Gene Number Changes Between Humans and Chimps

[AV1611VET]

... it is what first made me think modern creationism is not of the Spirit of God.

It's not.

 

[Assyrian]

That is absurd but let's see how you twist the Scriptures to your philosophy.

This ought to be good.

He was under the law because he was Hebrew. There is nothing about the virgin birth the contradicts that. What is more becoming man makes Jesus intimately related to the human race.

Virgin birth does not contradict it, claiming Mary was only a surrogate and not his real biological mother does. According to this teaching Jesus is completely unrelated to the Hebrews, completely unrelated to the entire human race. We are related to every other human being that has ever lived. Go back far enough and we share common ancestors, some great ... great grandmother and great ... great great grandfather. Everyone in the human race is related, except, according to this theology, Jesus. He has no relatives what so ever in the entire human race.

He is not even the seed of Eve that God promised would crush the serpent's head. This Jesus isn't Eve's seed at all, instead we are told a completely new seed was created an planted in Mary's womb. I would have though that you of all people see this, you are very keen on the idea the gospel being rooted in Genesis.

Heb 2:14 Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil,
17 Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.
18 For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

How this is untrue given the special creation of Adam is a mystery to me.

It is nothing to do with the 'special creation' of Adam, it has to do with the claim that human nature changed with the fall, and the claim that Jesus does not share the same flesh we do, but was given an unfallen version of our flesh. How can he be be like us in every respect, partake of the same things we do, share in our flesh and blood, if Jesus was given a body of unfallen flesh, a brand new perfect unfallen human nature, while we are dragged down by a fallen human nature corrupted and twisted by Adam's sin? That is hardly being 'made like his brothers in every respect'.

Ok, let's get to the point.

Christ was like us in every way except he had what we lack, the righteousness of God.

Glad you agree. So are you saying human nature did not change in the fall, in which case the AV link is pointless as there is no difference between human nature ebfore the fall and the human nature passed down the generations after the fall? Or are you contradicting AV's link saying Jesus did share our human nature with all its temptations, but because he was God with the righteous character of God, he had the strength to go through the temptations we go through but not sin? In which case

Adam and Eve were innocent but that does not mean they were righteous.

1John 3:7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. Maybe you have a different definition of righteousness, but weren't Adam and Eve righteous as long as they practised righteousness and did as God commanded? Or do you think that like us they simply were not able walk righteously and keep God's command, they they always would have needed Christ's imputed righteousness as we do? I do agree, some creationists seem to think of Adam and Eve full mature intellectually an morally, whereas Genesis seem to portray them with a very simple childlike innocence, they knew it was wrong simply because God told them not to. Not sure what this has to do with the discussion though, the question is whether human nature changed in the fall and whether Jesus shares the human nature we have now.

I have never been impressed with how evolutionists argue science but I'm even less impressed with their theology, if that's what they call it.

Have a nice day
Mark

Perhaps you would be more convincing if you could discuss theology without having to constantly resort to insults.

 

[Split Rock]

Perhaps you would be more convincing if you could discuss theology without having to constantly resort to insults.

It s funny how the "True Christian" constantly resorts to belittling and sarcasm in his discussions here with those who disagree with him... Christian, or otherwise.

 

[AV1611VET]

It s funny how the "True Christian" constantly resorts to belittling and sarcasm in his discussions here with those who disagree with him... Christian, or otherwise.

You mean like calling someone a "freak in a freak show", or a whole race of people, "ignorant, goat-herding, Bronze-Age nomads"?

Or calling their Torah, "a book of myths"?

Or calling the Aboriginals, "primitive"?

 

[gaara4158]

You mean like calling someone a "freak in a freak show", or a whole race of people, "ignorant, goat-herding, Bronze-Age nomads"?

Or calling their Torah, "a book of myths"?

Or calling the Aboriginals, "primitive"?

Or calling a spade a spade?

 

[AV1611VET]

You mean like calling someone a "freak in a freak show", or a whole race of people, "ignorant, goat-herding, Bronze-Age nomads"?

Or calling their Torah, "a book of myths"?

Or calling the Aboriginals, "primitive"?

Or calling a spade a spade?

QED

 

[gaara4158]

QED

We back up our claims with facts. You back up your claims with other claims and claims about other claims. I'm pretty sure you know this already.

 

[Split Rock]

You mean like calling someone a "freak in a freak show", or a whole race of people, "ignorant, goat-herding, Bronze-Age nomads"?

I don't agree with calling anyone here a "freak." As far as the target audience for Genesis, they were indeed "goat-herding Bronze Age nomads," that were ignorant of much of what we understand of the natural world today. Or do you deny they were nomadic goat-herders?

Or calling their Torah, "a book of myths"?

If you do not believe that the Torah is the inspired world of God, then what else would you call it, but myth?

Or calling the Aboriginals, "primitive"?

They were "primitive" in terms of their technology and lack of "civilization." I have heard worse things about Native Americans and Indians from creationists here, btw.

 

[Cabal]

You mean like calling someone a "freak in a freak show", or a whole race of people, "ignorant, goat-herding, Bronze-Age nomads"?

Or calling their Torah, "a book of myths"?

Or calling the Aboriginals, "primitive"?

Excuse me, the evolution-believing Christians here don't do that. At least, I personally endeavour not to use those descriptions.

 

[Split Rock]

It s funny how the "True Christian" constantly resorts to belittling and sarcasm in his discussions here with those who disagree with him... Christian, or otherwise.

You mean like calling someone a "freak in a freak show", or a whole race of people, "ignorant, goat-herding, Bronze-Age nomads"?

Or calling their Torah, "a book of myths"?

Or calling the Aboriginals, "primitive"?

Do you consider Mark Kennedy's behavior here as in keeping with the teachings of Jesus?

 

[AV1611VET]

Do you consider Mark Kennedy's behavior here as in keeping with the teachings of Jesus?

I don't read his posts --- he talks way over my head.

 

[Hespera]

What are the odds that the error correcting evolutionists will never admit the error of the OP and the statement made in Scientific American? About 3 billion to 1 I'll wager. You post constantly and while you don't make a single point based on actual scientific evidence your ad hominem attacks are unrelenting. Your encouraged by the fact that nothing you say is ever going to be an indictment on your credibility because all you have to do is insult creationists and you have instant credibility. The truth is your one of the minions and they relish your fallacious arguments because they don't want creationists to know that the evidence is on their side.

MK made the statement, presented as fact, that every time an ape fossil is dug up it is immediately celebrated as human / human ancestor.

This is demonstrably not true of every ape fossil. Two minutes with google would do it.

"Immediately" isnt true. Paleontologists actually do spend (a lot of) time studying what they find.

"Celebrated" is just tossed in, evidently for effect.

Nothing about MK's statement is true. Perhaps it was just a deliberate exaggeration to make a point, however little or meaningless a point it may have been. MK says his statement is true. Ok.....

There is very little point in debate with someone who wont concede a even a misstatement, on something so simple and obvious; why get off into genetics? The pattern has already been demonstrated.

Debate in any case is supposed to be about facts, data, issues, not name calling.

 

[Naraoia]

By the way, Mark Kennedy still hasn't told me what contrived Homo habilis tools he was talking about pages ago.

What I love about genetics is that they can't hide the actual facts. With the fossil record they were able to hide the Piltdown fraud for nearly half a century, only to find that it wasn't even a cleaver hoax. Same thing with Homo habilis, these contrived tools they keep pointing to are not recognized by archeologists.

I'm waiting for him to back up his accusations. Maybe we could get back on topic, too... or at least talk about something slightly more relevant than theology

 

[Hespera]

By the way, Mark Kennedy still hasn't told me what contrived Homo habilis tools he was talking about pages ago.



I'm waiting for him to back up his accusations. Maybe we could get back on topic, too... or at least talk about something slightly more relevant than theology

Why bother? You get a person who will tell a whopper, like the one about the ape fossils, and stick to it no matter what, what is the use of discussing anything else? You will just get more of the same. Well there is also name calling. But that really isnt what I'd call debate,

 

[Naraoia]

Would you rather I let it slip?

 

[Hespera]

Would you rather I let it slip?

Have at it! i just dont think it does anything other than add up the pages that can be pointed to when later telling how the forces of evolutionism were battled for X pages and he won.

 

[SLP]

Sure there are similarities, but these I assure you are irrelevant to the ultimate purpose in life.

 

[SLP]

I don't read his posts --- he talks way over my head.

 

[SLP]

Hi Professor, good to see you again

Yeah - just like old times. In fact, it is EXACTLY like old times - I see the exact same claims, even the exact same data being used (inappropriately, in most cases)

If I compare two sequences of DNA 100 bases long and 99 of the nucleotides are identical, it is a lie to claim that the DNA sequences I am looking at are 99% identical?

Really, I think the statement is crystal clear in this statement in Scientific American, just as it was in Time and the Nature Web Focus page. Here is the quote again:

A humbling truth ... (Scientific Amercian, What makes us human? by Katherine S. Pollard)
​

My mistake - I thought you were referring to your same-old, same-old quotes of yore and I did not read this entire thread.
I'm not sure what she is talking about.
Reading the actual paper, I think LifeToTheFullest is onto something - the paper is referring to a collection HARs and it seems to be in reference just to those when compared to chimp, but it is not clear and the SciAm article is clearly either a mistatement or an error.

So I guess all evolutionary biologists mjust be dishonest conspirators...

So you want to condemn all evolutionary biologists on the basis of what one person said in one article?
Can I use that criterion to condemn all Christians because I've seen a few celebrating the assassination of George Tiller?
I've seen creationists claim that no speciation has ever occurred. Does that mean that all creationists believe that ALL extant species were on the ark that didn't really exist anyway?

You know as well as I that it's at least 35 million based on single base differences genome wide and another 90 million bases (45 MB human, 42 MB chimp) based on indels. No where in the article does this capable and accomplished biostatistician indicate that at least since 2005 the known divergence is at least 100 million base pairs larger.

I also know that the number of bases in an indel has nothing to do with the overall mutation rate. What of it?

If I am looking at 2 DNA sequences 100 bases long from two specimens whose genomes are 1 billion bases long and there is 99% identity in the 100 base sequence that I am looking at, is it a lie to claim that 'the DNA' is 99% the same?

The statement is 3 billion base pairs of the human genome diverge by 15 million base pairs. This is simply wrong. Why does a Biology Professor let a statement like this stand when it is clearly erroneous?

What do you mean, 'let it stand'? What would you have me do? Write SciAm and complain that someone said something wrong in an article and that the erroneous statement is really irrelevant to the overall gist fo the article?
The precise number is really not that important, frankly. You are just hung up on it as a means of making what you think is a good argument. It isn't.

What you are saying is that you think that:
-all of the nucleotides involved in insertions deletions and duplications must be accounted for by the overall mutation rate

I think that would be nice but unlikely since the mainstream academic and media sources are not honest about the actual level of divergence.

And creationist detractors are not honest - or very well informed - when it comes to technical issues like this.
It has been explained to you proably a hundred times that the size of an indel is IRRELEVANT because it is a one-time mutational event. It counts as ONE, even if the indel is 10,000 bp long. It all gets inserted or removed in one shot. Therefore, they do not need to be included in the overall mutation rate, which is a measure of the OCCURRENCE of mutation. In fact, doing so would be an exercise in incompetence, sort of like claiming that if we launch a new rocket and it travels 1000 miles, we have to count it as 1000 individual launches because the old rocket could only go 1 mile.

-the largest % difference number, whatever it is based on, is the number to go by

No sir, the actual divergence. The total number of base pairs in the respective genomes that actually are different. Total base pairs/base pairs different would be the accurate ratio translated into a percentage.

As indicated, the actual divergence is largely irrelevant since it would be comparing apples and oranges.

-this larger number must mean that common descent is impossible

I have never said it's impossible, I am saying the the overall divergence indicates accelerated evolution.

But it doesn't necessarily, as has also been explained to you repeatedly. And even if it did, what of it?

When you look at a gene like the HAR 1 gene we are talking about highly accelerated divergence in a highly conserved regulatory gene involved in the early development of cerebral cortex.

Sometimes this happens. Sometimes it doesn't. You seem to require a uniform distribution of mutations at all loci for all time. Nature doesn't work that way, and I've seen your recycled quotes before. Not interested. Did you read the actual scientific pub, or just the SciAm bit? The actual article contains interesting information - such as most of the HARs are found close to the ends of chromosomal arms, indicating a positional effect. Hmmm....

I'm not saying this is impossible, as skeptical as I am I realize there are a lot of things that can change in relatively short spaces of time. I'm saying that this leaves room for honest skepticism Professor and reasonable questions arise and should be addressed.

Sure, asking questions is fine. But presenting questions as if they are evidence for something is quite another thing.

The thing is, if they are not honest about the actual divergence it becomes a credibility issue with me.

You keep tossing the term 'honest' around - do you think it is honest to repeat the same claims year after year when you have had your errors explained to you repeatedly?

- applying the same standards to things like intraspecies comparisons and interspecies comparisons dealing with any species but human and chimp is irrelevant.

I would happily compare them to interspecies and intraspecies comparisons ...

I think the term you are looking for is converged.

You did not understand my statement - your desire to use total raw sequence differences as the yardstick by which to judge hypotheses of descent runs into trouble if we apply the same criteria to other inter- and intraspecies comparisons. So, if we say that we must include all the nucleotides in indels in the raw count, and the human-chimp divergence goes up to 5%, then we have to use the same criterion when comparing dogs to foxes and loggerhead turtles to leatherbacks and even when comparing two individuals of the same species and guess what - the divergence goes up in ALL those cases.

I'm not entirely sure I understood the point you were trying to make here but I assure you my interest in purely academic. As long as evolutionists are honest and straightforward I will accept and even respect their conclusions regarding common ancestry.

History tells me otherwise, especially when you STILL refuse to acknowledge that overall mutation rates do not and should not be required to accommodate indels..

However, as long as the actual evidence is being skewed and the actual divergence is being misrepresented I remain skeptical both of their conclusions and professional integrity as I feel you should be.

Whatever...

Your reading of the literature at one time told you that DNA is made of amino acids and that mutations were "monstrosities." Your reading comprehension - as demonstrated by your history - is nothing to boast of or be confident in.

I know the difference between an amino acid sequence in a protein coding gene and other segments.

There is no amino acid sequence in a gene, protein coding or otherwise.

I have often pointed out that changes in amino acid sequences are neutral at best and when they have an effect they are most often deleterious.

And nobody would disagree. If adaptive evolution were easy, we'd all be supermen.

I wouldn't be as tenacious in my skepticism if you were as zealous to correct errors made by your cohorts and peers.

First, we like to make sure that the claimed errors really were. Second, correcting a claim made by someone on a discussion forum is easy, it can be done in almost real time. Correcting an error made by someone in a national publication is a bit different. Considering the fact that those in the know, know that science is a tentative buisiness, especially on the details, that one researcher claims a 99% identity and another claims 98% and another claims 95%, I don't think it really matters. The fact is that humans and chimps share a greater identity in the overall genomic as well as the genic level than chimps share with the other apes. If we want to make the divergence dependant upon the raw nucleotide difference, then the divergence between chimps and gorillas increases probably by just as much as the human-chimp divergence does.

IOW, your argument is irrelevant.

Depends on what you are comparing. Sorry.

See the above quote, it's whole genome comparisons. [/quote] Other such comparions do not bear it out. No biggie. Hard to tell what Pollard meant. If she DID indeed mean whole genomoe comparisons, then she is wrong. If she was referring to HAR regions, then the statement was clearly either terribly edited or was simply misstated.

It is ~99% generally when comparing homologous genes.

That was not what she said. [/quote] That is what I said.

That is not a lie.

Then what is it? Incompetence? [/quote] Perhaps an error of perspective? You are very quick to ascribe dishonesty when the answer is quite likley something else altogether. I've not read the article - I don't read popular press science magazines for a number of reasons - and I don't really care to. That one person's statement in one article seems incorrect is really quite irrelevant in the broader scheme of things.

When you toss in noncoding DNA and duplicates and the like, the difference increases.

Of course they do.

Good.

Just as it would when comparing ANY two species.
Just as it would when comparing any two humans.
Why you seem to think this is so significant in terms of the human-chimp question can be answered by realizing that your religious fervor dictates a need to be correct on a seperate ancestry for apes and humans.

My religion is a separate issue

Funny then that the only people that do not seem to accept it are religious.

the issue here is that a glaring error is being dismissed and rationalized.

And therefore.... what? I shan't get my panties in a bunch over what someone wrote in a popular press magazine.

No need to engage in your ego stroking 'challenges' to 1 on 1 debates - you never write anything in them that you don't write in the regular forum and you employ the exact same dodges and antics.

I know you have no interest in a real debate and I can't say I blame you since the evidence is actually pretty difficult to reconcile to you cherished assumptions.

Real debate is fine. Manefactured, recycled nonsense for the purposes of ego stroking is not. The last time I was in an 'official' debate on a discussion forum, my opponant ran away from the agreed upon topic in his first response, and insisted that he won because I would not diverge from the agreed upon topic.
I have no cherished assumptions to reconcile, whatever that is supposed to mean. You cannot simply ignore evidence because a person makes an error in a popular press article.

You are wrong here and you are wrong in 1 on 1 debates. The venue is immaterial.

If I'm so wrong then why does the statement made by Pollard contradict the finding of the Chimpanzee Genome Consortium published in 2005? You don't like to talk about that and yet you are unable to convince anyone, even yourself, that I am the one in error.

I'm not talking about your fixation on what someone says in pop press articles, I am talking about your basic positions - indels in mutation rates, brain grows too fast, etc.

You want to accuse me of error? Let's do it this way...You know it's not 99% yet you won't admit it.

Ummm....

I've written repeatedly that it is not 99%. Not the overall identity, anyway. I KNOW that it is not 99% overall. I also know that there are very sound reasons NOT to use the higher numbers as espoused by Britten when looking at descent, because in such cases the total divergence is misleading.
I also know that when comparing coding genes, the number is quite high, 99.4% reported in a recent study. Recent studies have also shown that any 2 humans diverge by about 10 times the amount previously thought. Are you going to be similarly fixated when spomeone writes that humans are 99.9% identical genetically?

I am neither surprised nor remotely impressed with the rationalizations you are making here. You would never tolerate such a glaring error made by a creationist but you ignore it when it's made in popular press. Shame on you Professor! I would expect better from a professional Biologist.

Thanks for the jousting match that reinforces my distrust of the academic and intellectual community with regards to our origins. To agree with such a blatant error is to abandon all intellectual integrity. Now you can either correct the error in the statement in the OP and the one in Scientific American or you can stop with the pretense of my errors conflating the actual evidence. My experience with evolutionists has been that you will do neither.

I am not surprised or impressed by the fact that you are fixating on something as irrelevant as this. Nor am I impressed or surprised that despite 5 years of having your erroneous genetics claims explained to you, you are still proudly making them.
The fact of the matter is that Pollard's claim is really irrelevant in the overall scheme of things. That your are fixated on it is demonstrative of the minutiae with which anti-evolutionists confine themselves, for the big issues are too much for them to handle.
Pollard's error has no bearing whatsoever on the evidence for descent, and a person that thinks it does is living in a fantasy land.

 

[Naraoia]

Daily bump, to keep this thread in Mark's field of vision.

Because I'll keep waiting for him to step up and support the accusations he made in post 172:

What I love about genetics is that they can't hide the actual facts. With the fossil record they were able to hide the Piltdown fraud for nearly half a century, only to find that it wasn't even a cleaver hoax. Same thing with Homo habilis, these contrived tools they keep pointing to are not recognized by archeologists.

What are these contrived tools? Who are "they"? Who are the archaeologists who don't recognise them, and what are their arguments?

May this in fact be a legitimate scientific debate that Mark is trying to dress up as an issue of fraud?