Re: [asa] chromasome fusion #2

Dave:

I take it that you believe you have an exhaustive set of possibilities
for the genetic sequence of humans with regard to chromosome 2. There
are, then, no other possibilities. I also take it that you regard
possibilities 2 and 3 to be highly unlikely, if not impossible. This
means that you believe of all the possibilites there is only one.

The only way that I've ever seen such a conclusion to be the case is
when we are dealing with logical truth. I take it then that you believe
it to (nearly) be deductively certain that the human genetic sequence with
regard to chromosome 2 developed by an evolutionary process.

What can we say of this evolutionary process as you conceive it. Whatever
it is, it must be different from possibility 2, wherein God created the
human genetic sequence to look like the first possibility. It seems that
we can at least distinguish possbility 1 and 2 by process. In the second,
God (or some other cause) established the human genetic sequence without
fusion and in the first by fusion. That fusion took place, as I indicated
previously, does not entail that it occurred by any "standard"
evolutionary process. If this is to make sense, then, you must believe
(if what I've said is correct) that if it took place by fusion, then it
must have taken place by an "evolutionary" process. I take it, then, that
by "evolutionary" you mean "by steps in time," which is just what any
notion of fusion would entail. Hence, by referring to the human genetic
sequence with regard to chromosome 2 as a fusion it is a tautology that it
took place according to an "evolutionary" process.

If this makes sense, it seems that you can imagine only two possibilites.
Either the sequence regarding chromosome 2 took place according to some
evolutionary process (by steps?) or miraculously.

It also seems since you are certain (or as certain as anyone can be) that
this sequence of human genetic coding can only have arisen according to an
"evolutionary" process, then you are equally certain at least some of
biological history must have occurred in this manner.

Let me be clear by what I mean by "certain." While what you say is not as
certain as a deductive conclusion like, All men are mortal, Socrates is a
man, therefore Socrates is mortal, it seems that you in effect take it to
be equally as certain, since you offer the "only" other two possibilites
as a jest.

If all, or most, of what I have said here is correct, I can understand why
so many people on this list find the attitudes of YECs and perhaps even
IDers to be so utterly frustrating, stubborn, and ignorant. It is as if
you were trying to explain fractions to a small child and they simply
could not grasp, or even stubbornly refused to grasp, that 3/4 was the
same as 6/8. And no matter how many times you went over it, no matter how
many pictures, and no matter how many object lessons, they would simply not
believe it.

It seems to me that a contingent science of a contingent world could never
make such claims, but perhaps I am wrong.

bill

dfsiemensjr wrote:

> Bill,
> You are giving generalities, but there are specific reasons why the
> single human chromosome came from two in the earlier ape line. The human
> chromosome has two centromeres, one functional and one degenerate. The
> sequence of DNA is the same in the two halves of the human chromosome as
> in the two ape chromosomes. So we have either the development of the one
> chromosome from two during evolution or else the Creator made it look, to
> all honest investigators, as if that happened. I forgot, there is one
> other possibility, Satan, in opposition to God, is the one who created
> man in such a way that human beings would be led away from God.
>
> To the best of my knowledge, the fusion of chromosomes is very unusual.
> There are small parts, genes, that move from one part to another (jumping
> genes), or viral genes that become incorporated in the genomes of more
> advanced creatures. There are deletions, duplications and rearrangements
> within chromosomes and genomes, along with trisomy and polyploidy. But
> these also lead to the essential certainty of evolution or to the
> deliberate misleading of humans. I don't know whether the lie by the
> deity or by the devil is worse.
> Dave (ASA)
>
> On Sun, 12 Jul 2009 19:55:41 -0600 wjp <wjp@swcp.com> writes:
>> Apparently chimpanzees, and other primates, have 48 chromosomes
>> while humans only have 46.
>>
>> From an evolutionary standpoint this is suppose to be a problem.
>> Why is that?
>>
>> It is presumed that chimps and humans have a common ancestor.
>> So I suppose the reasoning is that if one ancestor of the
>> common ancestor has 48 chromosomes and another has 46 there
>> is a problem in believing they had the same ancestor.
>>
>> The reasoning might be that since chromosome number is
>> directly related to inherited traits that it might be
>> difficult to see how an ancestor with 48 chromosomes could
>> produce (in no matter the number of steps) an offspring
>> with only 46.
>>
>> Now I, being naive, don't see why this is suppose to be so
>> great, or insurmountable a problem.
>> After all, if evoultion is correct, something like this must
>> be commonplace. Presumably the earliest of creatures had fewer
>> chromosomes than later species. So somehow chromosomes must be
>> added and I'm not certain why it should any more mysterious how
>> chromosomes can be added than that they can be taken away.
>>
>> In any case, Ken Miller asserts that this is so great a problem that
>> unless it were resolved evolution must be wrong.
>> I am astonished by this statement and can hardly believe that he
>> really
>> means it. In fact, it seems far more obvious that the reason he
>> says this is because he believed at the time of the statement that a
>> resolution was already at hand.
>>
>> In any case, the resolution supposedly is that the second chromosome
>> fused
>> with another chromosome, and since chromosomes come half from each
>> parent,
>> this would result in 46 chromosomes instead of 48.
>>
>> All I want to say about the supposed evidence that a chromosome had
>> fused
>> is that it does not entail that evolution occurred, rather it is
>> merely
>> consistent with an evolutionary development.
>>
>> The story, I suppose, would be something like that the ancestor of
>> both
>> man and chimp has 48 chromosomes, but somehow one chromosome in man
>> became fused to another, while that of the chimp and other primates
>> did
>> not.
>>
>> The notion of fused chromosomes is not necessarily associated with
>> an
>> evolutionary process, unless one means by evolution that something
>> that existed previously was used in the creation of something new.
>> Such a view of evolution could as well be the work of an intelligent
>> designer, which is why I am confused by Ken Miller's apparent
>> confidence that evolution is clearly a superior explanation.
>>
>> The very notion of fusion appears to entail a process whereby
>> something
>> changed from not being fused to being fused. The notion appears to
>> entail that there was a time when they were not fused and somehow
>> became
>> fused. It is true that if we presume that such processes must take
>> place,
>> then fusion would be consistent with that presumption. But does the
>> evidence for fusion really entail that a fusion has taken place?
>> In order for fusion to have taken place we must have a time when
>> they were not fused. But the mere fact that they appear to be fused
>> does not entail that they were ever not fused.
>>
>> It seems then that here, as in all of science, we proceed
>> abductively,
>> from theory to evidence and then back again to theory.
>> But in all cases the science finds a theory that is consistent with
>> the
>> evidence. There is no way to argue from the evidence to a unique
>> theory. The supposed discovery of the fusion of chromosome #2 is
>> consistent with an evolutionary story, but it could just as well be
>> consistent with other theories and explanations. This is, of
>> course,
>> true of all our knowledge of the physical world.
>>
>> What is surprising to me is that some think that this discovery is
>> of great importance. Yet it seems to me that the result is more
>> or less assured by the supposed discovery that chimp DNA and
>> human DNA are so very similar.
>>
>> I do not understand, I confess, why chromosomes are so important.
>> It seems to me that they are mostly an artifact from an earlier
>> state of biological science. Hence, I don't understand why fusion
>> would
>> seem so important. But, then again, I probably don't understand why
>> the bunching of DNA that can be observed under a microscope should
>> be so
>> important.
>>
>> bill
>>
>>
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>
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Received on Mon Jul 13 09:31:52 2009