Posted on 05/06/2005 7:36:09 PM PDT by DouglasKC
Two great achievements occurred in 1953, more than half a century ago.
The first was the successful ascent of Mt. Everest, the highest mountain in the world. Sir Edmund Hillary and his guide, Tenzing Norgay, reached the summit that year, an accomplishment that's still considered the ultimate feat for mountain climbers. Since then, more than a thousand mountaineers have made it to the top, and each year hundreds more attempt it.
Yet the second great achievement of 1953 has had a greater impact on the world. Each year, many thousands join the ranks of those participating in this accomplishment, hoping to ascend to fame and fortune.
It was in 1953 that James Watson and Francis Crick achieved what appeared impossible—discovering the genetic structure deep inside the nucleus of our cells. We call this genetic material DNA, an abbreviation for deoxyribonucleic acid.
The discovery of the double-helix structure of the DNA molecule opened the floodgates for scientists to examine the code embedded within it. Now, more than half a century after the initial discovery, the DNA code has been deciphered—although many of its elements are still not well understood.
What has been found has profound implications regarding Darwinian evolution, the theory taught in schools all over the world that all living beings have evolved by natural processes through mutation and natural selection.
Amazing revelations about DNA
As scientists began to decode the human DNA molecule, they found something quite unexpected—an exquisite 'language' composed of some 3 billion genetic letters. "One of the most extraordinary discoveries of the twentieth century," says Dr. Stephen Meyer, director of the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute in Seattle, Wash., "was that DNA actually stores information—the detailed instructions for assembling proteins—in the form of a four-character digital code" (quoted by Lee Strobel, The Case for a Creator, 2004, p. 224).
It is hard to fathom, but the amount of information in human DNA is roughly equivalent to 12 sets of The Encyclopaedia Britannica—an incredible 384 volumes" worth of detailed information that would fill 48 feet of library shelves!
Yet in their actual size—which is only two millionths of a millimeter thick—a teaspoon of DNA, according to molecular biologist Michael Denton, could contain all the information needed to build the proteins for all the species of organisms that have ever lived on the earth, and "there would still be enough room left for all the information in every book ever written" (Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, 1996, p. 334).
Who or what could miniaturize such information and place this enormous number of 'letters' in their proper sequence as a genetic instruction manual? Could evolution have gradually come up with a system like this?
DNA contains a genetic language
Let's first consider some of the characteristics of this genetic 'language.' For it to be rightly called a language, it must contain the following elements: an alphabet or coding system, correct spelling, grammar (a proper arrangement of the words), meaning (semantics) and an intended purpose.
Scientists have found the genetic code has all of these key elements. "The coding regions of DNA," explains Dr. Stephen Meyer, "have exactly the same relevant properties as a computer code or language" (quoted by Strobel, p. 237, emphasis in original).
The only other codes found to be true languages are all of human origin. Although we do find that dogs bark when they perceive danger, bees dance to point other bees to a source and whales emit sounds, to name a few examples of other species" communication, none of these have the composition of a language. They are only considered low-level communication signals.
The only types of communication considered high-level are human languages, artificial languages such as computer and Morse codes and the genetic code. No other communication system has been found to contain the basic characteristics of a language.
Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, commented that "DNA is like a software program, only much more complex than anything we've ever devised."
Can you imagine something more intricate than the most complex program running on a supercomputer being devised by accident through evolution—no matter how much time, how many mutations and how much natural selection are taken into account?
DNA language not the same as DNA molecule
Recent studies in information theory have come up with some astounding conclusions—namely, that information cannot be considered in the same category as matter and energy. It's true that matter or energy can carry information, but they are not the same as information itself.
For instance, a book such as Homer's Iliad contains information, but is the physical book itself information? No, the materials of the book—the paper, ink and glue contain the contents, but they are only a means of transporting it.
If the information in the book was spoken aloud, written in chalk or electronically reproduced in a computer, the information does not suffer qualitatively from the means of transporting it. "In fact the content of the message," says professor Phillip Johnson, "is independent of the physical makeup of the medium" (Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds, 1997, p. 71).
The same principle is found in the genetic code. The DNA molecule carries the genetic language, but the language itself is independent of its carrier. The same genetic information can be written in a book, stored in a compact disk or sent over the Internet, and yet the quality or content of the message has not changed by changing the means of conveying it.
As George Williams puts it: "The gene is a package of information, not an object. The pattern of base pairs in a DNA molecule specifies the gene. But the DNA molecule is the medium, it's not the message" (quoted by Johnson, p. 70).
Information from an intelligent source
In addition, this type of high-level information has been found to originate only from an intelligent source.
As Lee Strobel explains: "The data at the core of life is not disorganized, it's not simply orderly like salt crystals, but it's complex and specific information that can accomplish a bewildering task—the building of biological machines that far outstrip human technological capabilities" (p. 244).
For instance, the precision of this genetic language is such that the average mistake that is not caught turns out to be one error per 10 billion letters. If a mistake occurs in one of the most significant parts of the code, which is in the genes, it can cause a disease such as sickle-cell anemia. Yet even the best and most intelligent typist in the world couldn't come close to making only one mistake per 10 billion letters—far from it.
So to believe that the genetic code gradually evolved in Darwinian style would break all the known rules of how matter, energy and the laws of nature work. In fact, there has not been found in nature any example of one information system inside the cell gradually evolving into another functional information program.
Michael Behe, a biochemist and professor at Pennsylvania's Lehigh University, explains that genetic information is primarily an instruction manual and gives some examples.
He writes: "Consider a step-by-step list of [genetic] instructions. A mutation is a change in one of the lines of instructions. So instead of saying, "Take a 1/4-inch nut," a mutation might say, "Take a 3/8-inch nut." Or instead of "Place the round peg in the round hole," we might get "Place the round peg in the square hole" . . . What a mutation cannot do is change all the instructions in one step—say, [providing instructions] to build a fax machine instead of a radio" (Darwin's Black Box, 1996, p. 41).
We therefore have in the genetic code an immensely complex instruction manual that has been majestically designed by a more intelligent source than human beings.
Even one of the discoverers of the genetic code, the agnostic and recently deceased Francis Crick, after decades of work on deciphering it, admitted that "an honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that in some sense, the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going" (Life Itself, 1981, p. 88, emphasis added).
Evolution fails to provide answers
It is good to remember that, in spite of all the efforts of all the scientific laboratories around the world working over many decades, they have not been able to produce so much as a single human hair. How much more difficult is it to produce an entire body consisting of some 100 trillion cells!
Up to now, Darwinian evolutionists could try to counter their detractors with some possible explanations for the complexity of life. But now they have to face the information dilemma: How can meaningful, precise information be created by accident—by mutation and natural selection? None of these contain the mechanism of intelligence, a requirement for creating complex information such as that found in the genetic code.
Darwinian evolution is still taught in most schools as though it were fact. But it is increasingly being found wanting by a growing number of scientists. "As recently as twenty-five years ago," says former atheist Patrick Glynn, "a reasonable person weighing the purely scientific evidence on the issue would likely have come down on the side of skepticism [regarding a Creator]. That is no longer the case." He adds: "Today the concrete data point strongly in the direction of the God hypothesis. It is the simplest and most obvious solution . . ." (God: The Evidence, 1997, pp. 54-55, 53).
Quality of genetic information the same
Evolution tells us that through chance mutations and natural selection, living things evolve. Yet to evolve means to gradually change certain aspects of some living thing until it becomes another type of creature, and this can only be done by changing the genetic information.
So what do we find about the genetic code? The same basic quality of information exists in a humble bacteria or a plant as in a person. A bacterium has a shorter genetic code, but qualitatively it gives instructions as precisely and exquisitely as that of a human being. We find the same prerequisites of a language—alphabet, grammar and semantics—in simple bacteria and algae as in man.
Each cell with genetic information, from bacteria to man, according to molecular biologist Michael Denton, consists of "artificial languages and their decoding systems, memory banks for information storage and retrieval, elegant control systems regulating the automated assembly of parts and components, error fail-safe and proof-reading devices utilized for quality control, assembly processes involving the principle of prefabrication and modular construction . . . [and a] capacity not equalled in any of our most advanced machines, for it would be capable of replicating its entire structure within a matter of a few hours" (Denton, p. 329).
So how could the genetic information of bacteria gradually evolve into information for another type of being, when only one or a few minor mistakes in the millions of letters in that bacterium's DNA can kill it?
Again, evolutionists are uncharacteristically silent on the subject. They don't even have a working hypothesis about it. Lee Strobel writes: "The six feet of DNA coiled inside every one of our body's one hundred trillion cells contains a four-letter chemical alphabet that spells out precise assembly instructions for all the proteins from which our bodies are made . . . No hypothesis has come close to explaining how information got into biological matter by naturalistic means" (Strobel, p. 282).
Werner Gitt, professor of information systems, puts it succinctly: "The basic flaw of all evolutionary views is the origin of the information in living beings. It has never been shown that a coding system and semantic information could originate by itself [through matter] . . . The information theorems predict that this will never be possible. A purely material origin of life is thus [ruled out]" (Gitt, p. 124).
The clincher
Besides all the evidence we have covered for the intelligent design of DNA information, there is still one amazing fact remaining—the ideal number of genetic letters in the DNA code for storage and translation.
Moreover, the copying mechanism of DNA, to meet maximum effectiveness, requires the number of letters in each word to be an even number. Of all possible mathematical combinations, the ideal number for storage and transcription has been calculated to be four letters.
This is exactly what has been found in the genes of every living thing on earth—a four-letter digital code. As Werner Gitt states: "The coding system used for living beings is optimal from an engineering standpoint. This fact strengthens the argument that it was a case of purposeful design rather that a [lucky] chance" (Gitt, p. 95).
More witnesses
Back in Darwin's day, when his book On the Origin of Species was published in 1859, life appeared much simpler. Viewed through the primitive microscopes of the day, the cell appeared to be but a simple blob of jelly or uncomplicated protoplasm. Now, almost 150 years later, that view has changed dramatically as science has discovered a virtual universe inside the cell.
"It was once expected," writes Professor Behe, "that the basis of life would be exceedingly simple. That expectation has been smashed. Vision, motion, and other biological functions have proven to be no less sophisticated than television cameras and automobiles. Science has made enormous progress in understanding how the chemistry of life works, but the elegance and complexity of biological systems at the molecular level have paralyzed science's attempt to explain their origins" (Behe, p. x).
Dr. Meyer considers the recent discoveries about DNA as the Achilles" heel of evolutionary theory. He observes: "Evolutionists are still trying to apply Darwin's nineteenth-century thinking to a twenty-first century reality, and it's not working ... I think the information revolution taking place in biology is sounding the death knell for Darwinism and chemical evolutionary theories" (quoted by Strobel, p. 243).
Dr. Meyer's conclusion? "I believe that the testimony of science supports theism. While there will always be points of tension or unresolved conflict, the major developments in science in the past five decades have been running in a strongly theistic direction" (ibid., p. 77).
Dean Kenyon, a biology professor who repudiated his earlier book on Darwinian evolution—mostly due to the discoveries of the information found in DNA—states: "This new realm of molecular genetics (is) where we see the most compelling evidence of design on the Earth" (ibid., p. 221).
Just recently, one of the world's most famous atheists, Professor Antony Flew, admitted he couldn't explain how DNA was created and developed through evolution. He now accepts the need for an intelligent source to have been involved in the making of the DNA code.
"What I think the DNA material has done is show that intelligence must have been involved in getting these extraordinary diverse elements together," he said (quoted by Richard Ostling, "Leading Atheist Now Believes in God," Associated Press report, Dec. 9, 2004).
"Fearfully and wonderfully made"
Although written thousands of years ago, King David's words about our marvelous human bodies still ring true. He wrote: "For You formed my inward parts, You covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made . . . My frame was not hidden from You, when I was made in secret, and skillfully wrought. . ." (Psalm 139:13-15, emphasis added).
Where does all this leave evolution? Michael Denton, an agnostic scientist, concludes: "Ultimately the Darwinian theory of evolution is no more nor less than the great cosmogenic myth of the twentieth century" (Denton, p. 358).
All of this has enormous implications for our society and culture. Professor Johnson makes this clear when he states: "Every history of the twentieth century lists three thinkers as preeminent in influence: Darwin, Marx and Freud. All three were regarded as 'scientific' (and hence far more reliable than anything 'religious') in their heyday.
"Yet Marx and Freud have fallen, and even their dwindling bands of followers no longer claim that their insights were based on any methodology remotely comparable to that of experimental science. I am convinced that Darwin is next on the block. His fall will be by far the mightiest of the three" (Johnson, p. 113).
Evolution has had its run for almost 150 years in the schools and universities and in the press. But now, with the discovery of what the DNA code is all about, the complexity of the cell, and the fact that information is something vastly different from matter and energy, evolution can no longer dodge the ultimate outcome. The evidence certainly points to a resounding checkmate for evolution! GN
>> If high level information can only come from an intelligent source, and God must be composed of high level information, what intelligent source created God?
Considering our miniscule knowledge and understanding, when compared to the vastness and complexity of God's creation; would it not be prudent to attempt to understand God, first, before attempting to determine if God had a Maker?
DNA: The Tiny Code That's Toppling EvolutionHOW does this go to 'prove' the 'young earth' theory again?
Oh, never mind.
This is just another case of the small minded trying to put God in a 'box' again (they think they know how he put together HIS universe and are bent on telling THE REST of us how HE did it.)
Evolution is based on faith, just as intelligent design. Neither is proven.Water doesn't really freeze either; what does it do then?
It doesn't.
This is just another case of the small minded trying to put God in a 'box' again (they think they know how he put together HIS universe and are bent on telling THE REST of us how HE did it
If God can guide evolution over millions of years then why can't he make it happen *really* fast...say like in 1 day?
Considering our miniscule knowledge and understanding, when compared to the vastness and complexity of God's creation; would it not be prudent to attempt to understand God, first, before attempting to determine if God had a Maker?
Never mind; neither you nor I have the definitive answer and any attempt is, in my book, just another attempt to 'quantify the unquantifiable' (literally: put God in a box no matter HOW large you want to make it).
But is there not some point in complexity over time where evolution would break down? If the big bang occured 10 years ago, and first life appeared 3 years ago, would you still believe evolution adequately explained the complexity of living species? Where is the "break point"? and why?
Only, it would appear, to look for loopholes.
What kind of a 'box' is that, in which we have put Him, Jim?
>> Considering our miniscule knowledge and understanding, when compared to the vastness and complexity the universe; would it not be prudent to attempt to understand the universe, before attempting to determine if it had a Maker?
This is the stupidest thing I have read in a long list of stupid things written by 'atheists' (so-called).
For me, it has been nothing short of miraculous.
To say that I have shocked my lifelong, Christian friends beyond belief,
would be an understatement. ;)
To review.... :o)
>>Philip said:Considering our miniscule knowledge and understanding, when compared to the vastness and complexity of God's creation; would it not be prudent to attempt to understand God, first, before attempting to determine if God had a Maker?
>>>Tungenchek said: Considering our miniscule knowledge and understanding, when compared to the vastness and complexity of the universe; would it not be prudent to attempt to understand the universe, before attempting to determine if it had a Maker?
>>Philip said: This is the stupidest thing I have read in a long list of stupid things.
>>>Tungenchek says: okie dokie...:o)
What kind of a 'box' is that, in which we have put Him, Jim?You'll have to address that question to those who have spelled out the manner and time-frame that 'they' have said the earth and it's living inhabitants were created in.
Why is it so important to agree or disagree on the time frame and manner by which flora and fauna were established on this planet; the important factors far outweigh 'the details' like this, WAAAAAY too much time is being spent on what I will term 'minutia' (from Late Latin minutiae, petty details, from Latin min?tia, smallness, from minutus, small.)
Time was, the argument was between 'changelessness' and evolution, but even the Holy Catholic Church overcame that when certain 'points' are recognized as defined here:
http://www.cin.org/jp2evolu.htmlPope John Paul II
Message to Pontifical Academy of Sciences
October 22, 1996...
Science at the dawn of the third millennium
2. I am pleased with the first theme you have chosen, that of the origins of life and evolution, an essential subject which deeply interests the Church, since Revelation, for its part, contains teaching concerning the nature and origins of man. How do the conclusions reached by the various scientific disciplines coincide with those contained in the message of Revelation? And if, at first sight, there are apparent contradictions, in what direction do we look for their solution? We know, in fact, that truth cannot contradict truth (cf. Leo XIII, Encyclical Providentissimus Deus). Moreover, to shed greater light on historical truth, your research on the Church's relations with science between the 16th and 18th centuries is of great importance.
...
3. Before offering you several reflections that more specifically concern the subject of the origin of life and its evolution, I would like to remind you that the Magisterium of the Church has already made pronouncements on these matters within the framework of her own competence. I will cite here two interventions.
In his Encyclical Humani generis (1950), my predecessor Pius XII had already stated that there was no opposition between evolution and the doctrine of the faith about man and his vocation, on condition that one did not lose sight of several indisputable points (cf. AAS 42 [1950], pp. 575-576).
...
Evolution and the Church's Magisterium
4. Taking into account the state of scientific research at the time as well as of the requirements of theology, the Encyclical Humani generis considered the doctrine of "evolutionism" a serious hypothesis, worthy of investigation and in-depth study equal to that of the opposing hypothesis. Pius XII added two methodological conditions: that this opinion should not be adopted as though it were a certain, proven doctrine and as though one could totally prescind from Revelation with regard to the questions it raises. He also spelled out the condition on which this opinion would be compatible with the Christian faith, a point to which I will return.
Today, almost half a century after the publication of the Encyclical, new knowledge has led to the recognition of more than one hypothesis in the theory of evolution. It is indeed remarkable that this theory has been progressively accepted by researchers, following a series of discoveries in various fields of knowledge. The convergence, neither sought nor fabricated, of the results of work that was conducted independently is in itself a significant argument in favour of this theory.
You have erred in so many places I scarecely know where to begin, but perhaps the best plase is with this sentence of yours:
"Genetic code is a language that is used by living cells to convert information found in DNA into information needed to make proteins."
This is a false statement. Living cells do not use "language" to convert "information" in DNA into "information" needed to make proteins. These are merely convenient ways concious humans use to make the process comprehensible. You have fallen into an analogue to the anthropomorphic error by imputing consiousness to cells, or even to the DNA itself.
Put another way, using your reference, the Shannon-Weaver General Model of Communication, there is no communication because there is no message. it is unimportant whether the message can be said to have meaning or consist of nonsense, since either option requires a mind to distinguish between them. Again, the error of anthropomrphism.
You provide an example where a human decodes a DNA sequence and provides that sequence to another reseacher halfway around the world, who can use it to reconstruct the precise DNA sequence, which then should behave chemically like the identical sequence anywhere else.
So what? I neve said that people could not communicate about DNA. Obviously they can. But that is totally irrelevant to the argument. Your argument, if you want to make it is, that a reseacher could, using 3-base codons, construct a DNA sequence containing a message, send a sample of that DNA to another reseacher who could then reconstruct the message. But again, so what? This is not what we are talking about. The argument is that somehow, DNA acting in nature contains and communicates information. It cannot and it does not. It simple functions as a chemical in a chemical soup, and it does what it does. It does not accrue godlike or humanlike properties merely because it is complex.
It can be empirically demonstrated that any one missing (or inefficient) component will cause a complex synergistic system to be non-functional.
Sorry about that. Why don't you show how the syllogism is unsound either because according to the rules of logic the deduction is invalid, or that one or more of the premises are untrue.
Evolution precludes the uniqueness of humanity in creation, and therefore, in that aspect of it, is incompatible with the Christian Scripture.
Evolution precludes the uniqueness of humanity in creation, and therefore, in that aspect of it, is incompatible with the Christian Scripture.That's a pronouncemant that you made; and 'a box', once again, has been established ...
Secondly, we're not talking about DNA doing any communication whatsoever. That's what messenger RNA is for. Maybe you've not seen reference to messangerRNA and message DNA in biology textbooks?
Secondly, the last issue you object to shows you have no clue with respect to information theory. I suggest that before you argue against that you become familiar about. But more specifically, the point being made is that the alphabetic representation of the DNA sequence is just as informational as is the actual molecules the alphabetic representation itself. Moreover, the DNA sequences themselvers are code for the construction of specific proteins. If you don't understand that code and information are one and the same (regardless of what form its in), then you can't be helped.
You said:
If there is information in DNA, then that "information" ought to be just as useful, or perhaps I should say utilitarian, if carried by some other medium, just like "War and Peace" is "war and Peace" whether printed on paper or stored on a CD ROM. But, it is demonstably false that the amino acid sequences of DNA have any utility expressed in any other form.I proved that it is useful, and that it is utilitarian. Only a moron would insist that there's no information in DNA (although proteins can be synthesized on the other side of the world after translating the genetic DNA sequence from a molecular code, to alphabetic code, to binary code, into analog electromagnetic waveforms, that are decoded on the other side of the world in reverse order, the resultant alphabetic code being sythesized into a molecular analog and then spliced into bacteria genes), but the bits and bytes contained on a CD-ROM are information. That's not just illogical, but complete lunacy.
Clearly the Majesterium is not arguing for such things as the removal of the "theory, not fact" stickers from Georgia school books. Indeed, entertaining non-evolutionary ideas of origins seem to be specifically encouraged in this paper. This is directly contrary to the philosophical framework of the "mainstream scientific community" (a.k.a. "legacy science").
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