Evolution Requires Reduction in Genetic Diversity

Haven't got to this part of your post yet but I do want to affirm that you are right about there being so many alleles per gene in some cases, and I figure that had to develop from mutations at some point. But they are VIABLE alleles so it's not the usual kind of mutation with its vast production of disease and "neutral" changes that don't produce a new trait, but merely destroy a functioning allele.ABE: Ooops. Just realized I may be making the mistake of accepting that these many alleles ARE viable alleles, that is, that they do produce functioning unique traits. But perhaps they are merely accretions of the usual deleterious-to-neutral-to-redundant mutations, or many of them are, that are called alleles just because that's what the ToE calls them. Any light on the functions of these many alleles would be appreciated. Or I'll look it up later when my eyes have recovered. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

The rest of your post although my eyes really aren't recovered. Apparently you think the many different breeds of domestic sheep show that "genetic diversity has been added." But as usual this is confusing phenotypic with genetic diversity. Lots of new breeds (phenotypes) yes, but no evidence whatever of increased genetic diversity, which, as I've been arguing forever, is not how you get new breeds / phenotypes. That takes reducing genetic diversity. So all those breeds of sheep each has its own genome with LESS genetic diversity in it than the original population or the other breeds combined. Of necessity. Yes, as a general statement. However, speciation CAN occur, though not always, but at least an identifiable new subspecies should emerge. I'm happy with genetic isolation myself, it's the concept I usually use. But I think it would cause confusion if you identify speciation with mere genetic isolation because speciation is tied to loss of ability to interbreed with other populations, and genetic isolation doesn't always bring that about, which was the point I was just making. You WILL get a new subspecies but you won't always get speciation. It's not all Mendelian. I did find that interesting discussion of "Exceptions to simple inheritance" a while back, which includes information about traits that have many genes, and the fact that dominance and recessiveness can be affected by other genetic factors. Also, the main influences on my argument are really natural selection and reproductive isolation, which Mendel doesn't get into, the idea being that it's the processes that select and isolate, whether by human intention, nature's selection for adaptiveness, or the simple random reproductive isolation of a part of a population, that form new subspecies by reducing genetic diversity. As I acknowledged in my last post to you I agree that there has to be a source for these extra alleles per gene and I suppose it would have to be some form of mutation. But I also want to know how many of the extra alleles are really viable functioning sources of unique traits, because some of them could be just the usual mutation mistakes, producing nothing at all that contributes to the species except diseases, redundant functions and nonfunctioning changes etc. I agree, but it does depend on the quality of the extra "alleles" as Isaid. They could be explained by a formerly healthy version of mutation that deteriorated over generations into the unhealthy versions we have today. OR it's even possible that all the VALID variation DID come from four alleles per gene, which would produce a huge number of genetic combinations all by themselves especially with many more genes per trait, which really is very likely if junk DNA is what happens to them when they die. This I'm not following. DNA altered how? What would imply mutations? I certainly believe mutations exist, but that except for the rare fluke they do nothing at all beneficial for the organism and are very probably the cause of the death of many genes and so contribute to the junk DNA. Now wait a minute here. If I said anything like this I don't recall it and I can't have meant what you are saying. The initial or at least greatest reduction in genetic diversity as I explained it occurred from the bottleneck of the Flood, not mutations, and the Flood bottleneck would therefore also have contributed the majority of the junk DNA. I don't remember anything about 5% but I did say that the current percentage of heterozygosity in the human genome is about 7%, leading me to suppose it was quite a bit higher just before the Flood, but I don't think of mutations as contributing to all this death in the genome OR the organism until much more recently. Although your 5% and in fact your whole previous paragraph are a total confusion, at least this one ends up correctly representing my view that most of the initial genome is now junk DNA, thanks predominantly to the Flood bottleneck. NOT MUTATIONS. IF and only if the many alleles per gene ARE viable nondeleterious or nonfunctioning, which is still a question, then I agree that is an increase in genetic diversity. But I see no reason to think it's continuing now since the evidence for any valid gain in genetic diversity is nil. Outside of bacteria which do all sorts of weird things sexually reproducing creatures don't do. Absolutely correct. Evolution NEEDS a continuous source of genetic diversity, but I see only the cost in genetic reduction as it plays out its selective and isolating methods. I wonder that too. I think a lot of it must have been functions that enhanced the health and longevity of people and animals, various immunities perhaps, abilities to process foods we don't have. They should have had functioning appendix and gall bladder among other things, both of which aren't very useful to us any more. I think along these lines because of the hundreds of years people lived up until the Flood. But there could have been other interesting traits we have no way of imagining now. If someone would like to finance a well equipped laboratory for raising populations of small sexually reproducing animals that start with high genetic diversity, and help figure out which animals would be the best candidates, and find some good staff for it I'd be happy to outline the experiments I think would show reduced genetic diversity after the development of a series of subpopulations. If those "hominids" are pre-Flood human fossils [abeidn't say that right. Meant people who died in the Flood] they should show more heterozygosity in the genome. But you have to put your information into English and not expect me to deal with gene counts. Please. See above. I think you must have meant "The POSSIBILITY" not "impossibility. My lab experiment would use sexually reproducing creatures if there are any still to be found in the wild with sufficient genetic diversity for the purpose. E. coli isn't going to prove anything about sexually reproducing creatures. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I'm afraid I must have done some real damage to my eyes because they aren't recovering as they usually do from overuse. They're better but I should take lots of breaks from the internet. But it's not. You all say that and you're wrong. You and Dr. A both point to the number of different breeds {phenotypes} that came out of the domestic sheep O.aries as your evidence for an increase in genetic diversity and this is wrong wrong wrong as I've explained many times. This is *my* argument, I should know when somebody gets it or not. I've said over and over this is about HOW you get so many breeds, and that's by LOSING genetic diversity as each evolves its new traits. All the number of breeds tells you is how much diversity was in the original O.aries population, and apparently it had quite high genetic diversity for so many breeds to come from it. But it would have been already IN O. aries, not ADDED when O.aries split from O.orientalis, which you apparently think, though you say nothing about how it would be possible for a very large increase in genetic diversity to occur. Mutations are really the only option and mutations do not occur at such a rate, not to mention that it is well known that most of them add nothing of use anyway.The reality is that O. aries would have had less genetic diversity than the original population it shared with O. orientalis before O.Aries formed its own breed or subpopulation. But even with its remaining great genetic diversity each breed that then formed out of O. aries' high diversity also had to lose diversity as it developed its own new collection of traits, because this is what happens with such splits. It's brought about by the new gene frequencies that usually include the loss of some alleles because of the smaller number of individuals that were isolated in order to produce the new breed.I'm sorry I have to keep repeating myself but you are NOT getting it, and Dr. A is NOT getting it. But it does. The fact that you don't see how this happens shows you continue not to get it. I've said my argument is counterintuitive and it is.You can't get a breed or new subspecies by adding genetic diversity but even if you could, where is your increase in diversity going to come from? As I say above mutation is the only possible source and it's completely insufficient for the job, too slow and with too many negative results.But you are saying something like: in order to get a collie from a pack of wild dogs you have to add genetic diversity. This is not how it works. Breeders normally subtract to get their breeds. A pack of dogs should normally have lots of genetic diversity, at least more than any given breed that could be developed out of it. To get breeds out of it you subtract all the genetic material that does not support the traits of the breed you are developing. This is actual fact, the reality of how breeding works.Today they add some genetic diversity back into their breeds by mixing them with other dogs because of the very fact that breeds ARE created by eliminating genetic diversity which has led to genetic diseases, so they compromise the pure traits of their breed for the sake of its health by adding some genetic diversity back into it: by doing this they lose some of the desired traits by adding in genetic diversity, just as the desired traits were originally gained by losing genetic diversity. It's counterintuitive but it's fact. No, I am speaking of what it takes to form a breed from an original larger population. I'm not comparing the breeds with each other, I'm comparing each with the original population from which they formed from a smaller pool of gene frequencies. Each new breed formed by the same means: by losing genetic diversity. The long-hared breed lost the genetic means for short hair; the shorthaired breeds lost the genetic means for long hair; etc. etc. etc. All in relation to the ORIGINAL gene pool, not each other. The new gene frequencies for each new breed are in relation to the original gene frequencies of the population they came from. Could have been the original O. aries or could have been one of the breeds that came from it, but the new breed's gene pool develops from its "mother" population with no reference whatever to the other breeds that are similarly developed. But that's a great error. THE most fundamental error of confusing phenotypic with genetic diversity which is the problem here over and over again. All those different phenotypes can only develop by losing genetic diversity from that of the original "mother" population.My comparison IS between the original gene pool and the breeds formed from it at each level. After O. aries split from O. orientalis both populations might have had decreased genetic diversity from the original, depending on the numbers of individuals in each group, and O.orientalis might also have been able to continue to produce a great variety of subspecies just as O. aries did, and if it didn't that might simply have been because natural population splits didn't occur and it would have taken human intervention to bring them about as it did with O. aries. Again, not true. This is extraordinarily muddled. Evolution is indeed about how ancestral species produce descendant subspecies, breeds or races, which is why I focus on the processes that bring this about. It is a sort of article of faith that this requires an increase in genetic diversity, but when you think through what is actually happening as new subspecies form you have to realize that it requires the loss of genetic diversity in each case, just as the development of domestic breeds does. You are just repeating the party line, which is nothing but an assumption that in reality doesn't occur; what occurs in reality is the loss of genetic diversity I keep harping on. This sounds right: you *ASSUME* some additional genetic material "between" ancestor and descendants, which comes from where? Can't come from the normal production of mutations as discussed above, so are you conjuring it out of thin air?So I guess you are saying you have a completely new and different collection of genetic possibilities, that is, a new genetic diversity, that somehow miraculously got itself added to the gene pool of the descendant populations? That is, not the same genetic diversity that was in the original population getting distributed among the various breeds as I'm saying.First, there's no possible way it could happen, as discussed above, and second, it isn't needed. An ancestral species with high genetic diversity, which was obviously the case with O. orientalis, can bear many population splits forming new subspecies with their attendant loss of diversity. Even many breeds developing from those breeds may be possible if the original genetic diversity was quite high.You haven't even tried to show how it's possible for this increase in genetic diversity to occur that you believe must occur for new subspecies to form, you do just assert it, which really is nothing more than reciting the evolution party line. You came on promising to show us something new but all you've done so far is repeat the basic error of confusing phenotypic with genetic diversity, asserting that the apparent increase in phenotypic diversity proves an increase in genetic diversity which it does not.Perhaps you'll have more luck when you try to prove whatever it is you want to prove about the genetic diversity of the various "hominids" you've mentioned.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I want to get back to your post eventually, RAZD, but there's a lot in this thread to deal with and my eyes don't last very long right now.As for mutation as the source of new alleles, are you really including all those KNOWN mutations that do nothing whatever for the good of the organism, are either disease sources or functionally redundant or have no function at all, while the known "beneficial" mutations are so few and far between a species is more likely to go extinct waiting around for even one to come rescue it from a genetically depleted condition?I've proposed that the genes that have many alleles get them by some form of mutation, but the accidents in replication that are today the source of all these useless mutations could hardly be the source of anything useful to the organism. But also unless somebody has given the information above and I've missed it, some of these additional allleles may be just the usual mutational uselessness anyway. If my eyes hold out I'll read upthread some.

Just had to repeat this. This alone shows you haven't a clue to my argument or you'd at least get how losing genetic material causes more phenotypic variation. Relying on imagination just shows you aren't thinking it through.

But my argument goes against the very assumptions that lead you to say that, which is why DNA evidence is required. Ability to interbreed is an artificial category invented for the ToE. In reality this inability occurs WITHIN a species and is no marker of forming a new species at all, especially since if you did test the DNA they should show a very evident loss of genetic diversity from previous populations, most likely in the form of more fixed loci.Also, you get reduced genetic diversity even without so-called "speciation" which is a misnomer anyway as I just said. The point of DNA analysis would be to look for evidence of this reduction from population to population, probably mostly concentrating on the formation of fixed loci for the most characteristic traits of a population, or if possible, the reduction in number of alleles for those traits from the previous population from which it developed. Hybrid zones may make the investigation difficult but those are usually identifiable. The only marker I have in mind is the number of fixed loci from population to population, showing that a population has been reduced to one allele for a given trait. This should be possible to identify, shouldn't it? A general reduction in alleles for the characteristic traits could also be shown, couldn't it? But of course that couldn't prove an argument that disagrees with the assumptions of the ToE.However, I'd expect the best evidence to come from species that are reproductively isolated and NOT interbreeding with others. Only if you aren't interested in trying to find out if my argument is correct but prefer to hold on to your evolutionist assumptions.

It's not that it's artificial in the sense that it doesn't exist, it's artificial in the sense that it is not a new species. It could be a new subspecies but that doesn't require inability to interbreed.Yes I do want to claim that two populations that can't interbreed are the same species. Such as O. orientalis and O. aries for instance, both of the Species Sheep. The idea is supposed to suggest a new platform for evolution, but the usual cause of the inability to interbreed, if the cause is genetic rather than preferential, is loss of genetic diversity which creates a genetic mismatch with the former population, and is very far from a platform for further evolution. "Speciation" implies a stepping stone in evoljution to new Species and people actually believe it although it is genetically impossible.Different Species can't interbreed either, it's just that inability to interbreed isn't the definition of a new species.

I'm going to have to do that but I'll also not answer other posts while I'm working on yours so maybe I can get through it all.One thing I know after skimming through this and spending some time on your Pelycodus example is that I am really not getting what the chart shows. The whiteness of the chart hurts my eyes so I don't want to spend more time on it but I spent enough to know I'm not getting what I'm supposed to get out of it. I need a clearer description of what the lines represent for one thing. Anything you can do to make it clearer would help. I probably won't get to it for a while anyway.So back to the beginning: Sure, though I don't think this is pertinent to our discussion here since despite the different purpose the methods are the same. I know you believe this but nothing has yet really challenged the point I keep trying to make. First of all I have never heard of the parents of twins having this sort of experience before this. And it doesn't fit with what is said about mutations not making a noticeable difference for many generations, besides all the negatives that far outnumber anything positive that they ever produce. Mutations occur, yes, but not useful mutations except very very rarely, and not even mutations that actually code for something recognizable either. This is what I've gleaned from various discussions of mutations, not something I made up. Although this quote is talking about "genetic data" the way it's written sounds like this isn't from studying the DNA but inferences made from the differences in the phenotypes. I'm just noting this in passing, however, because the conclusion drawn is probably true enough and it probably doesn't impinge on the point I keep trying to make anyway. So they started in the south and then subpopulations formed on both the east and west sides of the "ring," which basically shows that this isn't a typical ring species, but more like two separate rings that went halfway around the ring on both sides and then met at the top of the ring.OK. Not necessarily. It depends on how many individuals split off to form the two subpopulations. Even one subpopulation could start from a large enough number to change the gene frequencies even in the original "mother" population, but two subpopulations could increase that number of emigrating individuals enough to make it certain the original population was reduced in numbers enough to change its gene frequencies. Since there's no way to know the actual history this is just a likely guess, but the principle is accurate: the original population could have changed genetically even as much as the migrating subpopulations.ABE: also, I have to ask HOW "they would KNOW that one population was the source of the others" which you answer: "as it would still have ALL the alleles of ALL the varietals." But this wiouldn't be apparent by just looking at the phenotype; you'd have to analyze the DNA and so far you've said nothing about that as the method used, and it sounds like the alleles are being inferred from the phenotypic traits. The phenotype isn't going to tell you that, just as looking at O. orientalis can't tell you anything about the great genetic diversity it must possess for O. aries and all its subsequent breeds to form from it. In fact the only reliable way to tell anything about a population's genetic diversity would be DNA analysis. According to my view of the phenotypic presentation, it might be more likely that later populations in a series would show more dramatic or specialized traits from the original due to the more reduced genetic diversity, while the ancestral population would likely have a more "average" look, but I'm not sure this guess holds up, i'ts just a possibility./ABE Is this "genetic evidence" from DNA analysis or again an inference from the phenotypic differences? I don't think you can know how many alleles each population has from looking at the phenotypes. In any case as I just said there is no reason to expect that the original population would retain all the original genetic material if the numbers that migrated way from it were great enough to change its gene frequencies along with the frequencies of the subpopulations. Yes, well, continued gene flow can make it more difficult to see the necessity of loss of alleles in developing new phenotypes, which is why I like to stick to the situation where no gene flow continues and no hybrid zones are formed. There may not be such a perfect situation in ring species in reality but there should be enough isolation in the ring to make the point. But this is why I'd like to set up a lab to demonstrate the point, where you can prevent gene flow between populations and prevent hybrid zones as well. That way all you have is separate populations that breed only among themselves. This fact makes it hard to see the point I'm making but it doesn't challenge the point because the point rests on reproductive isolation and explicitly excludes any gene flow. This depends on how long the separated populations have inbred among themselves in reproductive isolation before the overlap zone forms. It's important to keep in mind that populations with different gene frequencies are going to develop those different gene frequencies in a way that can radically alter the genetic fit between the two. If a hybrid zone develops it will be between a population that, say, originally had more alleles for one kind of plumage while the other had none of those, at least not expressed, but alleles for a different kind of plumage. When a hybrid zone forms we have a genetic situation that combines characteristics in a way that was impossible in each population separately, and the combination of the two different kinds of plumage would very likely produce something entirely different. This isn't a mere combination of separated alleles but a combination of traits based on new genetic combinations that developed from separate gene frequencies, increasing some, decreasing others. But it's not at all a problem for my argument, it's just a different and more complicated genetic picture to sort out. It remains true that if a subpopulation develops IN REPRODUCTIVE ISOLATION, meaning without continued gene flow or resumed gene flow in hybridization then alleles will of necessity be lost in developing its new traits. I do keep emphasizing reproductive isolation, and here you are taking that condition away so you aren't answering my argument at all. But again, RAZD, you are introducing a condition I've specifically eliminated from my argument for the sake of clarity. It can't challenge my basic argument, all it does is add complicating factors that interfere with demonstrating it neatly and cleanly. yes, and I did so above already. 1) The original population lost enough of its own alleles with the loss of large enough numbers of individuals to change its own gene frequencies. AND 2) hybridization doesn't just restore alleles as they originally existed in the original population because they've undergone a complete makeover as each separate population developed new traits from its new gene frequencies which means forming completely new combinations that can't just uncombine back to the original population's combinations. Well the problems you've brought up aren't based on my hypothesis but on your inclusion of gene flow which my hypothesis carefully leaves out, and on your failure to grasp that hybridization isn't a simple recovery of the original population's genome if that population also had new gene frequencies as a result of the migration, and if there was any time to generate new allelic combinations from the new gene frequencies by inbreeding in the separate populations before gene flow was reestablished --or actually even if gene flow remained limited and the genetic recombinations occurred mainly in the separated populations anyway.Believe me I've thought through an enormous variety of possibiltiies in working out this hypothesis of mine.===============Pelycodus is up next. Can you make that chart easier to understand? Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : add ABE paragraphEdited by Faith, : No reason given.

What I think is most wrong with Jerry Cpyne's classical evolutionism is his supposition that the genetic changes from population to population are the result of adaptations to the environment.Of course I particularly like ring species because they make my anti-evolution argument: you are getting a series of subspecies by the reduction of genetic diversity from subpopulation to subpopulation rather than "speciation" at any point as evolution defines it. The problem with ring species for either demonstration is the continued gene flow between the populations wherever that exists. I'm not sure it exists between ALL the populations in every ring species though, but that there can be complete geographic isolation in some cases. Even though it is messy because of the gene flow, I think these series of populations still serve the point I'm trying to make but it would take DNA analysis to find out.Evolutionists assume way too much about the formation of these subpopulations, such as that the genetic changes are due to environmental pressures. This completely ignores and glosses over the purely genetic causes of the genetic / phenotypic changes, meaning the very dramatic effects that occur simply as a result of the new gene frequencies brought about by the splitting off of some individuals to form the new population. Contrary to Darwin's thinking, the finches he studied most likelyl got their variety of beaks this way, and it's the beaks that do the adapting by finding the food best suited to their abilities, rather than the other way around. The beaks come first, the environment is the passive part of the relationship rather than the driving factor of the changes in the creature's traits as the ToE says. Most environments already have a choice of insects, seeds, berries and other hard and soft forms of food, and there's no reason to suppose much change in the environmental offerings from location to location. Not that that form of selection doesn't ever occur, but the ToE makes way too much of it. Darwin's Galapagos tortoise certainly didn't change its appearance for any adaptive reason brought about by natural selection of its traits; it simply got geographically isolated with a new set of gene frequencies from the population on the mainland it descended from.Simple shuffling of genes due to new gene frequencies is the real cause of the genetic changes, in other words the migration itself of individuals from population to population does the work of microevolution..So that wherever you can identify a subpopulation formed from a smaller number of individuals than the one it formed from you ought to be able to identify the reduction in genetic diversity I'm talking about, which I would guess would show up most clearly in the increase in fixed loci for the most characteristic traits of the subpopulation as compared to its "mother" population. Since even the original or mother population can have changed gene frequencies due to the loss of individuals to migration, the changes might not be easy to ascertain with any certainty. Which is why creating a ring species in the laboratory without gene flow or hybrid zones would make the point best. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I didn't stick to my plan of not answering other posts but I really don't know what the Pelycodus chart is about. This is part of your discussion of the chart about Pelycodus. I get that going up the chart is going from older to newer specimens but I need more of an explanation of the whole chart. The names and numbers on the left margin refer to what? locations of some fossils I assume, and their ages or numbers or what? And what do the numbers along the bottom indicate: millions of years?Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

No, it's reading out of context on your part. My comment was a response to his blog where he specifically said the changes are the result of adaptations, the blog that was linked in Tangle's post.Genetic drift? What's that got to do with this discussion?I've read his book too. I say "by." It's not your job to correct my opinion. Do you? I've seen a lot of assumptions and claims that appear to be based on the phenotypic appearance rather than the DNA -- not real evidence. So pony up.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I'm concentrating on population genetics, how sexually reproducing creatures develop new phenotypes by losing genetic diversity through new combinations that occur because of selection and isolation. Although I think I have a fair grasp of how genetics works at the genome level, and that much understanding IS necessary to the argument, if someone starts putting up charts from the genetics laboratory it's just a snow job designed to avoid addressing MY points. Bacteria are not anywhere near the level of this discussion I'm focused on, I don't trust anything said about how their genetics is a model for genetics in general, and since it always comes up when nobody has any evidence on the level I'm talking on I regard it as a cheat. The kind of evidence that matters in this discussion is on the level of claims to known mutations in whatever species we are talking about, their KNOWN functions, what they are KNOWN to code for and the KNOWN results of such mutations in KNOWN cases, plus proof of changes in genetic diversity from subpopulation to subpopulation of an actual living species and so on. Here I get a lot of assertions of increased genetic diversity without a shred of evidence, and Denisova in particular asserts it more on the basis of the ToE's assuming it than any actual known facts. E. coli may demonstrate some interesting genetic information, but only about E. coli and not about my argument. That's really quite a handicap you are imposing on me here. To my mind I just stated the scientific outline of my argument about what junk DNA is. I believe it clearly fits with the known facts of the percentage of DNA in the genome and offers an alternative explanation that nobody would guess at if I didn't spell it out from time to time when relevant issues come up. Granted, it's a statement of my theory rather than any kind of proof, but you know what, various hypotheses are really all anybody has for junk DNA, so what's wrong with stating mine? I think it helps put my overall argument into perspective.. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Drat, RAZD, I know you went to a lot of trouble reconstructing that chart for me and I thank you for that, but I still look at it and your descriptions and feel I don't have any idea what point you are trying to make. Not even enough to venture a good guess. I wish I did because I have no doubt it is not the challenge to my argument you think it is, just as the greenish warblers aren't. I don't know how to deal with this problem, I'd like to be able to understand it so I could answer it but it just makes my head spin reading through it. I've looked at some websites that discuss Pelycodus too. Sorry, I just don't have a way of addressing this. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I'm going farther back in the thread to catch up than I'd intended. Overwhelming amount of stuff to try to deal with. Perhaps my last post to Admin will help clarify I already answered that the addition of VIABLE alleles to a gene must involve some form of mutation, a healthy form as opposed to the vastly predominant useless and deleterious forms, but I'd restrict the process to those healthy functions since deleterious and neutral alleles are disease processes.Also, I don't see how the dead genes in junk DNA could be a source of alleles for OTHER genes still living, but if alleles can switch from gene locus to gene locus, that easily solves my problem: all the alleles formerly of the genes that are now junk DNA would just have been transferred to the still-living genes, but I've never heard of this being observed to occur.But the main thing I want to know is what the great numbers of alternate alleles actually do, such as the 59 for one gene I think you mentioned. How many of them code for an identifiable unique trait, how many are just redundant, coding for the same trait as the allele they replaced despite some differences in the DNA sequence, which I guess is what is meant by a "neutral" mutation? and how many disabled an allele, replacing it with nothing that codes for anything at all so effectively killing it?, and so on and so forth. Perhaps none of them really contributed anything useful to the trait the gene codes for. Do you happen to know? Of course. Your point is? Many suggestive facts that aren't evidence, such as the vulnerability to extinction of so many species in the wild. The thing is science isn't looking for what I'm looking for or they might have found it by now. But as long as they accept the assumptions of the ToE the evidence awaits some creationist scientific work that would need more consensus from the creationist community to get funded etc. Uh huh, and I've dealt with this fact many many times in discussions about all this. Genes of course. The loss of alleles is the loss of genetic diversity but a gene still functions with two of the same allele, which is homozygosity or the condition of fixed loci which usually exists for all the main traits in a breed, which is the definition of its being"truebred." I'm not superclear about what happens if that last allele becomes unfunctional but I think it works something like this: if even one copy of that allele dies, say by a mutation that destroys its normal coding, so that it can't form a functioning pair at all, then there is no more trait at all, no more living gene at all, so if that genome is nevertheless passed on, the offspring will inherit a dead gene, another corpse in the junk DNA cemetery. Over generations the gene should just keep getting deader as it were as that dead allele gets passed on, even if there remain individuals that continue to possess the functioning homozygous pair. Yes, I think it shows a previously enormously fertile and healthy genome that it could function at all as it is now. I did suggest that many immunities and abilities to absorb nutrients and health-protecting functions of organs were lost, all things that would ward off disease and promote great longevity, as well as perhaps simply many interesting variations on all the recognizable traits such as skin color etc. The fossil record shows an enormous variety of races of creatures that no longer exist as well as varieties of some that do have living counterparts, which variety suggests a lot more trait variability before the Great Bottleneck wiped it all out. Addressed above. Again I'd ask, can you account for the functions of those 59 alleles?

I think Percy's definition is good. But we don't need to account for ALL the genes and their alleles. What I've suggested is focusing on the genes for the particular traits that are most characteristic of the subpopulations, such as the genes for the plumage that varies from subpopulation to subpopulation in the greenish warblers ring species. If this is possilble. Avoiding hybrid zones and focusing on the populations that originally migrated from an identifiable "mother" population. If these can be clearly identified, and if the genes for the characteristic traits can be identified.It's where the populations differ most phenotypically that the loss of alleles should show up clearest. I'd expect maybe a half dozen traits per subpopulation to be evidence of loss of diversity as the subpopulations formed from each other around the ring. There could be multiple genes for each trait to look at too. Also, in many cases even the original population may have lost enough diversity to make this particularly difficult. I can't be sure it's even possible but this is what I'd expect to focus on. If a population is homozygous at a number of loci where in the previous populations there was heterozygosity this would be clear evidence of loss of genetic diversity. A mere loss of alleles at a locus that remains heterozygous would entail a count for many individuals which might be too much to ask. I'm not sure how this works with polymorphism but whatever is readily measured AND important is certainly where the focus should be. That's what I expect too. However, mutations DO occur. My expectation would be that none of them makes an actual functioning allele, that is, an allele for a new unique trait, and besides it probably wouldn't affect the phenotype right away anyway, it would have to be passed on and pair up with itself to find out what it does and that's too boggling to consider. Mutations that are merely a slightly different sequence that doesn't change the coding shouldn't be counted as increasing genetic diversity. I focus on alleles because they're easy to grasp. If it's possible to measure changes in diversity in other regions you'd have to explain the processes and make a case for it.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.