Evolution/Creation on Trial

[Smidlee]

Where you got that, from what I wrote, I have no earthly idea.

Man knows what he knows just like a animal know what it does because they were created that way. Man is scientist by the Great Scientist of all scientist.

 

[Loudmouth]

ERV have been found to have a purpose and probably where viruses get their genetic code from.

Whether ERV's have function has zero to do with where they came from.

Also, ERV's get their code from exogenous viruses, not the other way around. You only get functional viruses when you use a consensus sequence of ERV's, as you would expect if exogenous viruses produced the ERV's.

Comparing genes doesn't lead to turning animals into scientist.

The comparison of genes is the evidence for the cause of human intelligence, as already explained. It seems that you are left with a single option, to pretend that you don't understand plain English.

 

[bhsmte]

Man knows what he knows just like a animal know what it does because they were created that way. Man is scientist by the Great Scientist of all scientist.

Cool story.

 

[Smidlee]

Whether ERV's have function has zero to do with where they came from.

Also, ERV's get their code from exogenous viruses, not the other way around. You only get functional viruses when you use a consensus sequence of ERV's, as you would expect if exogenous viruses produced the ERV's.

Yes where did all that genetic code came from and exactly where does virus gets it's code since it can't reproduce of itself? Code and information is a real problem for evolutionist.

There is evidence of exogenous virus coming from ERV.

The comparison of genes is the evidence for the cause of human intelligence, as already explained. It seems that you are left with a single option, to pretend that you don't understand plain English.

The biggest changes are not due to genes so gene alone will not turn an animal into a scientist.

 

[Loudmouth]

Yes where did all that genetic code came from and exactly where does virus gets it's code since it can't reproduce of itself?

It gets it by reverse transcribing its RNA genome into DNA, and then inserting that DNA into the host genome. Once there, the LTR's act as strong promoters, tricking the host transcriptional systems to produce tons of copies of the viral particles. Those viral particles bud off at the surface of the cell and repeat the process when they bind to and insert into another host cell.

Code and information is a real problem for evolutionist.

Not a problem for this evolutionist. I have forgotten more about code and information than you have learned.

The biggest changes are not due to genes so gene alone will not turn an animal into a scientist.

It is due to changes in DNA sequence, whether that be in a promoter region, a DNA protein binding region, or in the amino acid sequence of a protein.

 

[Smidlee]

It gets it by reverse transcribing its RNA genome into DNA, and then inserting that DNA into the host genome. Once there, the LTR's act as strong promoters, tricking the host transcriptional systems to produce tons of copies of the viral particles. Those viral particles bud off at the surface of the cell and repeat the process when they bind to and insert into another host cell.



Not a problem for this evolutionist. I have forgotten more about code and information than you have learned.

So where did all that genetic code come from the start with. You believe a virus just popped into existence with it's code and start to insert to living cells?

It is due to changes in DNA sequence, whether that be in a promoter region, a DNA protein binding region, or in the amino acid sequence of a protein.

That doesn't change the fact the biggest difference are not due to genes.

 

[Loudmouth]

So where did all that genetic code come from the start with.

Irrelevant as it applies to using ERV's as evidence of common ancestry between humans and chimps. All we need to know is how retroviruses behaved once they were here.

You believe a virus just popped into existence with it's code and start to insert to living cells?

Irrelevant as it applies to using ERV's as evidence of common ancestry. Wherever the first retrovirus came from, we know how they acted once they were here. They act by inserting themselves into host genomes among millions of possible insertion sites. Finding the same retroviral insertion at the same location in two different genomes is evidence for a single insertion in a common ancestor since the chances of it happening independently are improbable.

That doesn't change the fact the biggest difference are not due to genes.

Which is irrelevant since I am saying that the differences are due to differences in DNA sequence.

Will you be addressing the actual argument I am making, or are you going to flail away at your strawman?

 

[stevevw]

What animals look like "completely formed from their own separate shapes"? Humans and chimps share the same ape shape. Humans and baboons share the same primate shape. Humans and bears share the same mammal shape. Humans and fish share the same jawed vertebrate shape. What exactly are you referring to?

And different creatures have an eye in common and they are unrelated. Many creatures have wings in common and they are unrelated. Humans and bears may sort of share a mammal shape but they dont share that mammal shape with a lot of other mammals like the whale, kangaroo, elephant or bat for example.

 

[stevevw]

Irrelevant as it applies to using ERV's as evidence of common ancestry. Wherever the first retrovirus came from, we know how they acted once they were here. They act by inserting themselves into host genomes among millions of possible insertion sites. Finding the same retroviral insertion at the same location in two different genomes is evidence for a single insertion in a common ancestor since the chances of it happening independently are improbable.

It seems that humans and apes dont have as much similar placed ERV as thought from the research I have read. Plus the is a boig question mark over how thousands of viruses could survive and

We identified a human endogenous retrovirus K (HERV-K) provirus that is present at the orthologous position in the gorilla and chimpanzee genomes, but not in the human genome. Humans contain an intact preintegration site at this locus.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11378389
Based on analysis of finished BAC chimpanzee genome sequence, we characterize a retroviral element (Pan troglodytes endogenous retrovirus 1 [PTERV1]) that has become integrated in the germ line of African great ape and Old World monkey species but is absent from humans and Asian ape genomes.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1054887/

It also seems there maybe hot spots or specific sites where these ERV may target so it may be no surprise that they end up in similar spots for different creatures. There are similarities with EVR locations for unrelated creatures as well. So its not so straight forward to be drawing any conclusions as to how these were obtained in the first place or whether they perform so important role and are needed anyway.

Large-scale discovery of insertion hotspots and preferential integration sites of human transposed elements.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2836564/
http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.0020234
Remarkably, we have found many cases of parallel intron gains at essentially the same sites in independent genotypes. This strongly argues against the common assumption that when two species share introns at the same site, it is always due to inheritance from a common ancestor.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091210111148.htm

 

[Shemjaza]

And different creatures have an eye in common and they are unrelated. Many creatures have wings in common and they are unrelated. Humans and bears may sort of share a mammal shape but they dont share that mammal shape with a lot of other mammals like the whale, kangaroo, elephant or bat for example.

Actually they do if you examine the bone structure.

Have a look at while fins versus fish fins.

 

[Loudmouth]

And different creatures have an eye in common and they are unrelated.

Such as?

Many creatures have wings in common and they are unrelated.

Such as?

Humans and bears may sort of share a mammal shape but they dont share that mammal shape with a lot of other mammals like the whale, kangaroo, elephant or bat for example.

There are features that wolves and Chihuahuas don't share.

 

[Loudmouth]

It seems that humans and apes dont have as much similar placed ERV as thought from the research I have read.

How many are shared and how many are not shared? Be specific. From my counts, humans and chimps share over 200,000 ERV's. Of the ERV's in the human genome, less than 100 out of 200,000 are not found in the chimp genome at the same location. Of the ERV's found in the chimp genome, less than 300 of the 200,000 ERV's are not found at the same location in the human genome. What do your counts show?

Plus the is a boig question mark over how thousands of viruses could survive and

The same way you survive with thousands of ERV's in your genome.

We identified a human endogenous retrovirus K (HERV-K) provirus that is present at the orthologous position in the gorilla and chimpanzee genomes, but not in the human genome.

Humans contain an intact preintegration site at this locus.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11378389

If memory serves, there are 2 to 4 of these insertions compared to the 200,000 in the genomes of each of these species. This is a well known effect of incomplete lineage sorting for ERV's that have not reached fixation within the population.

Based on analysis of finished BAC chimpanzee genome sequence, we characterize a retroviral element (Pan troglodytes endogenous retrovirus 1 [PTERV1]) that has become integrated in the germ line of African great ape and Old World monkey species but is absent from humans and Asian ape genomes.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1054887/

Using ID/creationism, what would you predict with respect to these insertions? Will they be found at orthologous or non-orthologous locations in the chimp and gorilla genomes, and why?

It also seems there maybe hot spots or specific sites where these ERV may target so it may be no surprise that they end up in similar spots for different creatures.

How many insertions would it take to get two insertions that occur at the same position with these hotspots? Let's see the math.

There are similarities with EVR locations for unrelated creatures as well.

Such as?

So its not so straight forward to be drawing any conclusions as to how these were obtained in the first place or whether they perform so important role and are needed anyway.

So far, you haven't been able to bring any relevant evidence that would cast doubt on the ERV evidence.

Large-scale discovery of insertion hotspots and preferential integration sites of human transposed elements.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2836564/
http://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.0020234
p
Remarkably, we have found many cases of parallel intron gains at essentially the same sites in independent genotypes. This strongly argues against the common assumption that when two species share introns at the same site, it is always due to inheritance from a common ancestor.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091210111148.htm

Out of how many cases of non-orthologous transposon insertions?

 

[florida2]

And different creatures have an eye in common and they are unrelated. Many creatures have wings in common and they are unrelated. Humans and bears may sort of share a mammal shape but they dont share that mammal shape with a lot of other mammals like the whale, kangaroo, elephant or bat for example.

Yes they do. Four limbs, head with two eyes a nose and a mouth, two ears, fur, give birth to live young etc etc.

Look at the skeletons and they are amazingly similar. For example upper limb bones. Whale fins, bat wings and human hands contain exactly the same bones (though obviously somewhat different sizes and shapes).

There's quite a few sites about it but here's one that sums it up http://www.sussexvt.k12.de.us/science/Evolution/Evidence for Evolution.htm

 

[Paul of Eugene OR]

Explain how evolution can turn an animal into a scientist.

a) evolve intelligence

b) using intelligence, develop culture

c) Using culture, develop science.

Well, that was easy.

 

[stevevw]

Actually they do if you examine the bone structure.

Have a look at while fins versus fish fins.

That makes the shapes pretty broad then. You may be able to find some similarities with some bone structures. But the two are very different

Yes they do. Four limbs, head with two eyes a nose and a mouth, two ears, fur, give birth to live young etc etc.

Look at the skeletons and they are amazingly similar. For example upper limb bones. Whale fins, bat wings and human hands contain exactly the same bones (though obviously somewhat different sizes and shapes).

There's quite a few sites about it but here's one that sums it up http://www.sussexvt.k12.de.us/science/Evolution/Evidence for Evolution.htm

All this can be the same evidence for common design. Afterall a car designer doesnt make a completely different car shape and features when he brings out different models.

 

[Smidlee]

a) evolve intelligence

b) using intelligence, develop culture

c) Using culture, develop science.

Well, that was easy.

You seem to left out the whole fact that man is wired to think as a scientist. If it was that easy we could take any animal and make them a scientist on a regular bases. A evolving intelligence doesn't exist. Just by slapping "evolution" on to something doesn't magically turn an animal into a scientist. We only know what we already know.

Also the strange fact is the more educated someone becomes the less offspring they will have which means natural selection is in flavor of the uneducated in the long run.

It's the same kind of thinking Dawkins use that because eyes had to evolve so many times then nature evolve eyes often and easily but there is no evidence of this. If different eyes doesn't pop in and out of existence on a regular bases than natural selection has absolute nothing to select for.

 

[The Cadet]

*grumble grumble delayed response grumble grumble*

This seems to be the recognized understanding by most who disagree with evolution.

Then those who disagree with evolution are wrong (although that's kind of a given anyways). I'm sorry, but no amount of repeating it makes it true. The idea that the selection process is "blind chance" is fundamentally wrong. Even assuming a massive amount of randomness, even the slightest non-random selection pressure will lead to large evolutionary differences. This video details an algorithm using almost entirely random factors, with only one significant non-random factor, and it still leads to clear evolution.

So as opposed to a guided process that knows what its doing. Wouldn't that be design or intelligence. Or is it the intelligence you have when your not having an intelligent and guided process.

Just because a process is not directed by an outside intelligence does not make it random. There is no outside intelligence governing what happens when I drop a ball, but I would gladly bet money against anyone who claims it to be "random". While mutations are for all intents and purposes "random", selection pressures, despite not being designed or intelligent, most certainly are not.

I can never understand this. Its like something that was created out of nothing or life from non life somehow becomes its own creating factory that produces life in a directed manner pumping out complex bits of living creatures. If it were anything but evolution it would be an ingenious designed machine produced by the greatest brains in the world.

Yes, and if elephants were white, small, and smooth, they'd be aspirin. The fact is that what we're dealing with is an ostensibly natural process. It seems to have natural origins, there's no known natural designer, and invoking the supernatural is, as always, premature and useless.

But its a blind process in that the mutations that produce one tiny part of something like a tiny bit of a complex feature or system in living things doesn't know what part is needed next to continue building that bigger thing.

You're right. It doesn't matter. Innocuous mutations can add up over time, bringing with them new functions. Heck, you can build something as complex as the bacterial flagellum protein by protein, each step bringing an advantage to the organism.

Natural selection can only work with what it is given. So its blind to what is needed in each step of the process for building parts. Its like a car assembly line that may mutate some wheels but doesn't know it needs a steering wheel as part of the building process. So it throws out all sorts of things that may be totally unconnected to building a car. Then one day by chance it produces a steering wheel.

Actually, that's a bit of a funny story. See, in design, things generally have clear goals, and are designed from the top down. In evolution, however, we see, again and again, complex machines that show clear signs of tinkering.

Things are never built from the top down, they are tinkered with from the bottom up, slowly building step by step, adding a piece there, removing a piece there, gluing this existing structure to this other part in a way that probably wasn't intended and doesn't really work as well as it would if you just put a piece specifically built for that spot there. Sometimes, this results in magnificent systems that seem improbable, that seem like they need to have been designed from the top down. Sometimes, it results in the absolute mess that is bacterial chemotaxis. But this idea that there's somehow a plan is just not tenable. Or can you provide a biological system which does not show these qualities?

It has to do this with every step of the way and sometimes needing several parts at the same time to be blindly produced so that it makes the other parts work properly as single parts are useless on their own. The chances of that happening as a chance and blind process is like throwing millions of letters up in the air to come down and write a novel.

Examples, please, backed up by legitimate peer-reviewed science. I need you to actually demonstrate that the intermediates served no function. We saw this claim with the bacterial flagellum, and it was shown to be wrong - every single intermediate step served a function and was advantageous to the organism.

I realize I've been a bit heavy on the video citations in this post, and I'm sorry for that, but CDK007 really just does such a great job of showing these concepts at work, and if you can't watch them, the description is usually quite informative as well. I'm not an evo-devo specialist or a biologist of any kind, but as far as I can understand it, systems that require numerous useless or harmful intermediaries should rarely, if ever, evolve. The question is, can we find such a system? I don't think we can.

Scientists havnt even began to explain how abiogenesis has created life from non life. In fact its such a problem that one of the more popular theories now is that the building blocks for it to start came on the back of a meteorite.

Panspermia is not a widely-held theory, it's a fringe idea. And yes, how life came to be is a hard question to answer, given the lack of physical evidence and the inherent complexity of the problem. However, evolution does not deal with abiogenesis. The origin of life is really quite irrelevant to the theory of evolution. The attempt to conflate abiogenesis with evolution in order to tar the latter with the relative infancy of the former is really not productive.

As for mutations, Smilodon's Retreat did an article on it, which I will defer to as I have no particular knowledge of the rate of positive mutations:

http://www.skepticink.com/smilodons...evolution-part-10-most-mutations-are-harmful/

No, new information has not been added that did not already exist. Those T's, A's, C's and G's "already existed," you simply create variation within the species - i.e. new breeds - just as with real life. A new dominant or recessive trait, not a new genome from simpler makeup to more complex makeup - from CAT to CATG.

So in other words, there is no difference in information between the binary string "01" and the Skyrim binary. Look, far from me to assert that you (or anyone else) lack expertise in any given field, but you seriously lack expertise in this field. Information theory is actually something we covered in my college courses before I dropped out. I was not very good at it, but I'd like to think I understand it well enough to say that you can increase the total amount of information present without increasing the size of the alphabet. Otherwise, coding anything in binary would be a complete waste of time, and computers as we know them would not work. I'd go so far as to say that the fact you're typing this on a forum proves you wrong! It doesn't matter that all future configurations will be some combination of existing base pairs, just like it doesn't matter that you can express literally any combination of characters as 0s and 1s - through an increase in the number of base pairs present and the change of said base pairs, you can increase the "information" present.

I really feel the need to emphasize this. A string of 4 randomly flipped bits contains less information than a string of 8 randomly flipped bits, despite the fact that they are both combinations of 1s and 0s. If you don't understand this, you need to stop using terms from information theory as if you had any idea what they meant.

Dead matter does not possess the innate information necessary to produce the array of organized information packed structural and functional variation of the simplest life forms

Well there's a tall claim.

Dead matter is not autocatalytic (it does not start doing things on its own, it MUST BE acted upon)

Yeah, you know, like having it slosh around in a suspension governed by gravity, Brownian motion, and centrifugal force. There are tons of forces acting upon basic organic molecules that could cause them to react. Sometimes it's the introduction of energy (via underwater volcanic activity or a lightning strike), sometimes it's mixing with some catalyst which lowers the necessary energy required for the reaction to the point where it occurs spontaneously, sometimes it's exposure to different chemicals. These molecules never had to show any agency.

The principle of causality states that you can't get more in the effect than you had in the cause.

Hey look, another tall claim with little backing.

Dead matter never organizes itself under its own power.

What do you mean by "its own power"? Crystals form under nothing more than natural circumstances all the time, and nothing demands that the first cells have anything more than a certain set of conditions and the laws of physics and chemistry in order to replicate.

Question: “Well then why then does the atheist insist on such an incredibly improbable explanation for the universe?

Answer: Because without it they cannot remain an atheist!

Honestly, I'm not sure how you calculated the odds of your God existing. Can you show your work? And you know what? Even if abiogenesis were proven completely wrong (which your arguments completely fail to make the case for), you know what my answer would be? "I don't know". Because inserting a supernatural cause accomplishes nothing and is fundamentally unfalsifiable. If we don't know the answer to a question, the answer does not automatically become "god did it". "God did it" is, historically, a phenomenally poor answer to questions like "how does this work" "how did this happen" and "why does X behave like that".

How do you even get from "Abiogenesis is wrong" to "there is no naturalistic explanation"? How do you get from "there is no naturalistic explanation" to "therefore god did it"?

 

[The Cadet]

That makes the shapes pretty broad then. You may be able to find some similarities with some bone structures. But the two are very different

Actually, we find this exact bone structure in all tetrapods. The bones themselves may be shorter or longer, but this basic structure doesn't go away.

We also never find it in non-tetrapods. You will never find a fish with this bone structure. Homologous structures like this make perfect sense in the light of evolution, and they make testable predictions. By contrast...

All this can be the same evidence for common design. Afterall a car designer doesnt make a completely different car shape and features when he brings out different models.

Of course it could be! Name me one thing that couldn't fit the "common designer" hypothesis.

...See, this is the problem with intelligent design. It's fundamentally unfalsifiable. As I keep saying over and over again: no matter what the scenario, you can come up with some excuse for why the designer made things the way it did! Same goal, same structure? "Same design, same designer". Same goal, totally different structure (such as with the whale and the shark)? "The designer got bored". Bananas are perfect for human consumption? "The designer wanted us to have this lovely fruit." Pineapples eat our flesh? "The designer wants humans to work for it sometimes."

Or, to come back to the issue above, the intelligent design hypothesis could easily accommodate both never finding a fish with Ulna, Humerus, Radius, Carpals, Metacarpals, and Phalanges in that particular structure, and finding such a fish. Evolution makes a testable prediction here, one that has, thus far, borne out completely. Intelligent design does not.

A hypothesis which fits every potential line of evidence by definition makes no falsifiable predictions and is as a result completely useless and completely untestable. You cannot distinguish between a world in which the hypothesis is true and one in which it is false. That's an unworkable, useless idea.

EDIT: I have been informed that while convergent evolution such as in the case of a fish with therapod bone structure should be rare, they are by no means impossible. My bad.

 

[joshua 1 9]

Why would you expect that much change in 100,000 years when there has been little change in the genus for tens of millions of years with the same generation times?

"Genomic mutation clock–based timings of the landmark speciation events leading to the evolution of D. melanogaster show that it shared most recent common ancestry 5.4 MYA with D. simulans, 12.6 MYA with D. erecta+D. orena, 12.8 MYA with D. yakuba+D. teisseri, 35.6 MYA with the takahashii subgroup, 41.3 MYA with the montium subgroup, 44.2 MYA with the ananassae subgroup, 54.9 MYA with the obscura group, 62.2 MYA with the willistoni group, and 62.9 MYA with the subgenus Drosophila."
http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/content/21/1/36.short



The genomes are very, very different. Bacteria do not have the same mutation rates or the same HOX genes that allow for morphological plasticity in animals.



If evolution is true, then no animal should evolve into a completely different animal. Fish and humans share a common vertebrate ancestor, and we are both still vertebrates. You stay on your branch of the tree of life.



Wings are not a new body part. They are a modification of already existing body parts.



The Drosophila genus began to diverge 60 million years ago. Why would you expect anything more dramatic than the current variation of fruit flies in a time period of just 100 years?

I do not expect slow gradual change over time. That model does not even work for geology. Evolution works off of extinctions and explosions (radiation) it works better with the creation model where God spoke and there was life. DNA being "the language of God" according to the book written by the leading expert on DNA.

 

[joshua 1 9]

Through the accumulation of mutations that increase intelligence.

Again there are much better theory than your mutation theory. For example the theory that cooking made us human. Most theory for the evolution has to do with food to some degree. Often the nourishment we have can go to intelligence, strength, OR speed. Take your pick. The bird wants to fly so their energy is invested in strength for wings. The horse can be strong or fast. A race horse or a working horse. Need I go on?