Macroevolution: Its all around us...

I suggest you and others read the study.The study considered their testing of this area of DNA to be a sufficient argument challenging the veracity of the molecular clock. http://www.pubmedcentral.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=509321Why do they think this is relevant for considering mutations in coding DNA, if as you guys claim, this has nothing to say about mutations in general?Note that specifically mention estimates of when things evolved. Why do they think this is relevant?For instance, they consider this research valuable for considering whether certain mutations are "highly unlikely" or not, and estimating the risks of harmful mutations.But wait, according to you guys, this study says nothing about mutations that could actually show up as real traits. you guys claim this says nothing about mutations in coding DNA. http://www.pubmedcentral.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=509321This message has been edited by randman, 06-24-2005 02:43 AM

Save the lecture. I know how science is suppossed to proceed. Unfortunately, I don't see that with much of evolutionism. Heck, even here on this forum you see statements like "common descent has been proven beyond any reasonable shadow of doubt." Good point, which is interesting in light of the dogmatism of evolutionists.But back on topic, I am not asking to prove a negative in the manner you claim. DNA either displays convergent tendencies or it does not. You guys say it does not, but you offer no evidence for that.I have offered evidence that it does have convergent tendencies. I am asking evolutionists to back up their claim that the nature of DNA is that it mutates not according to convergent patterns, but randomly.Can you back up Darwinism or not? I am referring to the basic properties of DNA. It appears there are rules or guidance of some sort creating a directional tendency in DNA. If that occurs in human DNA, we should expect to see it elsewhere too. The authors of the paper believed their study is evidence of that, and so do I. You have yet to explain why it could not be so. Admittedly the evidence is scant of this date, but there is some evidence for what they and I say, but no evidence for your claims.The only "leap" imo is to maintain DNA is not convergent.

Your post shows you have grasped nothing of the entire point.It completely matters "who gets there first." I'll try again.1. Mutations occur prior to being "selected for" via natural selection. Agreed?2. If 2 equally good mutations are possible, the one that shows up first wins. Agreed or not?3. Natural selection therefore can be a much stronger force, weaker force, it does not matter because it cannot consciously wait for the other mutation. It acts on the present.Let me illustrate it like this. Suppose there is a better solution possible, but is too rare to occur very often, and a mutation occurs more frequently due to convergent DNA, and this mutation once established, makes the "best" mutation no longer useful.Which mutation is going to arise and take hold?hint: The lesser beneficial mutation that "gets their first."Of course, this is predicated on the idea that such beneficial mutations do occur and create via natural selection the great diversity we see. It's all just speculation because we have not observed that.

Crash, discussions with you don't seem to be fruitful because you never seem to try to understand your critics, and thus you argue with a straw man.Clearly, you are way off here.What you fail to realize, and I assume it's because you never read the paper (right?) is that different sequences have different convergent patterns. Think of it like a river. At a given point, the river or stream is going to cut into the ground according to the path of least resistance, but as it cuts deeper, that can create a new area of least resistance.So there is not one pattern that all DNA converges towards, but rather specific combinations and patterns are predisposed to certain patterns, and as they arise, that changes as well.So convergent DNA is fully consistent with divergent patterns, completely opposite of what you claim here.You would have known that had you read the scientific papers in question, but you did not and therefore are arguing a nonsensical position based on ignorance of the claims of DNA convergency.

Wrong. You make a similar mistake to crash's in applying a simplified process to a complex process.Note the concept that the mutation that arises which is predisposed already contains within it a new and different predisposition, and in my example, I point out that this may make the mutation which would have been beneficial and selected for, no longer the case.In that way, a great many potential beneficial mutations that could conceivable arise would not do so, and this makes sense with what we see, regardless of whether one accepts ToE or not.We don't see perfect designs, which one would sort of expect with randomn mutations considering the long periods of times. What we see rather is a seeming directional tendency within DNA and resulting life forms.Convergent DNA is a significant discovery because it shows how a great many ideal designs never develop, and a great many similar designs that are imperfect do tend to develop, assuming that is the case.But you guys seem to, imo, be afraid of considering the implications of convergent DNA because it is presented in an argument critical of common descent theories.I suspect within a few short years, as evolutionists incorporate this into their models, every one of you will swear it was predicted all along, fits perfectly, etc, etc,....ad nauseum.

First off, you misunderstand the concept of proving a negative. Asking proof of what force would stop microevolution from becoming mancroevolution is asking to prove a negative because it is not established by observable evidence that microevolution and even speciation can produce the major leaps in morphological changes necessary for common descent models to be true, but that never stops you guys.But asking for evidence of the properties of DNA, whether convergent or not, is not asking to prove a negative. If I ask, for example, will this ball bounce or not, is that asking to prove a negative?No, it's clearly not. I have offerred evidence, for both coding and non-coding DNA by the way since microsatellites appear in both, that indicate DNA is convergent. Sure, it's not comprehensive, but thus far all the evidence we have indicates convergent patterns in DNA.You have offered no evidence one way or the other. The studies done could just as easily have shown non-convergency as a property of DNA as convergency.

I did not make the term up. It's not my fault if you won't take the time to read the paper and consider what they are talking about. No, the discussion clearly also involved coding DNA since they consider their findings applicable to discovering when harmful mutations might occur, and they specifically conducted the study to consider the validity of the molecular clock.You have just failed to consider the intent and implications of the paper.Have you read it, and the other paper/letter commenting on it?

I can't help you if you don't want to understand.1. By preventing, it is clear I mean preventing a mutation from being selected for, although a series of mutations could well prevent some mutations that were more likely before from occuring. That does and can happen, but that's not the point. The point is that once a mutation, a solution, is selected for and implemented in a species and causes a widespread change, alternative mutations that could have also provided an alternate solution may not longer be good for that species, and in that way, the solutions more predisposed to occur within the DNA will tend to crowd out and prevent mutations that could even be better at an earlier time from ever occuring because the earlier mutations "got there first."if you don't understand this by now, after repeating it so many times, I am frankly not interested in continuing to try to explain it. It's as simple as if someone makes a right turn on a road, drives 20 miles, the next best route to get the original destination (natural selection) may not be to turn around and backtrack, but to take a different route that cuts over to where you want to be, unless we are dealing with very straight roads, which is usually not the case.That's not a perfect example, obviously, but it does illustrate the principle that once a change is made, it changes the situation of what the best course of action is. So we are back to insisting the whole theory must be challenged instead of just looking at each piece of evidence.Frankly, you just need to read the paper. One of it's claims does address what ought to be a modification of ToE concepts, which is that DNA mutation is non-random.It does not challenge the theory otherwise, but properly sets itself upon the details of what and why DNA does what it does.Considering we are so new to understanding some of these basic properties of DNA, I find evolutionists dogmatic attitude to be inherently unscientific.

You are still missing the point. You are claiming that mutations are random, but with qualifications since we know they are not random, but still that is the general claim.I am saying you offer no evidence DNA is random. I am not asking you to prove a negative. I am asking you to prove your assertion. Randomness is assumed. It's never been proven, and the more we study it, the less random mutations appear to be.You play semantics by saying disproving convergency, but that's all this is because I'm not asking you to disprove that convergency can happen, I am asking you to offer evidence that mutations are random.They don't appear to be random.Why do you say they are?This study and others cited in the paper indicate mutations are not random. So really you are asking me to accept an unproven assertion, randomness, and reject the evidence that mutations contain convergent predispositions to mutate according to rules or a pattern.