Posted on 09/26/2005 3:27:53 AM PDT by Crackingham
When scientists announced last month they had determined the exact order of all 3 billion bits of genetic code that go into making a chimpanzee, it was no surprise that the sequence was more than 96 percent identical to the human genome. Charles Darwin had deduced more than a century ago that chimps were among humans' closest cousins. But decoding chimpanzees' DNA allowed scientists to do more than just refine their estimates of how similar humans and chimps are. It let them put the very theory of evolution to some tough new tests.
If Darwin was right, for example, then scientists should be able to perform a neat trick. Using a mathematical formula that emerges from evolutionary theory, they should be able to predict the number of harmful mutations in chimpanzee DNA by knowing the number of mutations in a different species' DNA and the two animals' population sizes.
"That's a very specific prediction," said Eric Lander, a geneticist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, and a leader in the chimp project.
Sure enough, when Lander and his colleagues tallied the harmful mutations in the chimp genome, the number fit perfectly into the range that evolutionary theory had predicted.
SNIP
Evolution's repeated power to predict the unexpected goes a long way toward explaining why so many scientists are practically apoplectic over the recent decision by a Pennsylvania school board to treat evolution as an unproven hypothesis, on par with "alternative" explanations such as Intelligent Design (ID), the proposition that life as we know it could not have arisen without the helping hand of some mysterious intelligent force.
SNIP
"What makes evolution a scientific explanation is that it makes testable predictions," Lander said. "You only believe theories when they make non-obvious predictions that are confirmed by scientific evidence."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
I have been quoting the consortium paper the entire time providing this figures. In post 98 I quoted directly and there was no need to clear it up.
I understand that you do seem to need some external authority to decide for yourselves. Very strange that you need a regurgitation from a secondary source rather than the actual consortium article, which you have access to and the pertinent paragraph all ready posted here.
It's like catholics having to have the missive from the Vatican before they can make a decision.
The confusions seemed to lie in the figures from the Eichler paper which present a higher variation. These figures and the alternative method used by Eichler's group are not addressed in that t.o. missive.
They'd have been drifitng in the ether without this official missive.
Or for it for that matter.
It's not good or bad. It is what it is. The sequences of the respective genomes are what they are and the similarity is what it is. The point was what you would call technical. Again it is that the whole genome is about 98-99 identical -- 2.4 billion bases were examined to see that. The coding region would be maybe only 50 million bases.
(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)
Thanks for the ping!
You must understand, it's not a matter of believing G-d, it's a matter of believing that the man-made record, written thousands of years ago is the last word in biology. To possess a need to accept scripture, with all of it's obvious errors, as an inerrant statement on all things scientific is to choose to miss it's beauty and real purpose as a moral and ethical guide.
Yes...there is not one missing link but millions.
You know what I mean...the first man.
What a rude comment...why are you so hostile to Christianity? I studied Biology. You may be surprised to learn that many fine Biologist believed in God...they also believed in evolution. The two are not incompatible. Actually the belief that man is just another animal has led to some of the worst murders in history-Stalin, Hitler, etc...without the belief in a higher power, man is indeed merely another animal and often behaves accordingly.
My point is that in a debate centering on the interpretation of evidence, changes in numbers that do not alter the interpretation are a side issue.
I was trying to establish whether your posts were corrections of facts, or an indicator that the interpretation is wrong.
Like the Psych exam in Animal House? We all got the same wrong answers?
Ah ha.
I am not hostile to Christianity.
I am hostile to all primitive literalist cults of all religions.
The belief that man is just an animal has also lead to every advance in medicine in the last 100 years.
If medicine is a product of belief in evolution and that man is an animal, and it is, then modern medicine is evil and you should have othing to do with it. You should avoid it like you would Hitler.
If the situation arises, consider having your gall bladder removed by some unwashed amateur with a rusty blade and no anesthetic. If you get cancer, have the preacher pray over it. Certainly don't take any of that chemotherapy stuff or radiation that, because man is an animal, is based on tests on animals.
So9
These threads are most difinitley not about biology, evolution or science in general.
They are about personal issues those like servant of the nine and almost every other one here have. We see their acting out.
How can the fundamental finding of a huge multi-million dollar years long study be a side issue?
What "interpetation" would you be referring to?
THEOLOGICAL arguments against ID are out of order.
Cordially,
It's not a side issue if it has implications, but raw numbers do not have immediate implications to non-specialists.
Suppose the number of people reported killed by the recent hurricanes is eventually found to be off by ten percent? Will that change anyone's worldview?
More importantly, it's obvious from the text that the raw numbers are dependendent on the method of counting. Only a specialist or a deeply involved amateur would know the implications. Everyone has a hobby. I can spot BS in some kinds of science writing, but not all. If you cannot articulate what you think are the implications of your numbers, you add nothing to the discussion.
Whatever interpretation leads you to refer to other FReepers as a sect with a priesthood.
That interpretation.
Don't think so.
The often-quoted statement that we share over 98% of our genes with apes (chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans) actually should be put another way. That is, there is more than 95% to 98% similarity between related genes in humans and apes in general. (Just as in the mouse, quite a few genes probably are not common to humans and apes, and these may influence uniquely human or ape traits.) Similarities between mouse and human genes range from about 70% to 90%, with an average of 85% similarity but a lot of variation from gene to gene (e.g., some mouse and human gene products are almost identical, while others are nearly unrecognizable as close relatives). Some nucleotide changes are “neutral” and do not yield a significantly altered protein. Others, but probably only a relatively small percentage, would introduce changes that could substantially alter what the protein does.From here.
These comparisons are just gene-to-gene and ignore the junk. Humans and chimps are about 98 percent similar gene-to-gene, but it drops to 96 percent when the junk is included. So the applicable figures are human-chimp: 98, human-mouse: 85. That's not bad for evolution, since a mouse is a mammal and probably--I'm guessing here--diverged from the line leading to humans after the dinosaurs were wiped out a mere 65 million years ago.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.