[_ Old Earth _] THE CRAB-LOUSE IN THE CAMBRIAN: YOUR GR-R-R-R-EAT GRANDADDY?

[Asyncritus]

​

There’s something wonderful about evolution science.

You can get such wholesale conjectures out of a trifling investment of fact!

For example: did you know that your g-r-r-r-r-r-e----a-t-t-t-t granddaddy, a zillion times removed, was a crab louse in the Cambrian? You didn’t? It’s true, you know.

Which particular crab-louse still hasn’t been determined yet, but, just give ‘em time, give ‘em time…

And how do they know that? Why, by DNA testing, of course! That’s the be-all and the end-all of biological science these days.

We can identify a man as the parent in a paternity suit, by using DNA tests. With a 99.8 or 99.9% accuracy. And that’s fine. We can run with that.

But there are 2 little problems with the infallibility of that technique.

 

[Asyncritus]

1 Did you notice that 99.8 or 99.9% accuracy figure up there? It’s not 100% certain.

Here’s Discover magazine:
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FROM THE APRIL 2006 ISSUE

[/FONT]

Who's Your Daddy?

Don't count on DNA testing to tell you.
By Susan Kruglinski|Sunday, April 02, 2006

When celebrity hairstylist Andre Chreky was hit with a paternity suit by a woman he had not been involved with for years, he was certain he couldn't lose. Paternity tests are DNA tests, he thought, and DNA tests never lie. So he unhesitatingly submitted a swab of cells. To his shock, he was positively identified as the father, with a 99.99 percent certainty.

But last April, after a two-year legal battle that cost Chreky $800,000, the Fairfax, Virginia, circuit court found that human error in the testing was probable and that the DNA results were incorrect.

"It hurt my family; my business," Chreky says. "My life will never be the same."

DNA testing is thought of as definitive. If there is a match between two samples, then identification is certain. Some DNA experts place the probability of an error at one in a billion. But recent cases in which paternity tests were proven to be inaccurate suggest the odds may be much less certain.

In other words, the lab made a mess of things.

 

[Asyncritus]

But that was a case 7 years ago, dealing with events maybe 10 years ago.

The percentage error is very small, in a short period. But what about identifying your gre—ee-e-e-e-a-a-aa-ttt granddaddy in the Cambrian, 542,000,000 years ago?

Do you think there may be some doubt about the accuracy and dependability of all these ‘phylogenetic genealogies’ which are constructed by computer on the basis of DNA testing?

What about human error? And the DNA has got to be corroded or damaged or something like that if it is 542,000,000 years old.

Yet, the evolutionists construct these silly ‘trees’ and present them as if they are 100% certain and accurate results.

The computer does the job: but we’ve all heard of GIGO – Garbage In, Garbage Out!

One wonders, yes-s-ss, one wonders!

 

[Asyncritus]

2 There’s a second problem.

We can say with a 99.67% certainty that X was the father of Y. Not 100%.

But X and Y are from the same species. There are bound to be close similarities.

But your granddaddy one zillion times removed, was most definitely not from your species. He was some kind of arthropod.

Don’t you think that may also mess up the results?

I certainly do, and Professor Austin Hughes, MNAS had some nasty words to say about the procedure in PNAS, the magazine of the National Academy of Sciences:

Thousands of papers are published every year claiming evidence of adaptive evolution on the basis of computational analyses alone, with no evidence whatsoever regarding the phenotypic effects of allegedly adaptive mutations.

Pure guesswork, and computerised evolutionary garbage is what he seems to be saying.

So when we read evolutionary writers, or hear our esteemed colleague barbarian talking about DNA proving that A is related or descended from B, we know what to think now, don’t we?

Yes, we do. GIGO, brother, GIGO!

 

[Asyncritus]

Incidentally, Hughes also had this to say about natural selection, which as we should know by now, is coming under severe fire as an agent for evolution.

Hughes:

A major hindrance to progress has been confusion regarding the role of positive (Darwinian) selection, i.e., natural selection favoring adaptive mutations.

In other words, natural selection is of dubious value in furthering evolutionary progress.

Lynch said much the same:

IDers like to portray evolution as being built entirely on an edifice of darwinian natural selection. This caricature of evolutionary biology is not too surprising. Most molecular, cell and developmental biologists subscribe to the same creed, as do many popular science writers. However, it has long been known that purely selective arguments are inadequate to explain many aspects of biological diversity. Michael Lynch, May 2005

This is nothing new!
http://www.uncommondescent.com/evol...nism-is-a-caricature-of-evolutionary-biology/

One of the central theses of the book is that natural selection is not necessarily the central evolutionary mechanism…..

Massimo agrees with Lynch on that point. I do too, so does Michael Behe, Bill Dembski, and most of the ID movement. Perhaps everyone except Richard Dawkins!

[And barbarian!]
​

BTW: Uncommon Descent in that link above, is well worth a visit by anyone supporting creationism and not evolution.

 

[Sparkey]

Pardon my interjection but there may be another problem with the comparison between myself and my great-grand-daddy a zillion times removed, or even my ancestor 4 generations back when it comes to DNA testing. That being we don't have a DNA sample for Great-great-granpappy Sparrow. How can we begin to conduct a comparison between stuff that no longer exists and stuff that does?

I hope that I'm not just posting in ignorance, that certainly isn't my intent. I did go to the link that was cited and brought back something that I like. An analogy. Not of mere words and letters that I've noticed elsewhere on this forum but instead that of a library. Here's the quote:

To understand the concept of higher levels of organization, I begin with a down-to-earth example of a public library. Simply speaking, the library is composed of collections of books (and other things), books are composed of chapters, chapters are composed of paragraphs, paragraphs are composed of sentences, sentences are composed of words (and punctuation), words are composed of letters of the alphabet, letters of the alphabet are composed of ink on paper.

I gave a description of books basically in terms of what is printed. But even beyond that description, how can we describe the notion of books without the notion of themes and ideas? These are also higher levels of organization, and these levels of organization are especially problematic for materialists.

Does it make sense to try to fully understand a library by studying the alphabet? Of course not. Does it make sense to describe the contents of books, their origin and evolution, in terms of the dynamics of how ink is put on paper? Of course not. Pigliucci is subtly criticizing Lynch for making comparable errors in Lynch’s view of evolution.

Read more at: Darwinism is a Caricature of Evolutionary Biology found under the section title "Uncommon Descent" previously quoted

 

[Pizzaguy]

For example: did you know that your g-r-r-r-r-r-e----a-t-t-t-t granddaddy, a zillion times removed, was a crab louse in the Cambrian?

It gets better, did you know that HIS g-r-r-r-r-re-----a-t-t-t-t granddaddy, a zillion times removed, was a single cell organism on Mars?

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/sci..._medium=email&utm_campaign=20130831-Weekender

Quick, someone get Barbarian in here to defend this guy.

 

[Barbarian]

So the poor guy had a lab tech goof. The obvious answer "do it again." The likelihood of a second goof was pretty low, and of course, he was vindicated.

Likewise, the DNA testing that demonstrates common ancestry would never be accepted by science without repeatability. If a scientist's findings are repeatable, he's in big trouble.

I think Async is making a joke, again.

Here's more evidence:

Incidentally, Hughes also had this to say about natural selection, which as we should know by now, is coming under severe fire as an agent for evolution

Pretty much the way 747s sometimes come under severe fire from Brazilian Indians, who fire arrows at them to drive them away. So far, they are quite satisfied with their 100% success record.


A major hindrance to progress has been confusion regarding the role of positive (Darwinian) selection, i.e., natural selection favoring adaptive mutations.

In other words, natural selection is of dubious value in furthering evolutionary progress.

You should have said "in other meanings"; the two sentences seem completely unrelated.

And "uncommon dissent" is an IDer site, ideologically fixed on how just awful science is generally, evolution particularly.

If you want to know how capitalism works, it's probably not a good idea to ask Fidel Castro to explain it to you.

 

[Barbarian]

It gets better, did you know that HIS g-r-r-r-r-re-----a-t-t-t-t granddaddy, a zillion times removed, was a single cell organism on Mars?

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/scie...0831-Weekender

Well, it got started over 20 years ago, with meteorites from Mars (blasted out of the Martian atmosphere by asteriod hits) showing some little cells in the rock that looked very much like fossilized
bacteria. Then physicists showed that it was certainly possible for bacteria to survive the acceleration, cold, heat, and subsequent impact. Possible.

And then the discovery that certain minerals had a catalytic-like property with certain organic compounds that could possibly produce phospholipids, a critical step in cellular formation. Could possibly.

But before I believe it, I'd like to see more than possibly. This is particularly, since there are less surprising ways of forming cells that are equally possible. Exobiology needs a Darwin, willing to dig up the evidence needed to make it a science. Or maybe that's the last thing it needs. We just don't know.

 

[Asyncritus]

Likewise, the DNA testing that demonstrates common ancestry would never be accepted by science without repeatability. If a scientist's findings are repeatable, he's in big trouble.

Your faith is touching, barbarian - but somewhat misplaced. Sparrow put his finger on it:

That being we don't have a DNA sample for Great-great-granpappy Sparrow. How can we begin to conduct a comparison between stuff that no longer exists and stuff that does?

So they dig up a fossil of some kind (BTW did you know that there are about 200,000,000 fossils in the museums of the world? So Darwin's pathetic bleat that the fossil record doesn't support his fancies because it is defective, is pure eyewash).

Then they extract whatever DNA they can, carry out their hopeful analyses, and come up with something - which, as I've pointed out - may well be damaged, distorted, defective, deficient or any number of other things.

Then, using those results, they construct these marvellous 'phylogenetic trees'!!!

And barbarian believes them! Do you?

 

[Asyncritus]

It gets better, did you know that HIS g-r-r-r-r-re-----a-t-t-t-t granddaddy, a zillion times removed, was a single cell organism on Mars?

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/scie...0831-Weekender

Well, it got started over 20 years ago, with meteorites from Mars (blasted out of the Martian atmosphere by asteriod hits) showing some little cells in the rock that looked very much like fossilized
bacteria. Then physicists showed that it was certainly possible for bacteria to survive the acceleration, cold, heat, and subsequent impact. Possible.

And then the discovery that certain minerals had a catalytic-like property with certain organic compounds that could possibly produce phospholipids, a critical step in cellular formation. Could possibly.

But before I believe it, I'd like to see more than possibly. This is particularly, since there are less surprising ways of forming cells that are equally possible. Exobiology needs a Darwin, willing to dig up the evidence needed to make it a science. Or maybe that's the last thing it needs. We just don't know.

Exobiology needs to stop wasting my good money chasing a fool's dream.

Just imagine how many starving people, how many sick people could be enormously helped with that incredible sum of money they spend sending these rockets etc to Mars and wherever.

And why are they doing this? Because if they can find proof of life on Mars or wherever, then life could have started spontaneously.

They clearly haven't heard of Pasteur.

 

[Asyncritus]

...
I think Async is making a joke, again.

You have heard of satire, I'm sure. Well, maybe...

Here's more evidence:

Incidentally, Hughes also had this to say about natural selection, which as we should know by now, is coming under severe fire as an agent for evolution

Pretty much the way 747s sometimes come under severe fire from Brazilian Indians, who fire arrows at them to drive them away. So far, they are quite satisfied with their 100% success record.

Hughes, Lynch, Kingsolver and Kimura are not people you can dismiss so lightly .

A major hindrance to progress has been confusion regarding the role of positive (Darwinian) selection, i.e., natural selection favoring adaptive mutations.

In other words, natural selection is of dubious value in furthering evolutionary progress.

You should have said "in other meanings"; the two sentences seem completely unrelated.

I really don't know what you mean.

And "uncommon dissent" is an IDer site, ideologically fixed on how just awful science is generally, evolution particularly.

And all those quotations you habitually cut and paste from Google scholar or wherever, they are all from completely uninvolved and dispassionate sources, are they? With no pro-evolution biasses? You really think so?

 

[Asyncritus]

That site really deserves a visit.
http://www.uncommondescent.com/evol...nism-is-a-caricature-of-evolutionary-biology/

Here's some more from it:

although indeed necessary, population genetics is not even close to sufficient for understanding how phenotypes evolve.

Lynch is right to criticize the caricature of evolutionary biology which sees natural selection as the foundation upon which all else is built. Massimo is right to criticize Lynch for not going even farther and realizing the statistical dynamics of genes is insufficient to explain biology. This would be like trying to explain spacecrafts merely in terms of chemistry. This sort of reductionism has no hope of working.

Here's another from the same paper:

But let me offer why all explanations that appeal to mindless evolution will fail. Until biologists acknowledge that design is the best way to characterize biology rather than evolutionary history, they will not really understand biology.

Trying to comprehend engineering wonders in terms of random accidents makes no sense.

Trying to explain computers in terms of chemistry alone makes little sense.

To the extent that function and design are exorcised from biology will be the extent that the engineering wonders of biology will be misunderstood.

Hey barbarian, do you hear the creaking and groaning of the edifice built on natural selection that you inhabit now?

Hadn't you better get out before it collapses round your ears?

William Paley is rising from the dead!!!

 

[Barbarian]

Incidentally, Hughes also had this to say about natural selection, which as we should know by now, is coming under severe fire as an agent for evolution

Barbarian chuckles:
Pretty much the way 747s sometimes come under severe fire from Brazilian Indians, who fire arrows at them to drive them away. So far, they are quite satisfied with their 100% success record.

Hughes, Lynch, Kingsolver and Kimura are not people you can dismiss so lightly .

Lynch? The one who said that human genetic health depended on natural selection? You mean Motoo Kimura who has endorsed natural selection as an important agent in evolution? (I showed you both of those) I would think you'd be a bit reluctant to mention them.

A major hindrance to progress has been confusion regarding the role of positive (Darwinian) selection, i.e., natural selection favoring adaptive mutations.


Async's restatment:

In other words, natural selection is of dubious value in furthering evolutionary progress.

Barbarian muses:
the two sentences seem completely unrelated.

I really don't know what you mean.

One says something entirely different than the other.

And "uncommon dissent" is an IDer site, ideologically fixed on how just awful science is generally, evolution particularly.

And all those quotations you habitually cut and paste from Google scholar or wherever, they are all from completely uninvolved and dispassionate sources, are they?

No axe to grind against science. No anti-religious biases in them. And you can say neither for many IDer statements.

With no pro-evolution biasses?

That's like saying physicists have a "pro-gravity" bias.

 

[Barbarian]

Exobiology needs to stop wasting my good money chasing a fool's dream.

Just imagine how many starving people, how many sick people could be enormously helped with that incredible sum of money they spend sending these rockets etc to Mars and wherever.

That's what they told Queen Isabella. But we don't have to go to Mars to pick up bits of Mars. They show up here regularly.

And why are they doing this? Because if they can find proof of life on Mars or wherever, then life could have started spontaneously.

Sort of like the Earth bringing forth life. We couldn't have that, could we?

They clearly haven't heard of Pasteur.

As you learned, Pasteur said nothing about abiogenesis. He was merely talking about spontaneous generation, the idea that complex creatures could arise from rotting organic matter.

Different issue entirely. And as you know, Darwinian science rules out spontaneous generation, but is open to the possibility of abiogenesis. Darwin merely assumed God did it, but had no data on how He did it.