Texas comes into the 21 century

Why do you insist that genetic changes are random? How can you know they are random?

Suppose an organism had a better-than-random algorithm for adapting to, say, a new threat or a new opportunity. Suppose it *did* keep a library of old, complex, no longer useful sequences and subsystems, disabled but able to be recalled and used when an external stimulus - not random mutation - suggests it might become useful again.

Wouldn't such an organism have a survival advantage over one that waits for random mutations? And if so, why wouldn't evolution have created such advantageous mechanisms? In general, why is the complexity of cell biochemistry limited to the things that you can imagine?

I'm beginning to think that you don't believe in evolution. You define and limit yourself by the things you refuse to imagine.

John

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We can see the Alu elements in the human genonome and their distribution certainly seems to be totally random. If someone proved that it wasn't it would have been front page news.

So find that library in the genome, and explain why - as an unused sequence - it wouldn't have mutated into uselessness in the way our array of olfactory genes has

Such an organism would have an evolutionary advantage. The most likely reason why evolution hasn't created such an advantageous system is probably exactly the same one that explains why fish haven't evolved propellors - you can't get there from here.

I believe in evolution. I also believe that some "evolutionary" trajectories involve non-viable, or at least non-competitive intermediate species. If you've got such a brilliant imagination, imagine how a fish might evolve a propellor.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

Well, I invite you to try following your conscience _exactly_ for a month, and then think back and see how you did. It's quite an experience, and clarifies a lot of issues.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

I'm certain that any detailed part of the human genome would look random to you.

If someone proved

Ok, you don't believe in evolution.

Some bacteria have propellers. I suppose fish don't because they have better ways to get around.

John

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I think there has been some 'motion' amoung biologists to modify the 'central dogma of evolution', that information only flow from the DNA outwards.

(I can't remeber the current example of this....)

But I do recall reading "The case of the midwife toad" in my youth.

George H.

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Freudian psychoanalysis is a bad enough idea when the analyst is trained and objective. Self-analysis is a complete waste of time. We are much too good at fooling ourselves about our aims and motivations for the exercise to be worth the effort.

I've got an unusually good memory, and from time to time I find myself recalling morally interesting periods of my life. The only take away message I can extract from them is that it takes a painfully long time to see what is going on, when seeing what is going on is going to make you feel uncomfortable.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

I'm not talking about introspection, I'm talking about goodness. It's difficult, you see. Even though we know how we ought to act, we don't, no matter how hard we try. We can dull our consciences over time, or we can deny them; but try as we may, we can't obey them entirely.

That's one of the main data points supporting theism.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

But there are so many (and contradictory) deities to chose from.

One of the early progenitors of YHWH (or possibly a cousin from the Sumerian side of the family) was a critter named YHW. If I understand it correctly, that name was pronounced "Yahoo!" Running down a hillside into battle shouting Yahoo! seems pretty reasonable to me. ;-)

citation: "The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel"

;)

You might start by eliminating the ones that demand human sacrifice, e.g. Baal-Hammon.

And then you might eliminate the ones whose taught moralities are obviously inferior, such as Allah. (The Sermon on the Mount is as good as it gets in that respect.)

Various folks do wind up in different places, and they can't all be right, but that's not an excuse for not trying. One reason that people like to kick up so much dust about this is that they think it would cramp their style if there really were a God. I used to think that too, but it ain't so.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

So

Dying is the thing that really cramps one's style.

John

So

Well, getting old and sick sure does, and pain especially. Dying not so much, I think--on the atheist view, you aren't there any more, so you don't have any style nor anything else. On the theist view, you find out what your style actually looked like, and it achieves its full development. Whether you like it when that happens is another matter.

That's the teaching of all religions I know of, except the Norse. Norse religion really is pretty heroic--they chose the side of the Gods even though they knew it was doomed. (Although Odin was a really, really creepy guy.)

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

So

YHWH did okay for himself, though.

{10:38} And Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, to Debir; and fought against it: {10:39} And he took it, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof; and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed all the souls that [were] therein; he left none remaining: as he had done to Hebron, so he did to Debir, and to the king thereof; as he had done also to Libnah, and to her king. ...

{11:18} Joshua made war a long time with all those kings. {11:19} There was not a city that made peace with the children of Israel, save the Hivites the inhabitants of Gibeon: all [other] they took in battle. {11:20} For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly, [and] that they might have no favour, but that he might destroy them, as the LORD commanded Moses.

{11:21} And at that time came Joshua, and cut off the Anakims from the mountains, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the mountains of Judah, and from all the mountains of Israel: Joshua destroyed them utterly with their cities. {11:22} There was none of the Anakims left in the land of the children of Israel

Shorter version: YHWH "harden[ed] their hearts" so that they'd fight against his guys, giving his guys the excuse to destroy them utterly. The game was rigged.

What a nice guy...

So

War is not pretty, but it isn't in the same league as burning babies to death so you'll have good crops.

I talk about the Conquest of Canaan on my very very occasional blog,

Short version: the goodness of God is visible even here.

Cheers

Phil Hobbs

In , Martin Brown wrote in part:

Prions existed and caused similar problems before then. A similar prion caused similar pathology in some tribe cannibalizing on deceased humans, causing a disease known then and there as kuru. The disease was more prevalent among those who ate human brains.

This disease was noted by "The West" as early as 1954 and since estimated to have existed as far back as 1900.

I sure think they're random. The results easily appear non-random, because most random results are deletorious, and most of the losers don't get far. The minority of the changes that turn out to be winners get to stay around longer or even spread and overtake what they evolved from. So, the *examinable* mutations are *not* representative of *all* mutations, because the loser mutations fail to reproduce. The "winner mutations" become over-represented and the "loser mutations" become under-represented.

Can you name a bacterium that has a propeller?

I am aware of microorganisms with flagella and some of those could put their flagella into corkscrew shapes, but that's less efficient than a tail fin. Is there any known life form that has a more outright rotor wing type thing rotating around an axis? It is commonly mentioned that no life form has this, due to inability to get connection to tissue past a bearing or a bushing to something that rotates.

So, a propeller so outright as a rotor-wing with a bearing or bushing ends up not existing as a biological part of a life form, but only as an external tool utilized by life forms. So far, I am aware of only one species of life forms that has achieved use of such.

After that, comes a genus or family of plants making use of a rotor wing, but lacking bushings/bearings because the rotor wing does not rotate about other parts of the biological item - since it is gravity-powered. Rotor-wing principle is used to slow down its falling speed when it falls through air - so that wind can blow some of them to whatever nearby areas are unpopulated by them. This plant item cannot outright fly. These plant things are maple seeds.

This is good news to those who fear riding helicopters because of fears of engine failure or fuel emergency - a helicopter lacking engine power can descend a lot more slowly than a brick or a lead-filled balloon does. The proceedure has been mentioned as "autorotation". The landing is harder than a normal one, but far short of an unsurvivable nearly-crater- forming flaming crash.

Google bacterial flagellar motor

"The process of controlled transcription and assembly is still not fully understood. Once assembled, the motor complex in the cytoplasmic membrane rotates, driven by the transmembrane ion gradient, at speeds that can reach many 100 Hz, driving the bacterial cell at several body lengths a second. This coupling of an electrochemical gradient to mechanical rotational work is another fascinating feature of the bacterial motor. A significant percentage of a bacterium's energy may be used in synthesizing the complex structure of the flagellum and driving its rotation. Although patterns of swimming may be random in uniform environments, in the natural environment, where cells are confronted with gradients of metabolites and toxins, motility is used to move bacteria towards their optimum environment for growth and survival. A sensory system therefore controls the switching frequency of the rotating flagellum."

Why do people keep claiming that organisms can't do things?

There is a mold that lives off gamma radiation. Go ahead, tell me that's impossible.

John

As I see it, that information *is* partially there, disproportionately from "winner" past mutations, as opposed to "loser" past mutations which are the majority of past mutations that had any actual effect. The losers of the random mutations tend to "die young" and to not get far with reproduction, while the winners gain advantage continuing into and past the reproduction stage of the next life cycle. So, the winners of random mutations, despite being in great minority, getv to over-represent themselves. The losers of random mutations (majority of the ones having any actual effect) are doomed to under-representation, often quickly, frequently completely succumbing to competitive disadvantage within a small number of generations. Often even before being born or hatching, as mentioned earlier in this thread.

One thing evolution appears to me to have affected: Flexibility of genomes.

Back around 470 million years ago or whenever "early Cambian" was, existence of most phyla of modern animal life forms was newly evolving. As new as animal life forms were then, there was greater advantage / disadvantage ratio of mutations (still minority) then than now.

Most genera of the animal kingdom came are now majority-considered to have come into existence in a period 25 megayears long or shorter, ending over 400 megayears ago.

Animals back then went through an "arms race" of a rapid pace of evolution and "natural selection".

Nearly half a gigayear later, animal life forms tend to have genomes less inviting of random mutations with actual and reproduction-surviving effect in comparison to back-then, because mutations have "average rate" of benefit less now than 100's of megayears ago. Lots of beneficial mutations were already achieved and exhausted over 400 million years ago. After then, mutations had their already-low benefit/harm ratio generally decreasing.

Kinda the way that Voldmort got his fingers burned by touching Harry Potter? >:->

Cheers! Rich