How much is too much evolution?

I think he is asking the amount of limb combinations.

No significant change in information; one produces a fin, another an arm with a hand, okay. 

No, for the words "Help me" to be written and understood, that would be 5 letters and space, in the proper order, while there are other letters and characters that could have been typed out as well. Thus "Help me" is really one out of a large number of possibilities for each letter or space in sequence. You guys say one gene as if there is only a variable in play; if you want to make that claim, fine by me.

ok

(but so far my only 'claim' has been that major phenotypic changes usually don't require major changes in genetic information, and this is not so much a claim as it is observational fact)

So far I have dismissed nothing.  You keep jumping ahead and talking about universal common ancestry and the origin of life when I'm just trying to see if we can find agreement on some basic facts and discoveries in biology; facts which you seem reticent to acknowledge.

But if anything, these facts should be good news to your ears.  These facts show that when it comes to at least the vertebrate fin/limb of fish, sharks, chickens, mice, etc. there is no disruption of the system (which is one of your biggest complaints).  The SAME system of genes (HoxA & HoxD) is able to control, regulate, and direct fin/limb formation in all these cases.  Thus, instead of violating any design principles or working outside of the system's capacity and tolerances, the system seems to be doing what it was designed to do.  The same system is able to effectuate the development of a variety of different types of vertebrate fins/limbs.  That is a very efficient design indeed!

Systems do what they are designed to do, no complaint there. Where I do complain is that you still promote that a system will break away from normal operations and start something new that wasn't there before all the while continuing without falling apart.

That's just it though.  You don't know the limits of the system.  You keep talking as if you do but you don't.  You're just guessing and making assumptions about what you think is and isn't possible based on computer programming analogies and your own personal opinion, but you have yet to provide any actual evidence that suggests there are limits to genetic change or that indicates how much genetic change is possible beyond which there are barriers to change.  You assume there's a limit to genetic change but offer no evidence on the subject.  You say I "still promote a system that will break away from 'normal operation'" when not only have I said no such thing, you've been unable to articulate precisely where this imaginary line is between 'normal' and 'abnormal' operation or prove that such a line truly exists.   

By contrast, I've cited study after study over the past year that give evidence of how genomes are not static but dynamic and capable of acquiring and rearranging new genetic material---*not* accidentally, but by design as part of an active biological process that is a normal part of the operating system.

I know if there are restraints within the system those will act as guides to keep everything from running off the rails. Keeping a dog a dog requires the system to act within its limitation to maintain that lifeform. Jumping out of the norm to produce something else has major issues that were discussed in detail in that discussion about evolution you watched. You don't get to change a body plan by tweaking code a little here or there. The limb you think is no big deal to make must have an arm socket and a million other little details that have to be just right.

Again, these are just your assumptions and personal opinions about what is and isn't possible.  You say you can't change a body plan by tweaking code a little here or there, but the truth is you have no idea what is required and whether it's a little or a lot.  You assume it's a lot, but again that's just your opinion unbacked by evidence.  You need to present evidence to back your claim.  I've presented evidence showing vertebrate fin/limb formation is directed by the same genetic system.  You simply saying no and being contrarian is not a reason to dispute the scientific evidence.  It's just your unfounded opinion.  To be more than just your opinion you need to provide some actual evidence that counters or calls into question the research I've presented.  You have yet to do that.

It was covered heavily that well in that discussion you watched, if you play with changes to the body plan early you run the risk of destroying something downstream that is required, too late and you don't affect the necessary changes to alter one body plan into another. I don't believe you have addressed the concerns I've given you. The fin and arm example you have given suggesting it's a little change I reject, how many changes in the information are required, and what needed to occur prior to that change so that an arm is effective or a fin? The whole body had to be ready for such a change that isn't just a little tweak, I don't think you have thought this through.

You can reject it all you want.  That doesn't change the scientific evidence which refutes you.  It's no different from genetic engineering, which by the way humans learned from cells, not the other way around.  And if you want to talk about prior changes we can get into that, drill down to specifics and look at the fossil record of recorded changes in the fish-tetrapod transition.  But the bottom line (whether you acknowledge it or not) is that the various vertebrate appendages are derived from the same genetic system, not different ones with swathes of new genes.  If I'm wrong, then tell me what different genetic systems are involved instead of just saying 'no, I don't believe it'.  And your video did not go into specifics of how much new information and what specific types of genes and how many for the various types of body plans, but painted with a broad brush.  Nor do I recall any of the video speakers being experts in developmental genetics or Cambrian paleontology.  A video by ID apologists (or any video actually) is also not a scientific study or scientific evidence.

I'll be happy to look over any published peer review research like the paper you cited in a different thread about half a year ago (that I complimented you on).  In fact, that would be a welcome change from the monotony of me presenting scientific evidence and you just saying 'nope, don't believe it', 'nope, don't believe it', 'nope, don't believe it', without you actually providing any counter evidence.  Questions (like 'What about this?  What about that?') are not evidence.  They're just questions.  Instead of just being contrarian you should try to be constructive by building and presenting your own evidence-backed case.

Until you can draw concrete lines instead of imaginary fuzzy ones as to where the supposed limit or barrier to evolution is ('How much evolution is too much?') and back it with actual evidence, you got nothin'.

And as an aside, I went back and watched your 'Mathematical Challenges to Darwin' video again.  Just finished it and it's the same as I remember:

1.  The panel included a mathematician, a computer scientist and a philosopher of science.  Not one biologist among them.

2.  Only two numbers are actually mentioned: the estimated number of living things (10^40) and the chance of making a protein 150 amino acids long from scratch (1 chance in 10^77). Those were the only numbers mentioned and the second number has to do with the origin of life problem as I said before.

3.  Their claim that a new protein requires a new gene is false.  One of the great discoveries in the past few decades is the modularity of protein subunits called domains and how you can get different proteins by domain rearrangement and alternate splicing of the same gene, which eukaryotic cells do all the time.

4.  Their assumption that new 'species' requires huge changes in morphology is false and a rather amateurish mistake for them to make.  Just look at the thousands of different species of frogs that we have that are all still frogs--not sheep or cows.  Most speciation events do not require large changes in morphology.

5.  Meyer spoke maybe two minutes on the Cambrian explosion.  He pretty much said exactly what you said above in post #111.  Nothing beyond that!  No elaboration.  No specifics.  Just general broad brush statements unbacked by any evidence.

How you can consider a few cursory comments by NON-biologists as supposed 'evidence' of any kind, much less enough to overturn volumes upon volumes of scientific research is beyond me.  

If they were the only people I listen to you'd have a point, but they are not.

I'm sure you have already seen the first one maybe not the 2nd.

Dr. Edward Peltzer Abiogensis

(261) Abiogenesis: The Faith and the Facts - YouTube

DR, James Tour

(261) Dr. James Tour - Does Science Make Faith Obsolete? - YouTube

What is better and more useful are citations to published peer reviewed research as I said

The first video is all about abiogenesis.  The first forty five minutes of the hour James Tour video is also about abiogenesis (and unrelated anecdotes about his work in nanotech).  You already know my thoughts on abiogenesis so it escapes me why you would give me over two hours of video on abiogenesis.

Only the last 15 minutes or so of the James Tour video deals with evolution:

1.  Tour is a chemist, not a biologist who makes mistakes in his presentation on the human genome.  For example, he misrepresents the 98.5% of non-coding DNA as all evidence of 'uncommonness', which is false.  There is huge amount of agreement between human and chimp genomes in this part too.  He also says inaccurate things about ORPHAN genes, which I've already addressed elsewhere in MindWalk's forum. 

2.  Tour says he signed the dissent statement by scientists who say they don't believe universal common descent can be explained by random mutation and natural selection.  I don't see the big deal there. I don't believe it can be explained just by mutation-selection theory either as I have made clear innumerable times. 

3.  Tour, a chemist, says he is clueless about the mechanisms for evolution.  OK, I'll take his word for it.  He then says no one understands it.  Well, that's not true, so he shouldn't speak for everyone else.  Are there things that are not understood?  Absolutely!  But lack of understanding isn't an argument for anything nor does it constitute evidence of anything.  In saying this, Tour seems blithely unaware of the mass amount of research on the subject, summarized in review articles like Shapiro's "Nothing Makes Sense in Evolution Except in Light of Genomics" that I have frequently cited.  

4.  But for sake of argument let's say he's right and we have absolutely no idea about mechanism (the 'how' it occurred).  As I have said countless times, even if we had absolutely no idea about mechanism (the 'how' it occurred) that still would do nothing to negate the evidence that it has occurred.

5.  In fact, Tour noted the same thing and distinguished between mechanism and evidence for universal common descent!  On this, Tour made several noteworthy comments, including that he said the 1.5% difference between the human genome and chimp genome coding regions--considered the most important part by yourself and other IDers, when it comes to functional information--he said by itself it is convincing evidence of shared common ancestry (he doesn't dispute this; he only questions perceived discrepancies in non-coding DNA).

6.  Furthermore, Tour also says that universal common descent is an amazing theory backed by a whole lot of evidence and that he can understand why it has such wide acceptance.  Again, he only addresses mechanism.  He doesn't dispute the strong, evidence backed case that exists for universal common ancestry.

Thank you for taking the time in watching it. For me the mechanism is very important, a reason why things occur, by necessity or chance. 

Thank you for the kind reply.  I appreciate that.

(13) Dr James Tour speaking about evolution - YouTube

Personally, I think he slams dunks the possibility of Abiogenesis as being impossible. You have seen this already, tbwp10. I believe this is a piece of what was posted elsewhere.

We actually do study that, in fruit flies. We have been mutating and studying their traits for hundreds of their generations (about 20 years of ours), and they are Still fruit files