Impossible evolution of new beneficial proteins

That's not true, in fact. A straight forward counter example is the Apo-AI Milano mutation, which is carried by something like 30 individuals in a small Italian village. The mutation has a number of significant effects; and most importantly it gives the carriers an effective immunity to heart disease. It works by more efficient clearing of bad cholesterol.With regard to information, all carriers are heterozygous; meaning that they carry the new more efficient mutated gene and also the original unmutated gene (one from each parent). This is plainly an increase in "information" from most people who simply have two copies of the unmutated gene. It is also beneficial.See: The Milano Mutation: A Rare Protein Mutation Offers New Hope for Heart Disease PatientsThis is not true either. A good example of a completely new gene giving a completely new enzyme is the famous nylon digesting bacteria. The primary mutation involved is a frameshift mutation, which completely alters the protein sequence, for a completely new enzyme.The new enzyme is called 6-aminohexanoate-dimer hydrolase. The name basically means "nylon digesting". It is interesting to read Lee Spetner's own comments on this mutation! Basically, Spetner says that the mutation does increase information, and asks instead whether or not it is random. Basically, Spetner appears to be some kind of an old earth creationist who wants a special kind of non-random mutation as a mechanism for a guided evolution. But he is not really clear on this; that is my attempt to comprehend his position. Actually, Dr Lee Spetner is a physicist; not a biochemist. He received his PhD in physics in 1950, and worked in applied physics at John Hopkins University in the sixties. One year (1962-1963) he had a fellowship with the department of biophysics at John Hopkins; and this engendered his interest in biology.His rather idiosyncratic views on information theory stand out as one of the only attempts by creationists to give a quantified definition of information, which is an essential requirement for any claim about information increase or decrease; but examination of the work shows that it actually falls significantly short of an unambiguous definition. No creationist has ever given a plain quantified definition of information by which the nonsensical claim of "no information increase" can be supported.In correspondence with Gert Korthof, Lee Spetner flatly contradicts the claim made above about the impossibility of information increase. Quoting Spetner from this letter:
I shall emphasize again: There is no theorem requiring mutations to lose information. I can easily imagine mutations that gain information. The simplest example is what is known as a back mutation. A back mutation undoes the effect of a previous mutation. If the a single nucleotide change in the genome were to lose information, then a subsequent mutation back to the previous condition would regain the lost information. The back mutation clearly adds information. Since these mutations are known to occur, they form a counterexample to any conjecture that random mutations must lose information.Further on in the correspondence, some concrete examples are given, and Spetner's comments in correspondence are:
Thank you for the reference to Wilks et al. I am delighted to add that piece of information to my collection. Yes, I agree with you that the mutation in this example does appear to add a lot of information to the genome, and I believe it really does (I have also found another, by the way).Spetner goes on to speak of how such mutations are unlikely or rare; and we could critique that also. For the time being I just want to clear up the misconceptions about what Spetner is actually saying. The claim that information increase is impossible is nonsense, and it is incorrect, and Spetner knows it.For mutations in general, we need a clear definition of information before one can claim that a particular mutation does or does not increase information. Spetner's definitions are vague; but any attempt to pin down a clear definition will allow one to give examples of mutations (and not just back mutations!) which increase information by that definition.Cheers -- Chris[This message has been edited by cjhs, 02-10-2004]

It would help if you could clarify to whom you are responding, and engage some of the specific points which have been raised by various contributors.Definitions certainly are important. Can you give a definition of "information" which you were using when you refer to no mutations yielding new information? This was in Post 13 of this thread, and I responded to that with some corrections in Post 25. Actually, it is entirely possible. In fact, what could prevent it? Microevolution is the small scale evolutionary change from generation to generation. Over many generations, change accumulates.Macroevolution is evolution above the taxonomic level of species. It is concerned with how diversity in living forms accumulates and diverges.A curious phenomenon in recent time is an increasing acceptance by creationists that speciation can occur rapidly. Indeed, this is absolutely required to account for the enormous diversity in living forms to arise since all the ark. It gets worse than this; to address diversity many creationists are reduced to denying the bible (which speaks of all animal life being extinguished: Genesis 7:23) and proposing various animal survivors on "floating mats" and other such inventions. I do not know if you use such models; but if you want to keep up with what creationists are proposing you need to be aware that they invoke massive amounts of macroevolutionary change (as the term macroevolution is used in biology; change above the level of species); far more than evolutionists. You need to be aware that mutations do not accumulate in one individual; but over a lineage. For example, you yourself, based on observed levels of mutations, probably have well over 60 new mutations not present in your parents. These will be passed on to your children, and they will add a futher 60 to 100 mutations or so; and so on as time passes. The accumulation of mutations is known; it occurs at rates consistent with the observed amounts of genetic differences between us and closely related primates, like the chimpanzees, and the amount of time since we shared a common ancestor.Macroevolution is pretty much inevitable under such circumstances. Of course, it is unusual to observe dramatic morphological change in a short period; but there are certainly observed changes which are classified as macroevolution. Examples include the development of maize, and evolution of mice on the island of Madeira; both of these over several hundred years. See, "Rapid chromosomal evolution in island mice", by J Britton-Davidian et. al., in Nature. 2000 Jan 13;403(6766):158.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/...
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and the less technical description at Island mice may evolve faster: From one species to six, at the Genome News Network.Cheers -- cjhs[This message has been edited by Sylas aka cjhs, 02-12-2004]

It's not hard at all. You have just learned something, for which sincere congratulations. Mutations can give new information, after all. No problem. This is a good place to ask.This transformation is documented in Requirement for BMP Signaling in Interdigital Apoptosis and Scale Formation, by Hongyan Zou and Lee Niswander, in Science Volume 272, Number 5262, Issue of 3 May 1996, pp. 738-741. The abstract is as follows (and look for the phrase I put in bold): This is, of course, because chickens already have the long evolutionary history for development of feathers; you won't get feathers on a snake by a single mutation.But the mutation to make scales into feathers is a good demonstration of just how closely related feathers and scales really are.Cheers -- cjhsPS. Added in edit. (You can edit posts, CreationMan; look for the edit button at the bottom of posts.) A comprehensive and detailed discussion by Richard Prum (Uni of Kansas) is available at The Evolutionary Origin and Diversification of Feathers. It has a wealth of detail, and includes a brief mention of the work of Zou and Niswander, with some useful cautions. Prum may be known to those following the BAD/BAND dispute. Prum is a colleage of Larry Martin; though they are in robust disagreement.[This message has been edited by cjhs, 02-11-2004]

A new kind of mouse, of course. That is how evolution works. It is a process of divergence of existing forms into a range of new forms.This is often not understood by critics of evolutionary biology, who ask for something like a cat evolving into a dog, or a mouse into a pig. In fact, evolution says this will never happen. What happens instead is that cats get more diverse over time. They are all still cats, but they can be described also as what species of cat: puma, tiger, ocelot, jaguar, lynx, etc.As time goes on, cats might either die out, or become still more diverse. Most likely, it will be a combination; some species or families of cats will die out, others with continue to live and diversify. We can observe just this process of diversification in mice on Madeira.Macroevolution is about this level of change; but it still arises by the accumulation of genetic change in diverging lineages.The mice on Madeira are, I believe, still described as "Mus musculus domesticus"; but they have a distinct karyotype; with fewer chromosomes than the normal mouse species. See House mice on the island of Madeira, which is within a page which explain more about speciation for you.It is interesting that a reduced number of chromosomes in the six new species on Madeira arose by a fusion of chromosomes appearing in the parent species. A similar event has occurred in human ancestry. Humans have one less chromosome pair than the great apes, and it is immediately clear which two chromosomes in apes correspond to the single fused human chromosome. See Comparison of the Human and Great Ape Chromosomes as Evidence for Common Ancestry.Cheers -- SylasPS. (Added in edit.) I think this was a good and important question by Skeptick; though AdminNosy is right that it was technically off topic for the thread. I think we have established already that new beneficial proteins can arise by evolution. The mouse example serves to show that macroevolution can occur without a need for new proteins to be involved.[This message has been edited by Sylas aka cjhs, 02-12-2004]

As a matter of simple conprehension of biology; that most certainly is evolution. This is basic. Biologically speaking, over time we expect successful organisms to become more and more diverse. In this instance we are observing macroevolutionary change (by the biological definitions of macroevolution; as evolution beyond the level of species). Extended for millions of years, one can expect mice to become more and more diverse; unless they become extinct; but according to evolutionary biology they all remain mice.To understand this better; think of mammals. They are all "still mammals"; and no matter how far evolution proceeds their descendents will be "still mammals"; but mammals will encompass more diversity. If, perchance, mice continue to leave descendents for the next 200 million years; we may have mice which have become as diverse as mammals are today. Mammals are, after all, descended from one small species which diversified in just this way. If the last common ancestral species to mammals ran across your path tomorrow, you might think it was a mouse at a quick glance. I'm not sure. What I described is macroevolution; as the term is used in biology. You can, of course, simply redefine macroevolution as being evolution which has proceeded for millions of years. But that is pointless. If you go that route, then there is no basis at all for saying macroevolution is impossible (which was your earlier claim).The long existence of life in different forms is observed in the fossil record. This is perfectly good as observation in science. It is common to observe the effects of the past in the traces of the present.You are in the situation of the person who denies that a shield volcano is built up from lava flows. We can see the flows deposting new material, just like we see diversity accumulating and new species arising in the present. We can see and study the traces of many layers of lava flows on a volcano, just like we see the results of accumulated evolutionary change in our own genomes, and in the fossil record. We see no limit or constraint on how much lava can accumulate, just as no limit on the accumulation of evolutionary change is known.The fundamental objections to the possibility of cummulative change are expressed in such terms as "no new species", "no new information", "no new proteins". All these claims are based on simple ignorance of the facts. No insult is intended by that; you are, I hope learning that new information, new benefits, new proteins, are all direct observations. Change occurs; and there is nothing to stop arbitrary levels of change accumulating in time; and time we have abundance.We are diverging from the topic here; perhaps a new thread is in order.Cheers -- Sylas[This message has been edited by Sylas aka cjhs, 02-12-2004]

The transition from reptiles to mammals is one of the best documented series of transitionals known. You can see it described for you at the talkorigins Transitional Vertebrate Fossils FAQ. I have linked to the relevant part of the page. The best part of the transitional series is from pelycosaurs (early synapsid reptiles) through the therapsids and cynodonts up to the first mammals; for a much larger and more detailed list, with descriptions, follow the link.The image I have supplied is a reconstruction of Diictodon sollasi, by Cedric Hunter, and linked from the South African Museum. One of the most dramatic fossil locations is the Karoo formation, described at that link. It contains an estimated 800 billion vertebrate fossils! There are probably billions of Permian and Triassic reptile fossils in the formation; but no modern mammals. I discussed it in a thread last year.We should note that the term "reptile" does not have good taxonomic standing. This is important, given my previous comments about diversification. Some of the species which are ancestral to mammals could be called reptiles, but of course mammals are not descended from any modern reptiles. Mammals and reptiles are both "Amniotes", and represent the current diversity of that grouping. We can identify in considerable detail the development of the features by which modern mammals are distinguished, by virtue of many transitional species that existed in the past.The Pelycosaurs are one major group worth looking at in this transitional series, and this time I have linked to the marvellous pages and the Berkeley museum of palaeontology, which gives more details on this important transition.(Dimetrodons, linked from ucmp)Shrug. You said: "The more mutations that accumulate, the more it produces a selective DISadvantage.". That is incorrect. You have failed to account for selection; and for the fact that the vast majority of mutations are neutral.As already noted, we observe mutations accumulating in lineages right now. Every human generation adds many new mutations -- the vast majority of which are neutral. And yet, people now are not degraded versions of what people were like two thousand years ago. (Over that time, you can expect to accumulate perhaps 10,000 mutations in a lineage; very roughly.)Also, with respect to quote boxes; the relevant tag is "[ QS ]" (remove spaces). You can add "=name" after the QS. See the EvC page on UBB code, a link for which can be found next to the edit box when you are composing a post.I generally proceed as follows:

• Hit the reply button
• Modify the resulting url to replace replyquote=NO with replyquote=YES.
• Edit the tags to use the QS tag described above.
• Incorporate my comments into the post.

Cheers -- Sylas(Editted for the comments on reptiles)[This message has been edited by Sylas aka cjhs, 02-12-2004]

I've given the requested correction in a new thread to avoid further topic drift.Cheers -- Sylas