Is Earth old enough for DNA to evolve?

Not only fascinating, but apparently you are working in the middle of it! It would be interesting to read some posts on where you guys think it is headed and what the implications are.

I appreciate your comments and have taken them to heart.

I did learn a lot here and appreciate the comments you made.

answers only generate more questions to ask - the lateral transfer of an entire genome - that sounds like something to study all by itself!

Sounds good - I will listen to it this weekend - thanks for the reference!

Wow - how to start.

1. It is hard to make a linear statement about anything. For example:
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   1. The length of the genome is not necessarily an indicator of the complexity of the creature it represents, nor the time it took for the genome to generate.
   2. It is hard to make statements about time as it relates to genetics. As some stated here, factors can go up and down over the duration of the genome, such as the reproduction rate, or the mutation rate.
   3. this whole concept of the bush of life and not a long chain of progression that most of us were taught in school.
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2. The complexity is beyond what I had even imagined. This is part of the problem that the general public like myself have in accepting the science that is presented to us. Most are not in forums like this. What we hear is that the genome has three billion pieces of information and that most if it occurred through random mutations. We think "so it just randomly organized itself three billion times and here we are". It is hard to accept intuitively that the utter complexity of genetics just randomly occurred even with natural selection. The science community has struggled with communicating this — maybe there is a straight forward presentation of genetics and evolution that does a good job of explaining these things and I suspect someone may have a suggestion. Several of the posts here were impressively clear and comprehensive in just a paragraph or two.
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3. I learned that someone has already asked my question in the right way and has an answer to the extent that the study covered it (see post by Taq) I need to get a science dictionary out to understand what it says, and I will be doing that, but I am fascinated that this has been looked at and am looking forward to trying to understand it.
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4. etc etc — I don’t want to bore you with a long list so I won’t continue but this has been very informative and I am grateful that the science community would take the time to do it.

Edited by Admin, : Make more readable by using dBCodes for the lists.

One thing "science" can do is to represent their own beliefs honestly and not represent everything they believe as "science". This is true regardless of your point of view on origins. I hear people on both sides talk about what the position of "science" is, and many times I think that anything they personally believe is presented as science. When they do this they diminish the credibility of the science community as a whole, and the public gets skeptical.

I have a life-long interest in understanding what is going on around me. I am a religious person and my personal belief includes the idea that there is a Creator. I believe the study of science is also a study of the Creator. True Science is a definitive statement by the Creator. There is a verse where God is asked his name and he answers I AM. Science also makes the same statement. If I asked science who are you ? it might answer IT IS. Science that is irrefutable just IS and that is what I want to know about. As far as this forum is concerned I was really looking for a forum of science minded people who would answer my questions from a strictly science context. I am not looking for Spiritual answers to scientific questions.