Do the math, mutations don't add up.

WOW....BEEP BEEP back the truck up lucaspa...you are claiming that there are more beneficial mutations than harmfull mutations....hmmm. looks like your re-writing evolutionary science.

Of course lucaspa simplified his numbers associating the mutations with genes.

All the while forgeting that the amount of information in the 3 billion base pairs in the DNA in every human cell has been estimated to be equivalent to that in 1,000 books of encyclopaedia size

Perhaps he ought to re-do his math

Come on, AG. Just explain the numbers; show your work, give detailed results. What numbers are you adding? What are you multiplying? How often?

For you to make such a strong claim, you must have done the math; couldn't you just type it in for us?

And, of course, respond to the points raised by Lucaspa and the others with more than just "you must have done your math wrong."

No vance, i showed that lucaspa was presenting a cartoon version of evolution and mutations.

Still you have continued to run away.

Ark Guy said:

In fact large populations would tend to hide any mutational change. Thus negating any advanntage for survival.

For example, when..that is when this hypothetical mutation occurs to one of the millions of individuals which gives it a survival advantage, that mutation will more than likely prove to be insignaficant.

For example, gather 1 million people, six feet and smaller and group them in one place. Add a 7 foot tall person and toss in a loaf of bread with out looking at where your throwing it. I doubt the 7 foot tall person will come up with the bread...
The odds say you'll need to throw a lot of bread before the tall guys even gets his loaf.

So as you see, the added benefit in a large population has llittle effect.

Now drop the number down to 12 people and a tall guy and you have a chance of the tall guy getting the bread.

But of course you already admitted that you need large populations for the mutation to be successfull and survive.

Click to expand...

If the mutation directly affects the survival of the individual, it will certainly have an affect. You purposely chose an example where it didn't. This does nothing to show that they can't have a cummulative and lasting effect and be fixed in a population.

Why do you suppose that sickle cell anemia is more predominent in populations that have been affected by malaria in the past?

Lets say out of a million people, one person has a mutation that gives him resistence to malaria and then you expose the population to malaria. My guess is that the beneficial mutation will affect the population and that this person and their offspring with resistence will have more offspring and a longer family line than those dying off around them. See, I picked an example where the mutation actually provide benefit instead of picking one and by definition stating that it doesn't. Do you care to address it?

Ark Guy said:

No vance, i showed that lucaspa was presenting a cartoon version of evolution and mutations.

Still you have continued to run away.

Click to expand...

Why don't you show us what numbers you are using for reasonable rates of mutation in your calculations and correct him?

Ark Guy said:

WOW....BEEP BEEP back the truck up lucaspa...you are claiming that there are more beneficial mutations than harmfull mutations....hmmm. looks like your re-writing evolutionary science.

Click to expand...

Do you have factual data of what proportion of mutations are beneficial?

I'm still waiting to see, if lucaspa's numbers are wrong, what the correct numbers are, and where Ark Guy got them.

Ark Guy said:

No vance, i showed that lucaspa was presenting a cartoon version of evolution and mutations.

Still you have continued to run away.

Click to expand...

Well, no you haven't, you just SAID that he was. Not the same thing.

This post bumped for lack of answer.

Ark Guy said:

Of course lucaspa simplified his numbers associating the mutations with genes.

All the while forgeting that the amount of information in the 3 billion base pairs in the DNA in every human cell has been estimated to be equivalent to that in 1,000 books of encyclopaedia size

Perhaps he ought to re-do his math

Click to expand...

Once again,
Of course lucaspa simplified his numbers associating the mutations with genes.

All the while forgeting that the amount of information in the 3 billion base pairs in the DNA in every human cell has been estimated to be equivalent to that in 1,000 books of encyclopaedia size.

Perhaps he ought to re-do his math.

Ark Guy said:

This post bumped for lack of answer.

Click to expand...

Speaking of posts going unanswered: You haven't produced your numbers yet.

For someone who uses an awful lot of SIZE=6 tags to demand that other people support their claims, you're awfully slow to support yours.

Just the numbers. If you can do the math, you can show us the exact numbers you used, and how you used them.

Ark Guy said:

This post bumped for lack of answer.



Once again,
Of course lucaspa simplified his numbers associating the mutations with genes.

All the while forgeting that the amount of information in the 3 billion base pairs in the DNA in every human cell has been estimated to be equivalent to that in 1,000 books of encyclopaedia size.

Perhaps he ought to re-do his math.

Click to expand...

What does the number of base pairs in the DNA have to do with the rate of mutations? Is your argument basically "There are some really really big numbers here so my argument is correct?". Can you tell us how many base pairs make up a gene?

Or is it that "Even with a very small rate of mutation, the number of base pairs affected can be huge, which would lead us to believe that multiple genes can be affected or there can be multiple mutation sin the same gene." This would seem to defeat your intended purpose which is to discuss some probability calculations related to mutations. If you could show us your calculations or even the numbers you used to do them, we could clear this all up.

Otherwise, unless you can give us some real numbers, I'm afraid we can't do the math you have asked us to do in your titleing of this thread.

It really doesn't matter how many base pairs make up the gene. The fact is that if you want a change you need to effect the base pairs in the gene which make up the chromosomes which all forms the DNA strand.

Now the odds of having a beneficial mutation occuring in the base pairs responsible for the change is astronomical..then to realize that it must be repeated many times over and over... evolution becomes science fiction.

Sorry my evo friends, but, you haven't convinced me evolution is possible. Especially on the level we see it today with all the variety of animals with their complex codependent systems

seebs said:

Speaking of posts going unanswered: You haven't produced your numbers yet.

For someone who uses an awful lot of SIZE=6 tags to demand that other people support their claims, you're awfully slow to support yours.

Just the numbers. If you can do the math, you can show us the exact numbers you used, and how you used them.

Click to expand...

It's quite obvious that you haven't read the previous post in this thread.

Ark Guy said:

Now the odds of having a beneficial mutation occuring in the base pairs responsible for the change is astronomical..then to realize that it must be repeated many times over and over... evolution becomes science fiction.

Click to expand...

Why? Can you show us the calculations used to determine this astronomical probability?

Ark Guy said:

Your amen was to soon....logic has just proven them wrong.
bettr luck next time

Click to expand...

I continue to say amen to Vance and notto, and also to lucaspa - who has at least actually tried some maths, which is more then you have done and which you have yet to properly refute.

Ark Guy said:

I just wish Yahweh Nissi did some homework prior to presenting these easily refutable so-called problems.

Click to expand...

Actually, as I am in the third year of a physics degree at oxford and currently studying cosmology, I have very litterally done some homework on two of those points in the past week.

Ark Guy said:

The bible teaches that all scripture is God inspired....you have read that verse? yes?

Click to expand...

Please do not do that. I very clearly said in my next paragraph, which you quoted so I assume you read it, that I believed scripture to be God's infallible word. My point was that it was not written directly to YOU, but in a different language to some people thousands of years ago with a totally different culture and outlook, and should be interpreted with that in mind.
For your information I have read every verse in the Bible at least twice and some many more, and I bring to your attention the fact that the verses you are refering to (2Tim 3:16-17) says that scripture is "God-breathed" and "useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work." It say NOTHING about it being a science or history textbook or about it being intended to all be litterally true rather then metaphorical.

Ark Guy said:

It would have been very easy to write in this myth of yours that God formed man from the primates...rather than dust. So why is it not recorded that way?

Click to expand...

If it was to give a full, literal account of creation it would not just have to talk about ape to man, but the full evolutionary history of both the cosmos and life on earth to people who had never seen any great apes, had never heard of DNA, that stars were actually other suns and galaxies, knew nothing about scientific method - it would have just confused people, been hugely long and totally pointless as they had no need to know these things.

Ark Guy said:

But a parable told by Jesus tells of actual events that could occur. Now, for some reason you then try to say Genesis was a parable..of an event that COULD NOT occur....do you see the differance and hence the problem with that line of logic you are using?

Click to expand...

Of course I believe that Genesis COULD have occured - God is all powerful and can do anything. I just do not believe that it DID happen like that because of how we observe things to be.

Ark Guy said:

But you can make excellent scientific argument that science does agree with Genesis.

Click to expand...

So make some. Ignoring my concluding point 2.II, all you have done is attempted to refute arguments for the current scientific consensus - this is not positive proof of a YEC theory. I will say again - if you wish to use scientific arguments to attack points for one theory you must be prepared to back your own theoy up scientifically, which you have not done. Can you refer us to any peer-reviewed studies provide positive evidence for a 6000 year old earth and Universe?

Ark Guy said:

Why couldn't the light have been created in place? or what if the speed of light has slowed down? Barry Setterfield ahs done some fantastic work on this subject.

Is you theory the only theory? Besides, measurements of an object 10 billion light years away is extremely inaccurate.

Click to expand...

If the light had been created in place, what would it be light of? We never see things as they are at the present, but as they were when the light left them. What would the light of things more than 6000 light years away be of? We do not just see a static picture but things moving - cephids pulsing, galaxies rotating, galaxies orbiting in their clusters, etc - what is all this we are seeing?
You could say that it is just a 'picture show' created by God - but then you adopting position 1 (which you say you do not need to adopt) - that God has changed the evidence of what actually happened to make it look like something different happened. This is of course possible - God can do anything - and unfalsifiable. But this is getting perilously close to saying that God lied (I know you would not wish to say that, but I cannot see how it could be avoided). And if you wish to take this line you must admit that you are rejecting science out of hand, and therefore have no right to use it to argue for your point of view if you will not accept arguments against your point of view.

About light slowing down, there have been some speculative theories that this has happened but they are just that - speculative theories. And they are working from the premise of a Big Bang and a Universe billions of years old anyway, so they provide no support for YEC. But let us just suppose that some undiscovered mechanism is causing light to slow down. For it to have traversed a distance that would take it 12 billion years at the current speed in just 6000, its average speed must have been 2,000,000 times its current speed. But let us be generous and say its initial speed was just 2,000,000 times what we see today - it has changed by a factor of over 300 in just 6000 years. - i.e. by about a factor of 1.001 every year. 1.001^6000 = 400. We know the speed of light to a much greater accuracy then 0.1% and have been measuring it for many many years, so we would easily have noticed it changing if it was. We have not.

The theory I give is the longstanding scientific consensus. If you wish to argue something different, the onus is on you to provide some pretty conclusive proof.
And whilst the measurement may not be very accurate, they are certainly not out by enough to qualitatively change any of my arguments. Even if they were out by a factor of 10, which is vastly bigger then the estimated inaccuracies in the measurements, things would still be over 1 billion light years away and my aguments would still hold.

Ark Guy said:

The bible says God spread out the heavens...what do you suppose it would look like?

Click to expand...

I think it looked like the Big Bang! The CMB has been measured to great accuracy and provides a very detailed picture of the early Universe (specifically at the surface of last scattering - about 300,000 years after the Big Bang) and the densities observed agree very nicely with those needed to produce the current mass distribution in the Universe. And it is the recent, highly accurate measurements of the CMB that give the current age estimate of 13.7 billion years - totally independent of looking at galactic redshifts, decay of radioactive elements in rocks, and all the other methods that show the Earth and the niverse have been around longer then 6,000 years. If things had been very different, the CMB would have been very different.

Ark Guy said:

Has the formation of C14 always been the same? Prior to the flood the amount of cosmic radiation entering the earth atmosphere was much less than todays rate.
This means that less nitrogen would have been converted to C14...making items dated prior too and for a time period after the flood appear much older than they really are.

Click to expand...

How would the flood have affected the amount of radiation coming from space entering the atmosphere? Has anyone produce a detailed model of how this could have an affect, what the effect would be and provided calculations showing how their model predicts the currently observed ratios for things the current theory says are over 6000 years old for things they say are ~ 4000 - 6000 years old.

Ark Guy said:

There was no need for the aquatic animals to have been aboard the ark. I could reply in great detail why thhat is so, but for this post this should be sufficient.

Click to expand...

I specifically said NON-AQUATIC.

Ark Guy said:

They went the way of the carrier pigeon and the doe doe bird.
I would suggest they did not fair well in the new environment or were hunted into extinction.

Click to expand...

Ah, so the dinosaurs went on the Ark as well? That makes things even more rediculous. I would be interested to see you provide a calculation to show how two of every land dwelling species and food for them for all the time could have fitted in the Ark. And do not forget to include tyranasaurus rex, diplodicus, brontasaurus, wolly mamoths, and all the other kinds you say were on there.

Ark Guy said:

From what I have read it depends on where you take the measurements from. from the inner lip or the outer lip..going from memory...changes the results.

Other have also suggested that the bible just presents a rounded off numerical value....but to be so dogmatic like yoou are is also equated with being ignorant on that subject. Once again you should have done your homwork.

Click to expand...

EXACTLY! It presented a rough value that was fine for what it was trying to get across - it ws not concerned wit scientific accuracy.

Ark Guy said:

My answers to your above cut and paste questions shows you that i don't hhave to reject science.

Click to expand...

OK, so provide positive scientific backing for YEC. And I believe my reply shows your answers to be inadequate.

Ark Guy said:

But you made no valid ppoints....

Click to expand...

IMHO I believe I did, and I hope my more thourough defense of them here persuades you to take them more seriously.

Ark Guy said:

I trust that you now stannd corrected.

Click to expand...

Back atcha!

God bless,
YN.

Yahweh Nissi said:

Actually, as I am in the third year of a physics degree at oxford and currently studying cosmology, I have very litterally done some homework on two of those points in the past week.

Click to expand...

Naaah, I know you, you don't do any homework, almost as lazy as me.
On second reflection, you do, perhaps too much?

If the light had been created in place, what would it be light of? We never see things as they are at the present, but as they were when the light left them. What would the light of things more than 6000 light years away be of? We do not just see a static picture but things moving - cephids pulsing, galaxies rotating, galaxies orbiting in their clusters, etc - what is all this we are seeing
You could say that it is just a 'picture show' created by God - but then you adopting position 1 (which you say you do not need to adopt) - that God has changed the evidence of what actually happened to make it look like something different happened. This is of course possible - God can do anything - and unfalsifiable. But this is getting perilously close to saying that God lied

Click to expand...

No. A universe without any obvious past wouldn't make sense! After all, even Oxygen is in some sense a fossil which has come from the past and from past life: should God have created the earth without enough to sustain life in the interests of avoiding mistruth?

WanderingMagi

Ark Guy said:

It's quite obvious that you haven't read the previous post in this thread.

Click to expand...

Okay, I guess maybe I'm stupid.

Could you identify for me in which post you showed all your numbers? I haven't seen real numbers here. I've seen a little tiny bit of handwaving.

I want to know what events you are estimating the chances of, how you estimated the chances, how often you think they had to occur, why you think they had to occur that often; the whole nine yards.

You have made a very strong claim, about "doing the math".

Well, do the math. Show your work. Show every number you use, and where you got it. Tell us what you're doing with these numbers, and show the final result as an actual calculation, not "it would have to be a lot".

I'm an actual mathematician by upbringing, and I have seen no real statistics in this thread, except from lucaspa. Now, you may disagree with his results, but at least he offered some numbers.

WanderingMagi said:

Naaah, I know you, you don't do any homework, almost as lazy as me.
On second reflection, you do, perhaps too much?

Click to expand...

Dang! Found out

WanderingMagi said:

No. A universe without any obvious past wouldn't make sense! After all, even Oxygen is in some sense a fossil which has come from the past and from past life: should God have created the earth without enough to sustain life in the interests of avoiding mistruth?

WanderingMagi

Click to expand...

Of course not, but that is an unusual case in our survival being dependent on it. There is no need for us to see stars millions of light years away or for there to be dinausar fossils.

YN.