molecular genetic evidence for a multipurpose genome

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Would it be a gain of information if the duplicated gene had a different role from the original gene?.

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It depends what the role is. If the new role causes a disease (which is often the case), it would clearly represent a net loss of information. If it could be shown that the new role is useful to the species as a whole, then I would accept it as an example of naturalistic increase of information.

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For example supposing the antifreeze gene was formed from a duplicated trypsinogen gene as the evidence suggests would that fit your definition of an increase in information?.

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Only if:1) It can be shown that the duplication/subsequent mutation events truly are Darwinian (random). The fact you have two independent convergences on the same gene makes me highly skeptical it was purely naturalistic. From my POV, your example has all the ear-markings of a pre-programmed genetic capability (aka directed mutation).
2) The presence of the duplicated gene does not produce a negative impact on the species in a normal environment.Still, your example is an alleged occurence from millions of years ago. I’ll repeat that if NeoDarwinian evolution is true, there should be myriads of observed examples occurring in our labs. There are NONE. Even if you found a handful this would not be provocative becuase you should find tons and tons of examples. With rapidly reproducing species we can obseve millions of generations in the lab. It turns out mutations invariably lead to reduced genetic information. No sign whatsoever of evolution in the positive, upward direction. None, nada, zippo. This is highly damaging evidence against evolution. Methinks it’s all a fairytale!

Hi Peter,I beleive the following lends support to predictions 1 & 5 of your MPG theory:Nature 403, 616 (2000) Macmillan Publishers Ltd.Conservation biology: 'Ghost' alleles of the Mauritius kestrelJIM J. GROOMBRIDGE*, CARL G. JONES, MICHAEL W. BRUFORD & RICHARD A. NICHOLS* Institute of Zoology, Zoological Society of London, Regents Park, London NW1 4RY, UK
Mauritius Wildlife Foundation, Black River, Mauritius
School of Biological Sciences, Queen Mary & Westfield College, London E1 4NS, UK
Present address: Cardiff School of Biosciences, Cardiff University, Cathays Park, Cardiff CF1 3TL, UKThe population of Mauritius kestrels is thought to have recovered from a single wild breeding pair in 1974, when its prospects were considered to be hopeless, to over 200 pairs today. Here we evaluate the loss of genetic variation that resulted from this bottleneck by typing 12 microsatellite DNA loci in museum skins up to 170 years old and from modern kestrels. We find that ancestral variation was remarkably high and comparable to continental kestrel species. This shows that the unexpected resilience of the population could not have been due either to benefits contributed by an undetected remnant population or to reduction of the inbreeding genetic load by a history of small population size.