Rewinding evolution: Scientists alter chicken DNA to create embryo with 'alligator-like' snout

Daily Mail ^ | August 18, 2011 | Daily Mail Reporter

[Free ThinkerNY]

Scientists have undone the progress made by evolution by altering chicken DNA to create embryos with alligator-like snouts instead of beaks.

Experts changed the DNA of chicken embryos in the early stage of their development, enabling them to undo evolutionary progress and give the creatures snouts which are thought to have been lost in the cretaceous period millions of years ago.

The scientific revelation of 'rewinding' evolution could pave the way for scientists altering DNA in the other direction and use the same process to create species better able to adapt to Earth's climate. It has also been claimed that the breakthrough could eventually help eliminate birth defects in human children.

Arkhat Abzhanov, an evolutionary biologist at Harvard University, developed the chickens with snouts by cutting a square hole in the shell of a chicken egg and dropping in a small gelatinous protein bead before watching the embryo develop.

[Elendur]

I know MANY devout Christians, including Southern Baptist,
and Protestant, that accept Geneisis as abstract.
if Pastor Randles, who i respect greatly, can explain this to me, i will listen respectfully and gratefully. but:

Joshua 10:12-14
King James Version (KJV)
12Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.

13And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.
///
Do the SAME standards apply, in the ENTIRE Bible?
or are they different for some books, like Genesis?

Jews, and Christians, for 2000 years, believed the Sun and moon, went around the earth.
Martin Luther himself, personally condemned Copernicus, for saying otherwise.

IF you take the above literally, you would certainly agree with Martin Luther.
And REJECT the Earth orbiting the Sun.
.

“They have just altered and damaged the DNA.
is not evolution unless that animal can produce offspring with the same trait.”
///
and you think they can’t? and changing the same code, in the same DNA spot, in different species, alters the same trait.
...i believe Daniel prophescised the length of Tribulation.
7 days = 7 years. MANY other phrases in the Bible, are not literal. and many multiply days into years.
if Daniel can do it, why “MUST” the 7 days in Genesis be literal ?

Jesus himself talked in parables and abstractions.
did He, or any Apostle, say that we couldn’t assume Daniel meant years, instead of days?

i have never understood that inflexible obsession.
God gave us minds to understand our environment.
HE told us, “examine all things, keep that which is true”.
...EVERY branch of science, from Geology to Biology, tells us the Earth is older than 1 million years.
People from EVERY religion, including many Christians, accept the science.
only a few, believe God left us false clues, to deceive us.

...and if someone tells me that Tribulation will last for 7 literal days, at least i’ll respect them for consistency.
instead of arbitrarily chosing which verses to interpret literally, and which to use symbolism.

My God, is consistent, logical, and trustworthy.
GOD CREATED THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH.
...in ANY way he WANTED to.

i have no need to use some science, and dismiss the rest,
because of a literal interpretation of a single verse.
especially when so many other verses, are clearly NOT.

(or are poetic, like “the Sun stood still”,
when God actually made the EARTH STOP TURNING !!!)

Christians use science in their daily lives. including medicine based on the same basic research.

we rightly criticise MUSLIMS for living in the 7th century.

...and then we should tell non-Christians, interested in learning about Jesus, that ALL science must be ignored,
that even indirectly requires that the 7 days in Genesis,
is abstract, like the 7 days of Daniel ?

I follow my Lord and Saviour Jesus.
i don’t need to reject the Earth orbiting the Sun,
or reject hundreds of years of repeatable science and research, which God gave us the ability to do,
because of a SINGLE abstract verse, from the OLD Testament.

[MissouriConservative]

“AS IN THE DAYS OF NOAH....”

They genetically modified chickens in the days of Noah?

[roamer_1]

They genetically modified chickens in the days of Noah?

In a word, yes. The Bible says that all of creation was corrupted. How are animals corrupted?

Read up on the Nephilim - the psuedapigraphical books of Enoch, Jasher, and Jubilees is a good start.

And Yeshua said that it would be like in the days of Noah at His coming... And here it is.

[pastorbillrandles]

Elendur I agree with you that we have to use our heads and not be rigid and inflexible on non essential things. But the admonition not to be rigid and inflexible should go both ways...

...for example, the fact that the book of Joshua states that the "earth stood still and the moon stayed" is written from the perspective of someone on the earth, just as you or I would say "the sun rose", (did it really?).

The account of the battles in Joshua are not meant to be technical explanations of the cosmology, they are true accounts inspired ,but told from an earth bound perspective. There is no where in scipture that tells us that the sun goes around the earth...Christians and Jews may well have believed that but only because they believed the conventional wisdom of the day, they weren't led to believe that by scripture. <<"...i believe Daniel prophescised the length of Tribulation. 7 days = 7 years. MANY other phrases in the Bible, are not literal. and many multiply days into years. if Daniel can do it, why “MUST” the 7 days in Genesis be literal ?">>

The difference between Daniel's seven days and Genesis' is the expression from Genesis"evening and morning" which calls upon us to believe in a 24 hour cycle.Correct interpretation of the Bible is not arbritrary. I Hope this helps and thanks for the respect!

[RichInOC]

“Hullooooo, zeeba neighba...”

[mtg]

Experts changed the DNA of chicken embryos in the early stage of their development, enabling them to undo evolutionary progress and give the creatures snouts which are thought to have been lost in the cretaceous period millions of years ago.

You mean there was a time when chickens had snouts instead of peckers?

[a fool in paradise]

What would that look like deep fried?

[politicalamity]

Can’t wait for the cheesy SyFy movie about a flock of flying alligators

[SunkenCiv]

GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach	join list or digest view topics view or post blog bookmark post a topic subscribe
Thanks Free ThinkerNY. Sure, they look ridiculous, but while you're laughing at them, *chomp*! To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.

[SunkenCiv]

[ApplegateRanch]

So hen's teeth ain't so rare as they uster be?

[ApplegateRanch]

use the same process to create species better able to adapt to Earth's climate.

And the step after that will be to "create" polar bears capable of swimming, instead of downing, when the ice melts out from underneath them? /SARC

BTW Earth does NOT have a climate. Earth has several climate zones, (each with one or more local climates) and which grade into each other; and that shift positions or even oscillate over time.

[bert]

blah blah blah yada yada yada drivel

[BroJoeK]

Guardian Sebastian: "I am so tired of people writing as if evolution was fact and not a theory."

Paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould writes:

"Evolution is a theory.
It is also a fact.
And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty.
Facts are the world's data.
Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts.
Facts do not go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them.
Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's, but apples did not suspend themselves in mid-air, pending the outcome.
And humans evolved from ape-like ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other yet to be discovered."

The National Academy of Science (U.S.) makes a similar point:

"Scientists most often use the word "fact" to describe an observation.
But scientists can also use fact to mean something that has been tested or observed so many times that there is no longer a compelling reason to keep testing or looking for examples.
The occurrence of evolution in this sense is fact.
Scientists no longer question whether descent with modification occurred because the evidence is so strong."

[DManA]

I suspect the headline is wrong. I don’t think they actually changed the DNA. They manipulated the environment so that traits that are coded for in chicken DNA but normally are repressed get expressed.

[DManA]

They are exploring the POTENTIAL that God packed into Chicken DNA.

[1010RD]

Isn’t ‘descent with modification’ natural selection?

[wildbill]

I keep seeing Igor and Dr. Frankenstein in the lab.

“It’s alive! I tell you it’s alive”

Scientists are so curious, some have no ethical compass to guide them. “Hey, I wonder if I could make a flying piranha?”

[Bellflower]

...and if someone tells me that Tribulation will last for 7 literal days, at least i’ll respect them for consistency. instead of arbitrarily chosing which verses to interpret literally, and which to use symbolism.

You are misunderstanding the original language which is easy enough to do. The term 7 days had more than one meaning. It basically meant a group of seven associated with time. In the case of Daniel the context is what gave the understanding of which period of 7 associated with time was meant.

During the creation account each individual day was described as an evening and a morning defining each day as a specific 24 hour period that we know of as an individual day.

Even in our language if not clearly defined as a 24 hour day the word day can mean an undistinguished time period such as when someone says "back in my day". Misunderstandings are easy when one hasn't yet studied the question in depth when it comes to translating language from one dialect to another especially when great distances in time are involved. Be sure to make a careful study when you have a question concerning the Bible and most importantly be sure to pray for The LORD's help.

[BroJoeK]

101ORD: "Isn’t ‘descent with modification’ natural selection?"

Thanks for the question.
The basic theory-fact of evolution is not really disputed by anyone on FR, and consists of two confirmed observations:

1. descent with modification -- offspring are often different in some ways from their parents.
   
2. natural selection -- some modifications are more helpful to survival than others, aka "survival of the fittest."

So, when people say, "evolution is a fact," this is what they are referring to.

It's the "grand theory of evolution" which causes so much debate -- namely that over millions and hundreds of millions of years, virtually all of life on Earth descended from common ancestors.
That can never be directly observed, of course, and must be inferred from literal mountains of evidence (the fossil record), plus input from virtually every other discipline of science -- from astronomy to physics, chemistry, geology, biology & on & on, now especially DNA analysis.

That's what they say is "only a theory."

But even that "grand theory" has been confirmed so many times the theory itself is no longer seriously debated amongst serious scientists.