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De Novo Genes: The Evolutionary Explanation
| November 23, 2009 | Posted by Cornelius Hunter under Intelligent Design |
Cells have remarkable adaptation capabilities. They can precisely adjust which segments of the genome are copied for use in the cell. They can edit and regulate those DNA copies according to their needs. And they can even modify the DNA itself, such as with adaptive mutations, to accommodate environmental pressures. And in addition to these examples, cells can create completely new, de novo, genes in an evolutionary instant. It is yet another biological capability that reveals the scientific weakness of evolutionary theory. Read more
50 Responses to De Novo Genes: The Evolutionary Explanation
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hummuas man:
That is what science is for- to help us ascertain those answers.
If we knew all the answers we wouldn’t need science, would we?
HOW can we answer those questions?
By trying to figure out what it is EXACTLY that makes each organism (population/ type) what it is.
And then try to figure out how much variation is permitted.
But anyways what do YOU have?
Do you have ANYTHING besides a refusal to accept the design inference that supports your position?
hummus man:
The Darwinists at least go to the effort of trying to support their claims.
They’re supposed to score points for trying? Fine, A+ for determination, but I’ll start being impressed when they start succeeding. Until then, their dogged determination to confirm what they’ve already chosen to believe looks like ideology barely disguised as science.
Joe responds to me:
Fair enough. All science is provisional, so it was an unfair question. Mea Culpa. Let me rephrase it. How many original kinds have been identified to date and what is the working hypothesis regarding how long ago those original kinds created/designed?
You mean besides an odd desire to see if you’ll actually answer my question? Not much that you would accept anyways. So, let’s just say I got nuthin and clear the decks so you can hold forth on the number and age of the known baramins.
PaV @ #29:
You remember quite incorrectly. There is no T-urf13 gene in any of the cmsT progenitors.
Why are you making all this up? The story is as I explain here. There is nothing in the literature about URF13 degradation being required for the cmsT trait.
Maybe you need to provide an explicit reference that leads you to make these claims.
And I’m impressed (in a sort of way) that you think digits are regressive compared with webbing. Would you like to look at a longer list of biological characters that are controlled by degradation? Are you seriously going to argue that this mechanism is always one that subtracts from an organism?
(I don’t suppose it needs to be pointed out that the Maseratti analogy only drives home the point that biology and engineering are two quite different, usually diametrically opposite, propositions. But I’ll thank PaV for making the point for me; the more voices that are showing this, the better.)
But anyways what do YOU have?
hummus man:
IOW you don’t have anything but a desire to misunderstand and misrepresent ID all the while never supporting your position.
Got it.
I don’t generally deal with intellectual cowards like yourself, I just expose them for what they are.
BTW my point is all you have evidence for is slight variations.
And nothing that shows those slight variations can accumulate in such a way as to support your position.
Joe:
Yup, you figured me out.
Now, about those baramins. How many have been identified and what is their hypothesized age?
hummus man:
It wasn’t hard- all evolutionists are basically the same.
Only the sock (puppet) changes, depending on the forum.
Baramins rule!
Go baramins!!!
Who dat? Who dat? What dat goin’ to beat those baramins?
This is the latest I can find:
The Current Status of Baraminology-
If you send an email to the author he may be better suited to give you an update.
But anyways doesn’t it seem just a little odd that when really pressed for evidence that supports their claims all evolutionists can do is point to slight variations that have no chance of doing what is being debated?
Yeah, I can see now why you can’t answer questions.
hummus man:
Right, lack of resources required to address such a complicated issue.
OTOH your position has all the resourses and still can’t put together a coherent argument.
Go figure…
Right, lack of resources required to address such a complicated issue.
DNA Sequencer too expensive to add to your basement laboratory?
Obviously brains too expensive to add to your inventory.
Perhaps you should go buy a vowel…
I would love to get my hands on a nice æ, but the radical Alphabetists have suppressed the evidence of the superiority of Olde English.
It was evolution by natural selection…
Arthur Hunt:
Art, I suspect that cms has been studied because of its commercial applications. It has not been well-studied. It was studied mostly in the 90’s. Not much interest has been shown since. If you look at the following quotes, it is apparent that URF13 is problematic for plant cells—as well as insect, worm and E. coli cells. The final sentence below says: “This male sterility gene is T-maize anther-specific and its origin is a genetic enigma.” So, here we have a gene that produces a protein that causes cell death, basically, and whose origin is enigmatic—-and, of course, is non-nuclear and thus non-Mendelian.
The Mendelian equivalent to all of this seems to me to be balanced polymorphisms, such as sickle-cell anemia. Now, when you compare a sickle cell to a normal cell, would you say that it is better or worse? Functionally we know the answer is that its “fitness” is lower. In the case of cms, it would seem that in nature this kind of deformation which T-urf13 causes is very likely lethal, though there might be some unknown advantage. Nevertheless, it is only because commercial companies can provide a seed that is heterotic and nonetheless does not need crossing that the issue of cms of any importance whatsoever. However, now we’re dealing with artificial selection, and not natural selection.
But maybe you would like to provide more information—because there surely is not much out there, and it’s old, and, quite frankly, I’m not really interested in looking further. I suspect you work with commercial grain companies and hence your interest in T-urf13; but this places you in a very small circle of people.
Quotes taken from: Hybrid Cultivar Development by Surinder S. Banga Springer-Verlag 1998
Arthur also said:
When I was seventeen, I ended up with a thyro-glossal duct cyst, which had to be operated on twice. The reason for this was that the cyst came about because the thyro-glossal duct did NOT degenerate in utero. So I’m all in favor of ‘nature’ degenerating things. But you are trying to place the same importance on the degeneration of the thyro-glossal duct as anyone would put on the formation of the thyroid, for which the thyro-glossal duct temporarily exists.
I just love Darwinists. How does natural selection work? Through species becoming more fit. How do species become more fit? Through natural selection. How does life come about? Through natural selection. How does natural selection work? Through selective death. Thus, life through death. Or progress through degradation. Is there any objectivity out there in Darwinland anywhere?
Re PaV @ 45:
1. CMS is studied actively and with much earnest at the present. T-urf13 hasn’t been (very much) studied for years, mainly because its origins and modes of action have been worked out (your claims the contrary notwithstanding).
2. CMS is a naturally-occurring characteristic in plants, and plays roles in the evolution of different sexual reproductive strategies (in the wild as well as in breeding programs). A useful google term – gynoecious.
Now, I rather suspect that you will claim that two “genders” – hermaphrodites and females – is less than one gender, but this is but another way that antievolutionists fail math.
3. Characteristics in living things that are controlled by degradation (a very tiny fraction of the complete list, but …): circadian rhythms, brains, the cell cycle, flowering, sexual reproduction, asexual reproduction, mitosis, meiosis, etc., etc., etc.
“Progress through degradation” is a fact of life (in every sense of the phrase). That this fact confounds ID tenets is just another nail in the lid of ID’s coffin. That ID proponents choose to pretend that this process doesn’t exist and cannot possibly contribute anything adds more to the disconnect between ID and biological reality.
PaV, I rather suspect that you don’t have a clue here about the interesting molecular mechanisms (including degradation) that work to build up complexity in living things. Digging in your heels and responding with nervous laughter and rank incredulity is no way to “win” a discussion, let alone learn something.
That point notwithstanding, when it comes to the status and stature of ID, we’re really accomplishing a lot with this discussion.
Arthur Hunt,
Nor is this sort of speculation about how another commenter feels. Did you hear nervous laughter over the written words? Did you smell the incredulity to decide that it was rank? This is no way to comment here or you will not be commenting anymore. Yes, this is a warning.
This is a very confused philosophical position. Degradation doesn’t progress unless you use the term “progress” to mean something like decomposition. But no one would say that decomposition is a progression of life, it is a digression. Degradation is a digression.
Another Art Hunt strawman:
Dr Spetner covered that in 1997, Art.
IOW once again you display ignorance of your opponents and think that ignorance is meaningful discourse.
Also BEFORE you can start degrading to get progress you FIRST have to build to that point.
The status and stature of the theory of evolution:
They cannot even provide a working/ testable hypothesis based on their proposed mechanisms of accumulating genetic accidents.
Art must be real proud of that…
Arthur:
Something from nothing, life from death, and progress through degradation are not part of ID. Somehow I don’t think that detracts from ID in the least.
To vainly attempt to get across to you, I point out to you that ID is concerned with the ‘build-up’ of information, not its degradation. Degradation is simply a class of processes that brings about important results biologically and elsehwere (microchips are ‘etched’, for example). But, as “Joseph” points out, we here at ID are interested in the progressive end of evolution. Microevolution is ceded by most, but macroevolution—which is progressive evolution—is what we refute.
You’re bringing an aracane argument to UD and trying to use it as a sledgehammer. It won’t work. You say cms is still being studied . . . . . but, of course, since it has agricultural applications and ‘Big Ag’ is interested. But there is simply no interest in Turf13. No one is studying it. The most recent review article—which I quoted at your blog—recycles old information indicating that the ‘jury is still out’ on whether turf13 works by ‘addition of function’ or ‘loss of function’. More likely, it is through ‘loss of function’. That appears to be the current state of things, and no one seems interested in finding out more. If turf13 represented a definite ‘addition of function’, and we had some sense as to how that happened, then that would be of interest here. Since neither of the above happen to be the case, I think I’ve probably said my last about it.