As you read this many of the cells in your body are in a gradual process of division which results in the production of two daughter cells. In this process, known as mitosis, the cell duplicates its contents, including its DNA, before dividing. But the hardware is only part of a cell. Like a computer the cell contains programming information. For instance, tiny chemical signals—methyl groups—may be added to certain proteins or DNA sequences. You can read here about one way that this programming information is passed on to later generations. New research is now elucidating a different mechanism for preserving the cell's programming information.Before the cell divides the DNA condenses and the various protein machines that normally bind to the DNA (to makes copies of the DNA genes, for instance) move away. The new research, however, found that one protein, known as MLL, remains connected to the condensed DNA. MLL connects to the DNA sequence adjacent to genes to influence the expression of the gene.
But during the process MLL moves to those genes that were most active. In this way MLL serves as programming information. MLL apparently identifies the genes that need to activate first in the new daughter cell. As the researchers wrote, "These findings implicate mitotic bookmarking as a component of ... gene regulation, which may facilitate inheritance of active gene expression states during cell division."
Indeed, it appears that MLL "bookmarks" active genes so they can quickly be identified in the daughter cell. It is another example of the additional layers of information in molecular biology, beyond the DNA itself.
It is also another example of the continuing failure of evolutionary theory where we must believe all this just happened to happen. MLL must have been created, or "recruited" as evolutionists prefer to imagine (who did the recruiting?). MLL must have luckily been coordinated with connecting and signaling molecules so as to attach to DNA. Even luckier, signaling molecules must have influenced MLL to switch to the active genes at just the right time. Then in the new, daughter, cell, the right molecules acted on the presence of MLL to activate those genes.
Impossible? Of course not. With enough multiverses anything can happen. A fact? Evolutionists think so. Religion drives science, and it matters.
Evolution is much worse than religion because it pretends to be science. It works only if you believe in Star-Trek voodoo fairy tales like multiverses. The leap of faith is gargantuan.
ReplyDeleteLouis, I agree: its call for 'leaps of faith' including faith in everything coming from nothing for no established reason, then out of chaos producing idea-having minds whose ideas are cognate with the real world is truly staggering.
ReplyDeleteA few points:
ReplyDeleteDespite the doubt expressed here, the molecular evolution of MLL doesn't seem so unreasonable. It is a large protein, yes, but it it composed of ancient domains (present in yeast and some even in bacteria/archaea). If you don't believe me, blast the entire human MLL1 gene. You'll get some lovely phylogenies with ortho- and paraloges very clear. And guess what? The trees recapitulate evolution. Funny thing molecular evolution. Now repeat with the individual domains.
Even in yeast, the MLL1 homologue, SET1, methylates the fourth lysine in Histone 3 to activate transcription. So is it that unreasonable, given evolutionary timescales, that a few duplications with divergence, and fusion with other domains have occurred-resulting in a specification and fine-tuning of MLL function?
Sadly, such rearrangements are very common. 50+ rearrangements of MLL in humans, in the modern era, have been identified. As an unfortunate consequence of the modular nature (built upon the contingent nature of evolution) of MLL1, the regulatory and 'action' bits are separate. Translocations cause gains of function, yielding aggressive pediatric leukemias of very poor prognosis.
Evolution in this case has produced a useful molecule with a dangerous side. Its modular nature allows exquisite regulation, yet kills 1000s (probably 10's of 10000 worldwide) of young children per year. I might have preferred a less modular molecule designed to totally lose function upon breakage.
So I see a bit of a quandry for you. Are the refinement of function duplications, translocations, mutations, etc the work evolution, or special design/creation? If these cannot occur naturally over eons, why can we observe similar (but lethal instead of useful) gain of function translocations?*. Is each case of childhood leukemia an act of special design?
MLL: a histone methyltransferase disrupted in leukemia
Jay L. Hess PMID: 15464450
The molecular biology of mixed lineage leukemia.
Slany RK. PMID: 19535349
*As a preemptive warning, do not try to argue that the translocations leading to leukemia are a loss of information. They are not. They are GAIN of function mutations that do something novel.
Robert:
ReplyDeleteThanks for those comments, but again, evolutionary thinking is contrastive:
===
So I see a bit of a quandry for you. Are the refinement of function duplications, translocations, mutations, etc the work evolution, or special design/creation? If these cannot occur naturally over eons, why can we observe similar (but lethal instead of useful) gain of function translocations?*. Is each case of childhood leukemia an act of special design?
===
The evolution of all life is of a different scope and magnitude than these sorts of changes. But such changes nonetheless argue for evolution, not because such an astronomical extrapolation is warranted, but because they rebuke design / creation.
It's all about metaphysics folks. These people are so deep into it they don't even see it, and they blame us for metaphysical premises we don't even make.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete"The evolution of all life is of a different scope and magnitude than these sorts of changes."
ReplyDeleteDifferent timescale, BUT utilizing identical mechanisms. If we observe these changes in 100 years, why are larger changes over longer timeframes so impossible?
The actual evidence for MLL1 evolution lies in the phylogeny, domain structure, and intron/exon boundaries (as I clearly stated). These evidences are undeniable, and you can do the alignments in the public databases yourself. I suppose the conclusion isn't obvious to all persons, since, of course, there could be a trickster designer that made things look evolved, and sequences cluster into phylogenetic trees.
The poor MLL1 'design' argument does not support evolution in any way. It is a response to the ID/creationist field. You design advocates need to explain the bad along with the good.
To recap, I'm asking about gain of function mutations (that produce proteins of novel function) and information. If the mutated protein does something novel, this must be an increase in information. The only alternative would allow us to conclude that evolution can naturally create new functions without increasing overall information, which, in my mind, kinda kills that whole story.
Since we've been told that increase in information content is a violation of the second law of thermodynamics, this must require divine intervention. But, can you argue that, and maintain gain of function mutations are natural processes in, say, childhood leukemia? These mutations are undoubtedly gain of function, as the chromosomal translocations produce proteins that do something entirely new. In the ID world, is a violation of the second law of thermodynamics occurring routinely, or is the designer actively killing kids?
Although I couldn't care except for the debate value, but this seems kind of theologically dicey-there's "natural evil", as a result of the fall, decay in information and all, and then there is the designer creating new information in violation of natural laws to kill a bunch of infants each year.
"These people are so deep into it they don't even see it, and they blame us for metaphysical premises we don't even make."
You've avoided taking this by never advocating anything. I believe you believe in ID/creationism, therefore I take some liberties in these debates. I assume you, or at least your readers, have some stock in ID. You can also plainly see from my reply that I use non-metaphysical evidences for evolution (molecular phylogeny, conservation of domain structure, intron-exon boundries, etc.).
Robert: Even in yeast, the MLL1 homologue, SET1, methylates the fourth lysine in Histone 3 to activate transcription. So is it that unreasonable, given evolutionary timescales, that a few duplications with divergence, and fusion with other domains have occurred-resulting in a specification and fine-tuning of MLL function?
ReplyDeleteJeff: If you take away the biases of metaphysics, the only thing it means to say it is reasonable to believe a single-celled organism would mutate into all preserved, extant, and hypothetical transitional phenotypes is if it is reasonable to believe that:
1) There are DNA sequences that produce the hypothetical phenotypes you posit, and
2) The blind mutational search through DNA space can attain all the phenotypes of 1) in the spatial and temporal ordering your computer generated "trees" require with realistic probability in the posited time-frame.
It is beyond me how the word "reasonable" applies to either of those claims. They are utterly a-plausible claims. As Cornelius says, you guys are so deep in metaphysics you can't even see that nothing you say makes sense in terms of aposteriori argument grounded in the minimal axioms of induction and applied to conscious experience.
It's always EXTRA metaphysical grounds that make such grand claims as the macroevolutionary and non-macroevolutionary ID inferences seem plausible to people. They're are analogical inferences. None of them are testable in a way that can falsify all competing analogical inferences.
Jeff,
ReplyDeleteYou have provided a non-answer to my post. I want to know what explains away gain-of-function/information mutations and human disease.
My question: "In the ID world, is a violation of the second law of thermodynamics occurring routinely, or is the designer actively killing kids?" Curious what your answer is.
Nevertheless:
"1) There are DNA sequences that produce the hypothetical phenotypes you posit"
The only phenotypes I've posited are healthy and leukemic. The causes of leukemia have been thoroughly traced to sequence, and the gains of function biochemically probed. References above. Are you arguing that genotype and phenotype are wholly unrelated?
2) The blind mutational search through DNA space can attain all the phenotypes of 1) in the spatial and temporal ordering your computer generated "trees" require with realistic probability in the posited time-frame.
First, the 'trees' are from direct experimental sequence data. Computers help us cluster them, but they are not artificial.
Secondly, considering we've observed 50+ unique translocations at Mll1 in the era of modern molecular biology, in humans alone, where scientists have looked--is it that improbable that a few accessory domains be brought together to fine tune Mll1 function between yeast and humans?
Lets say 1000 cases of leukemia (novel translocations) a year at the Mll1 locus. Many translocations won't result in leukemia, so that is a very low estimate. Now lets say similar translocations are occurring at all loci in all Eukaryotic progenitors of man (random process related to chromosome breakage). Multiple by a billion years (last common ancestor of yeast and mammals). How many times over does this "shuffle" the genome, allowing domains to be brought together? Throw in duplications and mutation, and there you go. Seems exceptionally reasonable to me. Oh, and where's the metaphysics in that logic? Maybe I don't know the new, cool definition of metaphysics in opposite-world philosophy.
Perhaps you could do a probability calculation to demonstrate otherwise? Or is it simply that nothing at all is ever evolvable to you?
Also, you seem to be suffering from the same issue as Dr. Hunter. What do you advocate as an alternative for those pesky sequence alignments? A designer who, oops, decided to make things look evolved? Tricky tricky.
I'm a scientist and not a philosopher-but when the opposition invokes a deity and I invoke naturalism, I'm tickled when I'm the one accused of jumping through metaphysical hoops. That you and Dr. Hunter keep repeating it doesn't make it true. Again, the way I research, teach and think is naturalistic. Only in debates against the infinitely metaphysical do I depart from this.
Again, I'm curious about answers to the original query.
You'll get some lovely [imaginary] phylogenies with ortho- and paraloges very clear. And guess what? The trees recapitulate [an imaginary] evolution. Funny thing molecular evolution.
ReplyDeleteIt's a funny thing, imagining things about the past. Yet I can imagine that your "recapitulations" are little different than Ernst Haeckel's imaginary recapitulations. After all, it would seem that if someone arranged similar memes in lovely little trees and merely imagined that they descended from Haeckel's then that would be overwhelming evidence of their history and descent. After all, why would God create similar memes? God wouldn't create stupidity, therefore it's clear that forms of stupidity of this sort descend from and recapitulate others.
mynym-
ReplyDeletePlease don't insert your own words into a quote. I won't tolerate you making it look like I said that.
I can't parse your exact point. I can't imagine how oversimplified drawings could be compared to raw genomics data, but whatever makes you feel good.
Please feel free to do the searches yourself.
Blast is found here:
http://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi
along with tutorials on how to use it. Please give it a try. You can go from raw data to phylogeny yourself. Nothing is presupposed in the algorithm, which is a basic alignment tool. No need to mock the data from ignorance (unless it is willful) when us awful dogmatic Darwinists have made it freely available for public scrutiny and search. Please give me evidences for creation and design, and against evolution you find in that data.
"God wouldn't create stupidity"
I think Dr. Hunter might say that is a metaphysical claim? Or do the religious accusations only apply to the opposition here?
As a metaphysical rebuttal (since, yeah, we've gone there):
1) Why did your designer make the sequence data (do it yourself!) appear as such? Why did he use 30% worm, 50% fly, 90% rat, 98% chimp genes in his special creation? Why the clear relationships?
2) And back to the original question, why would god break the second law of thermodynamics tens of thousands a time per year to create novel information (which evolution can't do! ?right?) to give leukemia to little children?
Again, I'm curious about answers to the original query.
ReplyDeleteWhich query was that?
I suspect this one:
Is each case of childhood leukemia an act of special design?
If leukemia did not exist would that be evidence of special design in your mind? Since you seem fond of imaginary evidence I would imagine that in a world in which leukemia did not exist one would not necessarily know the good of its lack of existence and would not treat the existence of well formed children as evidence of "special design" as a result. Your question only makes sense based on a supposed knowledge of God/Good and an Evil/Devil of some sort which I can imagine that you do not have. One could even imagine that your thoughts might have more to do with the mating habits of ancient worm-like creatures than supposed transcendent knowledge of any sort. Biologists seem fond of imagining things about every single organism and everyone else but themselves. So we come to the inner sanctum of sentience and the mind and find their muddy boots even there, tracking their hypothetical goo in.
Mynym-
ReplyDeleteRe #2 above, you've missed the point.
ID/creationism argues the generation of information CANNOT proceed through natural processes. They demand a 'designer' create that information.
So, in disease processess that result from GAIN of function/information mutations-
A) Has the 2nd law of thermodynamics been broken?
B) Has the designer decided to intervene and kill lots of little kids?
C) Has a natural process resulted in increased information (disproving a fundamental tenet of ID)?
And no reply to #1, or the rest of the post? Tsk.
Please don't insert your own words into a quote. I won't tolerate you making it look like I said that.
ReplyDeleteIt's perfectly clear what I said about what you said. And like it or not your ancestries are imaginary.
I can't parse your exact point.
Of course not...
I can't imagine how oversimplified drawings could be compared to raw genomics data, but whatever makes you feel good.
It seems that imaginary evidence only goes one way in your mind. Now you can't imagine? You seemed to be imagining things about "recapitulation" based on similarities just fine before. The data in this case is Haeckel's argument that similarity can be treated as evidence of recapitulation. I've always wanted to ask someone who actually believes such things why they assume that forms in existence now would somehow be repeating a series of imaginary events which happened millions of years ago. Given the similarity your thinking, why do you suppose that Haeckel assumed such a "retracing" would take place?
You can go from raw data to [an imaginary] phylogeny yourself. Nothing is presupposed in the algorithm, which is a basic alignment tool.
To be clear, I'm stating that the ancestry those with the Darwinian urge to merge simply merge with the data is imaginary. I know that you think observing similarity or nested hierarchy is the equivalent of data showing or "proving" ancestry.
Why did your designer make the sequence data (do it yourself!) appear as such? Why did he use 30% worm, 50% fly, 90% rat, 98% chimp genes in his special creation?
ReplyDeleteDo you honestly think that no one recognized similarities among organisms based on gross morphology? It's almost just as easy to assign percentages based on gross morphology. Unfortunately many charlatans sought to do just that when scientific racism was prevalent. Now we are led to believe that all is equal and the numbers are assigned to follow. Coincidence? Ironically if the difference between humans and chimps in their art, civilization, intellect, etc., has much to do with a supposed "%2" difference in their DNA then that only shows how irrelevant DNA is. And that doesn't enhance the power and position of biologists in society, now does it?
At any rate, a few notes on your numbers:
There are hardly any comparisons you can make to a daffodil in which humans are 33% similar. DNA comparisons thus overestimate similarity at the low end of the scale (because 25% is actually the zero-mark of a DNA comparison) and underestimate comparisons at the high end.
....The problem is that in being told about these data without a context in which to interpret them, we are left to our own cultural devices. Here, we are generally expected to infer that genetic comparisons reflect deep biological structure, and that 98% is an overwhelming amount of similarity. Thus “the DNA of a human is 98% identical to the DNA of a chimpanzee” becomes casually interpreted as “deep down inside, humans are overwhelmingly chimpanzee. Like 98% chimpanzee.” ….
…whatever the number is, it shouldn’t be any more impressive than the anatomical similarity; all we need to do is to put that old-fashioned comparison into a zoological context.
The paradox is not that we are so genetically similar to the chimpanzee; the paradox is why we now find the genetic similarity to be so much more striking than the anatomical similarity. Scholars of the eighteenth century were overwhelmed by the similarities between humans and chimpanzees. Chimpanzees were as novel then as DNA is now; and the apparent contrast between our bodies and our genes is simply an artifact of having two centuries’ familiarity with chimpanzees and scarcely two decades’ familiarity with DNA sequences. (What It Means to be 98% Chimpanzee by Johnathan Marks :28-31)
Why the clear relationships?
So if you were not supposedly %30 worm or whatever you seem to be imagining about numbers of that sort then you would conclude that a singular designer existed? I would imagine something along the lines of: "Worms aren't my cousins? Wow, God must exist!" Yet isn't it true that if there were no or few similarities among organisms that people who hated God or who believed that their methodology must be defined as "God did not do it." would cite it as evidence for many gods, many origins of life, etc.?
So, in disease processess that result from GAIN of function/information mutations...
ReplyDeleteThis claim seems to be based on knowledge that you do not have. An illustration might help, if a group of people lost their hands and instead developed a bony spike which was better suited for killing other groups of people and raping their women in order to spread their genes, overall adaptability and function* would greatly diminished. They would survive and propagate by destroying life overall. Destruction of this sort is not the equivalent of and may have little to do with the construction of life as we know and experience it.
*In addition to our brain, our linguistic ability, and our highly developed visual ability, we possess another wonderful adaptation, the ideal manipulative tool—the human hand. No other animal possesses an organ so superbly adapted for intelligent exploration and manipulation of its physical surroundings and environment. Only the great apes, our cousins, come close. Yet the hand of the chimp and gorilla, although possessing an opposable thumb, is far less adapted to fine motor movement and control. Although some chimps are remarkably dexterous, when one sees them attempt even simple manual tasks, they appear clumsy and inept compared to humans. Even a chimp with the intelligence of a human would have considerable difficulty carrying out many of the manipulative tasks that we take for granted, like peeling an apple, tying a knot, or using a typewriter.
...In the context of explaining man’s biological preeminence on earth, the crucial question is not whether the human hand represents the absolute pinnacle of manipulative capability, but whether any other species possesses an organ approaching its capabilities. The answer simply must be that no other species possesses a manipulative organ remotely approaching the universal utility of the human hand. Even in the field of robotics, nothing has been built which even remotely equals the all-around manipulative capacity of the hand.
(Nature's Destiny: How the Laws
of Biology Reveal Purpose in the Universe
by Michael Denton :241-242)
B) Has the designer decided to intervene and kill lots of little kids?
Are you treating the deaths of little children as evidence against the existence of a Designer? If so, can every birth of a beautiful child be counted as evidence for the existence of a Designer?
C) Has a natural process resulted in increased information (disproving a fundamental tenet of ID)?
This is too vague.
Nothing is presupposed in the algorithm, which is a basic alignment tool.
ReplyDeleteNothing would be presupposed in an algorithm programmed to compare similarities between your memes and Haeckel's, perhaps it could even be programmed to arrange them in a nested hierarchy. Would that be historical or empirical evidence of a line of descent with his ideas being ancestral to your own?
Robert says: "ID/creationism argues the generation of information CANNOT proceed through natural processes. They demand a 'designer' create that information."
ReplyDelete1) ID doesn't really claim this at all.
ID claims that prescribed information (complex specified information) such as found in computer code, formal papers, algorithms etc. cannot arise from natural processes. Neither can error detection/correction and neither can meta information - all of which are found in the cell and DNA.
2) Considering the time Rob has been hanging around here, it is strange that he should make such a bogus claim.
Rob still hasn't understood that prescribed information in any encoded form, CANNOT arise by natural processes.
The evolutionists position is akin to claiming that computer code (organic or silicon based) is the results of random processes.
Its like claiming that the 50 million lines of code in the Windows Vista OS self-organized from some small original 500 line program.
Windows Vista ain't anywhere near as algorithmically complex or functional as DNA.
Just because DNA information is encoded using chemical bases does not make it any more likely that the laws of physics and chemistry plus random movement could have built it up through pure luck.
On the contrary, Stuart Pullen (chemist and information theory expert), as well as many others, have demonstrated the impossibility of such in revealing detail - see his book "Intelligent Design Or Evolution? Why the Origin of Life and the Evolution of Molecular Knowledge Imply Design"
3) ID is not creationism. ID has no relation to the bible or any other "holy book". A ubiquitous bull crap error committed by Darwieners everywhere in order to convince themselves that ID is not science but religion.
The irony! It is Darwinism that is religion not science!
It is uncanny how Rob, in spite of knowing that code, by very definition, requires intelligent origin, still manages to live in denial of the fact. I guess Rob et al. just don't get it yet.
Evolutionists will believe any story they're told that helps them "believe" - as long as it denies the obvious.
But Darwinians, having accepted as fact contradictory and logically fallacious reasonings, suffer from acute cognitive dissonance and don't know it so I guess we must show the poor things mercy and try to explain their inane theory to them.
Robert: I want to know what explains away gain-of-function/information mutations and human disease.
ReplyDeleteJeff: How can you explain away human disease? It exists. Therefore, it can't be explained away. As for explaining away gain of functional information, we don't even know if there is such a thing as DNA sequences that produce the phenotypes you hypothesize as transitionals. If they don't exist, mutations can't "find" them. Nor do we know that if they exist that they could be blindly searched in the posited time-frame with realistic probability. Both of these must be determinable to show, SCIENTIFICALLY, that macroevolution is possible and plausible. But we're nowhere near that.
Robert: "In the ID world, is a violation of the second law of thermodynamics occurring routinely, or is the designer actively killing kids?" Curious what your answer is.
Jeff: As for the law of thermodynamics, if there is plenty of libertarianly free choices being made by humans, there are plenty of events that don't "obey" any law whatsoever. If I can choose to sit here and type or go to the grocery store, how does the law of thermodynamics explain that? As for the designer killing kids, why would a teleologist think that unless you rule out free-will in the first place?
If all events are naturally-caused except for some original final cause(s) by the designer, then you could say the designer is ultimately responsible for killing kids. But if free choices have significantly altered the course of events, we can't prove any such thing.
Robert: The only phenotypes I've posited are healthy and leukemic.
Jeff: On the contrary. You posit myriads of hypothetical genomes that produce hypothetical intermediate phenotypes if you hold to the modern synthesis.
Robert: Are you arguing that genotype and phenotype are wholly unrelated?
Jeff: Just the opposite.
Robert: is it that improbable that a few accessory domains be brought together to fine tune Mll1 function between yeast and humans?
Jeff: Calcuate the probability of macroevolution for me.
Robert: ... Throw in duplications and mutation, and there you go. Seems exceptionally reasonable to me. Oh, and where's the metaphysics in that logic? Maybe I don't know the new, cool definition of metaphysics in opposite-world philosophy.
Jeff: If you don't posit lots of transitional phenotypes, you then have to posit macro-changes in one generation. No matter which way you go you're dealing with speculation. You can no more work out the probability to see if it is doable than anyone else. You just assume it is probable because you are a metaphysical naturalist.
Robert: Perhaps you could do a probability calculation to demonstrate otherwise?
Jeff: No one can do the probability calculation. Which means you're clueless as to whether it is probable. If you posit all the transitional genotypes/phenotypes, you're making tons of assumptions in addition to the assumption of the probability.
Robert: Or is it simply that nothing at all is ever evolvable to you?
Jeff: All biological variation is evolution per one definition of the term.
Robert: Also, you seem to be suffering from the same issue as Dr. Hunter. What do you advocate as an alternative for those pesky sequence alignments? A designer who, oops, decided to make things look evolved? Tricky tricky.
Jeff: Evolution occurs. It's the positing of the myriads of assumptions that is speculative.
Robert: I'm a scientist and not a philosopher-but when the opposition invokes a deity and I invoke naturalism, I'm tickled when I'm the one accused of jumping through metaphysical hoops.
Jeff: First of all, there is no evidence that theism is invoked. It seems to be a natural way of thought even according to many atheists even. But all intuitive/apriori modes of thought are metaphysical in that sense. In that sense, all people have a metaphysic which conditions what seems possible and plausible for them.
Both of these must be determinable to show, SCIENTIFICALLY, that macroevolution is possible and plausible. But we're nowhere near that.
ReplyDeleteThat doesn't seem to matter in the minds of most proponents of common descent. If they merely observe certain similarities and patterns (or better yet program a computer to arrange things in patterns) then that's overwhelming evidence of descent in their minds. After all, God wouldn't create such patterns and so on. No actual line of ancestry needs to be identified or any plausible mechanisms and processes observed to produce it, all that is necessary is for certain similarities and patterns to be observed so that descent can be imagined. Apparently imagining descent seems like the equivalent of "overwhelming" empirical evidence of actual lines of descent in the real world to some, to the point that even an idea like recapitulation is often also imagined. It seems to me that anyone imagining things about the past in that way is far gone at that point. Why not imagine even more? They might as well also imagine that sperm and ovum are "recapitulating" the origin of life in a primordial pool/womb. That would match the psychological dynamics that seem typical to those desperate to crawl back in the womb of Mother Nature, naturally.
I still want to know why Robert thinks that recapitulation takes place and what in the world would possibly produce it. I suspect that it doesn't matter if nothing is known to produce a "recap" of events millions of years ago. I suspect that merely observing certain patterns or programming a computer to recognize them for you supposedly justifies imagining whatever you will about development and descent.
mynym: recapitulation?
ReplyDeleteIndeed. Does anyone still believe in that?
Besides Darwinists who are way out of date?
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ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeletemynym-
ReplyDeleteSomehow you are conflating my use of the verb 'recapitulate' with Haeckel's "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny."
The biogenic law has been extensively refuted. Darwin's observation that early embryonic stages have striking similarities to the embryonic stages of related species holds water, and is defended by modern evolutionary biology.
Nevertheless, this is NOT even remotely what I was discussing.
Molecular phylogenetics is the use of sequence data to dervive phylogenetic relationships. You can align DNA or protein sequences, using tools like BLAST. BLAST (Basic Local Alignment Search Tool,) compares raw (empirical) data and aligns them. You can read about the algorithm here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BLAST#Algorithm
And give it a spin here:
http://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
Note the algorithm does not presuppose relationships. It finds them by merely aligning the sequences. The phylogenetic trees produced detail our evolutionary history.
The most parsimonious explanation for the result is that we share common ancestors. Of course, I suppose there are metaphysical alternatives, such as a designer who made these nested hierarchies apparent to deceive us. Certain young-earth creationists have argued such for the fossil record.
But back to the original question:
Can novel functions be produced by natural processes in evolution? Can information be created by random shuffling of the deck?
Somehow you are conflating my use of the verb 'recapitulate' with Haeckel's "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny."
ReplyDeleteNo, I was imagining that Haeckel's ideas are ancestral to your own given their similarity. Given your reasoning with respect to other organisms it would seem that pattern recognition or arranging things in patterns is the equivalent of evidence of an evolutionary history so I don't see why you would have a problem with that. It's no more conflating Haeckel's ideas with your own than it is to observe similarity between worms and humans, assign a percentage to it (say 30%) and make conclusions about their ancestry. To say that worms and humans share 30% of their DNA and imagine things about their ancestry is not to conflate worms and humans. Although some do become confused about such things:
"In the last ten years we have come to realize humans are more like worms than we imagined." (Bruce Alberts, National Academy of Sciences)
"…the worm represents a very simple human." (geneticist Glen Evans)
Actually the first statement would be more accurate if he had said: "In the last ten years we have come to imagine that humans are more like worms than we had previously imagined."
Your confusion with respect to imaginary ancestries is similar. It is typical to biologists. It seems to come about as a result of citing your own imagination as the equivalent of evidence of some sort, naturally enough.
For instance, you said:Why did he use 30% worm, 50% fly, 90% rat, 98% chimp genes in his special creation?
You do not have the knowledge that your questions assume. For one thing we do not know if DNA is the be all, end all that you assume it is. Ironically if biologists are correct in the way that they are assigning percentages and there is (supposedly) only a 2% difference in the DNA of chimps and humans then that only shows the general irrelevance of DNA to life as we know it. But that's a big if, the truth is that they generally don't know that there is a 98% similarity in the first place. At any rate, it would seem that given their mythologies of Progress that we should wait until the future to be certain because whatever they're supposedly right about today will probably be proven wrong tomorrow.
Note the algorithm does not presuppose relationships. It finds them by merely aligning the sequences. The phylogenetic trees produced detail our evolutionary history.
ReplyDeleteSo it would seem that you do not need any actual historical evidence or knowledge of any processes which would cause such a history, correct?
Can novel functions be produced by natural processes in evolution?
Of course, refer back to my imaginary example of humans developing bony spikes instead of hands, the better to rape and kill. The problem with novel functions of this sort arising and natural selection operating to preserve them is that they cannot be advanced as explanations of the construction of life as we know it because destruction is not construction.
Can information be created by random shuffling of the deck?
Nothing is random, the notion of chance is merely another name for ignorance.
mynym-
ReplyDeleteI've already pointed out why the comparison to Haeckel is a false analogy. Trust me, Haeckel was quite unaware of molecular phylogeny, and did not contribute to its founding. You saw 'recapitulate' and 'phylogeny' and tried to connect the dots. It is really quite a stretch.
You are correct there are different ways to parse the numbers relating organisms. One could compare identity of total nucleotides in the genome, or protein coding genes. The numbers vary, but nevertheless, we are very very related to chimps, very related to all mammals, and related to worms, sponges, etc. etc.... You can't will this away. Regardless of epigenetics, regulatory changes in expression, etc., that may affect phenotype, the relationships are there at the genomic level. They also correlate nicely-unless you think we have more in common with worms then chimps? Why is 2% not enough? Seems reasonable to me.
The Alberts and Evans quotes are nice, and you flatter me by placing me in their company.
"We should wait until the future to be certain because whatever they're supposedly"
The gods of ignorance have spoken. We shouldn't teach anything till we know everything. How very inconvenient. Or we could have the best working hypothesis, supported by data, and refute/refine it.
"So it would seem that you do not need any actual historical evidence or knowledge of any processes which would cause such a history, correct?"
Correct. The phylogenies emerge from the data following 'blind' alignments. Common descent is the best explanation for this observation. The understanding of the processes themselves is an independent contribution to our understanding of evolution.
"Can novel functions be produced by natural processes in evolution?
"Of course"
So ID, and the notion of information content increasing as a violation of the second law of thermodynamics is bunk? I think so too, as natural selection-survival- is the designer itself.
"Nothing is random, the notion of chance is merely another name for ignorance."
Are you arguing for some sort of universal predestination? There is truly nothing random to you? Brownian motion? Even at the quantum level?
mynym: If they merely observe certain similarities and patterns (or better yet program a computer to arrange things in patterns) then that's overwhelming evidence of descent in their minds.
ReplyDeleteJeff: Except that positing convergence is positing that there are plenty of exceptions to the CAUSE of the pattern. Thus, the analogy always fails at the relevant level of generality even by their own criteria. Then they resort to unadulterated metaphysics just like Dr. Hunter is saying. Per their metaphysics, macroevolution MUST be true.