Yet more 'proof' of evolution

[Temp3st]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4708459.stm

I wonder what wonderful explanations our I.D. friends will come up with?

[Mojo]

Well, this doesn't really demonstrate anything that ring species don't. And goodness knows, they've been ignoring those for long enough.

[Hawk one]

Summarised version of what the I.D.-ers will say: God still did it.

[WhiteLion]

Summarised version of what the I.D.-ers will say: God still did it.

Sure enough, that's their creed, which sceptics here as well do consider to be included within the theory of evolution, since some have theologicaly based beliefs as well.

Online as well as irl (really don't like these cyberterms very much but what the hey) the majority of christians are usually either uninterested in the science of evolution as well as the claimed science of I.D... or they are backing up the theory of evolution.

The most amusing claim of proof that I.D is the "way to go" that I have ever encountered was the fabricative photos of a helicopted on ancient stone walls as well as dinosaurs on old stone walls.

Turned out this cat was about nineteen years old so it eased the shock or what have you.

When hearing this line of reasoning and push of fabricated evidence from someone olders... is the toll of scary hour.

In other words it does summerise the emotional and intellectual content of the wn's at Stormfront as well.

[Peter Cartoon]

Found this on the net ... a handy good response.

"Most of us vaguely understand how a virus works. The little bastards sneak inside our cells by a variety of ingenious methods. Once inside, they head for the nucleus where all our nuclear DNA is located. The virus can't reproduce by itself, it has to hijack the replicative machinery inside our own cells. Our DNA receives new instructions from Mr. Virus; churning out more viruses. Then the cell dies, the cell wall dissolves, and away the baby viruses go to infect another cell.

So it's nice to be able to say something nice about viruses in the context of evolution. Animals have defenses against viruses that shut them down in their tracks (usually anyway). Sometimes, the little bastards will insert in the genome and successfully replicate a few hundred times, the copies reinserting back into the genome, and then the antibody Calvary comes riding to the rescue and shuts those little suckers down before they kill every cell in our body. Once they're neutralized, those little scraps of viral remnants remain in the genome, like a signpost saying "I, Mr. Virus, was here". These preserved viral scraps are called Endogenous Retro-viruses or ERVs for short.

What's really interesting is occasionally, by chance, the cell thus partially infected with a virus will be a reproductive cell, which also happens to go on to produce progeny. And when that happens, every descendant of that individual will have that same dead viral base pair sequence, like a distinctive genetic 'scar', encoded in the same exact places in a genome that that one reproductive cell had. If you and I had the exact same, unique, viral fragments in the same hundreds of places in our genome, that would be proof-admissible in court-that you and I share a unique common ancestor.

Well, it so happens humans and chimpanzees, have seven, count'em, seven, of the exact same viral base pairs sequences, each roughly one-thousand or so pairs long, and each in several hundred respective locations in their respective genomes. We know how that can happen; chimps and humans shared a common ancestor. We can also estimate how long those viral fragments have been there because there are slight, random changes to the sequence over time. The molecular clock on the shared ERVs works out to about 5-8 million years. Which just happens, oddly enough, to be exactly what the fossil evidence would suggest for a split between the ancestors of chimps, and the ancestors of humans. What a flippin coincidence, huh?

There's more. In addition to ERVs, we also share broader genetic markers that have no function as far as we can tell called LINEs and SINEs. We share them with chimps, we share them with mice. But when a human-chimp ERV just happens to lie in the same region as a LINE or SINE we share with a mouse, why the mouse elements are overwritten by the human-chimp ERV! And that's exactly what you'd expect, if the ancestors of primates diverged from the ancestors of rodents before the chimps and humans split. And when you calculate those molecular clocks, why it works out to about 70-80 million years, which again just happens to line up with the fossil evidence for the primate-rodent split. Wow! Another coincidence!

We can see how ERVs insert into genomes, we can see how those viral sequences get passed on to cells during mitosis. It's not controversial, we see it happening. We can make it happen on command in a lab. And the argument that it's 'common design' is going to be a particularly hard sale, given that these particular sequences aren't even native to the human and chimp genome, or any plant or animal, on earth. They're only used by viruses.

'Show me the proof' huh? Well, there it is. ERVs aren't just evidence folks, they're more than a smoking gun; ERVs are a high quality video surveillance tape of common descent pulling the trigger. The creationist response? Not much. Usually some vague assertion about 'common design', or that some ERV or other has been found to do something other than just lay there uselessly in the genome. Let's be clear about this; the critical fact here isn't that ERV's have no function, although as best we can tell the vast majority don't have any function at all. The critical fact is how they got to be in the same place on both the chimp and human genome in hundreds of places.

Since the point of insertion is controlled by chance and local chemistry, the odds of seven distinct ERVs each inserting in the same exact respective places in both genomes, each genome being several billion base pairs long, and each of the seven inserting hundreds of times, is significantly greater than the chance of winning the lottery 25 consecutive times in a row ...
Creationists really don't have an answer for it, because the only plausible answer is common ancestry of humans and chimpanzees.

You could spend your entire scientific career studying human-chimp ERVs. And those ERVs are just one small piece of the genetic evidence for common descent between only two species, out of millions. And the genetic evidence in turn makes up only one small portion of the over all evidence for common descent.
All of those lines of evidence converge on the same solution; we humans share ancestors with other creatures on earth, some more recently than others. This common ancestry interlocks consistently across all the lines of evidence; genetic, fossil, and comparative homology. And that kind of convergence is itself pretty damn powerful evidence."

[jmercer]

Great post - and welcome, Peter! :)

[Ashles]

I'm not quite sure about the way that BBC article is written.
Once again the impression is given that this might be a useful thing to do, therefore that's why the creatures evolve it, almost as if it is a species decision.

These wing colours apparently evolved as a sort of "team strip", allowing butterflies to easily identify the species of a potential mate.

This process, called "reinforcement", prevents closely related species from interbreeding thus driving them further apart genetically and promoting speciation.
Call me sceptical, but this seems quite simplistic, and getting the driving factors the wrong way round.

It seems to imply that if a butterfly is born looking different then it will be more likely to reproduce. That way different looking 'teams' will be created.
But then, when different looking butterfly 'teams' are created, their mating suddenly changes to remaining within similar looking groups or 'teams'.

I just don't quite get their explanation in terms of Natural Selection.

Is it just me?

[jmercer]

Truthfully, I don't know... however, in terms of ensuring propagation of the species, "like propagates with like" is what I thought usually happens. This prevents "mules" and unproductive matings, etc.

Which might be critical in terms of butterflies - after all, they have a very short timespan in which to mate successfully and to lay their eggs.

If that's the case, then having an easily identifiable marking to distinguish "like" would help increase the rate of propagation. I could be wrong, though.

[Ashles]

Originally posted by jmercer
If that's the case, then having an easily identifiable marking to distinguish "like" would help increase the rate of propagation.
I agree with that. But surely there can only be different groups to be like if a difference emerges in the first place.
And if the difference occurs why is that difference not selected against initially?

If it is part of butterfly behaviour to mate with those that look like themselves, how do the butterflies who are born different reproduce in order to produce the different looking offspring...

I just don't quite understand it.

[LostAngeles]

Wow. That bit about ERVs was incredibly informative (and snarky). Where'd you find it?

[Aussie Thinker]

Peter,

That spiel on ERV's was spectacular. What an elegant and VERY simple explanation of a "smoking gun" proof of evolution theory.

I am cut and pasting it straight into my EVO arsenal !

[Peter Cartoon]

a very long read -- send this link to you ID buddies.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/molgen/


Here's a great book and the intro to the web site is fantastic!
http://www.waronscience.com/home.php

[Nucular]

Originally posted by Ashles
Truthfully, I don't know... however, in terms of ensuring propagation of the species, "like propagates with like" is what I thought usually happens."Homeopathic evolution"? ;)

I would have thought that this wouldn't be wholly the case beyond preventing inter-species mating, since mating with those most similar to us doesn't keep the gene pool chlorinated.

But there again, there's a lot of evidence that humans find those with similar appearance to themselves more attractive, so what I'm actually saying is, I dunno.

[Nucular]

Nope, changed my mind - got bogged down and confused myself. Carry on.