Mutations - The Basis For Evolution?

Daystar

Mutations are said to be the basis of evolution, but at the same time, it seems to me, the least likely to have substance. Steven Stanley called mutations "the raw materials" for evolution. Geneticist Peo Koller said they "are necessary for evolutionary progress." Robert Jastrow stressed the importance of "a slow accumulation of favorable mutations." Carl Sagan said: "Mutations - sudden changes in heredity - breed true. They provide the raw material of evolution. The environment selects those few mutations that enhance survival, resulting in a series of slow transformations of one lifeform into another, the origin of new species."

The Punctuated Equilibrium

In Science Digest John Gliedman stated: "Evolutionary revisionists believe mutations in key regulatory genes may be just the genetic jackhammers their quantum-leap theory requires." But British zoologist Colin Patterson observed: "Speculation is free. We know nothing about these regulatory master genes."

Mutations are thought to occur in the normal process of cell reproduction, but experiments have shown that they also can be caused by external agents such as radiation and chemicals. And how often do they happen? The reproduction of genetic material in the cell is remarkably consistent. Relatively speaking, considering the number of cells that divide in a living thing, mutations do not occur very often. As the Encyclopedia Americana commented, the reproducing "of the DNA chains composing a gene is remarkably accurate. Misprints or miscopying are infrequent accidents."

It is generally ... well actually overwhelmingly thought that, as Sagan said: "Most of them are harmful or lethal and Koller: "The greatest proportion of mutations are deleterious to the individual who carries the mutated gene. It was found in experiments that, for every successful or useful mutation, there are many thousands which are harmful."

From my perspective this would be an indication that evolution could work itself into something better or something worse from the perspective of the human machine.

Contemplating it further I would have to admit that it could possibly be a filtering which would result in the right thing at the right time. Simply speaking.

I think it is possible that both of those statement could be true. One of the things that has always troubled me about such speculation is it's uncertainty.

With the Bible, for me and my studies, it has always been etched in stone, if you like. A problem in my understanding could be investigated, usually a simple excercise.

What I see from my understanding is that most mutations are damaging to the organism which seems hard to reconcile with the view that mutation is the source of raw materials for evolution. Indeed, mutants illustrated in biology textbooks are a collection of freaks and monstrosities and mutation seems to be a destructive rather than a constructive process.

That is pretty much word for word from the Encyclopedia Americana. Though not scientific, it is where I am leaning at this point. As G. Ledyard Stebbins observed: "After a greater or lesser number of generations the mutants are eliminated."

This could indicate to me that mutations are useless - harmful. Or that they are as was what I learned in 'school,' the basis for evolution. In that they are eliminated.

The problem I have with that is that if they are eliminated why would they have evolved through mutations in the first place? I could think along the lines that they need to be eliminated. Survival of the fittest is even more minimal and outdated than my thinking, but these accidents would not have occurred in the first place under that premise.

Key word, accident.

An accident is marked, noted ... logged. Studied. It is what is going on. What we see. No conclusion needs be formulated before its time and nothing need be added.

In his book The Wellsprings of Life, science writer Isaac Asimov wrote: "Most mutations are for the worse . . . . In the long run, to be sure, mutations make the course of evolution move onward and upward."

From the Creationist perspective, which is from my own Biblical studies, the conclusion could be drawn that 999 times out of 1,000 mutations are harmful.

If, however, I had to play a game 1,000 times before I got it right only once I would have gained something.

Geneticist Dobzhansky once said: "An accident, a random change, in any delicate mechanism can hardly be expected to improve it. Poking a stick into the machinery of one's watch or one's radio set will seldom make it work better."

That seems to me a logical excursion, though not a very well thought out one. As a child I liked to take electronics apart to see how they worked. Often this would result in their premature demise. But when they were broken it would sometimes result in a temporary fix. A piece of bubble gum placed here resulted in a connection ... a toothpick placed there provided the simple means of contact for a worn out ...

If, sometimes, a swift kick to an old TV jarred the wires enough to set it straight, then even a monkey could have come to such a necessary conclusion. Just by beating hell out of it.

The trouble, in the end that I have with mutations is this. If evolution is change and mutations are the basis of it then why is it that mutations can not produce anything new?

The World Book Encyclopedia: "A plant in a dry area might have a mutant gene that causes it to grow larger and stronger roots. The plant would have a better chance of survival than others of its species because its roots could absorb more water."

But ... it couldn't produce anything new ... it changed but that was it's demise.

Here I see the flaw of the basis of evolution. It provides a brief window of speculation and study but beyond that it is a stagnant pool. Evolution could only wind itself out in a series of mishaps. Mishapen accidents leading nowhere.

Drosophila melanogaster

Dobzhansky: "The clear-cut mutants of Drosophila, with which so much of the classical research in genetics was done, are almost without exception inferior to wild-type flies in viability, fertility, longevity."

DNA has a remarkable ability to repair genetic damage to itself. The organism it is coded for thus is preserved. Scientific American relates how "the life of every organism and its continuity from generation to generation" are preserved "by enzymes that continually repair . . . . In particular, significant damage to DNA molecules can induce an emergency response in which increased quantities of the repair enzymes are synthesized."

Again ... mutations are increasingly science fiction ... of speculations which lead to nowhere.

In the Book Darwin Retried the author relates the following about the respected geneticist, the late Richard Goldschmidt: "After observing mutations in fruit flies for many years, Goldschmidt fell into despair. The changes, he lamented, were so hopelessly micro [small] that if a thousand mutations were combined in one specimen, there would still be no new species."

The Peppered Moth

The International Wildlife Encyclopedia: "This is the most striking evolutionary change ever to have been witnessed by man. After observing that Darwin was plagued by his inability to demonstrate the evolution of even one species, Jastrow, in his book Red Giants and White Dwarfs, added: "Had he known it, an example was at hand which would have provided him with the proof he needed. The case was an exceedingly rare one." The peppered moth.

There were two forms of the peppered moth. A light and a dark. The lighter type blended into the lighter colored trunks of the trees which it hung to. It thrived while the darker didn't. Then, when industrial pollution caused the trunks of those trees to darken the role of survival switched, naturally to the darker.

Consequently the darker variety of peppered moth, which is said to be a mutant, survived better because it was difficult for birds to see them against the soot-darkened trees. The darker variety rapidly became the dominant type. The question was, of course, was the peppered moth evolving into something new? No. The English medical journal On Call referred to using this example to try to prove evolution as "notorious . . . . This is an excellent demonstration of the function of camouflage, but, since it begins and ends with moths and no new species is formed, it is quite irrelevant as evidence for evolution."

The same could be said of some germs which have proved resistant to antibiotics. The hardier germs are still the same, not evolving at all into anything else. Even this is not likely evolution through mutations, but simply a case where some germs were immune to begin with. Some germs having been killed off by drugs and the immune ones multiplied and became dominant. Evolution From Space said: "We doubt, however, that anything more is involved in these cases than the selection of already existing genes."

Insects being immune to poisons - is a case of some poisons being effective and others not, that is being effective on some insects and other insects it is ineffective. The ones having been killed could not develop a resistance since they were dead. Those living were immune from the start, a genetic factor which is selective but not demonstrating change or evolution of the insect itself or in effect any evolution other than some insects were dead and others were not. It doesn't change anything on a minimal scale as evolution would suppose.

Molecules to Living Cells said: "The cells from a carrot or from the liver of a mouse consistently retain their respective tissue and organism identities after countless cycles of reproduction." Symbiosis in Cell Evolution said: "All life . . . reproduces with incredible fidelity." Scientific American said: "Living things are enormously diverse in form, but form is remarkably constant within any given line of descent: pigs remain pigs and oak trees remain oak trees generation after generation."

Rose bushes always blossom into roses, never into camellias. And goats give birth to kids, never to lambs, mutations cannot account for overall evolution - why there are fish, reptiles, birds, and mammals.

Interpretation

Darwin's observations of the finch on the Galapagos Islands operated upon the premise that they were the same type as those which had apparently migrated from South America, but there were curious differences in those which Darwin observed - the shape of their beaks, for example. This, he interpreted as evolution.

Here is where science and the Bible come, with very little notice in my opinion, to the same conclusion. That is to say, that the Genesis account speaks of kinds. And science of old says that there is an evolution.

The reason that I side with the Bible over evolution, then, as far as mutations go, is a matter of a flawed observation based upon speculation. The finch that Darwin observed is a finch. It will never be anything else. A black person, a red person, a yellow person, a white person, a brown person, a person with a big nose and a person with a small nose or any variation of person or finch never evolves beyond what a finch or a person is.

A moth becomes a butterfly, a child becomes an adult. This is, in effect an evolution ... a change ... but not a change which evolves beyond what the Bible speaks of in the Genesis account.

Questions For Evolutionist

1.) What examples of mutations would you cite as a matter of concern for the case of evolution and what examples against? In other words where has mutations produced helpful results.

2.) To what degree would you grant the possibility of these examples being based upon a growing speculation? In other words is this speculation fallible, and to what degree is this relevant?

3.) To what degree would you have found a disagreement with the Bible and the theory of evolution? In other words, put simply, do you see a disagreement between the two and if so what is it. If not would you admit there is some disagreement which is unsubstantiated?

FFT

Daystar

FFT · Posted: Mon May 12, 2008 8:19 pm Post subject:

Trinity1 · Emperor of the World Joined: 02 Apr 2006 Posts: 3123

Daystar · Posted: Tue May 13, 2008 7:25 am Post subject:

FFT, the question that interests me regarding the Creation / Evolution debate as far as mutations go is a simple one. Where do they have a conflict. Changes within a kind do not conflict with the Bible. My immune system doesn't mutate into something other than what it is. It changes but it doesn't change into something else.

Basically the speculation that one thing mutates into another with positive results is unscientific. In a single lifetime? I never said that. In the record.

When you say I don't know much about what I am talking about I find it interesting that you didn't really address any of that. You only gave an attempt to answer my questions.

When you say that the Bible's claim that humans have only been here for about 6,000 years is incorrect am I supposed to take your word for it? The flood didn't happen because you said it didn't?

The theory of evolution isn't proven, that is why they call it theory. Theoretical science isn't proven science. You can make the arrogant assumption that what you think is fact is fact, but I can do the same.

I am not interested in looking at your link, Answers in Genesis, I am talking to you.

FFT · Posted: Tue May 13, 2008 11:21 am Post subject:

Trinity1 · Emperor of the World Joined: 02 Apr 2006 Posts: 3123

FFT · Posted: Tue May 13, 2008 2:33 pm Post subject:

Trinity1 · Emperor of the World Joined: 02 Apr 2006 Posts: 3123

Daystar · Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 7:03 am Post subject:

FFT - It doesn't change into something other than an immune system, but it does optimally change into an immune system adapted against whatever's attacking it.

I didn't claim that it turned into something other than an immune system, that would be ridiculous and completely defeat the purpose of the mutations it undergoes.

Daystar - Exactly my point. Science can demonstrate how there are changes which are helpful. These are not mutations in the sense that something has mutated or evolved into something other than what it was. Evolutionists have always considered such changes as evidence for evolution. At the same time science has aptly demonstrated that mutations, real mutations, are mostly harmful. They don't produce anything new.

If they produced something new that would be against the teachings of the Bible. But they don't.

Just like the examples I gave in my original post, the Pepper Moth.

A fruit fly mutated into a freakish version of itself, but not into something else. It didn’t become a rock star or a dentist or a rosebush.

45degreeN · Posted: Sun May 18, 2008 10:51 am Post subject:

In Behe's book "The Edge of Evolution," the atomic level of cell structure is examined and just how a mutation might come into being.

He emphasizes sickle cell anemia and looks into the chemical and sub cellular reasons why it works to stop malaria. The mechanism shuts down the reproductive pathways for the virus and prevents Malaria from ever affecting the sickle cell anemia patient.

Since the first appearance of both sickle cell and Malaria the virus hasn't been able to "mutate" so that it can overcome this blockage. To count the number of generations between that time and now would be 10*30th opportunities for some possible mutation and still nothing.

Within this scenario this situation for the malaria virus and the sickle cell is not one that can be seen, is not some immensely complex figure like an eye but something that is microscopic, atomic in scale, and yet so far there has not been that single event that might change this whole scheme. As far as "Random" mutation just how much time do Darwinists need for this type of event?

There is simply not enough time for all of the many mutations that it must have taken to generate the changes needed to change a complex organism into something else.
_________________
My boss is a Jewish carpenter.

Read the
www.Christian-Thinktank.com

FFT · Posted: Sun May 18, 2008 11:22 am Post subject:

45degreeN · Posted: Sat May 24, 2008 2:59 pm Post subject:

A typo sorry. Yes of course I recognize it is a bacterium.

Do you consider sickle cell anemia a human mutation?
_________________
My boss is a Jewish carpenter.

Read the
www.Christian-Thinktank.com

FFT · Posted: Sun May 25, 2008 5:47 am Post subject: