Uncommon Descent Serving The Intelligent Design Community

We are the 99% chimpanzee? Scratch that!

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Here are some realistic stats from Brit expert Richard Buggs:

Looking closely at the chimpanzee-like 76% of the human genome, we find that to make an exact alignment, we often have to introduce artificial gaps in either the human or the chimp genome. These gaps give another 3% difference. So now we have a 73% similarity between the two genomes.

In the neatly aligned sequences we now find another form of difference, where a single ’letter’ is different between the human and chimp genomes. These provide another 1.23% difference between the two genomes. Thus, the percentage difference is now at around 72%.

We also find places where two pieces of human genome align with only one piece of chimp genome, or two pieces of chimp genome align with one piece of human genome. This ”copy number variation” causes another 2.7% difference between the two species. Therefore the total similarity of the genomes could be below 70%.

This figure does not take include differences in the organization of the two genomes. At present we cannot fully assess the difference in structure of the two genomes, because the human genome was used as a template (or ”scaffold”) when the chimpanzee draft genome was assembled.

Hey, if you like bananas, that’s fine, but you are still far more closely related to Ronald Reagan than to Bonzo (whatever you may think about that).

Also at the Post-Darwinist:

Why does it matter if humans are not just the “third chimpanzee”?

If the universe was designed, it does not follow that your grandmother’s superstitions are true

Comments
Here's genome comparison on Nature, and here user Shpongle is pulling Poe quoting Buggs on freeration forum.tremor
November 26, 2008
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there aren’t any mutations that can become fixed in each generation unless the population is very low- say one or two individuals.
scottrobinson: Do we? "Do we" what? scottrobinson: Care to expand on that? Ya see mutations are supposed to be random genetic mistakes, ie copying erors. Now if we had a population say of 1 million individuls, then in order for any mutation to become fixed it must be in all individuals in the population. Simpson, back in his day, stated it is more likely that a mutation, even a beneficial one, is more likely to get lost then it is to become fixed. Haldane stated that it should take 300 generations for a mutation to become fixed. But anyway scottrobinson, how long do you think it would take a mutation to become fixed in a population? And remember in sexual reproduction half of each parent's genome gets tossed. And that means even the best beneficial mutation is not guaranteed to get passed on. IOW sexual reproduction basically put a stop on evolution in the form of universal common descent.Joseph
November 17, 2008
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Joseph,
there aren’t any mutations that can become fixed in each generation unless the population is very low- say one or two individuals.
Do we? Care to expand on that? Any maths to go with that? Citations?scottrobinson
November 16, 2008
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If this is true then how many mutations have to become fixed per generation? That may not matter as we know there aren't any mutations that can become fixed in each generation unless the population is very low- say one or two individuals. But even that is moot if it cannot be demonstrated that the genetic differences account for the physiological and anatomical differences.Joseph
November 16, 2008
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Buggs is being called a religious fanatic by the BCSE - the UK version of the NCSE - a Darwinist propaganda engine. But who cares what they think. Their stated purpose is largely to "oppose the tide of creationism". Of course like all others of that category of Darwinist fanatics, they fail to realize how many of the founders of science were full fledged creationists.Borne
November 15, 2008
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I can see a lot of Darwinian feathers getting severely ruffled by this: This was by far their strongest piece of suggestive evidence they had going for them, since ENCODE and negative mutation rates were definitely killing them evidence-wise, but alas how come I think that a major piece of obfuscation will soon hit PT and PZ blogs as well as other Darwinian propaganda mills? --- I've updated my notes: naturalists/materialists USE TO say that evolution is proven true when we look at the 98.8% similarity between certain segments of the DNA in a Chimpanzee and compare them with the same segments of DNA of a Human. Yet that similarity was not nearly good enough to be considered “conclusive” scientific proof. For starters, recent preliminary comparisons of the complete genome of chimps and the complete genome of man yield a similarity of only 96%. As well, the December 2006 issue of PLoS ONE reported that human and chimpanzee gene copy numbers differ by a whopping 6.4% (Hahn). Whereas, Dr. Hugh Ross states the similarity may in actuality be closer to 85% to 90% when taking into account the chimp genome is about 12% larger than the human genome. A recent, more accurate, Study in 2008, which compared the entire genomes of Chimpanzees and Humans side by side found the similarity at below 70%! Chimpanzee? 10-10-2008 - Dr Richard Buggs ...Therefore the total similarity of the genomes could be below 70%. http://www.refdag.nl/artikel/1366432/Chimpanzee.html The author of the paper is a research geneticist at the University of Florida. Secondarily, at the protein level only 29% of genes code for the exact same amino acid sequences in chimps and humans (Nature, 2005). As well, using their old method, our DNA is 92% similar to mice as well as 92% similar to zebrafish (Simmons PhD., Billions of Missing Links). So are we 92% mouse or are we 92% zebrafish? Our DNA is 70% similar to a fruit fly; So are we therefore 70% fruit fly? Our DNA is 75% similar to a worm; So are we 75% worm? Decoding the dogma of DNA similarity http://creationontheweb.com/content/view/5111bornagain77
November 15, 2008
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BTW: I emphasized the "only" in my post on purpose. I'm not trying to be sarcastic at all. I love that we're only 70% similar to chimpanzees. :)Domoman
November 15, 2008
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Wait, so humans are only 70% similar to chimpanzees? That'd be an enormous difference! Wow, huge, even! I'm so used to hearing we're 90-something-percent all the time. xDDomoman
November 15, 2008
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Yes but: Isn't that percent similarity still a striking similarity? http://sciencedefeated.wordpress.com/NotedScholars
November 15, 2008
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Try this link instead http://christianstudycenter.org/wp-content/uploads/csc_buggs_handout_091508.pdfidnet.com.au
November 15, 2008
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Denyse, the link under Here ( http://www.refdag.nl/artikel/1366432/Chimpanzee.html ) in your post gets a page in German. Is the link OK?idnet.com.au
November 15, 2008
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Thanks for the link. You made my day!bornagain77
November 15, 2008
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Great post. Thankstribune7
November 15, 2008
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