[_ Old Earth _] Collins and DNA

[Asyncritus]

I was absolutely staggered to read that Francis Collins is a 'theistic evolutionist'.

Collins, who knows DNA like no one else (probably), being the Human Genome Project leader, should have known better, and I deeply deplore his foolish attitude.

He thinks that DNA and RNA could have 'evolved' somehow!

Imagine that.

Here is a most 'elegant', 'ingenious' CODE, CLEARLY DESIGNED FOR THE PURPOSE OF REPLICATION, that 'evolved' somehow.

A code of any sort, presupposes an intelligent code constructor - a cryptographer, if you will - and an intelligent code decipherer, or at least an intelligently constructed method of deciphering the said code.

To imagine that both of those requirements could have just 'evolved' is the height of imbecility.

It is like saying that the Enigma code machine could have 'evolved' without intelligent direction. A person saying such a thing deserves, in my opinion, a few well-aimed German bombs down his chimney stack, or through his roof.

For a mechanism that required the best efforts of Nobel prize winners to unravel, and more Nobel prizes to decipher, to have just 'evolved', is such crass stupidity that words fail me.

I think that the best statement on the topic is this one:

"At that moment, when the DNA/RNA system became understood, the debate between Evolutionists and Creationists should have come to a screeching halt. ...the implications of the DNA/RNA were obvious and clear. Mathematically speaking, based on probability concepts, there is no possibility that Evolution was the mechanism that created the approximately 6,000,000 species of plants and animals we recognize today."

I. L. Cohen, Darwin Was Wrong - A Study in Probabilities 1984 op cit pp 4,5,8


Mind you, George Wald wasn't too far wrong when he described his own position on the matter (though I gather that he recanted his position)


[FONT=&quot]“One has only to contemplate the magnitude of this task to concede that the spontaneous generation of a living organism is impossible. Yet we are here—as a result, I believe, of spontaneous generation.” [/FONT][FONT=&quot]George Wald, Harvard professor and Nobel Prize winner.[/FONT]

 

[lordkalvan]

I was absolutely staggered to read that Francis Collins is a 'theistic evolutionist'.

Collins, who knows DNA like no one else (probably), being the Human Genome Project leader, should have known better, and I deeply deplore his foolish attitude.

He thinks that DNA and RNA could have 'evolved' somehow!

Imagine that.

Here is a most 'elegant', 'ingenious' CODE, CLEARLY DESIGNED FOR THE PURPOSE OF REPLICATION, that 'evolved' somehow.

A code of any sort, presupposes an intelligent code constructor - a cryptographer, if you will - and an intelligent code decipherer, or at least an intelligently constructed method of deciphering the said code.

To imagine that both of those requirements could have just 'evolved' is the height of imbecility.

In your argument you seem to be assuming your conclusion. In a choice between who is displaying the greater 'height of imbecility', why should we choose Francis Collins over yourself, for example? Perhaps you can remind us what your scientific credentials are in this field, as opposed to Collins's?

It is like saying that the Enigma code machine could have 'evolved' without intelligent direction. A person saying such a thing deserves, in my opinion, a few well-aimed German bombs down his chimney stack, or through his roof.

So anyone who disagrees with you deserves to be killed? Is that really what you are saying?

For a mechanism that required the best efforts of Nobel prize winners to unravel, and more Nobel prizes to decipher, to have just 'evolved', is such crass stupidity that words fail me.

Can you remind us which Nobel prize winners were involved in 'unravelling' Enigma?

ETA Or are you referring to DNA? In which case, why do you suppose that something which is difficult to understand must inevitably be inexplicable naturalistically?

I think that the best statement on the topic is this one:


I. L. Cohen, Darwin Was Wrong - A Study in Probabilities 1984 op cit pp 4,5,8

Cohen appears to misunderstand the statistical probabilities involved in biological and chemical processes. I think this has been mentioned before.

Mind you, George Wald wasn't too far wrong when he described his own position on the matter (though I gather that he recanted his position)


[FONT=&quot]“One has only to contemplate the magnitude of this task to concede that the spontaneous generation of a living organism is impossible. Yet we are here—as a result, I believe, of spontaneous generation.” [/FONT][FONT=&quot]George Wald, Harvard professor and Nobel Prize winner.[/FONT]

Why did he recant his position? Do you think the reasons for this might be significant?

 

[Asyncritus]

In your argument you seem to be assuming your conclusion. In a choice between who is displaying the greater 'height of imbecility', why should we choose Francis Collins over yourself, for example? Perhaps you can remind us what your scientific credentials are in this field, as opposed to Collins's?

Intelligence is always superior to degrees. I may remind you, as I've done before, that Einstein was a patents clerk, and Edison had about 6 months of schooling. You would have ignored them too, wouldn't you?

So anyone who disagrees with you deserves to be killed? Is that really what you are saying?

No. I'm saying that anyone who says or implies that the Enigma code machines 'just evolved' deserves a bomb up the exhaust.

The Enigma machine was vastly inferior to the DNA/RNA coded, and here is Collins and presumably others, I'm certain, who think precisely that. And yet, can produce this nonsense we're talking about here!

Can you remind us which Nobel prize winners were involved in 'unravelling' Enigma?

Turin didn't receive one - presumably because it was wartime - but he should have, given the millions of lives he probably saved.

But you note, it took a fearful amount of intelligence (in the sense of intellectual ability) to decipher the code. I wonder who actually constructed it, and just how much intelligence he/they displayed.

Of course, it just 'evolved', didn't it, LK?

ETA Or are you referring to DNA? In which case, why do you suppose that something which is difficult to understand must inevitably be inexplicable naturalistically?

All of human experience tells me that. Perhaps you missed out on that somehow?

Cohen appears to misunderstand the statistical probabilities involved in biological and chemical processes. I think this has been mentioned before.

Does he? Why do you say that? Because he disagrees with your conclusions?

In that case, how about Dawkins' statement?

It is true, Dawkins responds, that the probability of life having arisen by chance is as vanishingly small as the likelihood of a Jumbo Jet having being constructed by a hurricane sweeping through a scrap yard.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/3655792/I-dont-believe-in-Richard-Dawkins.html
Or Denton:

Michael Denton, Ph.D., M.D.: "Considering the way the prebiotic soup is referred to in so many discussions of the origin of life as an already established reality, it comes as something of a shock to realize that there is absolutely no positive evidence for its existence."
[Michael Denton, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis (Bethesda, Maryland: Adler and Adler Publishers, 1986) p. 261 (emphasis added).]

Hoyle:

"The notion that not only the biopolymers, but the operating programme of a living cell could be arrived at by chance in a primordial soup here on the Earth is evidently nonsense of a high order Quite a few of my astronomical friends are considerable mathematicians, and once they become interested enough to calculate for themselves, instead of relying on hearsay argument, they can quickly see this point." [Fred Hoyle, "The Big Bang in Astronomy," New Scientist, Vol. 92, No. 1280 (November 19, 1981), p. 527.]

Hoyle again:

"Once we see, however, that the probability of life originating at random is so utterly minuscule as to make it absurd, it becomes sensible to think that the favourable properties of physics on which life depends are in every respect deliberate.It is therefore almost inevitable that our own measure of intelligence must reflect higher intelligences even to the limit of God. such a theory is so obvious that one wonders why it is not widely accepted as being self-evident. The reasons are psychological rather than scientific."
[Fred Hoyle and N. Chandra Wickramasinghe, Evolution from Space (London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1981), pp. 141, 144, 130 (emphasis added).]

Crick:

"To produce this miracle of molecular construction all the cell need do is to string together the amino acids (which make up the polypeptide chain) in the correct order.

This is a complicated biochemical process, a molecular assembly line, using instructions in the form of a nucleic acid tape (the so-called messenger RNA). Here we need only ask, how many possible proteins are there? If a particular amino acid sequence was selected by chance, how rare of an event would that be?

This is an easy exercise in combinatorials. Suppose the chain is about two hundred amino acids long; this is, if anything, rather less than the average length of proteins of all types. Since we have just twenty possibilities at each place, the number of possibilities is twenty multiplied by itself some two hundred times. This is conveniently written 20200, that is a one followed by 260 zeros!

This number is quite beyond our everyday comprehension. For comparison, consider the number of fundamental particles (atoms, speaking loosely) in the entire visible universe, not just in our own galaxy with its 1011 stars, but in all the billions of galaxies, out to the limits of observable space. This number, which is estimated to be 1080, is quite paltry by comparison to 10260.

Moreover, we have only considered a polypeptide chain of a rather modest length. Had we considered longer ones as well, the figure would have been even more immense.

"Why did he recant his position? Do you think the reasons for this might be significant?

I am not certain that he did. But if he did, then God may have opened his eyes to good sense, instead of the folly he wrote in the quote above.

On the basis of the above, I think Collins needs to revise his views.

And so do you.

 

[lordkalvan]

Intelligence is always superior to degrees. I may remind you, as I've done before, that Einstein was a patents clerk, and Edison had about 6 months of schooling. You would have ignored them too, wouldn't you?

I take this to mean that you don't have any qualifications in the same field as Collins. The remainder of this paragraph just seems to be an exercise in re-asserting your belief that you are at least as clever as Edison and at least as smart as Einstein. As I have seen no evidence to support such an idea, I am afraid I will have to regard this as no more than an example of hubris.

No. I'm saying that anyone who says or implies that the Enigma code machines 'just evolved' deserves a bomb up the exhaust.

So you do think that anyone who disagrees with you should be killed. Two points, however: (1) I know no one 'who says or implies that the Enigma code machine' just evolved''. Do you? (2) That the Enigma code machines did not evolve is not evidence that DNA did not evolve. You are in effect offering as an argument the fallacy of the false dilemma.

The Enigma machine was vastly inferior to the DNA/RNA coded, and here is Collins and presumably others, I'm certain, who think precisely that. And yet, can produce this nonsense we're talking about here!

You have yet to establish that it is 'nonsense'. Asserting that it is so does not make it so. And no, no one has to prove it isn't nonsense in order for your claim that it is to stand unrefuted.

Turin didn't receive one - presumably because it was wartime - but he should have, given the millions of lives he probably saved.

Not because it was wartime, I think, but rather because the work on Enigma and the other German codes was shrouded in utmost secrecy. But you're right that Turing and others did not receive the recognition they deserved until far too late.

But you note, it took a fearful amount of intelligence (in the sense of intellectual ability) to decipher the code. I wonder who actually constructed it, and just how much intelligence he/they displayed.

There is no evidence that DNA was constructed artificially. However, even if it was, this does not inevitably mean that evolutionary theory is false, as I and others have pointed out before.

Of course, it just 'evolved', didn't it, LK?

Oooh, scare quotes again. As far as I am aware, there is no evidence to the contrary. If there is, perhaps you can present it?

All of human experience tells me that. Perhaps you missed out on that somehow?

So is it your case that anything you are unable to understand and for which you cannot believe a naturalistic explanation is possible can only have a supernatural explanation? This appears to be simply yet another fallacy, i.e. an argument from ignorance.

Does he? Why do you say that? Because he disagrees with your conclusions?

Eh, no, because he seems to regard biological and chemical processes as entirely random and unguided.

In that case, how about Dawkins' statement?

If you're going to offer references to support your argument, at least get them right. It was Hoyle who first suggested this analogy. As Dawkins points out, this is an argument that could only be made by someone who doesn't understand the first thing about natural selection (Dawkins, The God Delusion, p.113)

Or Denton:

Michael Denton, Ph.D., M.D.: "Considering the way the prebiotic soup is referred to in so many discussions of the origin of life as an already established reality, it comes as something of a shock to realize that there is absolutely no positive evidence for its existence."
[Michael Denton, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis (Bethesda, Maryland: Adler and Adler Publishers, 1986) p. 261 (emphasis added).]

Well, as naturally occurring organic materials are synthesized by stars, and as we have evidence of fossil microbe-like objects dating to 3.5 billion years ago,I would suggest that the question as to whether they arose in a 'prebiotic soup' or not is largely irrelevant to determining whether they arose naturalistically or not.

Hoyle:

"The notion that not only the biopolymers, but the operating programme of a living cell could be arrived at by chance in a primordial soup here on the Earth is evidently nonsense of a high order Quite a few of my astronomical friends are considerable mathematicians, and once they become interested enough to calculate for themselves, instead of relying on hearsay argument, they can quickly see this point." [Fred Hoyle, "The Big Bang in Astronomy," New Scientist, Vol. 92, No. 1280 (November 19, 1981), p. 527.]

Hoyle again:

"Once we see, however, that the probability of life originating at random is so utterly minuscule as to make it absurd, it becomes sensible to think that the favourable properties of physics on which life depends are in every respect deliberate.It is therefore almost inevitable that our own measure of intelligence must reflect higher intelligences even to the limit of God. such a theory is so obvious that one wonders why it is not widely accepted as being self-evident. The reasons are psychological rather than scientific."
[Fred Hoyle and N. Chandra Wickramasinghe, Evolution from Space (London: J.M. Dent & Sons, 1981), pp. 141, 144, 130 (emphasis added).]

Hoyle seems to be labouring under the same misapprehensions as Cohen as to the statistical probabilities involved in considering likely eventualities in complex chemical systems.

More later.

 

[lordkalvan]

...Crick:

"To produce this miracle of molecular construction all the cell need do is to string together the amino acids (which make up the polypeptide chain) in the correct order.

This is a complicated biochemical process, a molecular assembly line, using instructions in the form of a nucleic acid tape (the so-called messenger RNA). Here we need only ask, how many possible proteins are there? If a particular amino acid sequence was selected by chance, how rare of an event would that be?

This is an easy exercise in combinatorials. Suppose the chain is about two hundred amino acids long; this is, if anything, rather less than the average length of proteins of all types. Since we have just twenty possibilities at each place, the number of possibilities is twenty multiplied by itself some two hundred times. This is conveniently written 20200, that is a one followed by 260 zeros!

This number is quite beyond our everyday comprehension. For comparison, consider the number of fundamental particles (atoms, speaking loosely) in the entire visible universe, not just in our own galaxy with its 1011 stars, but in all the billions of galaxies, out to the limits of observable space. This number, which is estimated to be 1080, is quite paltry by comparison to 10260.

Moreover, we have only considered a polypeptide chain of a rather modest length. Had we considered longer ones as well, the figure would have been even more immense.

And here's another reference from Crick, which rather gainsays your own offering:

'But this should not be taken to imply that there are good reasons to believe that it could not have started on the earth by a perfectly reasonable sequence of fairly ordinary chemical reactions. The plain fact is that the time available was too long, the many microenvironments on the earth's surface too diverse, the various chemical possibilities too numerous and our own knowledge and imagination too feeble to allow us to be able to unravel exactly how it might or might not have happened such a long time ago, especially as we have no experimental evidence from that era to check our ideas against.' (Francis Crick, 'Life Itself, Its Origin and Nature', p.88).

I am not certain that he did. But if he did, then God may have opened his eyes to good sense, instead of the folly he wrote in the quote above.

You have yet to establish that it is 'folly' or that 'good sense' suggests that life can only have arisen supernaturalistically.

On the basis of the above, I think Collins needs to revise his views.

Really? Why? All of your references long predate Collins's work on the human genome, after all.

And so do you.

I'm afraid you're going to have to do more than offer personal incredulity and quotemines from creationist sources to persuade me to your point of view.

 

[Barbarian]

I'm sure Francis Collins would be happy to be schooled in DNA by Async. After all, what does Collins know about the subject?

The Enigma machine was vastly inferior to the DNA/RNA coded, and here is Collins and presumably others, I'm certain, who think precisely that. And yet, can produce this nonsense we're talking about here!

How preposterous to believe God would be able to create a universe in which things more complex than humans can design could happen by natural processes! Who does God think He is? (WFTH-I)

 

[Free]

No. I'm saying that anyone who says or implies that the Enigma code machines 'just evolved' deserves a bomb up the exhaust.

Seriously? Please, do not use such statements again.

 

[MarbleShooter]

I really don't see the impossibility from DNA to evolve. DNA is made up of simple proteins that are copied when cells divide and when sex cells are created. Duplication errors happen and DNA changes slightly. To say the human DNA or any current organism's DNA just popped out of nowhere is stupid. To infer that DNA has changed dramatically since its formation isn't stupid and an easily supported theory since we can observe DNA changing now. But heck, what do these experts who dedicated their entire lives work to know? Its not like they have a degree and do experiments and research.

 

[jasoncran]

I really don't see the impossibility from DNA to evolve. DNA is made up of simple proteins that are copied when cells divide and when sex cells are created. Duplication errors happen and DNA changes slightly. To say the human DNA or any current organism's DNA just popped out of nowhere is stupid. To infer that DNA has changed dramatically since its formation isn't stupid and an easily supported theory since we can observe DNA changing now. But heck, what do these experts who dedicated their entire lives work to know? Its not like they have a degree and do experiments and research.

so we just blindly follow experts when they break rules of logic?

i prefer free thinking

let me postulate this. darwin had no formal science degree if i recall. today he wouldnt be bothered with. yet..

hmm if the story is well liked it guess given consideration.

proove via testable observation that dna on its own can and did evolve chemically with no lab that says we have this place that the earth was like and we call know reasonably what it was like(aka abiogenesis) which is dead in the water.

so far no one can.

 

[MarbleShooter]

so we just blindly follow experts

An expert explaining their findings and submitting their work to peer review. Which has been done is not blindly following. Check mate.

when they break rules of logic?

No rules of logic where broken. Also, can you be specific which logical rules were broken?

i prefer free thinking

Lol, do you support others doing the same?

let me postulate this. darwin had no formal science degree if i recall. today he wouldnt be bothered with. yet..

Actually the degrees in evolutionary biology didn't exist in his time. So saying he didn't have a degree is irrelevant.

hmm if the story is well liked it guess given consideration.

Darwin didn't tell a story. He wrote a very dray book that explained his findings. He set up his theory and it was tested over and over again. What didn't work was changed. What worked stayed. Next.

proove

Nope, don't have to. Just have to use the information thats available and test the conclusion. Collins cracked the Gnome, and with it we discovered how our genetics vary and how they have changed.

via testable observation that dna on its own can and did evolve

Okay. Its been done by us breeding animals and plants for specific traits. That's evolution. Done.

chemically with no lab that says we have this place that the earth was like and we call know reasonably what it was like

So you want me to test something, but not test it? You don't know what you want.

(aka abiogenesis) which is dead in the water.

Abiogenesis isn't dead in the water. Just saying it is dosen't mean it is. Nice try.

so far no one can.

No one built iphones during the victorian era, so I guess its impossible to build Iphones. Makes about the same amount of sense as your last sentence.

 

[jasoncran]

oh you mean this effective peer review that
missed that and when the assumption of 70 million bones.

http://www.icr.org/article/peer-review-fails-soft-tissue-study/

and here where peer review is hurting

right?


and critically think much?

answer me logically how natural selection gave us morals?

you cant and you know it,

i will eliminate god did it if you can say that random mutations that some survive gave us morals when we cant test how we got our societies isnt science but conjecture

inference isnt science.

if its such a fact and settled then why the contreversy? we dont argue

gravity
electricity

and clearly demonstrationable

these laws of logic

argumentum ad nondemstretum
argumentum ad futuris

saying it will in the future isnt valid and macro evolution as you all put it is just that

laws of shannon info

no darwin pressumed in that he didnt have all the info. its not settled.

i dont fully believe what is in a book as i was taugh not to and theres also the old debunked that you sure hate for me to bring up.


im sure you and i dont know the whole story on nixon and jfk and et all and is science and man so pure and angellic that peer review that if one has a bunch like thinking men who dont look outside the paradigm they wont see it.

forgive me for my cyniscm, but when i have had a former co worker who was into marine biology and didnt trust labs to keep things clean . it made wonder about science and how off it can be.

and yet that comes out. i thought it was because of her boss who was a drunk. and she didnt also trust statistics in that one can manipulate the data. her opinion but it gave me reason to wonder how its caught. but i waited.

yup keep arguing for something so obvious.

why waste time here and space on something that really wont affect science?

do we need darwinism for cures? how does origins have to deal with day to day? which we can observe. we can all see micro and test that .

 

[MarbleShooter]

oh you mean this effective peer review that
missed that and when the assumption of 70 million bones.

I don't play around with fished up stories about rare incidents. All I have to do is look at Newtonian Mechanics, Relativity, entropy, Natural selection, etc. and know that peer review works. I don't throw the baby out with the bath water because of mistakes.

and critically think much?

Are you actually going to follow that up with some kind of test? Or just infer that its uncritical to disagree with ya?

answer me logically how natural selection gave us morals?

Are you talking about how through natural selection our species developed a brain that has a better ability to feel empathy and reason? That wouldn't be to hard to show. I think your question has more to do with psychology then evolutionary biology.

you cant and you know it,

Arogant are you not? May I ask how much schooling you have had in biology?

i will eliminate god did it if you can say that random mutations that some survive gave us morals when we cant test how we got our societies isnt science but conjecture

I think you don't understand how exactly natural selection works and how tests are done on it.

if its such a fact and settled then why the contreversy?

Because its a very complex field of biology that takes a lot of time to understand. Its something a layman would have to spend quite a few hours and possibly years to cover all the basics. Especially considering genetics, Evolutionary Biology, and Numerological Psychology are separate fields.

we dont argue

gravity
electricity

Probably because neither of those interfer with the story of Genesis.

and clearly demonstrationable

Natural selection is easy to demonstrate. The offspring of organisms that don't fare well die. The offspring that fare well live. Done.

these laws of logic

argumentum ad nondemstretum
argumentum ad futuris

Yeah, I understand how those work. I just don't think you understand what you are arguing.

saying it will in the future isnt valid

No one here has said anything about he future.

macro evolution as you all put it is just that

Actually we don't use your made up terms. Macro evolution means nothing to me. Every time I've seen the word used, the definition is different. So I'll just continue on.

laws of shannon info

?

no darwin pressumed in that he didnt have all the info. its not settled.

Yep, Darwin admits this in the origin of species. There is also this entire field of biology that studies how organisms adapt and change. Heck a lot Darwin's idea in Origins have been scrapped and replaced.

i dont fully believe what is in a book as i was taugh not to and theres also the old debunked that you sure hate for me to bring up.

So far you haven't made a lick of sense and have done nothing but assume everything. But lets go ahead. Lob your anti evolution nonsense at me. Lets see how much actually has to do with evolutionary biology and is not just a bunch of random jabs at several theories.

yup keep arguing for something so obvious.

Blah blah blah. Oh I cut out the rest of that nonsense that had nothing to do with anything. I'm going to be honest and let you know that I'm going to cut out all the off topic nonsense. ;) Or I'll just respond in jest.

darwinism

Made up term, not wasting time on that nonsense. Moving on.

how does origins have to deal with day to day?

That is called ecology.

we can all see micro and test that .

Another made up term. I dare say that that was not the challenge I thought it was going to be. Carry on.

 

[lordkalvan]

...answer me logically how natural selection gave us morals?

you cant and you know it

I just thought I'd respond to a couple of points here. there is a great deal of research amongst primates (monkeys and apes particularly) which studies how altruistic behaviour exists amongst social groups of these animals and how this altruistic behaviour relates to our own developed moral sense. There is also a great deal of research into how moral behaviour may have developed amongst early humans. The Wiki article is a good basic starting point at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_morality

You may also find this site interesting:

http://www.jessicapierce.net/wild_justice.htm

i will eliminate god did it if you can say that random mutations that some survive gave us morals when we cant test how we got our societies isnt science but conjecture...

The cause of the mutations is random, but the effects aren't: they are filtered through the algorithm of natural selection - modify, if successful repeat, otherwise discard.

 

[jasoncran]

I just thought I'd respond to a couple of points here. there is a great deal of research amongst primates (monkeys and apes particularly) which studies how altruistic behaviour exists amongst social groups of these animals and how this altruistic behaviour relates to our own developed moral sense. There is also a great deal of research into how moral behaviour may have developed amongst early humans. The Wiki article is a good basic starting point at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_morality

You may also find this site interesting:

http://www.jessicapierce.net/wild_justice.htm

The cause of the mutations is random, but the effects aren't: they are filtered through the algorithm of natural selection - modify, if successful repeat, otherwise discard.

thats a problem then how does the said organ get better with so many mutations

altruism doesnt mean we get it from them. just because they did it doesnt and cant prove or support the toe.


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Refractive Errors


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Age-Related Macular Degeneration



Macular degeneration, often called age-related macular degeneration (AMD), is an eye disorder associated with aging and results in damaging sharp and central vision. Central vision is needed for seeing objects clearly and for common daily tasks such as reading and driving. AMD affects the macula, the central part the retina that allows the eye to see fine details. There are two forms of AMD, wet and dry.


Wet AMD: when abnormal blood vessel behind the retina start to grow under the macula, ultimately leading to blood and fluid leakage. Bleeding, leaking, and scarring from these blood vessels cause damage and lead to rapid central vision loss. An early symptom of wet AMD is that straight lines appear wavy.


Dry AMD: When the macula thins overtime as part of aging process, gradually blurring central vision. The dry form is more common and accounts for 70-90% of cases of AMD and it progresses more slowly than the wet form. Over time, as less of the macula functions, central vision is gradually lost in the affected eye. Dry AMD generally affects both eyes. One of the most common early signs of dry AMD is drusen.


Drusen: Drusen are tiny yellow or white deposits under the retina. They often are found in people over age 60. The presence of small drusen is normal and does not cause vision loss. However, the presence of large and more numerous drusen raises the risk of developing advanced dry AMD or wet AMD.


It is estimated that 1.8 million Americans 40 years and older are affected by AMD and an additional 7.3 million with large drusen are at substantial risk of developing AMD. The number of people with AMD is estimated to reach 2.95 million in 2020. AMD is the leading cause of permanent impairment of reading and fine or close-up vision among people aged 65 years and older.


Cataract




Cataract is a clouding of the eye’s lens and is the leading cause of blindness worldwide, and the leading cause of vision loss in the United States. Cataracts can occur at any age due to a variety of causes, and can be present at birth. Although treatment for the removal of cataract is widely available, access barriers such as insurance coverage, treatment costs, patient choice, or lack of awareness prevent many people from receiving the proper treatment.


An estimated 20.5 million (17.2%) Americans 40 years and older have cataract in one or both eyes, and 6.1 million (5.1%) have had their lens removed operatively. The total number of people who have cataracts is estimated to increase to 30.1 million by 2020.


Diabetic Retinopathy




Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is a common complication of diabetes. It is the leading cause of blindness in American adults. It is characterized by progressive damage to the blood vessels of the retina, the light-sensitive tissue at the back of the eye that is necessary for good vision. DR progresses through 4 stages, mild nonproliferative retinopathy (microaneurysms), moderate nonproliferative retinopathy (blockage in some retinal vessels), severe nonproliferative retinopathy (more vessels are blocked leading to deprived retina from blood supply leading to growing new blood vessels), and proliferative retinopathy (most advanced stage). Diabetic retinopathy usually affects both eyes.


The risks of DR are reduced through disease management that includes good control of blood sugar, blood pressure, and lipid abnormalities. Early diagnosis of DR and timely treatment reduce the risk of vision loss; however, as many as 50% of patients are not getting their eyes examined or are diagnosed too late for treatment to be effective.
It is the leading cause of blindness among working-aged adults in the United States ages 20–74. An estimated 4.1 million and 899,000 Americans are affected by retinopathy and vision-threatening retinopathy, respectively.

Glaucoma




Glaucoma is a group of diseases that can damage the eye's optic nerve and result in vision loss and blindness. Glaucoma occurs when the normal fluid pressure inside the eyes slowly rises. However, recent findings now show that glaucoma can occur with normal eye pressure. With early treatment, you can often protect your eyes against serious vision loss.


There are two major categories “open angle†and “closed angle†glaucoma. Open angle, is a chronic condition that progress slowly over long period of time without the person noticing vision loss until the disease is very advanced, that is why it is called “sneak thief of sight". Angle closure can appear suddenly and is painful. Visual loss can progress quickly; however, the pain and discomfort lead patients to seek medical attention before permanent damage occurs.


Amblyopia




Amblyopia, also referred to as “lazy eye,†is the most common cause of vision impairment in children. Amblyopia is the medical term used when the vision in one of the eyes is reduced because the eye and the brain are not working together properly. The eye itself looks normal, but it is not being used normally because the brain is favoring the other eye. Conditions leading to amblyopia include; strabismus, an imbalance in the positioning of the two eyes; more nearsighted, farsighted, or astigmatic in one eye than the other eye, and rarely other eye conditions such as cataract.


Unless it is successfully treated in early childhood, amblyopia usually persists into adulthood, and is the most common cause of permanent one-eye vision impairment among children and young and middle-aged adults. An estimated 2%–3% of the population suffers from amblyopia.


Strabismus


Strabismus involves an imbalance in the positioning of the two eyes. Strabismus can cause the eyes to cross in (esotropia) or turn out (exotropia). Strabismus is caused by a lack of coordination between the eyes. As a result, the eyes look in different directions and do not focus simultaneously on a single point. In most cases of strabismus in children, the cause is unknown. In more than half of these cases, the problem is present at or shortly after birth (congenital strabismus). When the two eyes fail to focus on the same image, there is reduced or absent depth perception and the brain may learn to ignore the input from one eye, causing permanent vision loss in that eye (one type of amblyopia).

i got this from a forum here.

http://www.evolutionfairytale.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=4762&hl=&fromsearch=1

so given all that its hard to say the ns could do such a thing when it eliminates un fit genese not improves dna
meaning a massive amount of dna had to exist prior and somehow gradually be eliminated.

 

[Barbarian]

thats a problem then how does the said organ get better with so many mutations

Natural selection.

i will use the eye and its myriad of defects(human eye)

Pretty shoddy for a "designed" object, um? But it wasn't design. It was created, and it was created by evolutionary processes. As a result, that trial-and-error processes produces something with lots of defects, but it works pretty well anyway.

 

[lordkalvan]

thats a problem then how does the said organ get better with so many mutations

On what grounds do you suppose that 'so many mutations' are required to make an 'organ get better'? It appears that only one mutation was required for Old World primates to develop a trichromatic vision, for example. If a mutation offers a significant advantage to those organisms that possess it, it is more likely to become fixed in a population.

altruism doesnt mean we get it from them. just because they did it doesnt and cant prove or support the toe.

The point is that you implied there was no logical argument that could be used to show how natural selection led to moral behaviour. These studies into altruistic behaviour amongst social groups of primates, other animals and early hominids show that this is not the case. I am not offering these examples as proof or support for the theory of evolution, but simply to show you that they suggest pathways that would allow the behaviour to develop evolutionarily.

i will use the eye and its myriad of defects(human eye)....

I do not follow the argument you are trying to develop here. No one argues that natural selection is a mechanism that leads to the elimination of all weaknesses and diseases. Many of the vision problems you list are a consequence of age and they are largely irrelevant in terms of the success of a population as opposed to that of individuals within the population. Also, altruistic behaviour helps preserve heritable conditions because the group cares for and protects the less fortunate individual.