6000 Years vs. Millions of Years

[kari21]

The biological realm of evolution is likewise untenable. Descent with modification is limited. There's NO way the diversity of life could have sparkled from a single cell.

Arguments from personal incredulity are spectacularly unconvincing. Especially when it is clear that the person making the argument has little knowledge of the area.

This coming from someone who's pet answer is, "I don't know."

[Jorge S]

Lorax,

Come back after you have some sleep (e.g. more than ranting you're losing focus). When you do, let us take direction B and address your arguments for:

1- Informational energy that bypasses entropic principles (although I read you didn't want to discuss chemical evolution.)

2- Evolution from single cell to universal biota.

[Guest Simian]

Lorax,

Come back after you have some sleep (e.g. more than ranting you're losing focus). When you do, let us take direction B and address your arguments for:

1- Informational energy that bypasses entropic principles (although I read you didn't want to discuss chemical evolution.)

2- Evolution from single cell to universal biota.

1. evolution does not violate entropy

2. Volvox What we have here is a multicellular organism made up entirely of cells capable of survivng on their own..(aka single celled organisms) that come together and live as a colony because as a group they become stronger..This only one f half a dozen or more such examples of single celled organisms working as a colony..communicating with each other and even reproducing whole colonies that are clones of themselves throough asexual reproduction

[The Lorax]

1- Informational energy that bypasses entropic principles (although I read you didn't want to discuss chemical evolution.)

Before I start, let it be known that I'm not familiar with information theory. I'm all too familiar with the flawed thermodynamic-entropy arguments against evolution but this is the first time I've heard an informational-entropy argument against evo. Perhaps the reason you don't hear this argument more often is that it quite simply doesn't apply.

First, I'm guessing you consider nucleotide sequence (which of course consists of four characters: A, T, G, and C) to be a locus of information in cells, right? (That's QUESTION 1 for you.)

So let's say you have a sequence of 30 nucleotides. If, during transcription, a mutation event duplicates the sequence, adding an exact copy of the 30 nucleotides to one end, does the 60-nucleotide sequence have twice as much information as the original? (QUESTION 2) I look forward to your answer, but until then I'm proceeding with the assumption that it will be something like 'No, that wouldn't be new information, just the same information twice.'

Sometimes entire genomes are mutationally duplicated. It's called polyploidy and its pretty common, especially in plants. Normal plants are diploid (2x) but genome duplication can create triploidy (3x), tetraploidy (4x), and so on. Sugar cane is octaploid (8x)!

What's my point? Even though polyploidy doesn't create "new" information--it just copies existing info--it can introduce new traits. Polyploid plants tend to grow larger and faster than their diploid counterparts, and for this reason many crops are polyploid. Leaf shape, root structure, and other attributes may also differ. (I should mention that I am talking here about autopolyploidy, which represents the duplication of the genome of a specific species. Allopolyploidy involves genomic hybridization between species.)

Question (3) for you, Jorge. What do you consider to be "new" information and how you would quantify it? If that's too broad, try these two questions:

4) Would you consider the insertion of a single nucleotide into the middle of our hypothetical 30-nucleotide sequence to constitute new information?

5) Would you consider the deletion of a single nucleotide therein to constitute new information?

It's counterintuitive, but deletion as well as insertion can create new traits. Inserting or deleting a single nucleotide can have a HUGE effect on an organism. This is because of something called frame shift. Nucleotides are interpreted in sets of threes, with each triplet coding for an amino acid, the building block of proteins. So if you insert a triplet of nucleotides into a sequence, that sequence is now coding for an additional amino acid. But if you add just one or two nucleotides into a sequence, the entire sequence will be frame-shifted, meaning all the triplets now code for different amino acids. Thus a tiny informational change can have a huge phenotypic effect. Injecting a single nucleotide into a sequence can change the meaning of thousands or millions of neighboring nucleotides.

I've talked about duplication, insertion, and deletion mutations and their unpredictable phenotypic effects. My last topic for this post is substitution, a kind of a mutation where one nucleotide is accidentally replaced with another, say, a G with a T. Even though this represents a change in information, it doesn't always change traits. Earlier I mentioned triplets earlier as coding for amino acids. There are 64 possible triplets, but only 21 amino acids. As a result, most amino acids are coded for by more than one triplet. GCU, GCC, GCA, and GCG all code for alanine, for instance. Now, if a substitution mutation changed a GCU triplet to a GCC triplet, that's a change in information, but it would not be a change in traits, since alanine is still coded for.

Why have I talked so much about mutations? Well, because they are the mechanism by which cellular information evolves. But if you've taken anything away from my post, it should be that informational evolution is an unpredictable yet unmistakable side-effect of physical evolution. Mutations are physical events. They can be induced by things as subtle as invisible rays from the sun or things as concrete as fine tweezers. But in every case, they happen according to physical law. You seem to be claiming something more, though. You seem to think these physical events are somehow subject to informational laws as well, or perhaps instead. How is mutation subject to informational laws? How is the duplication, insertion, deletion, and replacement of nucleotides in any way governed by informational laws? (That's Question 6. The big one.)

Another thing:

Information theory attempts to OBJECTIVELY quantify information. Your claim that genetic information is conserved rests on the assumption that genetic information can be objectively quantified in the first place.

BUT

That assumption is wrong. Genetic information can't be objectively quantified. As shown in my examples, the informational value of DNA is entirely context-dependent, based not on inherent nucleotide sequence but on how nucleotides are translated into amino acids.

Sure, nucleotides can be quantified. There are huge databases filled with representative As, Ts, Gs, and Cs. But those characters are meaningless. In and of themselves, they contain no information whatsoever. Only through their translation into amino acids, and through the concatenation of those acids into peptides, and through the construction of those peptides into proteins, do those nucleotides have any meaning. In short, only through the phenotype (the actual organism) does the genotype (DNA) have meaning. Info theory can't be used to account for this connection. As a result, it can't account for cellular information at all. You can look through a genome until you die and you will have no idea what kind or how much information it contains if you don't know what organism that DNA belongs to and how that DNA is translated and expressed.

The floor is yours, Jorge. I'd appreciate an answer to questions 1 - 6. I asked them with the hopes you will articulate your argument because I don't think you have in the slightest. I'm genuinely curious about your belief that information theory has any bearing on nucleotide sequence. Please explain.

[Jorge S]

Hi, brethren!

My apologies to Simian, Lorax and everyone else interested in this thread for my late reply. Work commitments and connection problems limited my chances of pursuing our contributions. I'll try my best to catch up.

1. evolution does not violate entropy

In a purely naturalistic world it does.

2. Volvox What we have here is a multicellular organism made up entirely of cells capable of survivng on their own..(aka single celled organisms) that come together and live as a colony because as a group they become stronger..This only one f half a dozen or more such examples of single celled organisms working as a colony..communicating with each other and even reproducing whole colonies that are clones of themselves throough asexual reproduction

Grupal cooperation amongst unicellular organisms does not make them a multicellular individual and tells nothing about evolution.

I'm all too familiar with the flawed thermodynamic-entropy arguments against evolution but this is the first time I've heard an informational-entropy argument against evo. Perhaps the reason you don't hear this argument more often is that it quite simply doesn't apply.

It is a stumbling block and atheistic evolutionists are not forced to shoot their own foot by speaking about it. The theistic evolution position fares worse: as a Christian you overcome the difficulty through the external agency of a Creator while as a non-literalist you deny the Genesis account given by Him.

The answers to your questions 1 through 6 require differentiating between quantitative and qualitative informational changes. How do they impact upon the specificity of species is unknown and in this regard I agree with your assertion that knowing the genome of species does not explain why they are what they uniquely are and nothing else. Evolution neither predicts nor explains the reasons for the existence of one universal biological code and the surprising disparity in the amount of genetic material (genes, chromosomes) among species at different levels of complexity does not follow the expected simple-to-complex pattern.

Single nucleotide polymorphism and larger-scale mutations fail to account for the diversity of life. Most of them are either fatal or neutral, most of them are not inheritable, some of them are reversible/repairable, some of them may represent normal variants of gene expression, none of them will create a new 'kind'.

By all accounts of the evidence progeny ressemble their parents and variations are kept within the same kinds. This is encoded in and directed by the genetic material contained in the cells. In other words, genotypes precede and determine phenotypes. The DNA (RNA in some lower species) instructs what is to be made, when and how, not only regarding cell reproduction but cell function in general. The reasons why you deny the informational character and nature of the genetic material are a puzzle to me.

[The Lorax]

It is a stumbling block and atheistic evolutionists are not forced to shoot their own foot by speaking about it. The theistic evolution position fares worse: as a Christian you overcome the difficulty through the external agency of a Creator while as a non-literalist you deny the Genesis account given by Him.

I've already shown your informational argument to be invalid and thus not a stumbling block for anyone.

Evolution neither predicts nor explains the reasons for the existence of one universal biological code

Wrong on both counts. Evolution both predicts AND explains the existence of a single genetic code. Think for a second about common descent, the notion that all living organisms on Earth evolved from a single ancestor. We bioguys call the last universal common ancestor LUCA for short. LUCA possessed a working genetic code and it passed this one to all its descendents. Since all living organisms are presumably descendents of LUCA, it makes sense that all organisms would share LUCA's genetic code. It couldn't be much simpler. And the reason that LUCA's genetic code hasn't changed too much over time is that changes therein have massive, highly deleterious consequences in an organism, and thus organisms with deviant codes are selected out. So the universal genetic code is anything but a mystery. It would only be a mystery for evolutionists if the genetic code WEREN'T universal among species--if instead there were several codes--because that would call the idea of common descent into question.

and the surprising disparity in the amount of genetic material (genes, chromosomes) among species at different levels of complexity does not follow the expected simple-to-complex pattern.

Care to explain this?

Single nucleotide polymorphism and larger-scale mutations fail to account for the diversity of life. Most of them are either fatal or neutral, most of them are not inheritable, some of them are reversible/repairable, some of them may represent normal variants of gene expression, none of them will create a new 'kind'.

What do you mean by 'kind'? Are you talking about species? Speciation by mutation has been observed, for your information.

The reasons why you deny the informational character and nature of the genetic material are a puzzle to me.

Clearly I don't deny that DNA "contains" information. I simply disagree with your assumption that the information in DNA can be objectively quantified. Your informational argument rests entirely on this false notion. My last post gave several detailed examples of how it is difficult if not impossible to quantify genetic information. (What did you think about them, by the way?) Additionally, I've invited you to show me a way in which the info in DNA can be quantified. You haven't, and I don't suspect you will.

Please take a closer look at my questions and give them real answers. I've been patient.