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The bionic antinomy of Darwinism

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Do you remember when I said “when a thing is untrue, if we say it is true we get contradictions” (The Darwinism contradiction of repair systems)? Here I will deal with another contradiction of Darwinism: that we could name its “bionic antinomy”.

According to Wikipedia “Bionics (also known as biomimetics, bio-inspiration, biognosis, biomimicry, or bionical creativity engineering) is the application of biological methods and systems found in nature to the study and design of engineering systems and modern technology.” In fact, whether we analyze the history of technology, we find how often technical innovations and systems take inspiration from natural models. For some of the more recent examples of biomimetics see The 15 Coolest Cases of Biomimicry. This article synthetically defines bionics as “biologically inspired engineering”.

Bionics divides in sub-fields. For example, robotics, cybernetics and Artificial Intelligence try even to simulate the human body and mind. By the way these research fields are far from having achieved their long-term goal: to construct an artificial intelligent living being. These sub-fields of bionics, despite they are at the forefront of the technological advance, are those where the qualitative differences between artificial and natural systems are maximum. Matters of principle do exist that scientists never will succeed in such task of artificial creation of a true intelligent living being. Yes they will succeed to construct a robot simulating a human, but this robot will be neither really intelligent nor living. And less than less it will be a real “being” either. But this is another story…

The story herein is the strange phenomenon that happens when bionic and biological systems are put on the same table and compared. When a system “biologically inspired” to a certain biological system is considered in technology the terminology applied to it is engineering jargon (what else). When that biological system itself is considered in biology the terminology applied is purely Darwinian. For example, before the sonar of a submarine they say it is sophisticated engineering; before the sonar of a bat they say it is natural selection. This odd double standard always struck me.

What makes this double standard even more absurd is that, as noted above about robotics, the natural systems usually are more optimized and efficient than the equivalent artificial ones. For example, the bats have an echometer emitting 100 kHz supersonic pulses at a frequency of 30 times per second. These waves are reflected and distorted by the surrounding objects and their echoes are intercepted and elaborated by the bat to catch its prey and also just to get around. The signal processing of these echoes is so accurate to allow bats to fly, twisting, looping and zig-zagging through the air, into a completely dark room intersected by tens pianoforte strings without grazing them. The bat’s echometer has more accuracy, more efficiency, less power consumption and less size than any artificial sonar constructed by engineers. What … technological jewel! And many other wonderful examples could be considered in nature.

Let’s try to formalize somehow as a very logic antinomy the double standard situation described above.

(1) Intelligence is what creates and optimizes artificial systems by inserting complex specified information into them. Intelligence is the unique source of CSI.
(2) Bionic systems are fully created by intelligence. Say B the CSI of a bionic system, B > 0.
(3) A bionic system is less efficient than the similar natural system (say N its CSI). Then B < N.
(4) Natural systems are not created by intelligence, then N = 0. This is the fundamental axiom of Darwinian evolution: natural systems seem to be designed by intelligence but it is an illusion only.
(5) From #3 (B < N) and #4 (N = 0) we have B < 0.
(6) From #2 and #5 we have in the same time B > 0 and B < 0, i.e. an absurdum.

The above reasoning logically proves that the evolutionist double standard is a very antinomy. In all logic antinomies there is at least a premise that is untrue. I am sure the UD readers will have no difficulty to discover that the false premise is #4, indeed the Darwinian main hypothesis (all species arose by unintelligent natural processes).
There is a teaching for evolutionists here (as in all other contradictions of Darwinism), simply they cannot have it both ways: biological systems undesigned and their artificial clones designed. Since they cannot deny design in artificial clones, they should resign themselves to consider as designed their biological archetypes too.

Comments
Mr Frost122585, That is getting pretty personal- and leaves the realm of arguments from evidence, facts and reason – and enters into just a nasty personal attack. Yes, it is personal. It is sad how Mr BA^77 has pulled down the level of discourse to this level. Nak the only way it is possible for me to even be considered gullible by you, considering the actual state of the evidence that you have blatantly ignored, is for you to be absolutely insane. This, after expressing his willingness to bet on the brine shrimp discovered by satellite lasers. I leave it to you to decide if this is the writing of a True Christian. If only Casey Luskin were here to give us a lesson in civility.Nakashima
November 19, 2009
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When geologists look at their samples, >95% of it is rock.
That's why I reject evolution. 95% of 95% of the evidence is against it. ;)Mung
November 19, 2009
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BA77
The problem for getting a rough measure of CSI in larger systems, of multiple interlocking parts, such as echolocation of bats, is that we don’t actually know where the information is stored at that is directing the construction of the overall body plans??? No one knows! This is a very mysterious enigma to put it mildly: i.e. How do you put a measuring stick to information that no seems able to find?
I always had the impression that ID actually does measure the information you refer to in terms of CSI/FSCI.osteonectin
November 19, 2009
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And Jitsak, No offense- but I got hammered the other day by everyone for using so called "ad hominem" arguments (even though they weren't) when I said a Darwinist cannot be a true Christian for the reasons I listed- But for you to say -
"I can only guess as to why you feel that way. My guess would be that you are grateful to be freed from your previous addictions, and now you’re overshooting in another direction."
That is getting pretty personal- and leaves the realm of arguments from evidence, facts and reason - and enters into just a nasty personal attack. Wouldn't you say?Frost122585
November 19, 2009
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The bottom line with universal common ancestry is that the fossil evidence is very poor. You do have some likely transitionals but they are all almost of the same kinds of animals - and in the cases of human and ape like creatures the sequences change all the time- and the perputed "missing link" has been claimed ot hav ebeen found many times and each time it gets up into either a category of ape or man. In the second best case of a transitional you have the whale transitions- which consists of one good skull with teeth and a few bones of the body with the rest of the body left up to speculative reconstructions. The transitional fossil record is incredibly incomplete. When you look into books with fossils there almost none. This is not the reality I am arguing for but this is just reality. It is not my fault that they have not found many when their should be millions. We have plenty of Dinosaur fossils from over 200 million years ago but they of course mysteriously show stasis. You also have some possible fish transnationals- but it is still just fish turning into fish. And of course most ridiculously among the Darwinists problems is the notion of the so called possible reptile to bird transitions. While one side of the Darwinists totally see them as a knock out blow for the ancestry argument or model- you have another side which thinks birds evolved from dinosaurs. The avian lung complexity no doubt plays a role in the controversy. It is amazing. And the reason why the common design argument is so important when you try to link somewhat closely similar creatures like say apes and man- is that if you look at cars for example- there is very little difference between a 1960 mustang and a 1970 mustang- you could easily wrongly conclude common ancestry when it is obviously design. In both cases there are physical processes leading to the design - but the processes are very different- in the case of common design it almost certainly or inexorably implies a mind for the source of origin of the information- as opposed to maybe some simply proximate mechanisms like natural selection and mutation.Frost122585
November 19, 2009
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But alas why do I feel that you may be too wise and knowledgeable in your own eyes, as Seversky and Nak seem to think they are, to learn from this?
I can only guess as to why you feel that way. My guess would be that you are grateful to be freed from your previous addictions, and now you're overshooting in another direction. I'm glad you found Jesus in your life, and as a regular of AA meetings I can sympathize with that. But your holier than thou attitude is unbecoming. Back to science. The tree of life is still very much alive. Just like a real tree, the root is more complex than we thought before. In no way does this invalidate evolution.jitsak
November 19, 2009
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Hey Jitsak I never claimed to be wise, I only claimed to know the One Who possesses all wisdom,, Jesus Christ!!! And your right I ain't humble enough to let Darwin bullies run all over me,,, but nobody is perfect? I have to work on being a Darwinian door mat!!! In my "humble" opinion, If you guy's wisdom lets you be so blind to the fact God is indeed real, it can't be true wisdom and must in reality be deception!! A song for you dude. Johnny Cash Hurt http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmVAWKfJ4Gobornagain77
November 19, 2009
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boreagain,
Thanks for a good laugh Seversky, maybe you problem is that you need to humble yourself before you will truly learn!
Are you back on the sauce? You are far from humble yourself, so you should think twice before accusing another poster from the lack thereof. Indeed, you are often quite rude, and I would enjoy your posts much more if you would refrain from baseless accusations.jitsak
November 19, 2009
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This quote really drew my attention Jitsak: “For a long time the holy grail was to build a tree of life,” says Eric Bapteste, an evolutionary biologist at the Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris, France. A few years ago it looked as though the grail was within reach. But today the project lies in tatters, torn to pieces by an onslaught of negative evidence. Many biologists now argue that the tree concept is obsolete and needs to be discarded. “We have no evidence at all that the tree of life is a reality,” says Bapteste. That bombshell has even persuaded some that our fundamental view of biology needs to change.2 But alas why do I feel that you may be too wise and knowledgeable in your own eyes, as Seversky and Nak seem to think they are, to learn from this?bornagain77
November 19, 2009
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Jitsak,,,you might want to use another line of evidence other than fossils and genes: The Fossil Record - The Evolutionary Myth Of +99% Extinct Species - Dr. Arthur Jones http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVQeeY-Val0 "Why Darwin was wrong about the tree of life," New Scientist (January 21, 2009) Excerpt: Even among higher organisms, “the problem was that different genes told contradictory evolutionary stories,”,,,“despite the amount of data and breadth of taxa analyzed, relationships among most [animal] phyla remained unresolved.” ,,,,Carl Woese, a pioneer of evolutionary molecular systematics, observed that these problems extend well beyond the base of the tree of life: “Phylogenetic incongruities [conflicts] can be seen everywhere in the universal tree, from its root to the major branchings within and among the various taxa to the makeup of the primary groupings themselves.”,,, “We’ve just annihilated the (Darwin's) tree of life.” http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/05/a_primer_on_the_tree_of_life_p_1.html#morebornagain77
November 19, 2009
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Seversky stated: "The more knowledgeable amongst us" Would that be the knowledgeable Darwin zealots such as yourself that wouldn't know true science if they hit with there car?? Thanks for a good laugh Seversky, maybe you problem is that you need to humble yourself before you will truly learn! 1 Corinthians 1:27 "But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong."bornagain77
November 19, 2009
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Joseph @164
The vast majority of the fossil record is of marine invertebrates- >95%. In that vast majority we don’t see any evidence for Common Descent.
I've noticed you keep repeating this as some kind of mantra. Why is this >95% relevant? When geologists look at their samples, >95% of it is rock. The interesting information is in the boundaries between strata. What percentage of the visible stars give us information about the evolution of the universe?
The DNA evidence can be used for a Common Design.
I suppose it can. But of all the possible phylogenies based on common design, why did the Designer choose a nested hierarchy?--precisely what would be expected under a common descent scenario. One answer might be a sense of humor.
Ya see there isn’t any DNA evidence that links the genetic changes to the physical transformations required.
Why should I take your word for that? Are you a scientist? As a matter of fact, phenotypic differences between recently diverged species are small enough that the genetic basis for the differences has been mapped in some cases. As I mentioned in another thread, I recently attended a lecture by Jerry Coyne where he described genetic analysis of the differences between recently diverged Drosophila species. Coyne described a QTL analysis and more detailed analysis of genes responsible for small differences in morphology and genes that make females discriminate between them during mate choice. Remember that next time when you claim there isn't any DNA evidence linking genetic changes to physical differences.jitsak
November 19, 2009
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bornagain77 @ 142
The problem for getting a rough measure of CSI in larger systems, of multiple interlocking parts, such as echolocation of bats, is that we don’t actually know where the information is stored at that is directing the construction of the overall body plans??? No one knows! This is a very mysterious enigma to put it mildly: i.e. How do you put a measuring stick to information that no seems able to find?
Perhaps there is nothing there to find. Perhaps information theory provides useful tools for modeling some attributes of the organism but that does not mean that information is a property of the organism. The more knowledgeable amongst us can brandish technical definitions of information such as that of Claude Shannon or Kolmogorov/Chaitin complexity or invent new ones like Functional Complex Specified Information. But these definitions do not mean the same as each other nor do they mean what most non-specialists understand by "information". I developed these ideas a little in a post last year so, to save myself time and effort, let me quote part of it:
What we commonly think of as information seems to be what is called semantic information embodied in messages passed between intelligent agents such as ourselves. That involves intention and the capacity to extract meaning from messages which can also be distinguished from background ‘noise’. I found this passage from an article called “The Information Challenge” by Richard Dawkins which was helpful: Redundancy is any part of a message that is not informative, either because the recipient already knows it (is not surprised by it) or because it duplicates other parts of the message. In the sentence “Rover is a poodle dog”, the word “dog” is redundant because “poodle” already tells us that Rover is a dog. An economical telegram would omit it, thereby increasing the informative proportion of the message. “Arr JFK Fri pm pls mt BA Cncrd flt” carries the same information as the much longer, but more redundant, “I’ll be arriving at John F Kennedy airport on Friday evening; please meet the British Airways Concorde flight”. Obviously the brief, telegraphic message is cheaper to send (although the recipient may have to work harder to decipher it – redundancy has its virtues if we forget economics). Shannon wanted to find a mathematical way to capture the idea that any message could be broken into the information (which is worth paying for), the redundancy (which can, with economic advantage, be deleted from the message because, in effect, it can be reconstructed by the recipient) and the noise (which is just random rubbish). I understand from the illustration about the Concorde flight how a message can be stripped down to its bare essentials in terms of information and that Shannon expressed this in a mathematical form in which the meaning was irrelevant but what, exactly, is information? The question I asked myself is this, the message about the Concorde flight would have told the recipient something they didn’t know before, namely, when and where the traveller’s flight was due to arrive. But suppose the sender was uncertain whether the message had been received so sent it again just to be safe, would it still contain information? Suppose the recipient had read the first message, they would no longer be surprised or informed by the second message, yet it was exactly the same as the first, so what is the information it contained? It seems to me that information is not so much a property of the message as it is a description of the relationship between the message and the recipient or, more precisely, the change the message causes in the state of the recipient. In a sense, it’s a process rather than an attribute. In the case of the Concorde flight message, the first one changed the state of the recipient by adding new knowledge, the second did nothing because the knowledge was already there.
Seversky
November 19, 2009
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Joseph: The vast majority of the fossil record is of marine invertebrates- >95%. In that vast majority we don’t see any evidence for Common Descent. Victor Tussle: Does that mean there is evidence for Common Descent in a minority of the evidence then? Or none at all?
It's the weight of the evidence—in kilograms.Zachriel
November 19, 2009
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Zachriel: If you don’t start with the Theory of Common Descent, then none of the rest of the evidence will make much sense. Clive Hayden: Oh I see, you start with it and end with it, that’s not circular or anything.
As I didn't claim to have provided an argument for Common Descent, it wouldn't be circular. Rather, those that already understand the evidence for Common Descent will also understand why onychonycteris is considered an important intermediate species exhibiting many primitive characteristics. Saying it shouldn't coexist with bats with echolocation, is like asking "if people evolved from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?"Zachriel
November 19, 2009
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Evolution, defined as a change in allele frequencies over time in a population with variable and heritable traits, subject to scarce resources where the traits influence survival First, let’s look at some of the nouns in this description. Alleles - From this we know that we are going to have to model individuals with a genotype. Our description of individuals will have to be more than just alleles, but this is where we can start our object model. Frequencies - Some of the statistics we will want to keep track of in order to draw conclusions. Time - We will need to keep track of time. Many GA systems use ‘number of generations’ as a proxy for time. I would prefer to use a separate ‘clock’ so that we can have more flexibility, and decouple time keeping from modeling populations. Population - We will need to create a collection of more than one individual. These individuals must have some relationships to be considered a population, methods of interacting. These methods could include competition for resources, mates, etc. Traits - I’ll use this as a chance to differentiate the genotype and the phenotype. Our object model of an individual will have to keep both, as well as some other abstractions such as birth date, so that we can track age. Having both genotype and phenotype also implies a way to map from one to the other. Resources - We need a model of the environment. For example, we can record the carrying capacity of a ‘deme’ as a more natural way of defining a population size rather than just setting an arbitrary variable or array size. These numbers are finite, that is what we mean by scarce resources. We can make the model of the environment more or less elaborate with multiple demes, multiple kinds of resources. Multiple demes implies describing the deme relationships, such as migration between demes. It is also worth noting that the other population individuals constitute part of the environment. Survival - Individuals have finite lives. If some of this appears obvious or trivial, I apologize. The point is to agree on these simple and obvious things so that we can move on to more difficult issues.Nakashima
November 19, 2009
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Mung
Behe and Demksi are concerned with detecting design in nature, which is concerned with the detection of patterns.
Indeed, and they have detected the pattern of Common Descent. And said as much. I was pointing that fact out to Joe.
Where there is no pattern, I doubt they find it of interest.
Indeed.Victor Tussle
November 19, 2009
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Mr Mung, I take your concerns very seriously. One of the important aspects of model building is to verify it against other models and experimental data. In an analogy to a piece of rope, we don't expect any strand to span the whole length of the rope, or be as strong as the whole rope, but taken together, the strands are longer and stronger than any one of them, even the longest and strongest. It is this way with models and experiments. The conceptual structures and results have to overlap and extend. Luckily there are many other simple GA and pop gen models we can test against, including Mendel's Accountant and Gregor's Bookkeeper. ps - Mind control lasers will be used only as a last resort.Nakashima
November 19, 2009
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What do you know that they don’t?
What kind of question is this? Behe and Demksi are concerned with detecting design in nature, which is concerned with the detection of patterns. Where there is no pattern, I doubt they find it of interest.Mung
November 19, 2009
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Nakashima @159
What this new (to me) research says to me is that its wrong to try to draw a straight line between all Eocene fossil bats and modern bats.
Shouldn't we have already learned this from the horse sequence? :)Mung
November 19, 2009
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I noted several unsubstantiated assumptions you have built into your model which will give you a completely false reading as to what will actually happen in reality,,, you have “built” evolution into your model!
Dear Mr. Nakashima, Please do not build any unsubstantiated assumptions into your model which you have not yet built. Also, this matter of false readings concerns me greatly. Can we build some true reading measuring equipment that works in reality so that we can test the model against some live stuff? Perhaps your patented laser technology could assist in this regard. Lastly, could we not intentionally build evolution into this model of evolution? Perhaps if it crept in by a purely unintentional undesigned process we could allow it. Thank you for taking my concerns seriously.Mung
November 19, 2009
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Joseph
The vast majority of the fossil record is of marine invertebrates- >95%. In that vast majority we don’t see any evidence for Common Descent.
Does that mean there is evidence for Common Descent in a minority of the evidence then? Or none at all? I'm just wondering if you rule Common Descent out completely, which is a more extreme position then is generally taken in the ID community (Behe, Dembski etc). What do you know that they don't?
ML: In The Edge, you make a defense for common descent (p.182) and later attribute it to a non-random process (p. 72). Considering the convergent evolution of the digestive enzyme of lemurs and cows, hemoglobin of human and mice, and in your own work resistance mutations that also arise independently (p77), why such a commitment to common descent? Isn’t genetic convergent evolution or even common design (considering your view of mutations) good alternative explanations to common descent? MJB: I don’t think so. Although those other explanations may be true, I think that common descent, guided by an intelligent agent, is sufficient to explain the data. It has the great advantage of being easily compatible with apparent genetic “mistakes” shared by organisms, such as the pseudo-hemoglobin genes I wrote of in The Edge of Evolution.
http://www.ideacenter.org/contentmgr/showdetails.php/id/1441Victor Tussle
November 19, 2009
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Nakashima @145
Evolution, defined as a change in allele frequencies over time in a population with variable and heritable traits, subject to scarce resources where the traits influence survival.
I have no problem with this definition of evolution. In fact, in any evaluation/simulation of evolution you are going to need to address how genetic changes are spread (or lost) throughout the population (increse/decrease in frequency over time). So I think this makes a fine starting place. I really look forward to this as a learning experience both in modelling and codign of algorithms relevant to evolutionary theory. Thank you for your time.
I would propose unpacking various part of it and examine how to implement code that maps back to this definition. I’d prefer to do this rather than just dumping a big piece of code into a message and asking readers to accept that it maps to the agreed definition.
Yes, exactly. Bit by bit, as it were. ;) It will have to be that way, for me to understand it, hehe. Is it possible to write tests for the code, so that we can see that the code is functioning according to how it is intended?Mung
November 19, 2009
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Zachriel @144
Doesn’t it jar you a bit that generations of biologists have overlooked such a simplistic argument?
It bothers me! How could they be so obtuse?Mung
November 19, 2009
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Joseph,
It is always easier if you start with that which you need to demonstrate.
Indeed it is.Clive Hayden
November 19, 2009
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Clive, It is always easier if you start with that which you need to demonstrate. ;)Joseph
November 19, 2009
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Zachriel,
If you don’t start with the Theory of Common Descent, then none of the rest of the evidence will make much sense.
Oh I see, you start with it and end with it, that's not circular or anything.Clive Hayden
November 19, 2009
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jitsak, The vast majority of the fossil record is of marine invertebrates- >95%. In that vast majority we don't see any evidence for Common Descent. The DNA evidence can be used for a Common Design. Ya see there isn't any DNA evidence that links the genetic changes to the physical transformations required.Joseph
November 19, 2009
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Joseph,
I would think that first one would need evidence for the theory of Common Descent- as in what is the evidence that demonstrates the transformations required are even possible?
I sometimes wonder if Joseph is a very deep-cover Poe who is pretending to be very misguided. Come on, Joe. The morphological fossil evidence and the DNA evidence give us pretty much the same phylogenies.jitsak
November 19, 2009
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Zachriel:
If you don’t start with the Theory of Common Descent, then none of the rest of the evidence will make much sense.
I would think that first one would need evidence for the theory of Common Descent- as in what is the evidence that demonstrates the transformations required are even possible? We have plenty of evidence for mutations breaking things and causing slight variations, but nothing that demonstrates genetic accidents can accumulate in such a way as to confirm, or provide evidence for, the theory of Common Descent.Joseph
November 19, 2009
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