Four questions for YECs - (and a little history of creationism vs evolution)

[The Barbarian]

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Well, you're making a fatal flaw: We are NOT apes.

We are.   In fact, humans and chimpanzees are more closely related to each other than either of us is related to any other ape.

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Also, "the WHOLE CREATION groaneth together" because of MAN'S sin and its consequences of death and decay!

That certainly does not say that God punished innocent animals to get even with man for his sins.

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

There ARE many changes that take place at the cellular level, but they have ALWAYS occurred within the same family/genus "kind."

Even informed YE creationists admit that there is "very good evidence" for common descent.   They just prefer their interpretation of scripture to the evidence.   But they are honest enough to admit the evidence shows otherwise.

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Creationists believe in an "evolutionary ORCHARD," not an "evolutionary TREE."

That's a testable assumption.   Name me any two major groups, said to be evolutionarily related, and I'll see if I can find a transitional form between them.  What do you want to pick?

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Furthermore, the "mutations" that have been observed, when they produce a "positive" outcome, work by BREAKING something, not ADDING new information to the process!

No, that's a common assumption, but it's wrong in two ways.    First, every new mutation in a population adds information to the population.   Would you like me to show you the numbers for a simple case?     Second, new genes often come about by fixing something that's broken.    Learn about it here:

New genes from non-coding DNA

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0180.pdf

Non-coding DNA is what creationists sometimes call "junk DNA."

3 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

And, since we are made in God's image, we, like God, are to CARE for His Creation. So, we are commanded to "love one another," which means that we are to be INVOLVED with one another, and SPEND TIME with others, particularly our own children and grandparents! We are MEANT to care for our world, as its CARETAKERS!

I'm pleased to see you write that.   It's something I see so rarely from YE creationists.

 

[The Barbarian]

And you were going to show us one of those "Achilles' Heels" from your guy's book so we could take a look and see if he's right.    Which one do you want to have us look at?

 

[SavedOnebyGrace]

On 3/3/2023 at 7:53 AM, IgnatioDeLoyola said:

Dear Board Members,

It is genuinely fascinating, as a Christian, to study the history of science and how religious belief has played into it. Often in modern religion vs science debates, this history gets lost or forgotten.

The reality is, the vast majority of western scientists prior to the 20th Century were devout Christians. Many from the east were from other Abrahamic faiths. These faiths informed how and why they approached scientific inquiry. Up until the 19th Century for example, it was widely assumed by most scientists that fossils were remains of animals killed in the flood of Genesis (chapters 6 - 9). The big questions is, why did these assumptions and beliefs change, even though their faith in God didn't?

The reason is, as evidence from the fossil record accumulated, it started to challenge the beliefs and assumptions of these faithful scientists. Most of all, it started to pose the following questions, that I'd love any YEC to try to answer in modern day:

1. Why are modern animals not found in the fossil record?

As fossils began to be found, scientists assumed that they were of creatures that were as yet undiscovered, but nevertheless had modern-day equivalents. As more exotic fossils were found (Dinosaurs, etc.), scientists began to theorise that perhaps these were the remains of creatures that had died out in Biblical times, but were nevertheless contemporary with man.

But as more and more fossils were found, scientists became more and more unsettled. The simple reason was, the vast majority had no modern day equivalents. They weren't even close to modern-day creatures. They represented totally different genera, families, sub-phyla of creature.

Scientists had assumed that two of each and every species or genus had been taken into Noah's Ark, and that all creatures alive in modern times had descended from these creatures. Yet the animals that were left behind and died in the flood bore little or no resemblance to these descendants. How was this possible?

In fact, modern creatures found in the fossil record are very much the exception. So called "fossil-animals" (such as crocodiles for example) represent a tiny percentage of animals alive today. This made scientists doubt that the flood had caused the fossil record. If you are a YEC, what is your explanation?

2. Why are humans not found in the fossil record?

Much more troubling to scientists in the 18th and 19th centuries was the fact that human beings didn't exist in the fossil record. It is impossible to be sure exactly what animals were alive in Noah's time. But it is absolutely certain that one type of animal WAS around, and WAS killed by the flood - humans! In fact, wiping out the fallen and degenerate population of humanity was the whole point of the exercise.

Yet not a single human was found in the fossil record. When a Swiss scientist found a fossil that sort-of looked like a child in 1726, he was delighted, and called the fossil "homo diluvii testis" - man who bears witness to the flood. It turned out to be the fossil of an extinct species of giant salamander. 

300 years later, and not a single human has been found in the fossil record, anywhere, ever. Surely somewhere, amongst the dinosaurs and trilobytes, human beings must have existed? Nor have any human tools, implements, household items, clothes, or anything else been found. Some of these would have been very hardy and surely survived in some form. Yet not a single trinket has been discovered among fossils.

3. Why are the vast majority of fossils sea animals?

Another fact greatly troubled scientists as fossils were discovered. The vast majority were of sea creatures, not land animals. Of course this is readily explainable by modern evolutionists: the sea and its formation of sedimentary rock is a perfect place for fossils to be created naturally - much moreso than land. But at the time the assumption was that the fossil record was created by the flood, which drowned land-based creatures. Noah didn't have to have an aquarium aboard this ark.

Doubtless some sea creatures would have died. "All the springs of the great deep burst forth," the bible says - that sounds like something that might cause considerable water pollution and tumult and kill quite a few marine animals. But the fact remains that, while some sea creatures would have died and been part of the fossil record, every single land animal died through the flood.

Yet, the fossil record is about 95% marine fossils (mostly shellfish), 4.75% plants and algae, 0.2% insects, 0.015% fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals, etc.

If the fossil record were formed through the flood, why is this?

4. Why has the fossil record been precisely sorted?

Finally, as radiometric dating techniques started to gain traction, scientists were able to approximate the age of fossils. Even before this date however, they had noticed an unsettling fact: groups of species were found in the same layers or strata together, and didn't tend to appear in others.

As dating techniques started to be used, scientists discovered that creature ONLY appeared between certain dates of rock, and NEVER in others. Many YECs doubt radiometric dating techniques for various reasons, but even if radiometric dating is wrong, why are species only found between certain "dates"?

Moreover, the order of the record didn't lend itself to natural explanations. For example, hydrological sorting in a flood would put larger creatures being at the bottom and smaller at the top. But there was no such "sizing" order to the fossil record, and if there was an average trend, it would be the other way around. Why then has a dinosaur never been found outside Mesozoic rock? Why have mammals only been found in rocks dating up to 65 million years old? What possible force of nature could account for this?

Conclusion

As a Christian, I would genuinely love to hear the views on YECs on all of this. However, there is a wider point.

Theories such as evolution by natural selection didn't come about in a vacuum. They were products of an age where the evidence being examined by devoutly Christian, Jewish, Muslim etc. scientists was already revealing huge inconsistencies in the theory that the fossil record, and the changes in species and life it represented, could be explained by Noah's flood and the literal reading of the account of creation in Genesis 1 and 2.

Scientists genuinely believed, as the looked for fossils, that they would find overwhelming evidence of Noah's flood and biblical archaeology. But instead they found the opposite. Their predictions of what they would find based on their biblical or quranic beliefs didn't pan out at all. In many cases, they found the exact opposite. And these scientists, though devout, believed in the scientific method of making predictions and examining evidence based on these.

Perhaps any YECs on this forum could help out where these many great scientists failed?

As an OEC, I wrote a topic some time ago that Noah's Flood was a large local flood, not a global flood. This view agreed with the Bible and the Science of the natural world, e.g. Geology. To make it a global flood, you would have to add a number of additional miracles to the biblical text. There are knowledgeable Christians and Theologians who share this view which explains the copious amount of flood stories worldwide.

[Retrobyter]

On 8/4/2023 at 8:20 AM, The Barbarian said:

And you were going to show us one of those "Achilles' Heels" from your guy's book so we could take a look and see if he's right.    Which one do you want to have us look at?

 

Shalom, The Barbarian.

Yes, I've been preparing one that I think will be right up your alley: Genetics. Chapter 2 of the book is entitled "Genetics and DNA," and it is from 18% to 29% of the book (Kindle edition), with the last 3% used for the 73 endnotes.  But, if I give this to you and you want to test it more, please read the book. In it, they provide all the references that one might need to confirm what is said.

First, we find Dr. Robert W. Carter Ph. D. Marine Biology, saying...

DNA fragility is one of many Achilles’ heels of evolutionary genetics, but it is an important one. In order for DNA to be useful, it needs a huge complement of repair enzymes to maintain it. There are many different ways DNA can be damaged and there are specific enzyme complexes that deal with each type of damage, but what is even more challenging to the evolutionary model is that those enzymes are also coded in the DNA, yet DNA cannot be sustained in the cell without them. This is a chicken-and-egg problem par excellence! These enzymes are also sensitive to changes. Mutations in the DNA repair and copying enzymes are often catastrophic. How, then, did they originate through the process of mutation and natural selection over time? Without them, life cannot exist, yet life had to originate without them and had to start using DNA to store information before the DNA toolkit evolved.

Evolution's Achilles' Heels . Kindle Edition. 

Dr. Carter also said,

The order of the nucleotides on the DNA molecule has all the characteristics of a message, laden with information. A message may be passed on, but in the real world, there can be no message without a message sender. The ultimate puzzle of life is not the complexity of the molecules upon which life depends (although this is a huge puzzle). It is not the complex arrangement of the parts living organisms use (although this is another huge puzzle). No, the ultimate puzzle of life is THE ORIGIN OF THE INFORMATION upon which life is based.

Evolution's Achilles' Heels . Kindle Edition. (emphasis mine)

I believe you've already said that you do not believe in 'junk' DNA, and that's good, for according to Dr. Carter, the term was coined by S. Ohno, in Brookhaven Symposia in Biology, no. 23 (Smith, H. H., ed.), pp 366-370, in 1972. And, the complexity of the genetic code since the Human Genome Project has been discovering more and more uses for the once-thought-to-be "junk."

But, he also said that one might still hear, though, a statement made like, “Only 2 to 3 percent of the human genome is functional. The rest is worthless, junk DNA—garbage left over from our evolutionary heritage.”

Evolution's Achilles' Heels . Kindle Edition. 

Then, he went on into a short history of Haldane's Dilemma back in the 1950s when Haldane showed that natural selection cannot possibly select for millions of beneficial mutations, even over the course of human evolutionary history. Instead, and despite several simplifying assumptions in favor of evolutionary theory, only a few hundred beneficial mutations could have been selected since our common ancestor with chimps. (Haldane, J.B.S., The cost of natural selection, Journal of Genetics 55:511-524, 1957.) And, then Dr. Carter said,

Haldane’s Dilemma was never solved. What happened instead was A FIGMENT OF EVOLUTIONARY IMAGINATION. In the late 1960s, Kimura developed the idea of neutral evolution. He reasoned that, if most of the DNA in a cell were non-functional, it would be free to mutate over time. Thus, there would be no cost to the organism to maintain the non-functional portions (‘cost’ is measured in terms of how many extra babies must be born in the population for natural selection to kill in order to eliminate the bad mutations and maintain fitness over time, given the assumption that natural selection can see the bad mutations it needs to eliminate, of course).

Evolution's Achilles' Heels . Kindle Edition. (emphasis mine)

I'll just mention this complexity here at the end as something else with which evolutionists must come to terms. After Carter explained the simple linear first dimension of the DNA chain to align "genes" with the proteins that they can make. Then, he went on...

We just learned about alternate splicing. Here, one part of the genome affects another part, either directly or through RNA and/or protein proxies. This is part of the second dimension of the genome. In order to draw these interactions, one would need to write out the genome and draw lots and lots of arrow from one place to another. To do this, you would need many sheets of paper, which have two dimensions (height and width). The second dimension of the genome is extremely complex and includes specificity factors, enhancers, repressors, activators, transcription factors, histone acetylization signals, DNA methylation signals, post-transciptional regulation of RNA, alternate splicing, and many other things. It plays a major role in the tight coordination and regulation of the vast network of events that occur both in the nucleus and throughout the cell. In this dimension, the order is not significantly important, for gene regulators have to float around in order to find their targets anyway. Having the target immediately next to the regulator is not necessary. It is at the next level that things get very interesting.

The third dimension of the genome is the 3-D structure of the DNA in the nucleus. At this level, genes are not randomly distributed in the nucleus, but are ordered and clustered according to need. Genes that are used together in series may not be found next to each other on the chromosomes, but when the chromosomes fold, they are often found next to each other in 3-D space, and are also often clustered near a nuclear pore or close to a center of transcription. Thus, something is holding them in place. Since the DNA is equivalent to a huge bundle of string, the parts of that bundle that are buried are difficult to access while other parts are exposed on the outside or in internal pockets.36,37 Part of the code imbedded within the first dimension affects the 3-D folding of the DNA, which, in turn, affects gene expression patterns. This third dimension is extremely important. 

The fourth dimension of the genome involves changes to the first, second, and third dimensions over time. The chromosomes are in a particular shape in the nucleus, but that shape changes during development because different cell types need different complements of genes and other genetic instructions. The shape can change in the short term as cells respond to stimuli and unwrap portions of DNA in order to get at buried genes, only to re-wrap that section when the gene is no longer needed.

Evolution's Achilles' Heels . Kindle Edition. 

This is just a short introduction to the complexity within the genetic structure they've found ... SO FAR!

That's just a START of the Achilles' Heels found in evolution.

[The Barbarian]

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

First, we find Dr. Robert W. Carter Ph. D. Marine Biology, saying...

DNA fragility is one of many Achilles’ heels of evolutionary genetics, but it is an important one. In order for DNA to be useful, it needs a huge complement of repair enzymes to maintain it. There are many different ways DNA can be damaged and there are specific enzyme complexes that deal with each type of damage, but what is even more challenging to the evolutionary model is that those enzymes are also coded in the DNA, yet DNA cannot be sustained in the cell without them. This is a chicken-and-egg problem par excellence! These enzymes are also sensitive to changes. Mutations in the DNA repair and copying enzymes are often catastrophic. How, then, did they originate through the process of mutation and natural selection over time? Without them, life cannot exist, yet life had to originate without them and had to start using DNA to store information before the DNA toolkit evolved.

Evolution's Achilles' Heels . Kindle Edition. 

Dr. Robert is simply confused about what evolutionary theory is.   Evolutionary theory is not about how life started.   It's about how living populations change over time.   If God had magically poofed the first living things into existence (Darwin, for example thought that God just created the first living things) evolution would work exactly as we see it working today.  

A clue about this is the fact that prokaryotes have simpler repair systems:

DNA Damage Responses in Prokaryotes: Regulating Gene Expression, Modulating Growth Patterns, and Manipulating Replication Forks

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3809575/

No doubt earlier forms of life had even simpler processes.   But not a concern for evolutionary theory at all.

Let's go on...

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Then, he went on into a short history of Haldane's Dilemma back in the 1950s when Haldane showed that natural selection cannot possibly select for millions of beneficial mutations, even over the course of human evolutionary history.

Well, that wasn't Haldane's conclusion...

Journal of Genetics

Published: December 1957

The cost of natural selection

J. B. S. Haldane 

Unless selection is very intense, the number of deaths needed to secure the substitution, by natural selection, of one gene for another at a locus, is independent of the intensity of selection. It is often about 30 times the number of organisms in a generation. It is suggested that, in horotelic evolution, the mean time taken for each gene substitution is . about 300 generations. This accords with the observed slowness of evolution.

In fact Haldane is talking about the time it would take for one gene to completely replace another at a given gene locus.    Which is not how most evolution proceeds.    But even if it did, Haldane notes that it works about as fast as evolution proceeds in the fossil record.

2 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Haldane’s Dilemma was never solved. What happened instead was A FIGMENT OF EVOLUTIONARY IMAGINATION. In the late 1960s, Kimura developed the idea of neutral evolution. He reasoned that, if most of the DNA in a cell were non-functional, it would be free to mutate over time.

That's a fact, but here's what really throws a wrench into Dr. Rob's claims:

A radical form of genetic novelty

The emergence of new genes from non-coding DNA is common across eukaryotes — how they contribute to adaptive evolutionary novelties is fascinating.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0180.pdf

Before this, new genes were assumed to have developed by gene duplication, followed by mutation.   And they often do.  But it turns out that a large number of genes have come about by mutation of non-coding DNA.   Dr. Rob seems unaware of these findings.

And there's this:
Nature volume 221, pages 815–816 (1969)

“Haldane's Dilemma” and the Rate of Natural Selection

Abstract

The conclusion that most new genes must be more or less without selective effect can be supported in the face of recent criticism.

 

3 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

We just learned about alternate splicing. Here, one part of the genome affects another part, either directly or through RNA and/or protein proxies. This is part of the second dimension of the genome.

This is well-known to geneticists.  It's called "epistasis."   And it's a major driver in evolution...

Types of Epistasis

There are six common types of epistasis gene interactions: dominant, dominant inhibitory, duplicate dominant, duplicate recessive, polymeric gene interaction, and recessive. When a dominant allele masks the expression of both dominant and recessive alleles at another locus, it is referred to as dominant epistasis or simple epistasis. When it is a recessive allele that masks the expression, it is called recessive epistasis. Some genes can also mask other genes by suppression. This is referred to as dominant inhibitory or suppression epistasis because the gene is acting as a suppressor, or a factor that prevents the expression of another allele.

Duplicate types of epistasis depend on two loci. When there is a dominant allele masking the expression of recessive alleles at two loci, this is known as duplicate dominant epistasis or duplicate gene action. When there is a recessive allele masking the expression of dominant alleles at two loci, this is known as duplicate recessive epistasis. It is also known as complementary gene action because both genes are required in order for the correct phenotype to be present.

Polymeric gene interaction is the combination of two dominant alleles that intensifies the phenotype or creates a median variation. Alone, each dominant allele produces a physical trait different from the combined dominant alleles. Therefore, this creates three phenotypes for only two dominant alleles. This shows that neither dominant allele is prevailing over the other dominant allele.

Examples of Epistasis

The plant Primula produces a chemical called malvidin. Synthesis of the chemical is influenced by the K gene, while suppression of synthesis is controlled by the D gene. Both are considered to be dominant traits. If a dominant D allele is present, there will be no expression regardless of whether there is a dominant K allele present. This interaction between alleles is then classified as dominant inhibitory epistasis, since the dominant D allele is inhibiting the K allele.

Summer squash can have three different colors: white, yellow, and green. The white color is determined by the dominant gene W, yellow by the dominant gene G, and green by the recessive genes w and g. The white color is dominant over yellow and green. Since the white is dominant, it is called epistatic to the dominant and recessive G/g alleles. This interaction is then classified as simple or dominant epistasis.

https://biologydictionary.net/epistasis/

Your guy seems a little behind on what's going on in genetics.

3 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

That's just a START of the Achilles' Heels found in evolution.

So far, nothing.   Just misunderstandings of what evolution, new genes, and epistasis are about.

[The Barbarian]

On 8/9/2023 at 3:48 PM, SavedOnebyGrace said:

As an OEC, I wrote a topic some time ago that Noah's Flood was a large local flood, not a global flood. This view agreed with the Bible and the Science of the natural world, e.g. Geology. To make it a global flood, you would have to add a number of additional miracles to the biblical text. There are knowledgeable Christians and Theologians who share this view which explains the copious amount of flood stories worldwide.

It appears that there was a great regional flood in the Middle East, just about the right time, when the Mediterranean Sea broke through and created the Black Sea.  

 

[Retrobyter]

17 minutes ago, The Barbarian said:

Dr. Robert is simply confused about what evolutionary theory is.   Evolutionary theory is not about how life started.   It's about how living populations change over time. 

Shabbat shalom, The Barbarian.

Well, you're very good about denial, but you're not so good at keeping on track. I'm not talking about the Special Theory of Evolution (STE); I'm talking about the GENERAL Theory of Evolution (GTE). GTE IS talking about how life started.

17 minutes ago, The Barbarian said:

If God had magically poofed the first living things into existence (Darwin, for example thought that God just created the first living things) evolution would work exactly as we see it working today.  

And, again, you've switched to STE.

17 minutes ago, The Barbarian said:

A clue about this is the fact that prokaryotes have simpler repair systems:

DNA Damage Responses in Prokaryotes: Regulating Gene Expression, Modulating Growth Patterns, and Manipulating Replication Forks

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3809575/

No doubt earlier forms of life had even simpler processes.   But not a concern for evolutionary theory at all.

Well, that's all interesting, but again, you're missing the point. How did the prokaryotes even get started?! It doesn't matter that they have "simpler repair systems." The fact still remains that they need repair systems, TOO, as well as the code for replication! It's like bees and the flowers that they frequent. If each needs the other, how did the system even get its start?

17 minutes ago, The Barbarian said:

Let's go on...

Well, that wasn't Haldane's conclusion...

Journal of Genetics

Published: December 1957

The cost of natural selection

J. B. S. Haldane 

Unless selection is very intense, the number of deaths needed to secure the substitution, by natural selection, of one gene for another at a locus, is independent of the intensity of selection. It is often about 30 times the number of organisms in a generation. It is suggested that, in horotelic evolution, the mean time taken for each gene substitution is . about 300 generations. This accords with the observed slowness of evolution.

In fact Haldane is talking about the time it would take for one gene to completely replace another at a given gene locus.    Which is not how most evolution proceeds.    But even if it did, Haldane notes that it works about as fast as evolution proceeds in the fossil record.

That's a fact, but here's what really throws a wrench into Dr. Rob's claims:

A radical form of genetic novelty

The emergence of new genes from non-coding DNA is common across eukaryotes — how they contribute to adaptive evolutionary novelties is fascinating.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0180.pdf

Before this, new genes were assumed to have developed by gene duplication, followed by mutation.   And they often do.  But it turns out that a large number of genes have come about by mutation of non-coding DNA.   Dr. Rob seems unaware of these findings.

READ THE BOOK! Or, just stop talking. Perhaps, I didn't communicate it well enough for your needs, but you should really "hear" it from him, rather than relying on me to give a "summary" of what he said! Turns out he DID talk about these findings.

17 minutes ago, The Barbarian said:

And there's this:
Nature volume 221, pages 815–816 (1969)

“Haldane's Dilemma” and the Rate of Natural Selection

Abstract

The conclusion that most new genes must be more or less without selective effect can be supported in the face of recent criticism.

This is well-known to geneticists.  It's called "epistasis."   And it's a major driver in evolution...

Types of Epistasis

There are six common types of epistasis gene interactions: dominant, dominant inhibitory, duplicate dominant, duplicate recessive, polymeric gene interaction, and recessive. When a dominant allele masks the expression of both dominant and recessive alleles at another locus, it is referred to as dominant epistasis or simple epistasis. When it is a recessive allele that masks the expression, it is called recessive epistasis. Some genes can also mask other genes by suppression. This is referred to as dominant inhibitory or suppression epistasis because the gene is acting as a suppressor, or a factor that prevents the expression of another allele.

Duplicate types of epistasis depend on two loci. When there is a dominant allele masking the expression of recessive alleles at two loci, this is known as duplicate dominant epistasis or duplicate gene action. When there is a recessive allele masking the expression of dominant alleles at two loci, this is known as duplicate recessive epistasis. It is also known as complementary gene action because both genes are required in order for the correct phenotype to be present.

Polymeric gene interaction is the combination of two dominant alleles that intensifies the phenotype or creates a median variation. Alone, each dominant allele produces a physical trait different from the combined dominant alleles. Therefore, this creates three phenotypes for only two dominant alleles. This shows that neither dominant allele is prevailing over the other dominant allele.

Examples of Epistasis

The plant Primula produces a chemical called malvidin. Synthesis of the chemical is influenced by the K gene, while suppression of synthesis is controlled by the D gene. Both are considered to be dominant traits. If a dominant D allele is present, there will be no expression regardless of whether there is a dominant K allele present. This interaction between alleles is then classified as dominant inhibitory epistasis, since the dominant D allele is inhibiting the K allele.

Summer squash can have three different colors: white, yellow, and green. The white color is determined by the dominant gene W, yellow by the dominant gene G, and green by the recessive genes w and g. The white color is dominant over yellow and green. Since the white is dominant, it is called epistatic to the dominant and recessive G/g alleles. This interaction is then classified as simple or dominant epistasis.

https://biologydictionary.net/epistasis/

Your guy seems a little behind on what's going on in genetics.

So far, nothing.   Just misunderstandings of what evolution, new genes, and epistasis are about.

Brush-offs and disrespecting the writer. Nothing new here.

[The Barbarian]

21 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Well, you're very good about denial, but you're not so good at keeping on track. I'm not talking about the Special Theory of Evolution (STE); I'm talking about the GENERAL Theory of Evolution (GTE). GTE IS talking about how life started.

Sorry, no such animal.   That's just a fairy tale made up by creationists.     There is a theory of stellar evolution, and a theory of biological evolution, but what you're talking about is the theory of abiogenesis.    

21 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Well, that's all interesting, but again, you're missing the point. How did the prokaryotes even get started?!

That's the theory of abiogenesis, remember?       I get it; there's really not much to criticize in the theory of biological evolution, so Professor Rob decided to criticize something else and pretend it is evolution.

21 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

If each needs the other, how did the system even get its start?

Evolutionary theory merely assumes life began, and describes how it changes.    It makes no claims about how that happened.  As I showed you, Darwin just thought  God made the first living things.

(Regarding "Haldane's Dilemma")

Well, that wasn't Haldane's conclusion...

Journal of Genetics

Published: December 1957

The cost of natural selection

J. B. S. Haldane 

Unless selection is very intense, the number of deaths needed to secure the substitution, by natural selection, of one gene for another at a locus, is independent of the intensity of selection. It is often about 30 times the number of organisms in a generation. It is suggested that, in horotelic evolution, the mean time taken for each gene substitution is . about 300 generations. This accords with the observed slowness of evolution.

In fact Haldane is talking about the time it would take for one gene to completely replace another at a given gene locus.    Which is not how most evolution proceeds.    But even if it did, Haldane notes that it works about as fast as evolution proceeds in the fossil record.

21 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

READ THE BOOK!

Seems pointless.   Professor Rob seems to know very little about evolutionary theory at all.

21 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

didn't communicate it well enough for your needs, but you should really "hear" it from him, rather than relying on me to give a "summary" of what he said!

If you don't understand it well enough to show it to us, what makes you think it's right?  I already showed you a number of major goofs he made.  

That's a fact, but here's what really throws a wrench into Dr. Rob's claims:

A radical form of genetic novelty

The emergence of new genes from non-coding DNA is common across eukaryotes — how they contribute to adaptive evolutionary novelties is fascinating.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0180.pdf

Before this, new genes were assumed to have developed by gene duplication, followed by mutation.   And they often do.  But it turns out that a large number of genes have come about by mutation of non-coding DNA.   Dr. Rob seems unaware of these findings.

21 hours ago, Retrobyter said:

Brush-offs and disrespecting the writer. Nothing new here.

I'm just showing you some facts, and wondering why Dr. Rob didn't know about this.

Edited August 13, 2023 by The Barbarian

[Michael37]

Some insulting rhetoric has been reported. Some posts have been withheld. Those at fault please note:

[Daniel Marsh]

On 7/27/2023 at 9:13 PM, The Barbarian said:

He said that Adam had become like him.   But as you know, scripture never said that Adam was immortal, and God acknowledges that he was not. 

I know how much you want scripture to say that Adam was immortal.   But it doesn't.   Find a way to accept God's word as it is.

 

I always understood that as Adam and Eve gained knowledge of right and wrong like G_d has.