I have been following the discussion concerning literalistic interpretations of biblical kinds. While it is clear that defining what a kind is and what or what does not constitute a kind is very difficult, there is another problem with this idea that I thought I would bring up. Both sides agree that there is a lot of variation within populations of organisms
but where did this variation come from? According to modern evolutionary theory these variations are due to the accumulation of mutations (especially gene duplications) in a population over very large periods of time. How is this variation explained by a model where all animals on earth are descended from a single pair of mates that survived a world-wide flood about 5,000 years ago? Animals are diploid (i.e. have two sets of genetic material) and therefore a single mating pair would have at most 4 variants (alleles) of a particular gene. This means that their descendants would have at most 4 alleles of each gene. This however, is not the case, as many genes have more than 4 allele variants. This same problem exists if all humans were descended from a single mating pair (i.e. Adam and Eve) 6,000 years ago. For humans, the average number of alleles per gene is 13-14. The HLA-DRB1 (human leukocyte HLA antigen complex) has 59 such alleles. My question is how is this variation explained if one accepts a literalistic interpretation of Genesis? Thanks.
Explanation for variation within a population
- Thread starter SplitRock
- Start date
Well, it really cant be explained.
However, the common explination I hear is that everything was perfect when god made it, and after sin came into the world, sin mutated the animals into their imperfect form we see today.
Unfortunatly there are flaws with this theory.
1) that most (if not all) mutations are bad, and that these bad mutations Must be pased down to other generations (contrary to the idea of survival of the fittest)
2) The rate of mutation needed to go from "perfect" animals to what we have today is much greater than even what evolutionists think and what the evidence shows.
However, the common explination I hear is that everything was perfect when god made it, and after sin came into the world, sin mutated the animals into their imperfect form we see today.
Unfortunatly there are flaws with this theory.
1) that most (if not all) mutations are bad, and that these bad mutations Must be pased down to other generations (contrary to the idea of survival of the fittest)
2) The rate of mutation needed to go from "perfect" animals to what we have today is much greater than even what evolutionists think and what the evidence shows.
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Thank you for your reply, but I believe you may be missing my point. God could not have put all this variation into the original humans or surviving animals in the first place, because there could only be at most 4 variations of each gene (remember, each individual can only have two sets of genetic material) . Also, I do not think you can call this variation "flaws" because they are generally not bad for the organisms. Everyone seems to agree that genetic variation is necessary for the survival of life. For this same reason, I do not understand how this variation could be a consequence of Adam's fall, since it is not bad. Thanks again.
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Quath
Senior Member
That is a good point, SplitRock. I was looking for such information earlier this week, but I couldn't find any common gene permutations like blood or hair color. Is there a simple example of a gene that has more than 4 alles that is easy to explain? Or do you have a reference for the 13-14 alles per gene?
I read a book on creationism and realized that creationism and evolution have 2 major places where they disagree based on method. They disagree on rates of mutations and if new information can be gained in DNA. Having more than 4 alles per gene would show that DNA can gain information since it was suppose to have originated from Adam and Eve.
Scott (Quath)
I read a book on creationism and realized that creationism and evolution have 2 major places where they disagree based on method. They disagree on rates of mutations and if new information can be gained in DNA. Having more than 4 alles per gene would show that DNA can gain information since it was suppose to have originated from Adam and Eve.
Scott (Quath)
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<P>
<P><A href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/LocusLink/LocRpt.cgi?l=3123">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/LocusLink/LocRpt.cgi?l=3123</A><BR></P>
<BR><BR>Thanks for the reply Quath. The example I gave earlier was for the <A name=HLA-DRB1>HLA-DRB1; Major histocompatibility complex, class II, DR beta 1</A> protein. It plays a major role in immunity. The link below states that: "Hundreds of DRB1 alleles have been described and typing for these polymorphisms is routinely done for bone marrow and kidney transplantation." This is one factor that makes the finding of proper transplants that will not be rejected so difficult. It is very hard to explain such a thing without evolutionary theory. </P>
<P><A href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/LocusLink/LocRpt.cgi?l=3123">http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/LocusLink/LocRpt.cgi?l=3123</A><BR></P>
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Quath
Senior Member
Thanks for the link. I looked around and found a Christian website that tries to handle this evidence. It can be found at http://www.evolutionfairytale.com/articles_debates/bdka_mypost3.htm. Basically, they are saying that the new alles are just mutations that produce variations and do not add information enough to add to to a new "kind."
I find that quite silly myself. A new alle is new information.
Basically, creationists are backpeddling on their claims until they will eventually arrive at evolution.
Scott (Quath)
I find that quite silly myself. A new alle is new information.
Basically, creationists are backpeddling on their claims until they will eventually arrive at evolution.
Scott (Quath)
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Follower of Christ
Literal 6 Day Creationist<br />''An Evening and a
WHOA THERE SILVER.......
Your scientists are retracting and changing ideas and theories on almost a daily basis.
They ''backpeddle'' far more than we do.
If we learn something new, we're no different than non-creationists in that we will change our view if needed.
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Quath
Senior Member
I am not sure where you see backpeddling. Usually there is a refinement. Like age of the universe changes from 10 billion to 13.7 billion.
However, from what I see of Creationism, it is just Evolutionary theory with different mutation rates, does not accept that the number chromosones can grow or shrink and a shorter time span.
Many Christians I know just accept evolution as the method by which God created humanity and all of life. If you don't allow for the Bible to have some flaws then you wind up with Flat Earth societies and people exorcising demons and handling snakes.
Scott (Quath)
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Follower of Christ
Literal 6 Day Creationist<br />''An Evening and a
I do not accept evolution.
Man was created in Gods image as a man in the beginning.
Man was created in Gods image as a man in the beginning.
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FoC, then I ask for the nth time...why are you even bothering posting in the E/C forum then?
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FoC, theories are falsified in science every day. That's what science does, after all.
The problem here is that creationists end up admitting evolution but then say they aren't. Remember, Darwin's book was On the Origin of the Species. So when a creationist site like this one -- http://www.icr.org/pubs/btg-a/btg-152a.htm -- says "Creationists have no problem, however, with speciation, or even the "evolution" of new genera in some instances" then they are admitting evolution.
This particular site tries to limit that by continuing "as long as such development does not extend to the "family" (dogs, cats, horses, etc.)."
The problem here is obvious. Apes are the family classification that humans are in. So now this creationist (and by his admission, all creationists) have just admitted what they cannot admit by the ICR oath -- evolution of humans. What's worse, they now have to say that humans have less information than their ancestors, and therefore were not created "perfect".
It's one thing to falsify hypotheses, FoC, but quite another to contradict your hypothesis but say that you don't!! Creationists admit evolution. But then deny evolution. You can't have it both ways.
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4th April 2003 at 08:20 PM Follower of Christ said this in Post #11
I do not accept evolution.
Man was created in Gods image as a man in the beginning.
That is fine. Can you please answer the question I posed at the start of this thread? I do not even ask for a detailed mechanism. I am only asking how is it physically possible for humans and other organisms to exhibit the amount of variation we see today if they are decended from a single mating pair 6,000- 5,000 years ago according to the YEC model. Thanks.
I do not accept evolution.
Man was created in Gods image as a man in the beginning.
That is fine. Can you please answer the question I posed at the start of this thread? I do not even ask for a detailed mechanism. I am only asking how is it physically possible for humans and other organisms to exhibit the amount of variation we see today if they are decended from a single mating pair 6,000- 5,000 years ago according to the YEC model. Thanks.
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You asked good questions, but I need to comment on what you say "evolution" says.
1. Any given pair of a population has about 75% of the total variation in the population. This has been done from founder studies, where only a single breeding pair has become isolated from the original population. And example is Drosophila on the Hawaiian islands.
2. Most variation comes from SNPs -- single nucleotide pair -- mutations where you have a change in one nucleotide in a gene. Most of these are neutral with respect to natural selection and are therefore invisible to it. Therefore, they remain in the population at low frequencies as described by Mendelian genetics.
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These are intersting points, though I was trying to keep things simple for non-scientists to understand. In any case, I am assuming that 75% is an average, yes? This means that in a given founder pair that percentage can be greater or smaller. Also, much of the DNA is non-coding and is therefore pretty much irrelevant in terms of contributing to variation. In addition, natural selection is not the only mechanism of evolution. Genetic Drift can cause a neutral mutation to increase in a population, especially a small one.
I am not sure what your point is. When I refered to "variation" I was talking about differences in phenotype that we see in all populations of organisms... not specifically to genotype or minor mutations that don't result in coding changes (although obviously an individual's phenotype is dependent on its genotype).
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5th April 2003 at 02:27 PM SplitRock said this in Post #16
These are intersting points, though I was trying to keep things simple for non-scientists to understand. In any case, I am assuming that 75% is an average, yes? This means that in a given founder pair that percentage can be greater or smaller. Also, much of the DNA is non-coding and is therefore pretty much irrelevant in terms of contributing to variation.
This has nothing to do with non-coding regions of the DNA; it's only about the alleles. It's found on page 304 of Futuyma's Evolutionary Biology. "A colony founded by a small number of colonists will suffer some loss of genetic variation: uncommon alleles, in particular are unlikely to be represented. Teh average level of heterozygosity, however, is not greatly reduced in the first generation: it is (1-1/2N)H0, where N is the number of founders and H0 is the heterozygosity in the source population. Thus in a colony founded by one mating pair (N=2), the heterozygosity is, on average, reduced by only 25% in the first generation. Recalling that the genetic variance of a character is proportional to the population's heterozygosity at loci that affect that character, we see that most of the heterozygosity and genetic variance of a large population are, on average, carried over into a colony founded by a few individuals."
In addition, natural selection is not the only mechanism of evolution. Genetic Drift can cause a neutral mutation to increase in a population, especially a small one.
Yes, but the contribution is very small because the probability of a trait being fixed by chance is very small compared to its chance of being fixed by selection. Also, genetic drift cannot account for the designs in biological organisms. Only selection can do that.
I am not sure what your point is. When I refered to "variation" I was talking about differences in phenotype that we see in all populations of organisms... not specifically to genotype or minor mutations that don't result in coding changes (although obviously an individual's phenotype is dependent on its genotype).
Two points:
1. Heterozygosity is not as affected by small populations as you indicated.
2. Most variation in a population is not introduced by gene duplication, but by single nucleotide mutations. Most of those are neutral in that particular environment. They are then available, of course, when the environment changes and one of them is likely to be advantageous in the new environment.
These are intersting points, though I was trying to keep things simple for non-scientists to understand. In any case, I am assuming that 75% is an average, yes? This means that in a given founder pair that percentage can be greater or smaller. Also, much of the DNA is non-coding and is therefore pretty much irrelevant in terms of contributing to variation.
This has nothing to do with non-coding regions of the DNA; it's only about the alleles. It's found on page 304 of Futuyma's Evolutionary Biology. "A colony founded by a small number of colonists will suffer some loss of genetic variation: uncommon alleles, in particular are unlikely to be represented. Teh average level of heterozygosity, however, is not greatly reduced in the first generation: it is (1-1/2N)H0, where N is the number of founders and H0 is the heterozygosity in the source population. Thus in a colony founded by one mating pair (N=2), the heterozygosity is, on average, reduced by only 25% in the first generation. Recalling that the genetic variance of a character is proportional to the population's heterozygosity at loci that affect that character, we see that most of the heterozygosity and genetic variance of a large population are, on average, carried over into a colony founded by a few individuals."
In addition, natural selection is not the only mechanism of evolution. Genetic Drift can cause a neutral mutation to increase in a population, especially a small one.
Yes, but the contribution is very small because the probability of a trait being fixed by chance is very small compared to its chance of being fixed by selection. Also, genetic drift cannot account for the designs in biological organisms. Only selection can do that.
I am not sure what your point is. When I refered to "variation" I was talking about differences in phenotype that we see in all populations of organisms... not specifically to genotype or minor mutations that don't result in coding changes (although obviously an individual's phenotype is dependent on its genotype).
Two points:
1. Heterozygosity is not as affected by small populations as you indicated.
2. Most variation in a population is not introduced by gene duplication, but by single nucleotide mutations. Most of those are neutral in that particular environment. They are then available, of course, when the environment changes and one of them is likely to be advantageous in the new environment.
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