Saturday, January 21, 2017

Repetitive Elements: Evolution Has a Toolkit, And Several Other Findings

Tightly Coupled Molecular Machines Make Evolution Work

I’m not an expert carpenter, but if I know what needs to be built I’ll eventually get there. It may not be beautiful, but given a blueprint I can build a structure. What if I didn’t have that blueprint? What if I had no idea what needed to be built—no notion of where the task was headed? Furthermore, what if I had no knowledge of structures in general. Just randomly cutting wood and pounding nails probably would not end well. This is the elephant in the room for evolution, for according to evolutionary theory, random actions are precisely what built the world. It is what the Epicureans claimed two thousand years ago, and this random-creation hypothesis fares no better today than it did then. In fact, with the findings of modern science we now know far more about the details than did the Epicureans, and it has just gotten worse for their hypothesis. This is why evolutionists, as we have repeatedly documented, consistently appeal to teleological language. Regulatory genes “were reused to produce different functions,” Dinosaurs “were experimenting” with flight, and the genome was “designed by evolution to sense and respond.” Such Aristotelianism, which casts evolution as an intelligent process working toward a goal, makes the story more palatable; after all, evolution had a blueprint in mind. All of this makes for a glaring internal contradiction: on the one hand evolution has goals; yet on the other hand evolution is a mindless, mechanical process driven by random, chance events. As Jernej Ule explained last week:

We’re all here because of mutations. Random changes in genes are what creates variety in a species, and this is what allows it to adapt to new environments and eventually evolve into completely new species.

This makes evolution, rather inconveniently, dependent on random events (no, natural selection doesn’t change this—it cannot coax the right mutations to occur) which, by definition, do not work towards a goal—they do not build anything:

This ambiguity creates a great challenge. On the one hand, mutations are needed for biological innovation, and on the other hand they cause diseases.

Indeed. This is not looking good. As one Michael Skinner recently explained:

the rate of random DNA sequence mutation turns out to be too slow to explain many of the changes observed. Scientists, well-aware of the issue, have proposed a variety of genetic mechanisms to compensate: genetic drift, in which small groups of individuals undergo dramatic genetic change; or epistasis, in which one set of genes suppress another, to name just two. Yet even with such mechanisms in play, genetic mutation rates for complex organisms such as humans are dramatically lower than the frequency of change [between species if evolution is true] for a host of traits, from adjustments in metabolism to resistance to disease.

Whereas Skinner appealed to epigenetics to save the theory, Ule appeals to repetitive elements. Evidence has shown that far from being “junk DNA,” repetitive elements plays a genetic regulatory role. As a result evolutionists such as Ule have concluded repetitive elements “are an important toolkit for evolution.”

Like any good carpenter, evolution has a toolkit.

Ule and his co-workers are now elaborating on the details of how repetitive element toolkit might work. It goes like this: (i) Random mutations gradually modify repetitive elements, (ii) these repetitive elements are sometimes incorporated as part of the blueprint instructions for making a protein, (iii) there are several complicated molecular machines that either repress or allow such incorporation of these repetitive elements in the blueprint.

According to Ule, this complicated process, including these two opposing machines which are “tightly coupled,” allows evolution to experiment and successfully evolve more complicated species, such as humans:

We’ve known for decades that evolution needs to tinker with genetic elements so they can accumulate mutations while minimising disruption to the fitness of a species. … This [process we have discovered] allows the Alu elements to remain in a harmless state in our DNA over long evolutionary periods, during which they accumulate a lot of change via mutations. As a result, they become less harmful and gradually start escaping the repressive force. Eventually, some of them take on an important function and became indispensable pieces of human genes. To put it another way, the balanced forces buy the time needed for mutations to make beneficial changes, rather than disruptive ones, to a species. And this is why evolution proceeds in such small steps – it only works if the two forces remain balanced by complementary mutations, which takes time. Eventually, important new molecular functions can emerge from randomness.

These suggestions from Skinner and Ule are the latest in a long, long line of ideas evolutionists have come up with, in an attempt to make sense of their random creation hypothesis. In modern evolutionary thought, the first such idea was natural selection.

The reason there is a long, long line of ideas is none of them work. They are becoming ever more complicated, ever more unlikely, and equally useless in solving the basic problem of random events constructing the world.

But Ule’s latest attempt highlights yet another problem: serendipity. All of the solutions, from natural selection on up to epigenetics and repetitive elements rely on serendipity, and this reliance is increasing. Ule’s solution is serendipity on steroids, for the idea holds that evolution just happened to create (i) repetitive elements, and (ii) the complicated, finely-tuned, opposing molecular machines that repress or allow those repetitive elements into the protein instructions.

This isn’t going to work, but the point here is that even if it did somehow work, it amounts to evolution creating evolution. In order for evolution to have created so many of the species, it first must have lucked into creating these incredible mechanisms, which then in turn allowed evolution to occur. And all of this must have occurred with no foresight.

This is just silly. This violates the very basics of science. Imagine a car factory that uses highly complex machines, such as drill presses and lathes, to build the cars. Now imagine the factory first creating those machines by random chance, so then the cars could be built, by yet more random chance events.

Religion drives science, and it matters.

26 comments:

  1. "This is the elephant in the room for evolution, for according to evolutionary theory, random actions are precisely what built the world."

    When an argument starts with such a misrepresentation about what one is arguing about, it is time to stop reading. The conclusions drawn cannot possibly be valid.

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    1. Random mutations culled by natural selection are still random mutations and the heart of evolutionism. Natural selection is non-random only in that not every variant has the same probability of survival. And it's an after-the-fact assessment (natural selection is a result).

      It is all just whatever is good enough to survive may get the chance to mate and reproduce. Contingent serendipity to the core.

      So, the misrepresentation would be to say natural selection is anything other than that- just one way genetic accidents, errors and mistakes get culled/ accumulate.

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  2. What exactly has been misrepresented?

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    1. MB: "What exactly has been misrepresented?"

      The statement that "...random actions are precisely what built the world." Anyone who thinks that this is what evolutionary biologists are claiming does not understand anything about evolution.

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    2. Please link to the scientific theory of evolution so we can all see what it actaually says

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    3. Joke: "Please link to the scientific theory of evolution so we can all see what it actaually says."

      Who said anything about a theory? You really have to keep up with the discussion and stop going off on bizarre tangents.

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    4. LoL! If you don't have a scientific theory then you don't have anything to complain about. That is because no one has a good enough understanding of evolution to formulate one.

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    5. You said something about a theory:

      If anything, my modification of your statement is less of a misrepresentation of cosmological theory than yours is of evolutionary theory.

      Just below. You really have to keep up with what you post and stop being such an obtuse jerk

      Delete
  3. Mike Boll

    What exactly has been misrepresented?


    The idea that evolution is "just luck" is a canard. Evolution is a process with random components (genetic variation, neutral drift) and a non-random component, selection.

    Misrepresenting evolution as being "just dumb luck" is a pretty common creationist lie on internet C/E sites.

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    1. The idea that evolution is "just luck" is a canard.

      Ohhh what a beautiful own goal.

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    2. Ghostrider: Evolution is a process with random components (genetic variation, neutral drift) and a non-random component, selection.

      But the non-random component can do nothing until the random components build something, right? So it would be random actions doing the actual building, like Dr. Hunter said, right? Besides, you can see from the evolutionist scientists he quoted and many he didn't quote that his comment was on par with what they themselves say.

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  4. chance alone is at the source of every innovation, of all creation in the biosphere. Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, at the very root of the stupendous edifice of evolution: this central concept of modern biology is no longer one among other possible or even conceivable hypotheses. It is today the sole conceivable hypothesis, the only one that squares with observed and tested fact. And nothing warrants the supposition—or the hope—that on this score our position is likely ever to be revised. -- Nobel Laureate Jacques Monod

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  5. We’re all here because of mutations. Random changes in genes are what creates variety in a species, and this is what allows it to adapt to new environments and eventually evolve into completely new species. -- Jernej Ule

    ReplyDelete
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    1. "Pure chance, absolutely free but blind, at the very root of the stupendous edifice of evolution:"

      "We’re all here because of mutations. Random changes in genes are what creates variety in a species, and this is what allows it to adapt to new environments and eventually evolve into completely new species."

      Do you notice what both of these quotes have in common? And why your original statement is misrepresenting what they are saying?

      Let's try modifying your statement.

      "...random Hydrogen atoms are precisely what built the world."

      If anything, my modification of your statement is less of a misrepresentation of cosmological theory than yours is of evolutionary theory.

      Delete
    2. Do you notice what both of these quotes have in common? And why your original statement is misrepresenting what they are saying?

      What they both have in common is a clear statement of evolutionary theory. I think you swung and missed.

      Delete
    3. CH: "I think you swung and missed."

      Which just proves my point. Anyone with a reasonable understanding of evolution would understand how you are misrepresenting (or completely misunderstanding) what is being said in these two quotes.

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    4. Or, you actually could try spelling it out, rather than making vague claims with a most suspicious brevity.

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    5. CH: "Or, you actually could try spelling it out, rather than making vague claims with a most suspicious brevity."

      It is sad that I have to spell out to you something that is obvious to anyone who understands evolution.

      When someone says that something is at the root of something, they are saying that it is a fundamental requirement, not that it is the only mechanism involved. Without mutations, variation couldn't increase and selection would have nothing to act on. So, yes, mutations are at the root of evolution. But mutations are not limited to point mutations. Anything that changes the sequence of DNA is a mutation (e.g., inversions, insertions, duplication, etc.) and increases the genetic variation in a population. And once you have that variation, mechanisms such as drift and selection can take place.

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    6. According to evolutionism all mutations are random, as in happenstance, occurrences. Natural selection is just one way to cull the less fit and keep the fit enough.

      Variation drives everything and according to evolutionism that variation is random.

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    7. Joke: "According to evolutionism all mutations are random,..."

      No. Random with respect to fitness.

      "Variation drives everything and according to evolutionism that variation is random."

      Variation drives nothing. Without selection and drift it is just variation.

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    8. LoL! "Random with respect to fitness" is meaningless drivel. According to Mayr they are random as in happenstance occurrences. According to evolutionary biology all mutations are accidents, errors and mistakes.

      Variation drives everything as there cannot be natural selection, drift or change without it. No change no evolution.


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    9. Joke: "Variation drives everything as there cannot be natural selection, drift or change without it. No change no evolution."

      You have a strange idea of what the verb "drive" means. But given that you don't understand what "water", "Wavelength", "Frequency", or "lie" means, I am not surprised.

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    10. wee willie:
      You have a strange idea of what the verb "drive" means.

      That is your desperate and ignorant opinion. Too bad you can't support it.

      But hey given that you think a molecular code turns water into ice at zero C, it is clear that you haven't a clue.

      Delete
    11. Joke: "That is your desperate and ignorant opinion. Too bad you can't support it."

      Anyone who can read can see that you don't understand what "water", "wavelength", "frequency" or "lie" mean.

      Delete
    12. wee willie:
      Anyone who can read

      That leaves you out

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    13. It is sad that I have to spell out to you

      We at Darwin’s God certainly do not want to be the cause of any depression experienced by evolutionists. But, I’m afraid facts are facts.


      So, yes, mutations are at the root of evolution. But mutations are not limited to point mutations. Anything that changes the sequence of DNA is a mutation (e.g., inversions, insertions, duplication, etc.) and increases the genetic variation in a population.

      Except that nothing we said was limited to point mutations. You have a basic, fundamental mischaracterization of the theory, thus avoiding the rather inconvenient fact that, according to the theory, natural selection (or drift, or whatever “mechanisms” you can or will imagine) do not and cannot induce fitness-improving change. All biological variation must be random with respect to fitness. Every single mutation, from molecule to man must have been random.

      Delete