I was wondering: is there another species that has a genetic deficiency in a vital metobolic factor that is analogous the the primate Vitamin-C deficiency. A deficiency that humans and a majority of other mammals do not share?

I hesitate to mention a dog's inability to metabolize theobromine (the chemical that gives chocolate is oomph), because some might dispute that chocolate is actually vital.

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:What's the point of this? What is the designer trying to achieve? Why is he trying to make it look like evolution happened?

I don't know why the designer is did this or what he's trying to achieve. It's you who is inferring evolution, creationists don't infer evolution and we're both looking at the same data.

Creationists don't "infer" evolution because their doctrinal blinders will not allow them to do so. To someone not so encumbered, the presence of the broken Vit C gene is easily explainable and is, in fact, the type of thing that would be expected to exist under evolutionary theory as it is now understood. That it presents an imponderable and inexplicable mystery to creationists only shows up the intellectual bankruptcy of your ideology.

questioner121 wrote:It's you who has built this hierarchy. This would have no problem with fitting in a common design hierarchy.

Why would a designer even employ a hierarchy? It seems he's gone to a great deal of trouble to make it look like life evolved. It does beg the question of why those nested hierarchies continue all the way down the fossil record as well, as the molecular evidence. Why, for example, did he start with micro-organisms, up through stromatolites and trilobites and all the way through dinosaurs, etc, to the present biosphere? Why, in fact, did he take about 10 billion years from the 'start' of our local cosmic expansion? Was he warming up for the main event? Getting his chops together?

You've already made up your mind that common ancestry is true which is why everything fits.

I certainly haven't. I tentatively accept UCA, because ALL the evidence points to it. Should somebody ever find a piece of robust evidence to the contrary, I''ll shed that acceptance in less than a heartbeat. Got any of that to counter the swathes of evidence in support?

You're already aware that there things which don't fit in with the phylogenetic tree

'The' phylogenetic tree? 'The'?

Look, there are many such trees. Aside from a few details that have yet to be robustly placed, the trees largely agree. Indeed, much of the refinement is about applying these phylogenies to each other.

but you pass that off as normal "noise" expected in statistical analysis. That's just a cop out, you need to address those points before claiming common ancestry as a truth.

Who's claiming it as a truth? Science doesn't do 'truth', it does evidence, and the evidence is overwhelmingly in support of UCA. When that changes, UCA will be dropped like a hot potato. On the other hand, in support of god, all we have is fucking noise, and not a single scrap of verifiable, robust evidence. The double standard rears it's ugly head yet again.

But I suppose this is typical of non believers.

And back to the cheap ad hom. Let us know when you find a way to make this tactic turn into supporting evidence for your idiot magic man.

BTW, did you find that gap yet?

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:It doesn't matter that it's not under our control, that still does not explain why your designer is intentionally creating a nest hierarchical arrangement of broken vitamin-C genes with mutations in them. Why does your designer go out of his way to make it look like evolution happened?

It's you who has built this hierarchy. This would have no problem with fitting in a common design hierarchy.

That's the big problem for you creationists. The very existence of a hierarchy is irrefutable evidence for evolution. Under creationism, there is no reason for a nested hierarchy to exist at all. Whereas the odds that every single species extant or extinct can be placed into such a relationship is astronomically small, unless commond descent is true. Look at this phylogenetic tree:



That tree only involves 3000 species, less than 1% of the number of known species. Yet look at how complex that diagram already is. Calculate the odds of that just happening by chance, then realize that the same relationship exists for 100 times the number of species.

Shrunk wrote: Yet look at how complex that diagram already is.

Far too complex for our creationist friends to understand I fear.
After all, if they did understand, we wouldn't be arguing with the turgid crap they keep spouting.

Shrunk wrote:

Why do I infer design? If you look at each of the animals they have similar traits. Chimps have hands, feet, similar eyes, similar shape, etc. so for me it's not surprising the DNA is similar. The DNA is information which if you manipulate will result in predictable outcomes. The whole world is created in such a way where we can manipulate things and see pretty predictable results. If it weren't for that life would be a headache and it would difficult. Just because different animals have the same traits doesn't mean the design has to be exactly the same, it just has to fulfil it's purpose. For example if you look at all the car manufacturers who make cars. There a variety of models from different manufacturers but each component is not exactly the same design but it does fulful the same purpose to a degree.

So do car designers deliberately put broken carburetors that serve no function in their designs?

I always use the airco as the broken part. Because your car can still run (with a broken carburetor not, I think). And indeed, if a car company sells cars with broken airco's and continues doing so because you can't complain, would you, questioner121, think the car company is intelligent? Would you think the car company is intelligent if later models carry a modification (i.e. a mutation) of the airco (but it still doesn't work). Of course, the analogy fails because cars don't reproduce.

Bert

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:
Why would the designer put a broken vitamin-C gene into individual organisms and then subsequently mutate it, particularly such that a phylogenetic inferences produces a hierarchical arrangement congruent with the one inferred from comparative anatomy?

Why is your designer trying to make it look like evolution happened, and since that is what it looks like, why do you even infer design at all?

How do you know it's broken? Have you tried fixing and seeing if it works?

From the video you can learn that the chunk is missing because single base was missing, causing a frame shift and a premature stop-codon. It is not impossible for an insertion mutation to arise that negates this. But if it happens AFTER (i.e. downstream) the stop codon, then the frame-shift back doesn't help because the stop-codon is still there. If it happens TOO far upstream , then a major part of the gene undergoes a frame-shift before it continues with the correct remainder of the vitamin-C gene. So, it is unlikely that it will have the required activity for the synthesis of vitamin C. It will certainly possible for scientists to fix the gene correctly.

It looks like evolution to you because of the way you are analysing it and thinking about it. You're not being objective and unbiased, you're filling the gaps with biased assumptions.

It is because of the biased assumption that parents get off-spring and the off-spring inherits the genetic material of the parents (with a couple of mutations). And we assume that this is not unique to the last generation. That's ALL the assumptions. Do you question that? And with these assumptions, we find we can explain why both chimps and humans have the same broken vitamin C gene and why the guinea pig has a vitamin C gene broken in a different way. And why ERVs are distributed like they are.

Why do I infer design? If you look at each of the animals they have similar traits. Chimps have hands, feet, similar eyes, similar shape, etc. so for me it's not surprising the DNA is similar

.

Right. And geneticists aren't surprised either. But if it were designed, this wouldn't necessarily have been the case. The genes for the eyes do not need to be on the same chromosome close to the genes for the nose. Chromosomes are not building plans. You can swap the location of the gene for insulin with that for blue eyes without any effect.

If you create something, you don't do everything the same way. Unless you want to be efficient; but then if you really want to be efficient you don't do repetitive work (Why create everything from scratch and then create humans from clay?) Then you let evolution take its course. Or a couple of steps back: Create a big bang, and watch it all unroll automatically, and enjoy all the religions that develop and mutate faster than any species.

When I asked the video, I did indeed quote the vitamin C video, but I should have deleted that because I was actually interested in your response to the ERV video, because Cali had given you an expose about it (and he can be a bit long in his explanations, so I thought you'd appreciate the video).

Bert

ADParker wrote:
And no I would not expect any human to "reacquire" it because that is a lot of quite specific mutations that would have to take place. Either all at once which would be just insanely improbable, or mutation after mutation, every one for no good reason being maintained.

You mean something like the eye? Hands and feet? Head/face shape? Nose shape? Pregnancy changes? etc, etc.

What about two headed snakes? Cats with 6 toes?

I thought evolution was all about tiny gradual changes across successive generations?

questioner121 wrote:I thought evolution was all about tiny gradual changes across successive generations?

And you think otherwise because?

Rumraket wrote:You're welcome to tell me about something that doesn't fit.

The platypus. According to scientists this was a hoax, another typical response when things don't fit in.

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:You're welcome to tell me about something that doesn't fit.

The platypus. According to scientists this was a hoax, another typical response when things don't fit in.

What makes you think it doesn't fit?

http://basketofpuppies-billy.blogspot.c ... onist.html

Sendraks wrote:

questioner121 wrote:I thought evolution was all about tiny gradual changes across successive generations?

And you think otherwise because?

We see some big changes in animals.For example different patterned zebras, dwarfs, giants, hairy people, cross breeds, etc.

questioner121 wrote:

Sendraks wrote:

questioner121 wrote:I thought evolution was all about tiny gradual changes across successive generations?

And you think otherwise because?

We see some big changes in animals.For example different patterned zebras, dwarfs, giants, hairy people, cross breeds, etc.

Yeah, big changes. It's as if we have one "kind" and it changed completely into another "kind".

Shrunk wrote:

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:You're welcome to tell me about something that doesn't fit.

The platypus. According to scientists this was a hoax, another typical response when things don't fit in.

What makes you think it doesn't fit?

http://basketofpuppies-billy.blogspot.c ... onist.html

"egg laying “reptiles” becoming egg laying mammals, which become live birth giving mammals." Where is the evidence of this or is this an assumption?

Why nothing about electroreception? Why don't other land mammals have it?

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:
Why would the designer put a broken vitamin-C gene into individual organisms and then subsequently mutate it, particularly such that a phylogenetic inferences produces a hierarchical arrangement congruent with the one inferred from comparative anatomy?

Why is your designer trying to make it look like evolution happened, and since that is what it looks like, why do you even infer design at all?

How do you know it's broken? Have you tried fixing and seeing if it works?

It has a premature stop codon, several missing exons and the associated regulatory region doesn't work to initiate transcription. That's about as broken as protein coding gene can get.

We know it's broken, we know how broken genes look and what breaks them, it's broken, deal with it.

So, what is the purpose of a broken, neutrally drifting gene again? Why'd your designer design a broken gene and then put it into several different organisms and even mutate it further?

questioner121 wrote:
Why nothing about electroreception? Why don't other land mammals have it?

You should look into that. Do some rigorous research. Then, publish your findings in a reputable journal.

questioner121 wrote:

Shrunk wrote:

questioner121 wrote:

Rumraket wrote:You're welcome to tell me about something that doesn't fit.

The platypus. According to scientists this was a hoax, another typical response when things don't fit in.

What makes you think it doesn't fit?

http://basketofpuppies-billy.blogspot.c ... onist.html

"egg laying “reptiles” becoming egg laying mammals, which become live birth giving mammals." Where is the evidence of this or is this an assumption?

The platypus, for one. It's a transitional form between egg-laying reptiles and viviparous mammals.

Funny how when creationists are actually presented with something that more closely resembles what they claim a "transitional form" should look like, they start saying it is evidence for creation. Are they that stupid, that dishonest, or both? What is your opinion, questioner121?

Why nothing about electroreception? Why don't other land mammals have it?

Because they do:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1189155/

Skate wrote:

questioner121 wrote:
Why nothing about electroreception? Why don't other land mammals have it?

You should look into that. Do some rigorous research. Then, publish your findings in a reputable journal.

Platypus's aren't real anyway. Becaue if anything actually did exist at the bottom of the world it has long since fallen off.

questioner121 wrote:We see some big changes in animals.For example different patterned zebras, dwarfs, giants, hairy people, cross breeds, etc.

And you think these are "big" changes?!?!

questioner121 wrote:Why nothing about electroreception? Why don't other land mammals have it?

Why do you think they need it?

Bribase wrote:
Excuse me. You initiated your prescence on this thread, telling us that we are wrong when we say that creationists don't infer evolutionary mechanisms. You told us that they do, now you're saying that they don't again. Try to show some consistency in the future. Then again, it's far too much to ask from someone that requires an incredibly high bar for evidence of naturalistic explanations of our origins but presumes the existence of a mind that can author universes but can't make people's knees, backs, eyes, toenails and teeth (to name a few) properly without it having all of the hallmarks of evolution.

Sorry I'll clarify. Creationists accept evolution with closely related species. We don't accept that all of life evolved from a common ancestor. Hope that clears it up. This interview here is quite a good position of creationists. It also mentions how pro evolutions deliberately peddle dishonesty to support their views, the example is that of Haeckel's embryos. It's quite satisfying to see Dawkins squirm out of that one without responding to it.

Richard Dawkins Interviews Creationist Wendy Wright
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AS6rQtiEh8

Like I said before, creationists don't see evolution in those things, they see design but I can see where the non believers are coming from.