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Author Topic:   Can random mutations cause an increase in information in the genome?
Percy
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Posts: 22393
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 196 of 310 (286938)
02-15-2006 1:37 PM
Reply to: Message 194 by SuperNintendo Chalmers
02-15-2006 1:21 PM


Re: Question outstanding!
Chalmers writes:
What genome contains more "information" the dog or the cat genome?
To be fair to Randman and Garrett, I don't think we could easily answer these questions using traditional information theory, either. We'd need to know the number of genes and the number of alleles for each gene in the populations of dogs and cats, as well as their frequency. Then there's whatever mysterious information isencoded in the non-functional junk DNA that isn't as nonfunctional as originally thought.
The difference between specified complexity and information theory is that if these things were known, then information theory could answer the question as to which contains more information. In the end it just comes down to comparing how many bits it takes to represent the dog population's genome versus the cat's. But specified complexity can produce no such metric. I've read Dembki's book The Design Revolution: Answering the Toughest Questions About Intelligent Design, and there was no equation for calculating specified complexity. He has many other books, though. Maybe someone's read one that provides a method for calculating a number for specified complexity? Randman? Garrett? Anyone?
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 194 by SuperNintendo Chalmers, posted 02-15-2006 1:21 PM SuperNintendo Chalmers has replied

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SuperNintendo Chalmers
Member (Idle past 5834 days)
Posts: 772
From: Bartlett, IL, USA
Joined: 12-27-2005


Message 197 of 310 (286944)
02-15-2006 1:43 PM
Reply to: Message 196 by Percy
02-15-2006 1:37 PM


Re: Question outstanding!
The difference between specified complexity and information theory is that if these things were known, then information theory could answer the question as to which contains more information. In the end it just comes down to comparing how many bits it takes to represent the dog population's genome versus the cat's. But specified complexity can produce no such metric. I've read Dembki's book The Design Revolution: Answering the Toughest Questions About Intelligent Design, and there was no equation for calculating specified complexity. He has many other books, though. Maybe someone's read one that provides a method for calculating a number for specified complexity? Randman? Garrett? Anyone?
That's kind of my whole point Percy. If their argument had any merit they SHOULD be able to answer the question. I can't answer that question, but I'm not arguing that DNA contains information and that new information can't be added.

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Replies to this message:
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EZscience
Member (Idle past 5154 days)
Posts: 961
From: A wheatfield in Kansas
Joined: 04-14-2005


Message 198 of 310 (286958)
02-15-2006 2:07 PM
Reply to: Message 194 by SuperNintendo Chalmers
02-15-2006 1:21 PM


Re: Question outstanding!
The problem is that 'information content', by any primitive measure, does not equate to 'organismal complexity'. If it did, then more complex organisms would have the largest genomes. They don't. If you go here you will see the absence of relationship between the two depicted graphically.
Larger genomes have the *potential* to encode more information, but that information may or may not exist (much of the genome may be random repeats), or the same amount of genetic information may encode either simple or complex structures.
Along these lines, a single gene may cue a whole cascade of developmental events leading to a very complex change in morphology (= huge increase in complexity) with a very minor change in 'information content' of the genome. Thus I would argue that
'information' is not a useful variable to try and quantify in biological systems. Information content doesn't evolve in populations; gene frequencies and their mechanisms of expression and inheritance do.

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 Message 194 by SuperNintendo Chalmers, posted 02-15-2006 1:21 PM SuperNintendo Chalmers has replied

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Garrett
Member (Idle past 6166 days)
Posts: 111
From: Dallas, TX
Joined: 02-10-2006


Message 199 of 310 (286962)
02-15-2006 2:12 PM
Reply to: Message 128 by AdminNosy
02-14-2006 5:45 PM


Re: W e l c o m e !
Just as a clarification, I'm not an ID'er. Although, I agree with many of the tenets of the ID movement, I'd classify myself as a creationist because I believe that the God of the Old/New Testament was the designer. Just wanted to point that out since I'm sure the ID'er in the group, randmann I think it was, wouldn't agree with some of my views (although not to the extent of everyone else, obviously :-)).
Obviously, if there has only been a small amount of research done into complexity, then I most likely won't be able to supply a definition that will ever be acceptable to those in this thread. However, not being able to quantify the results doesn't mean the concept is invalidated, just not confirmed...as of yet.

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randman 
Suspended Member (Idle past 4899 days)
Posts: 6367
Joined: 05-26-2005


Message 200 of 310 (286966)
02-15-2006 2:20 PM
Reply to: Message 199 by Garrett
02-15-2006 2:12 PM


Re: W e l c o m e !
Garret, I too believe that the God of the Old Testament and New Testament is the Designer, but I am not a YECer. I guess I am more an old earth creationist, but to be honest, I like ID as a framework because I am a little hesitant to argue the Bible as scientific evidence, and I think often people misunderstand the Bible, and in reality probably cannot understand the Bible as an unbeliever, or even as a believer without the assistance of the Holy Spirit.
In some sense the Bible is an other-wordly book, a mystical book of revelation, while at the same time being a book of objective reality. Christianity differs from some religions in that it is rooted in history and historical events, but there is still the spiritual and mystical component, and the Bible in some sense is written in code, and that code is the Spirit of God, and without it, the natural mind cannot fully understand the words, imo.

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SuperNintendo Chalmers
Member (Idle past 5834 days)
Posts: 772
From: Bartlett, IL, USA
Joined: 12-27-2005


Message 201 of 310 (286970)
02-15-2006 2:25 PM
Reply to: Message 198 by EZscience
02-15-2006 2:07 PM


Re: Question outstanding!
EZ, I think you know way more about this subject that I do (and I think you for that most informative post).
My point is there is an argument that new information, complexity or WHATEVER can not be added to the Genome for whatever reason.
So how about which is more complex - a dog or a cat
I mean, how can you make these kind of arguments when you have no way to apply them to reality at all? If there is complexity or information content in DNA think of a way to measure it and prove it can't be added.
Maybe I picked a poor way to show the argument is ridiculous.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 198 by EZscience, posted 02-15-2006 2:07 PM EZscience has replied

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 Message 203 by EZscience, posted 02-15-2006 2:51 PM SuperNintendo Chalmers has not replied

lfen
Member (Idle past 4678 days)
Posts: 2189
From: Oregon
Joined: 06-24-2004


Message 202 of 310 (286974)
02-15-2006 2:31 PM
Reply to: Message 161 by randman
02-15-2006 12:21 AM


Re: Clarify some please?
deleted
I hadn't gotten to the warning sections when I replied to this post.
mea culpa
lfen
This message has been edited by lfen, 02-15-2006 11:41 AM

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EZscience
Member (Idle past 5154 days)
Posts: 961
From: A wheatfield in Kansas
Joined: 04-14-2005


Message 203 of 310 (286987)
02-15-2006 2:51 PM
Reply to: Message 201 by SuperNintendo Chalmers
02-15-2006 2:25 PM


How to measure complexity
Yes, the argument is ridiculous to anyone who understands the genetics of inheritance. But you raise another question.
SN Chalmers writes:
So how about which is more complex - a dog or a cat
How can we measure biological complexity in an objective way?
We can't.
We would have to select a series of quantifiable criteria and these would necessarily be susceptible to intrinsic bias.
For example, one criteria might be 'number of transcribed genes', but this would be biased toward ranking genetic complexity more highly than organismal complexity and, as I have already mentioned, these are not the same things.
Criteria for organismal complexity are even more difficult to establish because not all morphological features are shared by all organisms. If we counted appendages, we would rank jellyfish higher than humans. Similarly, if we measured behavioral complexity as, say, the number of distinct intra-specific signals the organism is capable of producing and responding to, we bias our measurements toward organisms that are behaviorally complex, and against those that might be more complex in morphological ways.
Complexity is not quantifiable in any way that will be objective and equally applicable for all living things. Degrees of complexity are not a focus for biologists. Thats why we don't have teams of biologists trying to re-organize Aristotle's Escala Naturae according to levels of organismal complexity - rather, we have abandoned it entirely.
Complexity in biology is kind of like pornography - it lacks a clear and uniform definition, but you know it when you see it.
So the answer to your question is likely dependent on some sort of anthropic principle.
If you are a dog owner - you will judge the dog more complex.
If you are a cat owner - you will judge the cat more complex.
If you own both (as I do) you will realize that there is no fair answer to the question.
ABE: This not to say we cannot objectively determine whether a hamster or a human is more closely related to a dog or a cat, because this we can do.
This message has been edited by EZscience, 02-15-2006 01:56 PM

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Replies to this message:
 Message 231 by FliesOnly, posted 02-16-2006 9:43 AM EZscience has replied

Parasomnium
Member
Posts: 2224
Joined: 07-15-2003


Message 204 of 310 (286988)
02-15-2006 2:52 PM


Cul-de-sac and Ratchet
Garrett writes:
Are you suggesting that all of the instructions were there from the beginning?
In reply, Belfry writes:
Of course not. I'm saying that extra genetic information was gained along the way. That's an aspect of evolution, but not its totality. A loss of genetic information, promoted through a population by natural selection, is also evolution.
Exactly. Belfry is saying what I said in this post (to which I have received no reply, to my great dissapointment), namely that it doesn't matter whether information is gained or lost. The only thing that matters is that the information changes, in whatever direction. If your information changes and mine doesn't, or vice versa, or yours changes this way and mine that way, then the result is that we have different information. If the environment is such that my information gives me an advantage over you, then I'll succeed where you won't, even if I have lost information you kept.
Of course, what we see in nature is a steady increase in the complexity of genomes, which is the - for some confounding - characteristic of evolution that this thread is all about. But this phenomenon can easily be explained by considering two metaphors that show two different aspects of evolution.
One metaphor is the one-way street. Since random mutations are just that - random, there's no turning back from a certain evolutionary development, because it is extremely unlikely that a particular chain of random mutations is followed by another chain of the same mutations in reverse order. In other words, evolutionary development is a one-way street.
The other metaphor is that of a ratchet. Although a ratchet too is a one-way thing, that's not the characteristic I'm thinking of. Apart from being a one-way device, a ratchet is also something that produces an increase of sorts. A mechanical ratchet may for example increase the height of something pulled up with it. The increments are usually small but in the end add up to something large.
In a like manner, evolution acts as a complexity ratchet. With many small steps, each having a reasonable probability, the complexity of an evolving genome is ratcheted up to a level that would be very unlikely to be achieved in far fewer steps.
Since genomic complexity tends to tranlate as phenotypical versatility, the more complex a genome, the more chances it has to survive a diversity of circumstances. This in turn leads to ever more complex genomes. In other words, evolutionary development works like a ratchet.
Feedback/criticism anyone?
This message has been edited by Parasomnium, 15-Feb-2006 08:04 PM

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EZscience
Member (Idle past 5154 days)
Posts: 961
From: A wheatfield in Kansas
Joined: 04-14-2005


Message 205 of 310 (286997)
02-15-2006 3:13 PM
Reply to: Message 204 by Parasomnium
02-15-2006 2:52 PM


Re: Cul-de-sac and Ratchet
Generally quite correct. But on the subject of complexity,
one small qualification is in order.
It seems to you that the general tendency of evolution over the long scale has been to increase complexity of living things.
This is generally true when we consider higher organisms and those that dominate their ecosystems.
This is certainly true at the level of communities, as more species make for more complex interactions etc.
However, at the organismal level, it is important to note that increasing complexity is not an inevitable outcome even over long evolutionary time scales.
Consider the Archaebacteria, some of the oldest life-forms on earth that evolved in a reducing atmosphere and are now narrowly confined to anaerobic environments. Their success in surviving this long is likely their *lack* of complexity. They have not needed to evolve more complexity in order to maintain dominance of their particular niches, even if these niches have been reduced to obscurity in many cases, e.g. the guts of cockroaches and under-sea volcanic vents.
Under some circumstances, complexity can be selected against. For example, mass extinctions seem to selectively eliminate the dominant, more complex animals, the survivors having quantitatively and qualitatively lower resource requirements for growth and reproduction.

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 Message 204 by Parasomnium, posted 02-15-2006 2:52 PM Parasomnium has replied

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 Message 206 by Parasomnium, posted 02-15-2006 3:23 PM EZscience has replied
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Parasomnium
Member
Posts: 2224
Joined: 07-15-2003


Message 206 of 310 (287002)
02-15-2006 3:23 PM
Reply to: Message 205 by EZscience
02-15-2006 3:13 PM


Re: Cul-de-sac and Ratchet
EZscience writes:
on the subject of complexity,
one small qualification is in order
Thank you for pointing that out. Like everything, evolutionary explanations are usually a bit more *complex* than you'd think at first glance.
How about this? "Evolutionary development can work like a ratchet, but not necessarily so."

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 Message 205 by EZscience, posted 02-15-2006 3:13 PM EZscience has replied

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crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1467 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 207 of 310 (287003)
02-15-2006 3:23 PM
Reply to: Message 184 by randman
02-15-2006 11:55 AM


Re: some links to specified complexity
So the idea appears to be that in the combination of specificity and complexity, we see intelligent design.
If contiingency explains complexity, and natural law explains specificity, then why is the explanation for specified complexity supposed to be "intelligent design" and not contingent natural laws?

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Garrett
Member (Idle past 6166 days)
Posts: 111
From: Dallas, TX
Joined: 02-10-2006


Message 208 of 310 (287005)
02-15-2006 3:29 PM
Reply to: Message 197 by SuperNintendo Chalmers
02-15-2006 1:43 PM


Re: Question outstanding!
To be honest, if one holds to a theory that requires many successive mutations to increase the complexity of an organism, the onus should be on them to provide evidence, rather than on me to provide evidence that it doesn't happen. Seeing as every example that has been given, including the beneficial mutations, have degraded the function of one of more previously operable systems, that proof doesn't appear to be forthcoming. Benefits can be derived from degradation of functionality, but this sounds a lot more like deevolution than evolution. No new functions have ever been created in this process...just new side effects to old functions.
And I don't really think we need to define complexity to understand that it isn't increasing. It rather seems like a convenient way for people to throw out a scientific sounding rebuttal to the issue without actually addressing the issue.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 197 by SuperNintendo Chalmers, posted 02-15-2006 1:43 PM SuperNintendo Chalmers has replied

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 Message 213 by crashfrog, posted 02-15-2006 3:37 PM Garrett has replied
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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 209 of 310 (287007)
02-15-2006 3:30 PM
Reply to: Message 199 by Garrett
02-15-2006 2:12 PM


Not confirmed yet or ...?
However, not being able to quantify the results doesn't mean the concept is invalidated, just not confirmed...as of yet.
It isn't that it isn't confirmed yet. It is that the "concept" isn't well-formed enough to be confirmed, rejected or anything'd yet. There is NO concept! It is just made up to sound fancy and oh so "scientific".
Without something precise enough to discuss, measure and confirm or deny there isn't anything at all yet.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 199 by Garrett, posted 02-15-2006 2:12 PM Garrett has replied

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 Message 211 by Garrett, posted 02-15-2006 3:34 PM NosyNed has not replied

Garrett
Member (Idle past 6166 days)
Posts: 111
From: Dallas, TX
Joined: 02-10-2006


Message 210 of 310 (287010)
02-15-2006 3:33 PM
Reply to: Message 205 by EZscience
02-15-2006 3:13 PM


Re: Cul-de-sac and Ratchet
Are you suggesting that the higher organisms which dominate their ecosystems didn't evolve at one point from simple-celled organisms?
If not, what do you mean when you say that it isn't necessary for there to be a trend of increased complexity over evolutionary timescales.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 205 by EZscience, posted 02-15-2006 3:13 PM EZscience has replied

Replies to this message:
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