rice’s second annual Moody X-Fest in Founder’s Court on April 19. In advance of Zucker’s set, student groups like Basmati Beats, Rice Philharmonic and BASYK performed. The festival also offered complimentary merchandise and food from Dripped Birra, Cane’s and Oh my Gogi.

Jones wins men’s and women’s Beer Bike races, GSA snags alumni

Jones College won both the women’s and men’s Beer Bike 2024 races, while the Graduate Student Association claimed the alumni team win. Hanszen College bike teams were the runner-up in the alumni and men’s races, while Brown College was the runner-up in the women’s race. Martel and McMurtry Colleges did not bike in the alumni race, according to the Rice Program Council’s final report, and the GSA was disqualified from the men’s race for accidentally sending out two bikers simultaneously.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication by The Rice Thresher .

“The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims His handiwork.” —Psalm 19:1

Our mission.

We are passionate in seeing as many people as possible receive the love of God through his son Jesus Christ.

Our Purpose

We deeply desire to introduce the world to salvation in Jesus Christ through the profession of him as Lord and belief in his resurrection from the dead.  

 We want to teach others how to evangelize through a living example while utilizing love, truth, grace and reason to reach those who need Christ.

Our vision consists of three concentrations:

• Using the gifts and influence of Dr. James Tour, we remove barriers to faith by examining natural evidence and engaging the scientific community
• Doing good works in local communities like providing meals

Raising a small army of likeminded people with a passion for evangelism and good works

Ready to help?

Dr. james tour.

   Born in New York City and raised in White Plains, NY, James Tour was raised in a secular Jewish home. He knew little of the teachings contained in the Bible. While attending college at Syracuse University, James was presented with the gospel of Jesus Christ by a student who served with the Navigators Campus Ministry. James then encountered the saving power of Jesus Christ in his small dormitory room.

  At Syracuse, James was discipled by Dr. T. E. Koshy, the evangelical chaplain of Syracuse University, and Bakht Singh from India . In graduate school at Purdue  University, James was further taught in the faith by Professor Delmar Broersma.  After post-doctoral appointments at the University of Wisconsin and Stanford  University, James was mentored in the faith by Professor Buck Hatch from  Columbia Bible College and Seminary (now Columbia International University). 

  James served on the Chemistry Department faculty of the University of South  Carolina from 1988 to 1999, and then he moved to Rice University in Houston,  Texas where he has served since 1999. He has made several breakthrough  discoveries in the laboratory in the areas of organic chemistry, medicinal  chemistry, materials science and nanotechnology. He has also started several  successful companies, some of which are publicly traded, while also raising 4  children with his wife, Shireen, to whom he has been married for 40 years.   (Click here to see his full credentials.) 

  Yet, what Dr. Tour values most is his  relationship with Jesus Christ. Whether it is students gathering at his home,  interviewing other scientists, or engaging his thousands of followers on social  media, Dr. Tour is not ashamed to declare of the life-giving power of the gospel  while boldly proclaiming the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

Watch Dr. Tour's Testimony

Speak with dr. tour.

  Dr. Tour will initiate a private Zoom call with anyone who is not a believer in Jesus but would like to hear his story about how he became a man with faith in Jesus, the Son of God. If you do not believe in the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, and you desire to hear Dr. Tour’s story of faith fill out the form to set up a meeting.

Connect with Dr. Tour

   Subscribe to Dr. Tour’s weekly podcast! Using biblical truth, conviction, and often a little bit of Science, Dr. Tour presents God’s word weekly with passion and wit.

Bible Study with Dr. Tour

Join us live.

• West U Baptist, 6218 Auden Houston, TX 77005
• 10AM Central US Time (Houston)

  If you are a believer in Jesus and you wish to meet regularly, one-on-one via Zoom, to read and discuss the Bible, Dr. Tour can arrange for that through a team of students wishing to serve in that way. If interested, send Dr. Tour an email to make the request: [email protected] .

Connect With JSF

Subscribe to Dr. Tour’s weekly podcast or watch hours of fascinating content on his Youtube channel.

Partner with us

  When you give financially to The Jesus and Science Foundation, you are contributing to the spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ through our media content. Media requires talented professionals, equipment and other resources and your contribution allows us to reach and instruct thousands of viewers and listeners daily. All donations are US tax deductible since The Jesus and Science Foundation is a 501(c)(3) entity. A payment receipt will be issued that is suitable for your tax recording purposes.

If donating by check, please make it payable to JSF and send it to 6218 Auden St, Houston TX 77005-2816.

Donor Privacy Policy

Contact the Jesus and Science Foundation

More on James Tour’s Abiogenesis YouTube Series

On today’s ID the Future , physicist Brian Miller continues his review of James Tour’s origin-of-life YouTube series . As Miller explains, Tour, a world-renowned synthetic organic chemist and professor at Rice University, was inspired to create the series when YouTuber and evolutionist Dave Farina critiqued Tour’s critique of contemporary origin-of-life claims. In reviewing Tour’s video series, Miller and host Eric Anderson praise the Tour series and discuss the Levinthal paradox of the interactome, the ridiculously long odds of blind processes assembling the first living cell, and the challenge of cell death (think Humpty Dumpty and what all the king’s men couldn’t do). Also discussed: entropy, molecular machines, the challenges that Brownian motion and homochirality pose, the presence of intelligent design in attempts by origin-of-life researchers to assemble cellular building blocks, and a poll showing that the public has been misled into believing that researchers have created simple life, and even frogs, in the lab.

James Tour: A Chemist’s Questions on Evolution

Dr. James Tour is the great chemist from Rice University. We have our disagreements. He is not an Intelligent Design (ID) proponent , but he is more friendly to ID than am I. He even signed The Dissent from Darwinism , a statement that I see as a misleading garden path . Across our disagreements, we still found common ground . Over the last few years, Jim and I grew to be friends.

How did we meet? For many years, Jim had this invitation, a challenge, on his website.

Does anyone understand the chemical details behind macroevolution? If so, I would like to sit with that person and be taught, so I invite them to meet with me. Lunch will be my treat. Until then, I will maintain that no chemist understands, hence we are collectively bewildered.

In 2017, I responded. That same day, James answered my phone call, and we talked for a couple hours. To my surprise and to his credit, Jim quickly booked a plane flight to St. Louis to discuss this with me in person. He paid for this ticket with his own money, and scheduled for the next week. I cleared my schedule. When he arrived, we spent two full days talking about science, family, faith, and evolution. This whirlwind exchange is how we first met and how we became friends.

Meeting Dr. Tour for the first time was intimidating. He has well over 800 publications, and an H-index of 150. For comparison, I have about one tenth as many publications, and an H-index of just 29 . For comparison, this year, Jennifer Doudna won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for CRISPR, and she has an H-index of 126 . Of course, Emmanuelle Charpentier also shared this Nobel Prize with an H-index of just 18 , which goes to show that H-index is not everything. Still, James is an uncommonly accomplished chemist. At the time, I was not even tenured.

I soon found that Jim was also humble. We discussed the evidence for common descent and neutral theory. Soon after, he removed the challenge from his website , replacing it with text that explained some of what we learned together. 

This is the idea that all life shares a common ancestor. For those less trained in science, this theory does not propose, for example, that humans evolved or descended from chimpanzees, but that humans and chimpanzees share a common ancestor in the distant past. I can understand why those fluent in the field of genetics would be convinced by that theory; there is an impressive quantity and insightfulness to the work.

Early on, with some exceptions , our friendship was largely private. More recently, however, our friendship has become more visible. Earlier this year, we had a “fiery debate” on a podcast about the Origin of Life . Soon after, Tour interviewed me on his new podcast to discuss The Genealogical Adam and Eve . Tour’s endorsement of the book was very generous:

Joshua Swamidass might not get a Nobel Prize in biology for The Genealogical Adam and Eve , but he should get a Nobel Peace Prize for his approach of kindness in trying to unite several disparate camps on the front lines of the origins debate…I think all camps can walk away happy that they’re right, in a way.

I am sure I will not get a Nobel Prize of any sort for my book, but I am honored and humbled by his endorsement. 

Just before the pandemic hit, in February of 2020, Tour publicly asked me a question at the end of my exchange with Michael Behe at Texas A&M .

Joshua, you and I have spoken many times and I consider you a good friend. We’ve disagreed on several things and you mentioned it again tonight, you mentioned mechanism. Being an organic chemist, and the chemists who are here, we look at mechanisms. Very specifically, it is so hard to fathom how you can get mechanistic changes in a complex system to change one into another. The problem is that when this is described by biologists it sounds as if there’s storytelling. And even when I’ve talked to you, I said “how does it change,” you say “well one small change at a time.” So, get me started: what would change? Tell me how one changes into another. It’s extremely hard to see that so you can come with little models that are mathematical to talk about relations but you ultimately have to change a lot of chemistry. It’s really difficult to begin to look at these evolutionary models that are going to allow you to have these kinds of complexities of change. So, how do you think about this happening when you really have to go back to your organic chemistry from when you were a sophomore in 1998. They say what kind of reactions are you going to do to do that.

This question continues our conversation from 2017.

How did I answer? In the video, I explained that science was non-intuitive, and that I looked forward to discussing it with him the next day in far more detail. And so we did. I spent the night at his home, and his wife cooked us a massive breakfast in the morning. For the rest of the day, we explored his graphene laboratory the next day. As we walked around the campus, we discussed how complex biological systems change. 

Jim and I do not agree on everything. We found something more valuable than agreement. We found virtue in the wasteland. We found friendship across our disagreements.

January 9, 2021 this article was given a new title.

• https://peacefulscience.org/articles/tour-pascal/
• https://peacefulscience.org/articles/garden-path/
• https://sandwalk.blogspot.com/2014/03/a-chemist-who-doesnt-understand.html
• https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=YwoecRMAAAAJ
• https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=oWGEj78AAAAJ
• https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2020/summary
• https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=YO5XSXwAAAAJ&hl=en
• https://www.semanticscholar.org/author/E.-Charpentier/4698446
• https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/_/10737
• https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/_/11249
• https://peacefulscience.org/books/genealogical-adam-eve/
• https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/_/9199
• https://discourse.peacefulscience.org/t/_/6788

Join the conversation...

Come to understand and to be understood. Whatever your personal beliefs, we saved a chair for you.

Discuss on Forum Suggest Changes Revision History

Related articles...

You are agreeing to allow Peaceful Science to send you emails with new posts and information.

You can unsubscribe at any time by clicking the link in the footer of our emails.

James Tour is the T. T. and W. F. Chao Professor of Chemistry, Professor of Computer Science, and Professor of Materials Science and Nano-Engineering at Rice University. A synthetic organic chemist, he received his BS in Chemistry from Syracuse University, his PhD in synthetic organic and organometallic chemistry from Purdue University, and postdoctoral training in synthetic organic chemistry at the University of Wisconsin and Stanford University. He has served on the faculty of the University of South Carolina and as a visiting scholar at Harvard University.

Tour has over 700 research publications and over 130 patent families.

He was inducted into the National Academy of Inventors in 2015 and was listed in “The World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds” by Thomson Reuters in 2014. He has been named “Scientist of the Year” by  R&D Magazine  and was ranked one of the Top 10 chemists in the world over the past decade by a Thomson Reuters citations per publication index survey in 2009. The same year he was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He won the Feynman Prize in Experimental Nanotechnology in 2008, the NASA Space Act Award in 2008 for his development of carbon nanotube reinforced elastomers, and the Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award from the American Chemical Society for his achievements in organic chemistry in 2007.

Stephen Meyer & James Tour talk Lee Cronin & Assembly Theory

Extravagant Claims: James Tour & Stephen Meyer Critique Origin of Life Research

James Tour and Stephen Meyer Bring Clarity to Origin of Life Debate

James Tour: The Goalposts are Racing Away from the Origin-of-Life Community

James Tour Talks Nanotech at Socrates in the City

Science and Faith in Dialogue

The Nanotech Revolution

Innovations in Biotech

Thermodynamics and the Origin of Life

Life’s Origin: Lab + Information = Mind

We’re Still Clueless about the Origin of Life

The Mystery of Life’s Origin

The Mystery of the Origin of Life

Science Uprising 05: Origin of Life

Rtishchevo Air Base Airport

• Airlines Serving AG3141
• Maps & Charts
• Flight Arrivals
• Flight Departures
• Airport Delays

AirportGuide.com may earn a commission for any sales placed through links on this free web site. For more info see https://paidforadvertising.com .

Based Aircraft

Annual operations (as of ), communications, fixed based operators (fbos) & fuel, flight service stations, instrument procedures / charts, navigation aids (navaids) near ag3141, nearby airports with fuel, notices to airmen (notams), notam radius search.

Enter NOTAM radius search distance

NOTAM Flight Path Search (Enter from two to five locations below)

Runway summary, ag3141 airport runway details, maps & diagrams, ag3141 sectional, ag3141 diagram.