Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Evolutionists Are Up in Arms Over Real Time Epigenetics

Epigenetics has gone real-time and evolutionists are insisting it has no impact on the fact of evolution. Recall that epigenetics provided one of the many falsifications of evolution’s claim that biological variation knows nothing of need. According to evolution, if the environment shifts, presenting a new challenge to a population, then the population responds via the selection of random changes, such as mutations, which are not in response to the new challenge. In short, biological variation must not be directed. Any such intelligent response to the environment smacks too much of teleology, which evolutionary thought fundamentally rejects. So under evolution, populations adapt by chance. Mutations that just happen to address the challenge are selected.

But epigenetics falsified all of that. Science tells us that populations rapidly and intelligently adapt to environmental challenges. Such responses, for example, may be accomplished via modifications to the DNA sequence or via modifications to how genes are expressed. For instance small chemicals, such as methyl groups or hydroxyl groups (or one on top of the other!), may be attached to the DNA or to the histone proteins about which the DNA is wrapped. And such modifications can be passed on to subsequent generations.

This makes no sense on evolution. We would have to imagine that evolution’s random mutations and the like created this fantastic directed adaptation machine, ready to respond to a range of future environmental challenges.

And now epigenetics has been found to occur in real-time, providing profound falsifications of evolutionary expectations. These “real-time” epigenetic mechanisms are applied not to DNA, but to its temporary transcript, mRNA, which supplies the information used to synthesize a protein.

So now evolution must not only have created another fantastic directed adaptation machine, ready to respond to a range of future environmental challenges, but this machine must have been capable and ready to operate, immediately at sometime in the future, on the transitory mRNA molecule.

The absurdity of evolution has just become that much more absurd.

Not surprisingly evolutionists are struggling to provide any sort of coherent explanation for all this. Their mandate that evolution must be a fact has been long since known to be little more than dogma, and the continuing onslaught of scientific findings is not helping.

Evolutionists had no scientific explanation for the fantastic mechanisms behind epigenetics. I once debated an evolution professor who simply denied that cells had any such capability. Needless to say, meaningful debate is not possible when evolutionists deny known facts of science.

Such denial is continuing with the new findings of real-time epigenetics. Evolutionists are not seriously reckoning with the science. One evolutionist, for instance, attempted to defend the evolution of real-time epigenetics by conflating it with the general operation of gene regulation:

I'm absolutely astonished by this series of yours on methylation, Cornelius. You seem to think it's new. How on earth do you think that biologists think that cells even differentiate in multicellular organisms, let alone function, without control of gene expression? Do you think that biologists until recently thought that all genes were switched on all the time? Have you never heard of cell signalling? And what do you imagine that "regulatory genes" actually do if not, um, regulate genes? i.e. switch them on and off?

This argument that the evolution of complex mechanisms is obvious because, after all, we’ve known about it all along, may seem bizarre to newcomers. But for evolutionists this sort of argument is typical. Point out that diversity appears abruptly in the fossil record and evolutionists will tell you that they’ve explained all that with “punctuated equilibrium.” Point out that the origin of life is unlikely, and they’ll tell you that they’ve long since synthesized amino acids in a test tube.

Such problems are not really problems, evolutionists will tell you, because they’ve been known for a long time, and about them evolutionists have produced plenty of speculation.

Evolution has no scientific explanation, beyond speculation, for gene regulation in general. And they don’t have one for real-time epigenetics in particular.

Nonetheless, this evolutionist continued with the same sort of argument, this time recruiting the study of development and how it relates to evolution:

And far from being problematic for evolutionary theory, "evo-devo" answers a huge number of problems for evolutionary theory as it stood, namely how very small incremental DNA variation can make considerable, but viable, changes to the phenotype.

Aside from the fact that the so-called “evo-devo” research fell short of expectations and that development has contradicted evolutionary expections, it has nothing to do with the evolution of real-time epigenetics.

Again, newcomers will be surprised by the level of argumentation produced by evolutionists. But such nonsensical logic does provide a teachable moment. It is another sign of the closing of the evolutionary mind.

17 comments:

  1. of related note, here as recent video on epigenetics:

    The Mysterious Epigenome. What lies beyond DNA – video
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpXs8uShFMo

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    1. A little known fact, a fact that is very antagonistic to the genetic reductionism model of neo-Darwinism, is that, besides environmental factors, even our thoughts and feelings can 'epigenetically' control gene expression:


      Upgrade Your Brain
      Excerpt: The Research
      In his book The Genie in Your Genes (Elite Books, 2009), researcher Dawson Church, PhD, explains the relationship between thought and belief patterns and the expression of healing- or disease-related genes. “Your body reads your mind,” Church says. “Science is discovering that while we may have a fixed set of genes in our chromosomes, which of those genes is active has a great deal to do with our subjective experiences, and how we process them.”
      One recent study conducted at Ohio University demonstrates vividly the effect of mental stress on healing. Researchers gave married couples small suction blisters on their skin, after which they were instructed to discuss either a neutral topic or a topic of dispute for half an hour. Researchers then monitored the production of three wound-repair proteins in the subjects’ bodies for the next several weeks, and found that the blisters healed 40 percent slower in those who’d had especially sarcastic, argumentative conversations than those who’d had neutral ones.
      http://experiencelife.com/article/upgrade-your-brain/

      Genie In Your Genes - video
      http://www.genieinyourgenes.com/ggtrailer.html
      main website
      excerpt: There are over 100 genes in your body that are activated by your thoughts, feelings and experiences
      http://www.genieinyourgenes.com/

      Genie In Your Genes - Book
      Book review: First of all, if you are a newcomer to Dawson Church's writing, you need to know that his facts are unimpeachable - they were stringently peer-reviewed before publication. What is more, when Church makes categorical statements, he provides research to corroborate them.
      http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1604150114?ie=UTF8&tag=eliboo-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1600700225

      Further note:

      This following video humorously reveals the bankruptcy that atheists have in trying to ground beliefs within a materialistic, genetic reductionism, worldview;

      John Cleese – The Scientists – humorous video
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-M-vnmejwXo

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  2. At least you didn't Photoshop in the picture of a mass murderer this time.

    ...and they say Creationists can't learn morals.

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  3. Hunter to Thorton:

    Is that you second from right?

    Hahahaha... Forgive the outburst but it's about time you start mocking the dirt worshipers, Hunter. Mock them for the same reason that Elijah mocked and laughed at the priests of Baal.

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  4. velikovskys

    Which was?

    They had faith in the wrong religion and they paid the price. In the end, it's all about your religion, even if you are convinced that you don't have one.

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  5. Evolution has no scientific explanation, beyond speculation, for gene regulation in general. And they don’t have one for real-time epigenetics in particular.

    What is “real-time” epigenetics? I don’t think that this was made clear in the referenced post. I see nothing in the quote from Jaffrey or in the abstract of his cited paper to support Hunter’s claim that:

    This truly is epigenetics in real time as the cell must be detecting the need and transferring the methyl groups to the right mRNA location at astonishing rates.

    If there’s something in the paper about environmental change inducing mRNA methylation, please quote it.

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  6. Book I of Kings, Chapter 18:

    36 At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: “Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. 37 Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”

    38 Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.

    39 When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, “The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!”

    40 Then Elijah commanded them, “Seize the prophets of Baal. Don’t let anyone get away!” They seized them, and Elijah had them brought down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered there.

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  7. The number of slaughtered prophets of Baal was four hundred and fifty (verse 22).

    No mention is made of the fate of the four hundred prophets of the lady god Asherah (verse 18).

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  8. Louis Savain

    velikovskys: "Which was?"

    They had faith in the wrong religion and they paid the price. In the end, it's all about your religion, even if you are convinced that you don't have one.


    Homer Simpson: "Suppose we've chosen the wrong god. Every time we go to church we're just making him madder and madder!"

    :D :D :D

    'fess up Louis - you're really a Poe, aren't you?

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  9. Obviously freedom of religion is not an objective good, right?

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  10. Why exactly would Evolutionist be "up in arms" over "real time epigenetics"?

    Are we "up in arms" because we want to stop the process from occurring inside cells, or there some other group threatening to stop it? But, AFAIK, we do not know who to stop it, let alone that anyone has threatened to. This doesn't make any sense.

    Are we up in ams because "real time epigenetics" was "observed"? But observations are meaningless in the sense you're referring to unless extrapolated using an explanatory framework. This doesn't make any sense either.

    Perhaps you think we're "up in arms" over your explanatory theory of "real time epigenetics". However, As I've pointed out before, a designer that "just was" complete with the knowledge of when to methylize genes, already present, serves no explanatory purpose. This is because one could more economically state that organisms "just appeared", complete with the knowledge of when to methylize a gene, already present in their genome. so, this doesn't make any sense either.

    As such, it's seems that you're either clueless about the issue at hand, or you're disingenuously attempting to portray the issue as "real time epigenetics" knowing full well that's not the case.

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  11. CH: Evolution has no scientific explanation, beyond speculation, for gene regulation in general. And they don’t have one for real-time epigenetics in particular.

    And it's speculation because? Let me guess: a designer could have chosen to create the biosphere in such as way that would have resulted in it creating the knowledge of when to methyate genes, rather than evolutionary theory?

    But, as I've pointed out before, there are more possible ways that a designer might have chosen to have created the world we observe other than entirely though secondary causes or through a limited number of unknown intentional interventions that occurred at unknown intervals though an unknown means and method. Another possibility is that an abstract designer, with no defined limitations, could have also chosen to directly create the world we observe last Thursday. And in doing to said designer would have created all of the knowledge before then.

    For example, Darwin wouldn't have been the author of evolutionary theory. And the same would be said for the people who authored the ideas and concepts that supposedly influenced Darwinism up to then. Rather, this designer would have authored them all when it created the universe last Thursday.

    This would even include your' "theory" that Darwinism isn't accepted due to collaborating evidence but to these same religious ideas. However, rather than Cornelius being the author, this designer would have been the author instead.

    Again, how do you know that an abstract designer, with no defined limitations, didn't choose to create the universe last Thursday? Wouldn't the assumption that he didn't represent speculation on your part?

    Specifically, creationism is misleadingly named as it's a general purpose means of denying that creation actually took place. This includes your claim that Darwinism is founded on the religious ideas of those before Darwin, and Darwin's own religious ideas.

    So, it would seem you either do not understand the consequences creationism would have on knowledge, or you're merely selectively appealing to creationism in regards to theories you personally find objectionable by disingenuously presenting a limited number of possible choices the designer could make.

    Then again, perhaps you think a designer couldn't have created the universe we observe 30 minutes ago? Or, could it be that you think knowledge isn't created, but again, that would further suggest that creationism is misleadingly named.

    Or perhaps you think creation has nothing to do with knowledge? However, if this were the case, I'd expect you to have some sort of criticism for the following background knowledge, which you have yet to present..

    The role that evolution would play, if it played one at all, is to create the knowledge use to build specific biological adaptations. This is because organisms build themselves using the instructions found in the genome, which I'm referring to here as knowledge.

    Specifically, biological features, including cellular mechanisms that copy and repair DNA/RNA, represent adaptations. Adaptations represent transformations of matter. Transformations occur in when the requisite knowledge of how perform that transformation is present, along with the necessary energy, etc.


    What of the above is *not* familiar and uncontroversial? Please be specific.

    Otherwise, it's unclear what conclusion you expect us to reach.

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  12. Cornelius, quoting without attribution is pretty poor form. You did it on your "two professors" post, now you've done it here. At the very least you should link to your source, which I recognise, in this case, as me.

    A link provides both attribution and context.

    But what is really extraordinary, is you quote me as asking you a series of questions:

    I'm absolutely astonished by this series of yours on methylation, Cornelius. You seem to think it's new. How on earth do you think that biologists think that cells even differentiate in multicellular organisms, let alone function, without control of gene expression? Do you think that biologists until recently thought that all genes were switched on all the time? Have you never heard of cell signalling? And what do you imagine that "regulatory genes" actually do if not, um, regulate genes? i.e. switch them on and off?

    But, instead of attempting to answer my questions, you comment:

    This argument that the evolution of complex mechanisms is obvious because, after all, we’ve known about it all along, may seem bizarre to newcomers. But for evolutionists this sort of argument is typical. Point out that diversity appears abruptly in the fossil record and evolutionists will tell you that they’ve explained all that with “punctuated equilibrium.” Point out that the origin of life is unlikely, and they’ll tell you that they’ve long since synthesized amino acids in a test tube.

    But I didn't, in the passage you quoted, even present an argument. I asked you a series of questions!

    Which, as so often, you have simply ignored. Do you just not see the question marks?

    However you do then quote a claim of mine:

    And far from being problematic for evolutionary theory, "evo-devo" answers a huge number of problems for evolutionary theory as it stood, namely how very small incremental DNA variation can make considerable, but viable, changes to the phenotype.

    And comment:

    Aside from the fact that the so-called “evo-devo” research fell short of expectations and that development has contradicted evolutionary expections, it has nothing to do with the evolution of real-time epigenetics.

    Firstly, you do not offer any citation (you rarely offer citations, actually, Cornelius, and when you do, it's usually to some previous blog piece of your own - again, poor form from a trained scientist) to support your claim that evo-devo "fell" (fell? It's still going you know!) short of expectations or "that development has contradicted evolutionary expections".

    But you then simply assert that "[evo-devo] has nothing to do with the evolution of real-time epigenetics". It doesn't?

    How can it possibly not? The "evo" part is the evolution part and the "devo" part is development which could not occur with out "real time epigenetics"!

    In fact, without epigenetics - "real time" epigenetics - genes would be absolutely useless! There could be no tissue differentiation, no cell signalling, no multicellular organisms, no response of an organism to its environment, no life!

    I realise that your position is that life is unevolvable anyway - but why pick on epigenetics as though it's this new problem that has suddenly cropped up for "evolution"?

    Without it (or something that did the same job), evolution of anything other than the simplest cell would be impossible!

    Of course epigenetics has gone "real time"! As I asked you before, how do you think that cell signalling and differentiation is supposed to work?

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