Roma

I recently starting debating via AIM and e-mail with a high school buddy about the merits of creaton vs. evolution. Using critical thinking skills I've picked up through internet articles, as well as the wealth of information I've read (especially at IIDB), I've been able to debunk his arguments pretty quickly. For instance, he used "the sun is shrinking, it would have once engulfed the earth" and the "tornado in a junkyard" thing, to name a few.

However, he just sent me this link: Scientis Speak About Mutations

Since I don't have an educational background in the biological sciences, I have trouble refuting arguments that are filled with quotes from trained scientists. Let me make it clear that I realize this list of quotes likely does little, if anything, to hamper the evolutionary theory. I'm just wondering what the best way to respond to this "argument" is?

Thanks,
Roma

KnightWhoSaysNi

Never trust a creationist who quotes scientists to make it look they support his/her viewpoint. More than likely, they're taken out of context.

If you have access to a reference listed on the website, pick it up and look up the quote. Reading the overall context in which the context is based. Show your creationist friend a sample of a quote, and then show him the overall context (a paragraph or two) to reveal the creationist misquote.

Lobstrosity

Have you noticed how nearly all of these quotes are more than half-a-century old? First of all, tell your friend that biology has advanced quite a bit since the 1950s! For example, the quote that:

is hardly impressive. Today scientists can demonstrate evolution using computer simulations, but it's really not surprising (nor is it evidence against evolution) that Nilsson couldn't do it in 1953.

This is all smoke and mirrors. It isn't evidence that mutations can't produce the evolution postulated by Darwin. First of all, each gene might mutate once every 100,000 generations (if this information is actually correct), but humans, for example, have around 50,000 genes (give or take). One can then very roughly estimate that approximately half of all humans have at least one gene that has mutated from the previous generation. That's a couple billion new mutants every generation.

Now, let's consider how much genetic variation is actually required for one species to evolve into a new species. Chimp DNA is 97 - 99% identical to human DNA. Obviously, not much has to change, which means that even though mutations may not happen very often, you don't need a lot of them. So what if the human genome might remain stable for 2.5 million years? No one's saying that evolution happens instantly; it's proposed to be a gradual process of constant adaptation over time.

I would say this is partially accurate. Most mutations can probably be considered neutral in that they have no significant impact on survival one way or the other. As I said, it's almost a given that you have a recently mutated gene (i.e. mutated somewhere over the last five to ten generations) somewhere in your genome. The chance that a mutation is beneficial is low, but it's certainly not zero. Humans aren't ideal machines. We're not constructed perfectly where every aspect of human DNA has one vital function that must not be altered on penalty of death. There is actually a lot of room for play, and because we're certainly not ideally constructed, some of that play will be considered an improvement.

Finally, It should be obvious that beneficial mutations are possible. They happen all the time in single-celled organisms. It can be conclusively shown in the lab that bacteria can evolve to survive certain antibiotics. Such evolution is driven only by mutations.

This is just narrow-minded bull. For some reason creationists can't see evolution as development over time. They start to challenge you to answer how a given animal in existence today could have evolved one of its features, as if it's fair to say "take animal A minus feature X and tell me how A evolved X." Yeah, it doesn't work that way. The features you see today didn't need to all evolve simultaneously but rather could quite reasonably have evolved sequentially over very long periods of time.

acidphos

Well for starters I noticed that virtually every quote on the page your friend sent you at least 40 years old.

However... on the upside for you is that your friend managed to pin himself into quite a predicament-

Ask him roughly how many generations humans have had. Then bring up genes with a handful of SNPs, like ITR (J Hum Genet 2003;48(4):170-2). Get whatever contorted reasoning you can, maybe you can get him to concede that there have been 22,000,000 human generations. Then hit him with Genomics 2002 May;79(5):635-56 that details the discovery of 11,533 SNPs within a 15 MB sequence on chromosome 13q.

Best case- it will cause him to doubt his sources.

Jan Haugland

The argument that page makes, with some creative quoting, is illusory.

Yes, mutations are rare, luckily. But they aren't too rare; I seem to remember that we all should have on average 2-8 mutations each (from memory). There are millions of mutations at any given time in any sizeable population.

That most mutations are harmful is irrelevant. One harmful mutation will only harm the individual who has it. One benefitial mutation can spread through the gene pool and affect an entire ecosystem after a few generations.


- Jan

...who rants and raves every day at Secular Blasphemy

Mageth

This page on takorigins covers a bit on the mutation claims of that website, though not very thoroughly IMO.

This talkorigins page covers one of the Muller quotes from the page, and illustrates how it's inaccurate, misleading and out-of-date.

The Lone Ranger

Can you say "quote mining"?

Seriously, it should raise enormous red flags when pretty-much all of the quotes are 30, 40, 50 or more years old.

Of course, just because someone says something doesn't make it true. Where's the evidence?

****

Anyway, let's have a look.


False.
First of all, "trans-species changes" seems like a deliberate attempt at misdirection. What they're saying is that a single mutation cannot cause a speciation event. A single point mutation probably can't, but that's irrelevant.

Evolution is changes in allele frequencies within a population over time. Mutations most certainly do cause this to occur. Indeed, mutation is the ultimate source of all new alleles. Once an allele arises in a population, its frequency can and will change due to selection and/or drift.

To say that "mutations cannot produce evolutionary change" is to betray complete ignorance of population genetics.




Again, this is misleading at best. It's not as if evolution typically occurs by a mother of one species giving birth to a "mutant" who's an entirely different species.




Really? Perhaps they're unaware of the Flavobacterium which, due to a frame shift mutation, can digest nylon. Some examples of beneficial mutations -- including in humans -- are listed here and here. Also, see Elena, S. F., V. S. Cooper, and R. E. Lenski. 1996. Punctuated evolution caused by selection of rare beneficial mutations. Science. 272(5269):1802-1804.

It's also worth keeping in mind that an allele which is beneficial in one environment might well be deleterious in another. The mutation which causes sickle-cell anemia is deleterious if malaria isn't present where you live, but it can be beneficial (at least, relatively so) if you live where malaria is prevalent and don't have access to antimalarial drugs.




And this doesn't raise a huge red flag in your friend's mind? Why would committed "evolutionists" be going around saying that evolution can't occur? I don't have time to read and look up all of the quotes to see what the context is, unfortunately. This is probably the point; Creationists often "argue" this way, by throwing out lots of misleading, out-of-context, and outright false quotations, counting on the fact that few people will have the time or resources to look them up and read them in the original.

In any event, many of the quotes are clearly taken out of context, and presenting them this way is therefore quite dishonest, since it's a clear attempt to misrepresent the original author's views. For example, consider this Ayala quote: "Although mutations is [sic] the ultimate source of all genetic variation, it is a relatively rare event."

Relatively rare. Clearly, the quote-miner means for you to think that this means mutations almost never occur. But, out of context, "relatively rare" could mean just about anything. If a thing is expected to happen 1,000,000 times a second, yet is observed to occur only 500,000 times a second, it's relatively rare.

***

Feh. The whole thing is just quote mining. It's blatantly dishonest, but that's what one has come to expect from the Creationists, sadly.

Good luck,

Michael

Azathoth

It really bothers me when Creationists do this.It's not a case of presenting honest facts and letting the reader come to their own conclusion,they are only concerned with making sure the reader thinks the way they want them to.

The thing that really astounds me,is that if they're mining the quotes,they know what was originally said,and they know the proofs they give,or the assertions they make about the stance of a particular scientist are false.

They know what they're saying is isn't true,and they continue to do it anyway,as proof of the Creation theory that they believe in.The cognative dissonance some of these guys go through must be astounding.

johngalt

I'm willing to bet that your creationist friend took the quote out of context.

NZAmoeba

You guys are forgetting another major factor in evolution, climate change.

Its not just random mutations, that would make evolution an even slower process than it is now, but when an area undergo's a change, like a dissapearing rainforest, decreasing temp etc etc, some of those neutral mutations can instantly become quite benefitial ones.

The creationist's bogus page doesn't seem to acknowledge that climate change happens at all...



But yeah, the single greatest argument against a creationist is showing how bacteria can form immunities to anti-biotics, a whole bunch die, some survive, the survivors breed, and the offspring are immune without ever having seen that anti-biotic before. All in front of your eyes! It may be a slow process for large animals, but certainly not for the microscopic world.