ESTABLISHED theory, wisdom and belief suppose life started either by divine intervention, or by electrical storms creating the necessary amino acids in pools on the Earth's surface. Of course, either version requires the existence of the fundamental hydrocarbons and a long evolution time to mutate and migrate across the planet. But it seems that a more likely scenario starts deep in the oceans. Go a mile or two down in the deepest waters and there is a richness of life that far exceeds any rain forest.

Sulphuric acid bubbles violently out of volcanic vents at about 400C to create a highly toxic mix with deep ocean salt water at 4C. This mix is so deadly to us that there is no legal way we could get a permit to dump waste of equal toxicity into the ocean. And yet there are worms and crabs in great numbers and variety feeding off a layer of white bacteria that lies inches thick over vast expanses of the sea bed surrounding these vents - all seemingly spewed out at high pressure with no electricity or light to prime the life process, and certainly no photosynthesis to sustain life.

Moreover, the volcanic activity in these deep sub-ocean ridges regularly destroys these islands of life. But within weeks more bacteria seems to originate from new and multiple vents. It is as if life itself pours out of the rocks by some chemical process we do not yet understand. So perhaps the key line of creation should be "Let there be heat" - or more specifically, let there be energy. And perhaps any form of energy will do.

No doubt we will one day discover the truth by unravelling the mystery of life in all it's glorious and intricate detail, and then go on to recreate the very conditions necessary to trigger and sustain new and original life.

For now the race is on. And it is between carbon and silicon, test tube and computer. If all it takes to create life is the essential chemicals and heat, and remembering heat is just energy, which is merely the transformation of matter, then it begs the question: is there an equivalent in the silicon world? Well, it would seem that the right bits, connectivity, and dynamic disorder - chaos - could be all that are needed.

A single embracing descriptor for both situations is entropy - the state of disorder between atoms or bits should do the trick. If this is the case it is only a question of time before we create life by design or accident. When we do, what will we have become, what will we do, and how will this knowledge change us? For sure, it will not promote us to god status, but it will load us with a new and fundamental responsibility. This new knowledge will make us unbelievably powerful.

Only 1,000 years ago, all of humankind, their livestock and pets, represented just 0.1 per cent of the vertebrate life mass on the planet. By 2050, if we do nothing but survive, this number will exceed 85 per cent. And if our computers spring to life and join us, our livestock and pets, we will represent 99.9 per cent. In just 1,000 years the balance of life on planet Earth will have been inverted by us and our technology, and evolution will have taken a giant leap.

Peter Cochrane holds the Collier Chair for the Public Understanding of Science & Technology at the University of Bristol. His home page is:
http://cochrane.org.uk