[unlearner]

"The genetic codes of organisms make no sense unless there is common descent."

Then they are not subject to being falsified. You are unwilling to be wrong and therefore confuse dogma with science.

It would be reasonable to say that common descent is a good explanation for certain features or data. It is unreasonable to say that no other explanation can be considered.

"There would simply be a huge number of unexplained regularities and differences."

So it's the regularities that prove UCD... oh, except when there are irregularities, then that proves UCD.

"Without common descent, we couldn't predict the gene or protein sequence for a gene in an unsequenced organism."

The scientifically correct way to state this is that UCD leads us to predictions of gene and protein sequences which are confirmed by testing. The question is whether other possibilities are supported by the same predictions. A correlation between structure and gene sequences, or a correlation between function and gene sequences hardly amounts to UCD being essential. It could just as easily support common design.

"Common descent is the organizing and unifying principle that underlies the field of genomics."

It's even more amazing that taxonomic nomenclature fits so nicely with evolutionary theory. Oh, but wait a second, the theory played a role in it all along. Circular. Just because scientific institutions have become infatuated with the theory does not in any way support the contention that this makes it essential. You can use almost anything as an "organizing principle" in that sense. You can use the alphabet. You could use any arbitrary syllabus. You could even build mnemonics from nursery rhymes. The issue is that UCD is not essential to science, and nothing fails to work if UCD proves false.

"Yeah, yeah, we've heard the standard tales of brothers in law who are supergeniuses in a biological field and don't believe in evolution. If you seriously want this to be believed, have him post, and say for himself why he believes this."

I will suggest it, especially since he votes conservatively. But anyone can claim anything on a forum. The proof is in the pudding. You could claim to already have your doctorate in molecular biology. The difference is that I know my friend. I don't know you. (And you don't know me.) So what is claimed on this forum is reasonably taken with a grain of salt.

Someone can say that all scientists accept UCD. Maybe that is true of many scientists, including 100% of the ones you know. But those I know do not. But then again I am not in that profession. All this proves to me is that claims of all scientists buying UCD is not true from my experience. Your experience may be otherwise.

[Right Wing Professor]

"The genetic codes of organisms make no sense unless there is common descent."

Then they are not subject to being falsified. You are unwilling to be wrong and therefore confuse dogma with science.

Yeah, thanks for lecturing me on science, a field that despite 80 or so published papers, I'm totally ignorant about. You've published how many? Several hundred or so?

You think that because ribosomal 16S/23S yields a single phylogenetic tree, its common descent can't be falsified? So if we found an entirely separate and distinct tree, that wouldn't be falsification?

So it's the regularities that prove UCD... oh, except when there are irregularities, then that proves UCD.

No one said or even implied the latter. You've started lying: you must be getting desperate.

The scientifically correct way to state this is that UCD leads us to predictions of gene and protein sequences which are confirmed by testing. The question is whether other possibilities are supported by the same predictions. A correlation between structure and gene sequences, or a correlation between function and gene sequences hardly amounts to UCD being essential. It could just as easily support common design

No. We can always come up with multiple hypotheses consistent with any body of data, last Thursdayism being the most universal. The fact that you can hypothesize an all-powerful being that, because of said being's omnipotence, can explain anything, doesn't mean you have another scientific explanation. You've merely got another explanation.

You could claim to already have your doctorate in molecular biology. The difference is that I know my friend. I don't know you. (And you don't know me.)

My regular web page is linked on my profile.

Here's my (somewhat outdated) web page and publication list, at a University of Nebraska domain name. Here's my blog. If you dispute I'm the author of them, send me an innocuous phrase by FReepmail, and I'll include it in the latter. Alternatively, I'll update the c.v. up to any publication number less than 83 that you request.