Creation vs. Evolution

[Warthaug]

I don't think anyone is out to disprove evolution. For starters, we can't even get all the evolutionists to agree on what evolution really is.

"Evolutionist" isn't a word.

And there is an agreed upon scientific definition of what evolution is. It is the creationists who confuse matter, by assuming things like abiogenesis, or increasing complexity, are part of that definition.

You have to have a defining reference point, and one is clearly lacking. You have some, like you, who believe that abiogenesis and evolution to be separate.

That is the scientific definition. It is only the creationists who make that mistake.

A convenient version that allows you to leave room for the hidden creator. Other's, like Gould, clearly include them together, or at least doesn't mind linking them in a public forum.

Maybe you should go back and read what he said again. He clearly treated them as two separate phenomena, which occur in sequential order. You'll notice that he clearly states that abiogenesis gives rise to the life that then evolves; as in they are separate things.

And if you don't like the interview, read his books. He goes over the abiogenesis/evolution thing in "Rock of ages", "The richness of Life", "the structure of evolutionary theory", and probably more of his books (those are the only ones on my bookself). It is blatantly clear that he consideres the two to be two different fields of science. He even spends a whole chapter in 'Rock of ages" making that point.

Bryan

 

[Warthaug]

Mutations we witness today are almost always fatal to the animal that undergoes it.

So I guess providing citations to scientific papers which clearly demonstrate this claim of yours is complete and utter bull****e was a waste of my time...

Unless, in creationist math, 0.00002% to 0.0053% is "almost always". And that's just detrimental; not all of those are lethal.

Just as another example of how very wrong you are, here's an example of a powerful scientific method called "ENU mutagenesis", wherein you randomly mutagenize mice. The goal - to randomly mutate genes of interest, and then ID those genes by screening for phenotype - including embryonic lethality.

Sung YH, Song J, Lee HW. Functional genomics approach using mice.
J Biochem Mol Biol. 2004 Jan 31;37(1):122-32.

Large-scale N-ethyl-N-nitrosourea mutagenesis of mice--from phenotypes to genes -- Rathkolb et al. 85 (6): 635 -- Experimental Physiology

The goal in ENU mutagensis is to induce enough mutations to hit something interesting - without mutating to the point of death. How many mutations do we shoot for in ENU?

The answer is (insert drumroll here):

1/1000 genes (that would be 18-22 mutations, within protein-coding regions), which works out to a genomic average of 360-400 mutation per mouse.

And that mutation rate was chosen as it was the highest rate achievable without significant mortality. And that's the mutation rate on top of the mouses natural mutation rate of 2.5-4.2 mutations in protein encoding regions/generation (which works out to 125-210 mutations/genome/generation)!

Add those numbers together, and each ENU mouse has (on average, of course):
20-28 mutated genes
485-610 total mutations

Most mutations lethal

Bryan

 

[Warthaug]

Sure it is. It is a theory like others with some supporting evidence..ie DNA encoding.

You're mistaking what "thoery" means in science lingo verses common useage. We've repeated this dozens of times already in this thread, so here's the short version:

A scientific thoery:
1) Is based on, and explains, all pre-existing data
2) Is testable, meaning you can design experiments/make observations to see if it is correct.
3) Is predictive, meaning it accuratly predicts the results of the experiments from point #2, and lastly
4) Is falsifiable. Meaning if its wrong, you can show its wrong.

Compare that to creationism:
1) Is based on finding reasons to ignore most pre-existing data
2) You cannot design experiments to test it
3) Since you cannot do #2, #3 is not possible, and lastly
4) Is not falsifiable. Not matter what result you get, all you say is "god made it look that way", and BAM, it fits the "theory".

Creationism simply doesn't make the grade as a scientific theory; it doesn't even achieve one of the four things you need to be a theory. Which is why it doesn't belong in science class.

Bryan

 

[Warthaug]

When one goes out 10²² standard deviations then grasps at straws and stands up with a straight face and whines that they are not taken seriously, but should be given equal time and consideration, then I have to say that person is an idiot.

I just spilled my coffee after reading that. Unfortunately, I don't know how many others will grasp this little gem.

I may have to work that into my next talk somehow...

Bryan

 

[sheck33]

I just spilled my coffee after reading that. Unfortunately, I don't know how many others will grasp this little gem.

I may have to work that into my next talk somehow...

Bryan

Aint it a gem
Love it.

 

[Warthaug]

Miller took molecules which were believed to represent the major components of the early Earth's atmosphere and put them into a closed system. Miller observed that as much as 10-15% of the carbon was now in the form of organic compounds. Two percent of the carbon had formed some of the amino acids which are used to make proteins. Perhaps most importantly, Miller's experiment showed that organic compounds such as amino acids, which are essential to cellular life, could be made easily under the conditions that scientists believed to be present on the early earth.

There has been a recent wave of skepticism concerning Miller's experiment because it is now believed that the early earth's atmosphere did not contain predominantly reductant molecules. Another objection is that this experiment required a tremendous amount of energy. While it is believed lightning storms were extremely common on the primitive Earth, they were not continuous as the Miller/Urey experiment portrayed. Thus it has been argued that while amino acids and other organic compounds may have been formed, they would not have been formed in the amounts which this experiment produced.

Just to add one small point to this excellent summary. More recent work has identified a variety of earthly minerals which, when submersed in water containing compounds at the ratios thought to be found in the oceans of early-earth, catalyze the formation of nearly every organic compound required to create modern life. This solves the energy issue; catalysis in place of high-energy electrons. Likewise, the quantities produced would be much greater, as you'd have an on-going process, rather than bursts due to lightning.

The book is still open on Millers work, but it seems unlikely to be the answer.

But his work did open the door to more realistic studies, by showing it was possible to generate the needed compounds. Since then, abiogenesis researchers have found numerous, more favorable ways of generating organic compounds, and have even identified many of the important compounds in both interstellar space and in cometary/meteoric material.

So while Miller was wrong (or maybe found a minor component), its not like he was the beginning and end of abiogenesis research.

So what's your problem?

He's desperate to prove abiogenesis impossible, so he's hooked onto a decades-old piece of science, while ignoring everything that came from the foundation Miller built.

Bryan

 

[Warthaug]

A Gene Divided Reveals The Details Of Natural Selection

Sorry to invade again as I said I was leaving, but I came across the above article. As I stated before, I don't have the journals in front of me, but the original work was in Nature.

But even this article clearly states that the gene duplication, if there even was one, would have happened 100 million years ago. This is obviously not directly observable.

However, this is just one gene that has duplicated. As I pointed out - and provided citations for - gene duplications are commonly observed as they happen - as in you find the duplication in a child, but not in the parent(s). Duplications of genes and other regions of DNA, appear to be the most common form of mutation in humans, with the average human carrying 7-12 indel-type duplications.

Oh, BTW, the scientific literature has 2834 articles (and counting) about gene duplications in humans, including 461 (and counting) clinical descriptions of patients who have experienced a duplication. For example:

Yu S, Cox K, Friend K, Smith S, Buchheim R, Bain S, Liebelt J, Thompson E,
Familial 22q11.2 duplication: a three-generation family with a 3-Mb duplication
and a familial 1.5-Mb duplication. Clin Genet. 2008 Feb;73(2):160-4. Epub 2007 Dec 12.

Bernardini L, Castori M, Capalbo A, Mokini V, Mingarelli R, Simi P, Bertuccelli
A, Novelli A, Dallapiccola B.
Bratkovic D. Syndromic craniosynostosis due to complex chromosome 5 rearrangement and MSX2
gene triplication. Am J Med Genet A. 2007 Dec 15;143A(24):2937-43.

Maybe you should try reading a few of those, else you make other silly mistakes like assuming that there is only one article, in yeast, showing that duplications occur.

Anyway, my specific example of gene duplication in yeast I gave in a previous post was dead on. And still we have no direct observation of it ever occurring. I also find it quite funny that the authors called this "evolution in action," when clearly this supposedly happened 100 million years ago.

Its hardly dead-on. You found 1 article that said what you wanted, while ignore the several thousand showing the exact opposite.

Typical creationist tactic; find the one piece of data you can twist to fit your beliefs, and ignore the rest.

Bryan

 

[gary-ramey]

Quote:
Originally Posted by ce4jesus
Okay my favorite fable is the Miller Experiment which is still in textbooks today. I've said this before and I'll say it again. Science becomes nothing more than a materialistic philosophy when it fails to police an endless trail of out-dated science which has been proven false by the scientific community. The implication is they're either lazy to fix it, or they just don't care because they're creating a planet of little atheists out there in our schools.

Exactly my point. Instead of going back to enlighten people on the past mistakes of science, its expedient to move on to the next, truth-of-the-moment theory.

A good scientist would never make such extrapolation. But I guess that we would never confuse you with a good scientist anyway.

The Miller-Urey experiment is perfectly valid. Many experiments of this kind followed.
Please provide some concrete information that states the Miller experiement is 'false' or a 'fable'. That experiment is what it is. It provided some very interesting insight into how primitive life might have formed. Needles to say you of course have no scientifically verifyable alternative.

I know you are focussing on mistakes that are inevitably made in science because that is all you really have to work with. You use mistakes made in science to 'prove' your opinions. Ludicrous.

His little pinky is more of a scientist than you'll ever be.

Then go read his response and understand that the Miller Experiment isn't valid anymore. First the atmosphere Miller used has been discredited. Secondly, even subsequent experiments which corrected the atmosphere yeilded nothing more than formaldehyde and cyanide (organic molecules). Furthermore, even if you had the correct protein molecules you still don't come close to the simplest lifeform. You can take a living cell today, puncture it and empty its contents into a sterile saline solution. You have all the ingredients...but you don't have life. Quite frankly there's nothing you can do to those contents to "breathe" life into them either.

 

[gary-ramey]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Theunis
One day we ALL will know the truth and the truth will be revealed to us.

Who knows, but in the meantime keep this creationist nonsense out of the science classroom, thanks.

So presenting creationism in the classroom with equal time might threaten evolution? But I thought evolution was indisputable.

 

[gary-ramey]

"Evolutionist" isn't a word.

And there is an agreed upon scientific definition of what evolution is. It is the creationists who confuse matter, by assuming things like abiogenesis, or increasing complexity, are part of that definition.

It's shorter than proponents of evolution and more accurate than Darwinists. Take your argument about abiogenesis up with your contemporaries, like Gould, who obviously disagree with you.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ce4jesus
Mutations we witness today are almost always fatal to the animal that undergoes it.

So I guess providing citations to scientific papers which clearly demonstrate this claim of yours is complete and utter bull****e was a waste of my time...

Unless, in creationist math, 0.00002% to 0.0053% is "almost always". And that's just detrimental; not all of those are lethal.

Just as another example of how very wrong you are, here's an example of a powerful scientific method called "ENU mutagenesis", wherein you randomly mutagenize mice. The goal - to randomly mutate genes of interest, and then ID those genes by screening for phenotype - including embryonic lethality.

Sung YH, Song J, Lee HW. Functional genomics approach using mice.
J Biochem Mol Biol. 2004 Jan 31;37(1):122-32.

Large-scale N-ethyl-N-nitrosourea mutagenesis of mice--from phenotypes to genes -- Rathkolb et al. 85 (6): 635 -- Experimental Physiology

The goal in ENU mutagensis is to induce enough mutations to hit something interesting - without mutating to the point of death. How many mutations do we shoot for in ENU?

The answer is (insert drumroll here):

1/1000 genes (that would be 18-22 mutations, within protein-coding regions), which works out to a genomic average of 360-400 mutation per mouse.

And that mutation rate was chosen as it was the highest rate achievable without significant mortality. And that's the mutation rate on top of the mouses natural mutation rate of 2.5-4.2 mutations in protein encoding regions/generation (which works out to 125-210 mutations/genome/generation)!

Add those numbers together, and each ENU mouse has (on average, of course):
20-28 mutated genes
485-610 total mutations

Most mutations lethal

Maybe I should have put the word "naturally occurring" in there. In a closed-loop system where you control all the variables, I'm sure there are quite a few possibilities.