The genotype/phenotype YEC challenge!

[tas8831]

I posted this as part of another thread a year or two ago and I had no takers:

Creationist electrical engineer Walter ReMine wrote:

Take an ape-like creature from 10 million years ago, substitute a maximum of 500,000 selectively
significant nucleotides and you would have a poet philosopher?... Is this enough to account for the significantly improved skulls, jaws, teeth, feet, speech, upright posture, abstract thought, and appreciation of music, to name just a few?
- The Biotic Message, p. 209​

Clearly, ReMine thinks that 500,000 beneficial mutations is just not enough to get a human from an apelike ancestor.
He never says why he thinks this, but it has become a mantra among creationists that even if evolution were true, there are not enough beneficial mutations to explain us evolving from an apelike ancestor.

So... the challenge -

How many mutations would it have taken to get a human pelvis (left) from an Australopithecine pelvis (right)?

Show your work please.

I was once told by a creationist computer tech that it must be 1 million! He could not explain why, he just "knew" it.
And yet... We actually know that a single mutation can produce this kind of pelvis:

from normal human phenotype parent... so, I'm thinking a million is maybe ~999,990 too many...

 

[exchemist]

I posted this as part of another thread a year or two ago and I had no takers:

Creationist electrical engineer Walter ReMine wrote:

Take an ape-like creature from 10 million years ago, substitute a maximum of 500,000 selectively
significant nucleotides and you would have a poet philosopher?... Is this enough to account for the significantly improved skulls, jaws, teeth, feet, speech, upright posture, abstract thought, and appreciation of music, to name just a few?
- The Biotic Message, p. 209​

Clearly, ReMine thinks that 500,000 beneficial mutations is just not enough to get a human from an apelike ancestor.
He never says why he thinks this, but it has become a mantra among creationists that even if evolution were true, there are not enough beneficial mutations to explain us evolving from an apelike ancestor.

So... the challenge -

How many mutations would it have taken to get a human pelvis (left) from an Australopithecine pelvis (right)?

Show your work please.

I was once told by a creationist computer tech that it must be 1 million! He could not explain why, he just "knew" it.
And yet... We actually know that a single mutation can produce this kind of pelvis:

from normal human phenotype parent... so, I'm thinking a million is maybe ~999,990 too many...

Why, I wonder, are so many cranks electrical engineers? I seem to keep stumbling across them on the internet. Sometimes they are trying to prove relativity or quantum theory wrong - QM a great favourite because they think they know all about EM radiation - but creationism too, sometimes.

Anyway, an informative post.

Many years ago I came across an article pointing out another example of this trick of claiming unfeasible odds for evolutionary steps. This was a paper by Behe and Snoke (of the Disco 'Tute) in which they ran a computer simulation, rigged to make it as hard as possible, for the time it would take for a particular protein binding site to evolve. To their embarrassment, their simulation said it would take only 20,000years! This came up in the Dover School trial and helped blow Intelligent Design out of the water - so a real own goal.

 

[tas8831]

Why, I wonder, are so many cranks electrical engineers?

Salem Hypothesis

It is a weird thing, though I have also encountered mechanical engineer creationists. In fact, one such person wrote on the old ISCID discussion forum that because he is 'intelligent and an engineer', that 'all of biology was just a weekend's worth of reading' for him. I had encountered him a few weeks earlier on another forum, wherein he declared that all cells were spheres. I showed him a picture of simple columnar epithelium, which he had never seen before, and he stopped replying to me.
Another such person once declared that evolution is impossible because each cell's DNA 'contained its own 12 digit grid coordinate' for its location in the body.
But yes, it is an odd phenomenon. Although some of the strongest and clearest voices I have seen (at least on the internet) in support of evolution have been engineers, so it is clearly a subset of all engineers. But my gosh they do show up on the internet an awful lot...

I seem to keep stumbling across them on the internet. Sometimes they are trying to prove relativity or quantum theory wrong - QM a great favourite because they think they know all about EM radiation - but creationism too, sometimes.

Sounds about right.

Anyway, an informative post.

Thanks!

Many years ago I came across an article pointing out another example of this trick of claiming unfeasible odds for evolutionary steps. This was a paper by Behe and Snoke (of the Disco 'Tute) in which they ran a computer simulation, rigged to make it as hard as possible, for the time it would take for a particular protein binding site to evolve. To their embarrassment, their simulation said it would take only 20,000years! This came up in the Dover School trial and helped blow Intelligent Design out of the water - so a real own goal.

Hilarious!

 

[exchemist]

Salem Hypothesis

It is a weird thing, though I have also encountered mechanical engineer creationists. In fact, one such person wrote on the old ISCID discussion forum that because he is 'intelligent and an engineer', that 'all of biology was just a weekend's worth of reading' for him. I had encountered him a few weeks earlier on another forum, wherein he declared that all cells were spheres. I showed him a picture of simple columnar epithelium, which he had never seen before, and he stopped replying to me.
Another such person once declared that evolution is impossible because each cell's DNA 'contained its own 12 digit grid coordinate' for its location in the body.
But yes, it is an odd phenomenon. Although some of the strongest and clearest voices I have seen (at least on the internet) in support of evolution have been engineers, so it is clearly a subset of all engineers. But my gosh they do show up on the internet an awful lot...

Sounds about right.

Thanks!

Hilarious!

Well, well, so it has a name: the Salem Hypothesis. I thought it was just me and couple of other guys on science forums who had noticed this. And actually yes, medical doctors too, to some extent, as the article notes.

My own theory about this is that engineering and medicine are, in large part, not experimental sciences. The bulk of these professions consists in putting into practice theories and knowledge developed by others. My hypothesis would be they get relatively little exposure to the basic history and philosophy of science, for instance the idea of theories being models of nature, informed by, and predicting, reproducible observation, or the history of earlier ideas being overturned by later observations. For most, it's not an issue but for some, perhaps, it is easier for them to take on board an alternative system that seems to be self-consistent, even when it is not grounded in observation. (I have an uncle who goes in for Intelligent Design. He's a civil engineer, by training.)

 

[tas8831]

Well, well, so it has a name: the Salem Hypothesis. I thought it was just me and couple of other guys on science forums who had noticed this. And actually yes, medical doctors too, to some extent, as the article notes.

My own theory about this is that engineering and medicine are, in large part, not experimental sciences. The bulk of these professions consists in putting into practice theories and knowledge developed by others. My hypothesis would be they get relatively little exposure to the basic history and philosophy of science, for instance the idea of theories being models of nature, informed by, and predicting, reproducible observation, or the history of earlier ideas being overturned by later observations. For most, it's not an issue but for some, perhaps, it is easier for them to take on board an alternative system that seems to be self-consistent, even when it is not grounded in observation. (I have an uncle who goes in for Intelligent Design. He's a civil engineer, by training.)

I've noticed the medical doctor thing, too. Years ago, encountered an engineer YEC who declared that he had calculated, based on published mutations rates and divergence time estimates for humans and chimps, the number of mutations that should have accrued per year and it came out to something like 3.6 (or whatever he had 'calculated'), and that it is impossible for 0.6 of a mutation to occur, therefore, the math proved evolution false.
And he was serious.
Also, about 6 months ago on a different forum, a retired pathologist popped in to condescend to us all how he had proven evolution false because it cannot explain beauty. Wrote a book on it and everything. He used some colorful marine fish with intricate color patterns and declared them beautiful but evolution cannot explain how they got their patterns, thus, false. Several people demolished his claims, to include those who argued that beauty is subjective, and asked him if fish with what appeared to be random spots were beautiful, too. Or what about catfish - beautiful? Others presented papers re: selection for coloration - in fish. Etc.
He was "humble" enough to admit that he hadn't seen those papers (despite claiming years of research), but - amazingly - he would not admit he was wrong.
Shocking...

But yes - applied science folks generally like things that fit in a box that they can understand (and calculate). No box? No can do.

 

[TagliatelliMonster]

I posted this as part of another thread a year or two ago and I had no takers:

Creationist electrical engineer Walter ReMine wrote:

Take an ape-like creature from 10 million years ago, substitute a maximum of 500,000 selectively
significant nucleotides and you would have a poet philosopher?... Is this enough to account for the significantly improved skulls, jaws, teeth, feet, speech, upright posture, abstract thought, and appreciation of music, to name just a few?
- The Biotic Message, p. 209​

Clearly, ReMine thinks that 500,000 beneficial mutations is just not enough to get a human from an apelike ancestor.
He never says why he thinks this, but it has become a mantra among creationists that even if evolution were true, there are not enough beneficial mutations to explain us evolving from an apelike ancestor.

So... the challenge -

How many mutations would it have taken to get a human pelvis (left) from an Australopithecine pelvis (right)?

Show your work please.

I was once told by a creationist computer tech that it must be 1 million! He could not explain why, he just "knew" it.
And yet... We actually know that a single mutation can produce this kind of pelvis:

from normal human phenotype parent... so, I'm thinking a million is maybe ~999,990 too many...

Thousand bucks says that none of our resident creationists / anti-evolutionists are going to take up the challenge.

Some might post though. But they will not take up the challenge. If they post, 100 additional bucks says they will handwave it away with some asanine off topic one liner.(*)


(*) I wanted to say: that they'll handwave it away with some species of pigeon chess, but the odds would be ridiculous and nobody in his right mind would take that bet.

 

[tas8831]

Thousand bucks says that none of our resident creationists / anti-evolutionists are going to take up the challenge.

Some might post though. But they will not take up the challenge. If they post, 100 additional bucks says they will handwave it away with some asanine off topic one liner.(*)


(*) I wanted to say: that they'll handwave it away with some species of pigeon chess, but the odds would be ridiculous and nobody in his right mind would take that bet.

It is almost like you are familiar with how they operate!

 

[tas8831]

And..... they never did...

 

[tas8831]

I posted this as part of another thread a year or two ago and I had no takers:

Creationist electrical engineer Walter ReMine wrote:

Take an ape-like creature from 10 million years ago, substitute a maximum of 500,000 selectively
significant nucleotides and you would have a poet philosopher?... Is this enough to account for the significantly improved skulls, jaws, teeth, feet, speech, upright posture, abstract thought, and appreciation of music, to name just a few?
- The Biotic Message, p. 209​

Clearly, ReMine thinks that 500,000 beneficial mutations is just not enough to get a human from an apelike ancestor.
He never says why he thinks this, but it has become a mantra among creationists that even if evolution were true, there are not enough beneficial mutations to explain us evolving from an apelike ancestor.

So... the challenge -

How many mutations would it have taken to get a human pelvis (left) from an Australopithecine pelvis (right)?

Show your work please.

I was once told by a creationist computer tech that it must be 1 million! He could not explain why, he just "knew" it.
And yet... We actually know that a single mutation can produce this kind of pelvis:

from normal human phenotype parent... so, I'm thinking a million is maybe ~999,990 too many...

So strange that the local science expert creationists did not even give this a try....
Almost as if...

 

[tas8831]

3 months and not a single creationist could put their money where their mouths are...

I posted this as part of another thread a year or two ago and I had no takers:

Creationist electrical engineer Walter ReMine wrote:

Take an ape-like creature from 10 million years ago, substitute a maximum of 500,000 selectively
significant nucleotides and you would have a poet philosopher?... Is this enough to account for the significantly improved skulls, jaws, teeth, feet, speech, upright posture, abstract thought, and appreciation of music, to name just a few?
- The Biotic Message, p. 209​

Clearly, ReMine thinks that 500,000 beneficial mutations is just not enough to get a human from an apelike ancestor.
He never says why he thinks this, but it has become a mantra among creationists that even if evolution were true, there are not enough beneficial mutations to explain us evolving from an apelike ancestor.

So... the challenge -

How many mutations would it have taken to get a human pelvis (left) from an Australopithecine pelvis (right)?

Show your work please.

I was once told by a creationist computer tech that it must be 1 million! He could not explain why, he just "knew" it.
And yet... We actually know that a single mutation can produce this kind of pelvis:

from normal human phenotype parent... so, I'm thinking a million is maybe ~999,990 too many...

 

[exchemist]

3 months and not a single creationist could put their money where their mouths are...

Not surprising in the least. The Creos, in my experience, always want to choose the ground to fight on for themselves, and thereby make the scientists dance around doing the explaining. Often, they've just read some argument somewhere and want to try it out. Few of them can really string together a whole argument from someone else's starting point.