Like you, I enjoyed the article.

Your comment that Quanta is "an editorially independent branch of the Simons Foundation" jogged my memory.

There was an article from Quanta that appeared on HN 11 days ago (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8699422). It had the same tone ("stat-mech techniques give basic insight into how universe works"). That article was more in-specialty for me than the article in this post, and I felt some of the grouchiness mentioned by @Xcelerate above ("claims to significance much greater than demonstrated significance"). I wrote a grouchy comment and then deleted it, feeling it was ungenerous.

While writing that comment, I noticed that the work in that other article (follow the link to the PDF on arxiv) was supported by the Simons Foundation. I thought, oh well, I guess I could regard Quanta as a press outlet for the Simons Foundation (which is fine).

But, as you say, they are indeed claiming editorial independence. Hmm. This isolated case doesn't mean much, but perhaps something to keep an eye on. (The OP here does not seem to be supported by Simons.)

Not to judge the whole article but on paragraph like three it goes off about how this compares/contrasts to evolution which is a nonsense question and I am shocked that a credible science journal? site? would even go down that road.

It struck me that the paragraph was for the benefit of the layman who may not be very conversant with the details of physics or biology.

In explaining abstract concepts it's helpful to clarify what something is not as well as find analogs to what it is.

Quanta isn't The Annual Review of Fluid Mechanics. It's not a scholarly scientific journal, meant for an audience of specialists in a particular field. It's a popular-science publication, meant for a lay audience. A smarter-than-average lay audience, perhaps, but a lay audience all the same. From the About page:

"Quanta is an editorially independent online publication launched by the Simons Foundation to enhance public understanding of science."

The key phrase here is "enhance public understanding." It's natural that the public, upon encountering a theory of the origins of life, will think about Darwin. The article anticipates this line of thought and addresses it.

I see nothing egregiously wrong here. Shouldn't we support publications for attempting to bring thoughtful, well-meaning, reasonably well researched science journalism to the lay public? This article does some spoon-feeding, but spoon-feeding is better than junk-feeding, and it's certainly better than no feeding at all.

Aside from what others have said about Quanta being a layman's website, I would also like to point out that the special thing about science is everything is subject to debate and discussion, no matter however established it might be. We often bring relativity into discussion, why should Darwin's theory of evolution be kept out of it?

It seems like lately science is getting more and more defensive to protect itself against religious forces. While understandable, such a change is not good for the progress of science. Science is a free-thinker's religion. Let's keep it that way. Nothing at all is above getting challenged or questioned. Neither god, nor evolution.

Why is it nonsensical?