And yet we observe such changes happening experimentally and in nature, so it must not be a problem
Acquiring new wings I know has been done, but wings were not functional therefore more of a burden than anything useful, there are a lot of things we can point to, but they don't pan out as hoped.
The take away is that major morphological changes don't require major genetic changes
Really, it happens in giant leaps of massive change all at once?
It depends on what you mean by 'giant leaps of massive change'. In fact, that is the problem addressed in this thread: YECs rarely define the line between acceptable and unacceptable evolution that represents too great of a change. The divding line is fuzzy and given no formal, rigorous treatment by YECs, who speak subjectively on the subject.
So I don't know what you mean by 'giant leaps of massive change', and you have yet to clearly, and rigorously locate the divding line between evolutionary change you consider acceptable and unacceptable, so I can only speak in similar generalities.
In general, changes in morphology that you would probably consider 'major' are usually not the result of evolving entire suites of brand new genes, but instead are usually the result of small scale genetic tinkering with what's already available.
Take the vertebrate tetrapod limb, for example. The various different types and skeletal arrangements (which represent 'major' changes in morphology) can be produced by mere changes in the kinetics (i.e., the rates) of developmental pathways.
Similarly, all the different, various types of eyes in the animal kingdom and the major differences between them result from tinkering with a single regulatory gene.
A massive change? Getting one positive change, one mutation that does good is a big deal; getting a string of them all working towards a change together in unison is huge, a string of alterations working towards a single change like producing a heart is astronomical, let alone the entire circulatory system.
You read books, getting a string of letters put together that add to a story without a planner/writer is not something that would happen if someone started randomly typing. They would have to make words, the words would have to string together to form sentences, and the sentences would have to form a paragraph, and it would have to fit within the story. That is what you are suggesting could happen biologically.
There is no reason to believe it will occur since the more we learn the more difficult we realize that is. So if you are going to say you believe, you believe in spite of not because of what we know.
Not really. What I've said is that I trust in the expert judgment of those who spend much of their professional careers investigating the question of origin of life and as far as I'm aware, they don't believe as a group that they've reached a dead-end.
For all his knowledge of cell biology, tbwp10 is not directly involved in such research.
The coming into existence of the first lifeform shouldn't be viewed in isolation! It was followed by a period of some 1000,000,000 years in which single-celled life remained to all intents and purposes single-celled.
After that it took another 2000,000,000 years to bring about more complex life, our own species having existed for about 2 million years.
It's all very well claiming that the first lifeform was created by some conscious mind but that entails the responsibility for giving an hypothesis (at least) for why any creator would go about things in that way.
@TruthMuse,
The book analogy is inaccurate.
You keep speaking of massive genetic changes, when I keep telling you that major changes in morphology are usually not the result of evolving entire suites of brand new genes, but instead are usually the result of small scale genetic tinkering with what's already available. This is not a suggestion, but a known fact. Usually all that's needed is minor changes in regulatory genes, gene expression, developmental timing, etc. New genetic information is not even always needed. Just like how many words can function differently in different contexts like the different meanings of 'hang' in Ben Franklin's famous quote "We must hang together, or we will hang separately", so also we observe a lot of modularity in genomes and proteins; where for example, the *SAME* gene--with *NO* mutations or alterations to the gene at all--can result in markedly different phenotypes just by putting it in a different genome or even just a different location in the same genome. Furthermore, we now have an overwhelming amount of empirical evidence that shows cells have various mechanisms that enable them to acquire and rearrange genetic information in this way. Genomes are remarkably dynamic, 'in flux' (some have even described them as 'volatile'), and capable of rearrangements, modifications, and acquisition of genetic material via normal, biological mechanisms (*not* 'accidental'). Genomes are remarkably more flexible and capable of change (without detrimental consequences) than we thought possible, and in ways that make your analogy to computer code inaccurate. A single change in computer code is likely 'disastrous'. That does not hold true for genomes. Not even close.
You've raised a lot of different issues and posed some great questions. Let's see if we can take them in turn starting with the point addressed above; i.e., the discovery that major morphological changes usually don't require major changes in genetics. Let's see if we can make progress in understanding just on that one issue for starters before moving on to address your other points.
There is no reason to believe it will occur since the more we learn the more difficult we realize that is. So if you are going to say you believe, you believe in spite of not because of what we know.
Not really. What I've said is that I trust in the expert judgment of those who spend much of their professional careers investigating the question of origin of life and as far as I'm aware, they don't believe as a group that they've reached a dead-end.
For all his knowledge of cell biology, tbwp10 is not directly involved in such research.
Yes, but you seem to be avoiding the facts of the situation--facts that don't come from me, but from the origin of life experts themselves--including the myriad problems; the fact that the net direction of natural chemical processes is in the wrong direction needed for the origin of life; the fact that we did not have the right atmospheric conditions on the early earth to generate the needed building blocks; the fact that even if we did and even if we somehow overcame the astronomical improbabilities of chance assembly of just a single gene or protein that it would be short-lived and rapidly degraded into its component parts by the same processes that produced it; and perhaps most importantly for the present discussion, the fact that the optimism of experts is NOT based on objective science, but hope, faith and assumption of what has not even been proved. In this regard, it is little different from the same practices or 'reasoning' of religious believers that you criticize.
... and perhaps most importantly for the present discussion, the fact that the optimism of experts is NOT based on objective science, but hope, faith and assumption of what has not even been proved. In this regard, it is little different from the same practices or 'reasoning' of religious believers that you criticize.
Well that's for scientists working in the field of OOL to answer rather than me because I don't possess a fraction of their knowledge.
But OOL on earth must be placed in its proper context, that's to say the entirely natural process of evolution that followed, taking some 3000,000,000 years to the present day, to produce all the myriad species we see around us.
I struggle to make any sense of a scenario in which some unspecified conscious entity, wishing to create life on this particular ball of rock, fashioned a single living cell and then apparently sat back for the next 3000,000,000 years.
Do people here really grasp how mind-bogglingly long that period of time is?
My point was in response to your post where you wrote: "That's the kind of example of (certain) believers starting with the conclusion they favour and working back towards the process(es) that caused it, that I was alluding to earlier"; and your follow-up post where you stated your belief in abiogenesis was based on expert optimism that a naturalistic explanation will eventually be found for the origin of life.
My point was simply to say that your justified criticism of certain religious believers erroneously starting with a conclusion (i.e., assuming what needs to be proved) is not limited to religious believers. People (of all kinds and beliefs or lack thereof) have been guilty of this. Abiogenesis is an example. Your belief in abiogenesis based on expert optimism that a naturalistic explanation will eventually be found does not change the fact that abiogenesis remains an unproven assumption and 'conclusion' that people start with; *not* arrive at.
... and perhaps most importantly for the present discussion, the fact that the optimism of experts is NOT based on objective science, but hope, faith and assumption of what has not even been proved. In this regard, it is little different from the same practices or 'reasoning' of religious believers that you criticize.
Well that's for scientists working in the field of OOL to answer rather than me because I don't possess a fraction of their knowledge.
But OOL on earth must be placed in its proper context, that's to say the entirely natural process of evolution that followed, taking some 3000,000,000 years to the present day, to produce all the myriad species we see around us.
I struggle to make any sense of a scenario in which some unspecified conscious entity, wishing to create life on this particular ball of rock, fashioned a single living cell and then apparently sat back for the next 3000,000,000 years.
Do people here really grasp how mind-bogglingly long that period of time is?
That length of time is one of the main reasons I disagree with that process.
But evolution requires vast spans of geological time to take effect. This has been understood since at least Darwin's day.
Or do you mean you simply don't accept the age of the Earth as has been established?
I don't know how old the earth is; that is what I admit. I don't believe in a natural unguided process could construct something as sophisticated as a living cell, let alone all the other lifeforms we see today, no matter how much time is given. Too much of the construction has to do with perfect timing for mixing, under controlled environment, etc.
But do you both take my point that whatever cause you choose to assign to the emergence of the first lifeform on Earth, it has to be placed in the context of the huge span of time that passed before it (some 10,700,000,000 years) and the 3,000,000,000 years that has passed since.
And our own species has come into existence only in the final seconds of that 24-hour clock.
I don't take that as the truth, I think it is not any different than the days of old when people used to say the old gods and titans rose from the distant past to form everything. Today we look at the distant past as if that and that alone could produce such a thing as life. I don't think God requires all of that time to do what He can do with a Word. Granted some don't believe in God, and others believe in little gods that cannot do a lot on their own. I just believe in One who created everything out of nothing and holds it all together by the power of His Word.
Did you watch the "Dr. James Tour-Does Science make Faith Obsolete?" talk in Mindwalk's group? He covers a lot of ground, some of which is his conversion to Christianity, but the science and biology parts are first rate IMO.
This really comes down to a question of whether or not the science of dating is reliable & (usefully) accurate and I think that question has been settled for some time?
So much so that even the major religions of the world seem to have little dispute with the findings.
I will not argue dates and times; I don't know the only good answer I have. I don't see time as adding to the possibilities from life forming or evolving either. For me, it is all about windows of opportunity, not the length of possibilities concerning time. If all of the necessary ingredients are not present, it doesn't matter how much time is there, if the necessary environment for the formation isn't there, it doesn't matter how much time is there, and so on. On top of that, you listen to the other Dr discuss abiogenesis; chemical reactions don't have a start-stop mechanism to reach a goal; what they will do is play out according to the reactions with chemicals. If life requires something, a chemical reaction gets it; it will not stop but continue reacting till the requirement gets altered into something else. There is no goal in chemical reactions, there is in life, but life is a system with goals, requirements, stops, and starts. Prelife, none of that is true.
That isn't quite what I had in mind. I was hoping you'd put any belief you have that the Creator described in the OT was responsible for the first lifeform on Earth, into the context of the vast expanse of time it's taken to get to today.
I believe in the scriptures as written. God started the universe and laid out how He did it; it is simple and to the point. It makes sense that God eternal, who transcends this universe spoke, and time, space, energy, matter all appeared. They appeared in such precision that the universe formed to support life and continue from the beginning. All of the massive galactic issues, all of the microscopic issues, were all worked out without chance.
Experimentally, as in someone....was involved?