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To Save Time Barry Argues Both Sides

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In comment [25] to my last post , The ID hypothesis, Elizabeth Liddle asks about information. I think I’ve been at this long enough to predict how an exchange between me and Elizabeth would go.

Barry’s Point 1:
Let’s take the information in your comment [25]. I am sure you will agree your comment contains specified complex information. Indeed, your one little comment contains more specified complex information than we could reasonably attribute to chance and necessity working from the beginning of the universe to this moment.

Barry’s Point 2:
I am sure you will agree that the cells in your body contain more complex specified information than your comment by several orders of magnitude.

Barry’s Question to Elizabeth:
If your comment contains more specified complex information than we could reasonably attribute to chance and necessity working from the beginning of the universe to this moment, and the cells in your body contain several orders of magnitude more complex specified information than your comment, why should we attribute the complex specified information in your body to chance and necessity? Isn’t it more reasonable to attribute the CSI in the cells in your body to intelligent agency, just as we attribute the CSI in comment [25] to intelligent agency?

Elizabeth’s Probable Response 1:
The CSI in the cells in my body can reasonably be attributed to the accretion of random errors.

Barry’s Response to Her Probable Response 1:
Surely you don’t believe your comment [25] could reasonably be attributed to random key strokes by our proverbial monkey. That has a sort of first blush plausibility, but as we all know the math does not work. Then why do you attribute the CSI in the cells in your body to the accretion of random errors?

Elizabeth’s Probable Response 2:
Well, it’s not just random chance. The good random errors are selected for by natural selection and bad random errors are eliminated by natural selection. So it is not pure chance. It is chance (random genetic errors) and necessity (natural selection) combined that results in the CSI.

Barry’s response to her Probable Response 2:
What an extraordinary claim! This remarkable interaction of chance and necessity to which you allude has never been observed even over trillions of reproductive events by bacteria under intense selective pressure. What non-question begging evidence do you have for your remarkable assertion? Remember, Dawkins says that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. And surely you will agree that saying the staggering amounts of CSI in living things is the result of the accretion of random errors sorted by natural selection is the most extraordinary claim ever made.

Elizabeth’s Probable Response 3:
Let’s change the subject.

Comments
an obvious waste of bandwidth @ 20 "[clearly refusing to *think* about what he wishes to dispute]"Ilion
August 4, 2011
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Ilíon (paraphrased): "'Information' is not a physical entity; it is never "contained" by or in physical entities." material.infancy: "Ilion, Meyer points out in SITC that there are two acceptable definitions of information. If you have a better word for the second definition, that would improve communication over the common usage, I’d be interested to know. If we can’t call the second definition “information,” what do we call it?" Then Meyer would be incorrect on that account. And -- this is very important, so please make an extra effor to grasp the principle I am invoking -- you are making the same invalid argument that DarwinDefenders routinely make so as to avoid facing up to the obvious shortcomings of the non-theory they assert is the truth about the nature and history of living organisms: you are arguing, in effect, "Well, sure, 'information' is an incorrect and misleading term to use for these cases, but unless you can provide me a better term to use, then you ought not point out the misleading and false usage currently practiced by nearly everyone." Moreover, I have already repeatedly used better terms which can be used to denote what nearly everyone insists upon mis-naming, and thus misunderstanding, such as: symbol, representation, signifier, symbolic representation.Ilion
August 4, 2011
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---Ilion: "Certainly, a DNA codon may represent information, much as a computer code in the proper context may represent information, but neither is, itself, information, nor “contains” information." Obviously, the cell does contain information as is clear from the fact that the contained information produces an effect.StephenB
August 4, 2011
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Ilion, Meyer points out in SITC that there are two acceptable definitions of information. If you have a better word for the second definition, that would improve communication over the common usage, I’d be interested to know. If we can’t call the second definition “information,” what do we call it? Excerpt: Defining Information: Two Distinctions Most of us use the term “information” to describe some piece of knowledge. When we say so-and-so passed on some interesting information, we mean that so-and-so told us something that we didn’t know before, but that we know now, thanks to what we were told. In other words, information equals knowledge. The first definition of information in Webster’s dictionary reflects this idea: information “the communication or reception of knowledge or intelligence.” Because many of my students had this idea of information firmly in mind, they were often confused at first when I talked about information stored in a molecule. There is a sense in which it could be said that DNA stores the “know-how” for building molecules in the cell. Yet since neither DNA nor the cellular machinery that receives its instruction set is a conscious agent, equating biological information with knowledge in this way didn’t seem to quite fit. But our English dictionaries point to another common meaning of the term that does apply to DNA. Webster’s, for instance has a second definition that defines information as “the attribute inherent in and communicated by alternative sequences or arrangements of something that produce specific effects.” Information, according to this definition, equals an arrangement or string of characters, specifically one that accomplishes a particular outcome or performs a communication function. Thus, in common usage, we refer not only to a sequence of English letters in a sentence, but also to a block of binary code in a software program as information. Information, in this sense, does not require a conscious recipient of a message; it merely refers to a sequence of characters that produce some specific effect. This definition suggests a definite sense in which DNA contains information. DNA contains “alternative sequences” of nucleotide bases and can produce a specific effect. Of course, neither DNA nor the cellular machinery that uses its information is conscious. But neither is a paragraph in a book or a section of software (or the hardware in the computer that “reads” it). Yet clearly software contains a kind of information. [my emphasis] Stephen Meyer, Signature in the Cell, page 85material.infantacy
August 4, 2011
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Matzke in #2 simply assumes the system he requires to operate.Upright BiPed
August 4, 2011
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Barry Arrington: "I am sure you will agree your comment contains specified complex information. Indeed, your one little comment contains more specified complex information than we could reasonably attribute to chance and necessity working from the beginning of the universe to this moment." That the two of you probably agree on that statement doesn't change the fact that it is both misleading and false -- neither her original comment, nor your OP here, nor this post of mine contain any information, whatsoever. Words and sentences, whether spoken-and-heard or written-and-read, conventionally represent information, they conventionally symbolize information, they conventionally point to information, but they are not, themselves, information and they do not "contain" information. The person/mind speaking or writing the words intends to convey to another person/mind some information or thought via the words. And the thought he intends to convey is, indeed, "more specified complex information than we could reasonably attribute to chance and necessity working from the beginning of the universe to this moment". And, moreover, in order to represent his thought via symbols, he must possess another set of "more specified complex information than we could reasonably attribute to chance and necessity working from the beginning of the universe to this moment", which defines *how* to encode the symbolic representation of the information he means to convey. Likewise, the person hearing or reading the words must possess essentially that same set of "more specified complex information than we could reasonably attribute to chance and necessity working from the beginning of the universe to this moment", which in his case defines how to decode the symbolic representation of the information the other meant to convey, such that he can "think the same thought" (whether or not he agrees with it). Barry Arrington: "I am sure you will agree that the cells in your body contain more complex specified information than your comment by several orders of magnitude." If so, then her belief is as wrong/misguided as yours -- cells do not contain information, no more than words do. Certainly, a DNA codon may represent information, much as a computer code in the proper context may represent information, but neither is, itself, information, nor "contains" information.Ilion
August 4, 2011
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Even endless courtesy and patience doesn't begin to make even a dent in intellectual dishonesty.Ilion
August 4, 2011
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"Elizabeth seems endlessly patient, and has NEVER changed the subject. Very much to the contrary, she has doggedly insisted on sticking to the subject when others want to wander off."
You forgot to mention that she's clothed with the sun, and the moon is beneath her feet. Elizabeth has been very courteous and considerably patient considering she's in enemy territory here, but let's cut the St. Elizabeth crap, dong-ma?material.infantacy
August 4, 2011
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David W. Gibson claims that biologists directly observe random mutation plus mechanical necessity generate CSI "routinely." Kindly give me one example David. Prediction about which I am reasonably confident: Gibson will resort to schoolyard name calling again "Denier, Denier, pants on fire!" Prediction about which I am absolutely certain: Gibson will not be able to point to a single example where see random mutation plus mechanical necessity has generate CSI.Barry Arrington
August 4, 2011
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Imagination fail. Why should Darwin non-believers be expected to imagine what the believers can't? Help me to imagine. Imagine a specific, plausible RM+NS pathway between two forms, or to some feature from its lack, and I'll be happy to imagine it with you.ScottAndrews
August 4, 2011
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Hi BA77. Effective communications: Less is more. Try it. Otherwise, you're ignored.woodford
August 4, 2011
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lulz pg, ur teh funneez!!!!11!! 3pik FALEZ!!!!!!!1! n ur f1rst!!1!!11 heerz teh lolcatz 4u: WUT?material.infantacy
August 4, 2011
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woodford, when it comes to Nick, I always seem to find time. ========= OT: To every Father who has raised a daughter, this song will touch you: Shane and Shane - The One You Need http://www.godtube.com/watch/?v=F9J9MCNUbornagain77
August 4, 2011
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I wonder what a dog (or cow, fish or sheep, or other) breeder would say to someone who told him that the results he was achieving “have never been observed” and that SAYING he’s achieved those results is “the most extraordinary claim ever made”, and that pointing to his results is “changing the subject”. A clever person can make lots of stuff from a bucket of legos. That's not the same thing as making new legos. How do thousands of years of breeding dogs, cows, and sheep and producing only more dogs, cows, and sheep make your point?ScottAndrews
August 4, 2011
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Wow, BA77, you have a lot of time on your hands! All I can say is I'm just grateful for the Page Down key...woodford
August 4, 2011
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And to really spoil Nick's evening, I point out, once again, that the neo-Darwinian paradigm of genetic reductionism has been falsified: Getting Over the Code Delusion (Epigenetics) - Talbot - November 2010 - Excellent Article for explaining exactly why epigentics falsifies the neo-Darwinian paradigm of genetic reductionism: http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/getting-over-the-code-delusion The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories - Stephen Meyer "Neo-Darwinism seeks to explain the origin of new information, form, and structure as a result of selection acting on randomly arising variation at a very low level within the biological hierarchy, mainly, within the genetic text. Yet the major morphological innovations depend on a specificity of arrangement at a much higher level of the organizational hierarchy, a level that DNA alone does not determine. Yet if DNA is not wholly responsible for body plan morphogenesis, then DNA sequences can mutate indefinitely, without regard to realistic probabilistic limits, and still not produce a new body plan. Thus, the mechanism of natural selection acting on random mutations in DNA cannot in principle generate novel body plans, including those that first arose in the Cambrian explosion." http://eyedesignbook.com/ch6/eyech6-append-d.html Stephen Meyer - Functional Proteins And Information For Body Plans - video http://www.metacafe.com/watch/4050681 further notes: A review of The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism The numbers of Plasmodium and HIV in the last 50 years greatly exceeds the total number of mammals since their supposed evolutionary origin (several hundred million years ago), yet little has been achieved by evolution. This suggests that mammals could have "invented" little in their time frame. Behe: ‘Our experience with HIV gives good reason to think that Darwinism doesn’t do much—even with billions of years and all the cells in that world at its disposal’ (p. 155). http://creation.com/review-michael-behe-edge-of-evolution Dr. Behe states in The Edge of Evolution on page 135: "Generating a single new cellular protein-protein binding site (in other words, generating a truly beneficial mutational event that would actually explain the generation of the complex molecular machinery we see in life) is of the same order of difficulty or worse than the development of chloroquine resistance in the malarial parasite." So, how many protein-protein binding sites are found in life? Dr. Behe, in an important Table 7.1 on page 143 of Edge Of Evolution, finds that a typical cell might have some 10,000 protein-binding sites. Whereas a conservative estimate for a multicellular creature is,,, Largest-Ever Map of Plant Protein Interactions - July 2011 Excerpt: The new map of 6,205 protein partnerings represents only about two percent of the full protein- protein "interactome" for Arabidopsis, since the screening test covered only a third of all Arabidopsis proteins, and wasn't sensitive enough to detect many weaker protein interactions. "There will be larger maps after this one," says Ecker. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/07/110728144936.htm So taking into account that they only covered 2%, of the full protein-protein "interactome", then that gives us a number, for different protein-protein interactions, of 310,000. Thus, from my very rough 'back of the envelope' calculations, we find that this is at least 30 times higher than Dr. Behe's estimate of 10,000 different protein-protein binding sites for a typical single cell (Page 143; Edge of Evolution; Behe). Therefore, at least at first glance from my rough calculations, it certainly seems to be a gargantuan step that evolution must somehow make, by purely unguided processes, to go from a single cell to a multi-cellular creature. To illustrate just how difficult of a step it is, the order of difficulty, of developing a single protein-protein binding site, is put at 10^20 replications of the malarial parasite by Dr. Behe. This number comes from direct empirical observation. Richard Dawkins’ The Greatest Show on Earth Shies Away from Intelligent Design but Unwittingly Vindicates Michael Behe - Oct. 2009 Excerpt: The rarity of chloroquine resistance is not in question. In fact, Behe’s statistic that it occurs only once in every 10^20 cases was derived from public health statistical data, published by an authority in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. The extreme rareness of chloroquine resistance is not a negotiable data point; it is an observed fact. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/10/richard_dawkins_the_greatest_s.htmlbornagain77
August 4, 2011
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Of related interest; constraint on variability of proteins (protein evolvability) is found to be extremely tight thus further constraining the 'bottom up' Darwinian scenario for 'randomly' generating functional complexity/information: Dollo’s law, the symmetry of time, and the edge of evolution - Michael Behe - Oct 2009 Excerpt: Nature has recently published an interesting paper which places severe limits on Darwinian evolution.,,, A time-symmetric Dollo’s law turns the notion of “pre-adaptation” on its head. The law instead predicts something like “pre-sequestration”, where proteins that are currently being used for one complex purpose are very unlikely to be available for either reversion to past functions or future alternative uses. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/10/dollos_law_the_symmetry_of_tim.html Stability effects of mutations and protein evolvability. October 2009 Excerpt: The accepted paradigm that proteins can tolerate nearly any amino acid substitution has been replaced by the view that the deleterious effects of mutations, and especially their tendency to undermine the thermodynamic and kinetic stability of protein, is a major constraint on protein evolvability,, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19765975 When Theory and Experiment Collide — April 16th, 2011 by Douglas Axe Excerpt: Based on our experimental observations and on calculations we made using a published population model [3], we estimated that Darwin’s mechanism would need a truly staggering amount of time—a trillion trillion years or more—to accomplish the seemingly subtle change in enzyme function that we studied. http://biologicinstitute.org/2011/04/16/when-theory-and-experiment-collide/ “Mutations are rare phenomena, and a simultaneous change of even two amino acid residues in one protein is totally unlikely. One could think, for instance, that by constantly changing amino acids one by one, it will eventually be possible to change the entire sequence substantially… These minor changes, however, are bound to eventually result in a situation in which the enzyme has ceased to perform its previous function but has not yet begun its ‘new duties’. It is at this point it will be destroyed - along with the organism carrying it.” Maxim D. Frank-Kamenetski, Unraveling DNA, 1997, p. 72. (Professor at Brown U. Center for Advanced Biotechnology and Biomedical Engineering) "A problem with the evolution of proteins having new shapes is that proteins are highly constrained, and producing a functional protein from a functional protein having a significantly different shape would typically require many mutations of the gene producing the protein. All the proteins produced during this transition would not be functional, that is, they would not be beneficial to the organism, or possibly they would still have their original function but not confer any advantage to the organism. It turns out that this scenario has severe mathematical problems that call the theory of evolution into question. Unless these problems can be overcome, the theory of evolution is in trouble." Problems in Protein Evolution: http://www.cs.unc.edu/~plaisted/ce/blocked.html Extreme functional sensitivity to conservative amino acid changes on enzyme exteriors - Doug Axe Excerpt: Contrary to the prevalent view, then, enzyme function places severe constraints on residue identities at positions showing evolutionary variability, and at exterior non-active-site positions, in particular. http://nsmserver2.fullerton.edu/departments/chemistry/evolution_creation/web/AxeProteinEvolution.pdf Darwin's God: Post Synaptic Proteins Intolerant of Change - December 2010 Excerpt: Not only is there scant evidence of intermediate designs leading to the known proteins, but the evidence we do have is that these proteins do not tolerate change. http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2010/12/post-synaptic-proteins-intolerant-of.html ======= further note: Michael Behe, The Edge of Evolution, pg. 162 Swine Flu, Viruses, and the Edge of Evolution "Indeed, the work on malaria and AIDS demonstrates that after all possible unintelligent processes in the cell--both ones we've discovered so far and ones we haven't--at best extremely limited benefit, since no such process was able to do much of anything. It's critical to notice that no artificial limitations were placed on the kinds of mutations or processes the microorganisms could undergo in nature. Nothing--neither point mutation, deletion, insertion, gene duplication, transposition, genome duplication, self-organization nor any other process yet undiscovered--was of much use." http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/05/swine_flu_viruses_and_the_edge.html "The likelihood of developing two binding sites in a protein complex would be the square of the probability of developing one: a double CCC (chloroquine complexity cluster), 10^20 times 10^20, which is 10^40. There have likely been fewer than 10^40 cells in the entire world in the past 4 billion years, so the odds are against a single event of this variety (just 2 binding sites being generated by accident) in the history of life. It is biologically unreasonable." Michael J. Behe PhD. (from page 146 of his book "Edge of Evolution")bornagain77
August 4, 2011
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What an extraordinary claim! This remarkable interaction of chance and necessity to which you allude has never been observed even over trillions of reproductive events by bacteria under intense selective pressure. What non-question begging evidence do you have for your remarkable assertion? Remember, Dawkins says that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. And surely you will agree that saying the staggering amounts of CSI in living things is the result of the accretion of random errors sorted by natural selection is the most extraordinary claim ever made. Elizabeth’s Probable Response 3: Let’s change the subject.
This sounds like something straight out of a Chick tract. Elizabeth seems endlessly patient, and has NEVER changed the subject. Very much to the contrary, she has doggedly insisted on sticking to the subject when others want to wander off. What I find rather surprising is the claim that "this remarkable interaction of chance and necessity to which you allude has never been observed." Most practicing biologists are under the vivid impression that they observe it routinely, as a matter of course, every day. Claiming it has never been observed is like claiming that no dispute has ever been observed in a courtroom. One wonders if we're speaking the same language. Molly Ivins once wrote that a Military Denier can look you straight in the eye, deny that you're there at all, and sincerely believe it. And something like that renders communication impossible. I wonder what a dog (or cow, fish or sheep, or other) breeder would say to someone who told him that the results he was achieving "have never been observed" and that SAYING he's achieved those results is "the most extraordinary claim ever made", and that pointing to his results is "changing the subject". I suppose you could tell him that his results "don't count" for some reason. And he might nod politely, and back slowly away, and return to what he's been doing, because it works.David W. Gibson
August 4, 2011
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Nick claims gene duplication is established beyond doubt, yet the empirical evidence states there is much room for doubt: Is gene duplication a viable explanation for the origination of biological information and complexity? - December 2010 - Excerpt: The totality of the evidence reveals that, although duplication can and does facilitate important adaptations by tinkering with existing compounds, molecular evolution is nonetheless constrained in each and every case. Therefore, although the process of gene duplication and subsequent random mutation has certainly contributed to the size and diversity of the genome, it is alone insufficient in explaining the origination of the highly complex information pertinent to the essential functioning of living organisms. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Complexity, 2011 http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cplx.20365/abstract Evolution by Gene Duplication Falsified - December 2010 Excerpt: The various postduplication mechanisms entailing random mutations and recombinations considered were observed to tweak, tinker, copy, cut, divide, and shuffle existing genetic information around, but fell short of generating genuinely distinct and entirely novel functionality. Contrary to Darwin’s view of the plasticity of biological features, successive modification and selection in genes does indeed appear to have real and inherent limits: it can serve to alter the sequence, size, and function of a gene to an extent, but this almost always amounts to a variation on the same theme—as with RNASE1B in colobine monkeys. The conservation of all-important motifs within gene families, such as the homeobox or the MADS-box motif, attests to the fact that gene duplication results in the copying and preservation of biological information, and not its transformation as something original. http://www.creationsafaris.com/crev201101.htm#20110103a The Limits of Complex Adaptation: An Analysis Based on a Simple Model of Structured Bacterial Populations Douglas D. Axe* Excerpt: In particular, I use an explicit model of a structured bacterial population, similar to the island model of Maruyama and Kimura, to examine the limits on complex adaptations during the evolution of paralogous genes—genes related by duplication of an ancestral gene. Although substantial functional innovation is thought to be possible within paralogous families, the tight limits on the value of d found here (d ? 2 for the maladaptive case, and d ? 6 for the neutral case) mean that the mutational jumps in this process cannot have been very large. http://bio-complexity.org/ojs/index.php/main/article/view/BIO-C.2010.4/BIO-C.2010.4 An Insurmountable Problem for Darwinian Evolution - Gene Duplication - And Minor Transformation of Protein Function - May 2011 http://intelligentdesign.podomatic.com/entry/2011-05-16T17_01_43-07_00 Michael Behe Hasn't Been Refuted on the Flagellum! Excerpt: Douglas Axe of the Biologic Institute showed in one recent paper in the journal Bio-complexity that the model of gene duplication and recruitment only works if very few changes are required to acquire novel selectable utility or neo-functionalization. If a duplicated gene is neutral (in terms of its cost to the organism), then the maximum number of mutations that a novel innovation in a bacterial population can require is up to six. If the duplicated gene has a slightly negative fitness cost, the maximum number drops to two or fewer (not inclusive of the duplication itself). http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/03/michael_behe_hasnt_been_refute044801.html The GS (genetic selection) Principle – David L. Abel – 2009 Excerpt: Stunningly, information has been shown not to increase in the coding regions of DNA with evolution. Mutations do not produce increased information. Mira et al (65) showed that the amount of coding in DNA actually decreases with evolution of bacterial genomes, not increases. This paper parallels Petrov’s papers starting with (66) showing a net DNA loss with Drosophila evolution (67). Konopka (68) found strong evidence against the contention of Subba Rao et al (69, 70) that information increases with mutations. The information content of the coding regions in DNA does not tend to increase with evolution as hypothesized. Konopka also found Shannon complexity not to be a suitable indicator of evolutionary progress over a wide range of evolving genes. Konopka’s work applies Shannon theory to known functional text. Kok et al. (71) also found that information does not increase in DNA with evolution. As with Konopka, this finding is in the context of the change in mere Shannon uncertainty. The latter is a far more forgiving definition of information than that required for prescriptive information (PI) (21, 22, 33, 72). It is all the more significant that mutations do not program increased PI. Prescriptive information either instructs or directly produces formal function. No increase in Shannon or Prescriptive information occurs in duplication. What the above papers show is that not even variation of the duplication produces new information, not even Shannon “information.” http://www.scitopics.com/The_GS_Principle_The_Genetic_Selection_Principle.html A Fishy Story About AntiFreeze Gene Evolution - Casey Luskin - January 2011 Excerpt: In his 2005 textbook Evolution, Douglas Futuyma states that a high estimate of the gene duplication rate is "about 0.01 duplication per gene per million years." (p. 470) A given gene will thus be duplicated about once every 100 million years. The present paper speculates that the antifreeze gene evolved in response to cooling temperatures in the Antarctic deep ocean water over the past 50 million years. What are we to make, then, of the fact that Antarctic eelpouts have over 30 AFPIII genes, all of which are said to have resulted from a duplication of a single AFPIII gene which evolved at some point in the past 50 million years in response to changing ocean temperatures? http://www.evolutionnews.org/2011/01/a_fishy_story_about_antifreeze043141.htmlbornagain77
August 4, 2011
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edit: "the only explanation for information/specified complexity is wrong" --> "the only explanation for information/specified complexity is ID is wrong"NickMatzke_UD
August 4, 2011
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There is massive evidence that gene duplication + mutation + selection has produced many new genes with modified or new functions. It's not just me saying this. Behe agrees. Even some UD posters, e.g. that Thomas guy, agree with this. If it's true, then natural processes can produce new information, and have produced many new genes in just the limited sample of well-studied genome sequences in just the last few million years. So (a) the basic ID argument, that the only explanation for information/specified complexity is wrong, and (b) please tell us why this process should magically stop at just a few genes? A process that can produce a little bit of information and store it, can build up lots of information when iterated over many species over billions of years.NickMatzke_UD
August 4, 2011
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Imagination fail.paragwinn
August 4, 2011
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