Evolving New Information

Fine... I have no problem dealing with a single three dimensional universe or a multiuniverse around here.I do not believe that any scientist who examined the evidence would fail to draw the inference that the laws of nuclear physics have been deliberately designed with regard to the consequences they produce inside the stars.- Fred HoyleFred Hoyle and I differ on lots of questions, but on this we agree: a common-sense and satisfying interpretation of our world suggests the designing hand of a superintelligence. Impressive as the evidences of design in the astrophysical world may be, however, I personally find even more remarkable those from the biological realm.- Dr. Owen GingerichNeed I say more? Now, how can we argue with these two scientists???Some of you can continue to bury your heads in the sand or spin some sort of protective cocoons around your psyches in order to shield yourselves from the existence of a creator. I however do not believe that shielding yourselves from the realities of life is a good way to deal with it and I don't think this is good science either.Enough saidEdited by traderdrew, : No reason given.Edited by traderdrew, : No reason given.

Yes, and the quote relays a claim made by Nick Matzke in an article posted to the Panda's Thumb. Now Nick has posted here you so you could say that someone on this site has made that claim, but they didn't make it here and it wasn't being made here again, someone was simply reporting that they had seen the claim made.The claim was to what the rebuttal paper said, not to the accuracy of its statement.Do you agree that there is in fact also evidence to substantiate the claim? I don't quite know what the point of this paragraph is, but I certainly agree that structurally distinct sequences can perform enzymatically similar functions. Are you claiming that the MotA from one of those bacteria is in fact the product of convergent evolution from an entirely unrelated gene rather than simply a member of the same lineage with a high proportion of sequence divergence? It is quite possible for similar but not identical amino acid substituttions to allow similar conformations, so there is no reason why a non-identical 2ary structure can't give rise to a similar functional fold. No, you got the terminology wrong and I corrected you. Transcription and translation are specific and distinct things. Simplification is not the same as being wrong. If you are using them to back up a substantive argument it shouoldn't be a problme, certainly less so than your indirect attempts to do essentially the exact same thing by directing people to google searches.I can quite believe that 50% substitutions can radically change a proteins conformation, even with a lot of conservative changes, but it depends a lot on the protien and the exact changes. One such example, or even several, does not undermine the example from MotA, it just suggests that the MotA situation is quite rare, which I am quite prepared to believe. No it isn't, it is exactly the subject Shapiro's work addresses and the answer is that much of the engineering comes from transposable elements in the DNA and mechanisms which promote genetic re-arrangement as a response to certain environmental cues or in specific cell lineages, i.e. the immune system in mammals. We also know that effective changes can be produce by mechanisms including single nucleotide substitutions and gene duplications.TTFN,WK

If you're making a point you've garnered from some website, make the point in your own words and provide a link as a supporting reference. It's best to provide a link to a webpage rather than to an entire website, and if the webpage is long it helps to describe where on the webpage the relevant information appears.In other circumstances, such as answering questions like, "What was that link again?" bare links are fine. As you discovered with RAZD, this is not a reliable way to provide a link. The order of results in Google changes frequently. It's best to provide actual links rather than procedures to find links. So if we find two scientists who disagree with Hoyle and Gingerich, then what? Do we conduct a poll and find the percentage of scientists who support each side? If we did then intelligent design would lose by about a 100-to-1 margin.Or acknowledging that such approaches are the very embodiment of the fallacy of appeal to authority, we could actually discuss the details of the issues ourselves.--Percy

OK, there it is.This "sickle cell" provides some protection against malaria.Accordingly, in areas in which malaria is endemic, this is a beneficial mutation.And don't bother trying to hand wave this away, or deny it.Your religious belief that there are no beneficial mutations is simply wrong and you'll just have to get used to that fact.

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

traderdrew responds to me:

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So unless you can show that there is a second universe out there, then we are left with only the universe we have. And thus, the probability of a universe existing with precisely the characteristics of our current universe is exactly 1.

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Fine... I have no problem dealing with a single three dimensional universe or a multiuniverse around here.

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Huh? What on earth does that have to do with what I said?The question to you is whether or not there is another universe out there. Certain aspects of quantum theory and cosmology seem to point to the possibility of other universes out there, but we don't have any evidence of them so far.I wouldn't be so quick to applaud the idea of multiple universes, though, since such theories tend to indicate that there can be as many universes as you like. Which means that a universe exactly like the one we are currently living in are inevitable.But no matter what, you run into the problem of the anthropic principle: Of course we exist in a universe that allows for our existence. Where else could we possibly be?

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Need I say more? Now, how can we argue with these two scientists???

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Because I'm a scientist, too. And surely you're not about to try and pull the argument from authority on me, are you?After all, Hoyle rejected the Big Bang which has been so soundly shown that it would be perverse to deny it.Too, Hoyle thinks life originated in space, advocating panspermia, with evolution on earth driven by viruses arriving from comets.Are you sure you want to hitch your wagon to that fallen star?

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Rrhain

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Thank you for your submission to Science. Your paper was reviewed by a jury of seventh graders so that they could look for balance and to allow them to make up their own minds. We are sorry to say that they found your paper "bogus," specifically describing the section on the laboratory work "boring." We regret that we will be unable to publish your work at this time.

We're living in two different dimensions greyseal. You claim that an organism develops brand new beneficial functions due to gamma rays smashing apart the information rich genetic structure of DNA.I've provided a useless but structured bit of information in my code. It's up to you to show how your theory holds up in the lab.

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There no doubt exist natural laws, but once this fine reason of ours was corrupted, it corrupted everything. blz paskal

Sickle cell anemia is a disease Coyote. It reduces the oxygen carrying capacity of the blood, it leads to organ failure and death. How can you claim that this is beneficial.Besides, it adds NO NEW INFORMATION.It's got nothing to do with my world view Coyote, it's observable science.

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There no doubt exist natural laws, but once this fine reason of ours was corrupted, it corrupted everything. blz paskal

No he doesn't. Is this how you think mutations occur?

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I hunt for the truth

You didn't ask for new information, you asked for a beneficial mutation. It was provided.

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I hunt for the truth

way to ignore the question, Lucy!I'm forced to go with "you don't know Jack about what you're talking about".I gave you a specific example of "an increase in information" and "a beneficial mutation" - the moth and it's colour change.You could have said "it doesn't count, you can't prove it's increasing information, you can't prove it occured without god doing it" but you just ignored it.I gave you a specific example of a massive increase in "code" in nature, the syndrome I provided.You could have said "it doesn't count, it's not beneficial and would in nature result in death" but you just ignored it.Instead, you give me some bullshit about "living in different worlds" and how I needed to show you the two things that I showed you (and AGAIN above) "in the lab".The world is my lab.Answer the question or retract your argument as irrelevant.Edited by greyseal, : No reason given.

You missed Message 340.--Percy

Since you didn't seem to read my post, let me repeat:

1) Sickle cells are caused by a mutation.

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2) That mutation carries some protection against malaria.

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3) In areas in which malaria is endemic that is a beneficial mutation.

That is evidence of a beneficial mutation in relation to malaria, although the same mutation is not beneficial in some other circumstances.Adds no new information? That is patently false, and if you weren't blinded by the religiously-based need to claim "no new information" in all circumstances you'd see your error.Those who have sickle cells are subject to anemia and a number of other problems. That is definitely "new" and not a part of the normal human condition. Likewise, those who have sickle cells have some protection from malaria. That also is "new" and not a part of the human condition.And your worldview does not necessarily coincide with "observable science." We have seen many examples where your worldview overshadows that science has learned, causing you to deny what is clear to almost everyone else.We have two examples in your post: no beneficial mutations and no new information. These are both examples of where your worldview (religious belief) prevents you from accepting what science has observed.

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Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.

At least one of those is baseless - Lucy has still failed miserably to even define what she's talking about with "no new information".She said it was "an increase in information" - Percy gave her a logical example of allele increase.She said that didn't count because it wasn't real (wtf?) - the melanine moth seems to count, because before that mutation occured there was only one type.Not only that but your very own example of "sickle cell" apparently doesn't count (despite being novel) because...uh...apparently because "f*ck you it doesn't".she gave an example of a computer code expanding greatly in size - the result of which would not give the intended result, but would do something. I gave her a syndrome where a large chunk of genetic code was duplicated - it wasn't beneficial, but it didn't result in death and still "did something".she hasn't answered that one at all - but I think she'd just say "it's a disease" like she did with sickle cell.Still, i think all rational people would say her objections are baseless unless she can set some criteria which make sense.

Sickle Cell Anemia is a recessive trait that tends to have more problems than benefits. You may be less susceptible to malaria, but more prone to dropping dead. Your cells need oxygen all of the time, versus the risk of contracting malaria some of the time. I really don't see that as being a beneficial mutation when the cost outweighs the gains, regardless of whether or not you live in an area of the world where malaria is prevalent. Edited by Hyroglyphx, : No reason given.

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"Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind." -- Bertrand Russell

You haven't got it quite right. The individuals who are heterozygoous for sickle-cell get enough resistance to malaria to outweigh the (limited) negative effects they suffer. It's only individuals homozygous for sickle-cell that get the full version of the disease.On the whole the mutation is beneficial (because having it in the population is positive) and the frequency is maintained by selection.
It'll just never reach fixation, because of the drawbacks.