Chemistry of life

[uchiacon]

I recently had a big discussion regarding politics and chemistry with my brother, who's 20years old and in 3rd year law. One of the big points in the argument was chemistry vs law, and which effects us more, and I bought up the fact that the start of life(when the basis of life was the chemical reactions that bought about amino acids and the first single celled organisms between nitrogen, carbon, hydrogen etc) WAS chemistry, which would in turn mean that without chemical processes and interactions there would be no life, and in turn no law/politics. My brother stated chemistry as being chemical processes and interactions. Now he said that that was instead biology. Which comes to another point, was chemistry happening before biology, or life. (when I say chemistry/biology I mean the process/happening of, not the study of)
This further pissed me off because then at another point he said that he was more intelligent than me. This then lead to intelligence breaking off into knowledge and the process of being able to apply that knowledge. He kept that opinion, even though he would be completely incapable to apply the knowledge of chemistry/maths; vice versa with my incapability of to apply law/politics and such.
I suppose what it all boils down to is which of our specialties came first, then meaning which is more important. The processes of chemistry or the processes of law and politics.
Then add liberal amounts of arrogance and a pinch of frustration and leave that to stew on a low heat.

I find this a very philosophical issue, what are all of you guys opinions on the matter?