Richiyaado

I think this is just an attempt at misdirection. An inattentive reader might leave believing that human and chimpanzee genomes are only 1%-3% homologous. As theyeti points out, the entire genome must be considered, but the writer doesn't want to come out and say the two genomes are 97% -98% homologous. The bit about functional DNA is the misdirection.

BTW, I think I understand now. I am mostly... a watermelon! I've long wondered why I spontaneously start spitting out seeds from time to time, often in the most inappropriate situations.

mibby529

It's a good question: What kind of intelligent designer would give us:

1) an appendix
2) a coccyx
3) a hymen
4) junk DNA
5) a little toe

I'm sure others can think other vestigial organs. But it all indicates that any "designer" would be incompetent.

And there are so many other things he could've done but didn't do. He could've given us the ability to change sex like certain lizards, or reproduce both asexually (which is what I'm guessing he wanted Adam to do) and sexually. He could've given us chloroplasts, thus ending world hunger.

lpetrich

It would be difficult to live off of photosynthesis, since light would penetrate only 1 mm or so into the skin, meaning that one would have to have the body architecture of a plant.

Failing that, one could have improved biosynthesis capabilities, and be able to make all one's biological molecules from simple organic ones, as many bacteria can.

Thus, one would no longer need vitamins or "essential" amino acids or "essential" fatty acids -- all of these would be made by our bodies.

One could live off of whisky, for example, with one's carbon and energy coming from the alcohol and nitrogen, sulfur, and the various minerals coming from the stuff that gives whisky its color.

Doubting Didymus

Gee! I'm starting to wish I had been more intelligently designed.

Albion

That's what I thought. It isn't an actual misstatement, it gives them plausible deniability if people read it the way the writer hopes they'll read it, but it's certainly an attempt at misdirection.

Richiyaado

Jonathan Wells is a master at this sort of misdirection. His whole book is an artful skein of skillful quote-mining, highly selective omission and errant hand-waving. So the mystery to me, apart from the fact that he has a religious agenda (Moonie), is that although he himself must have a reasonably good idea of what the actual evidence for evolution is, he's deliberately building a case that he knows will lead less knowledgeable people astray.

[ August 20, 2002: Message edited by: Richiyaado ]</p>

Albion

He answers to a higher authority, bless him.

Mageth

One could live off of whisky

I tried that. I had to switch to boilermakers for the extra nutrients.

GeoTheo

I heard Gish use the watermelon line in a live debate SUNY Binghamton. It works best in that setting. He won the debate BTW. The guy he was debating looked totally crestfallen at the end. He was under the impression Gish was going to tell Bible stories. He was totally unprepared.
But interestingly enough this snappy one-liner helped convince me of evolution. I was watching "politically Incorrect" which I liked to call "Four liberals and a Conservative" because that is how the deck was usually stacked in these "discussions" though the liberals were usually idiot actors so that made it a little more fair. But Bill Maher had the advantage of a sympathetic audience and he used snappy one-liners to get a crowd response. That gives a big psychological advantage in a debate I think.
But it proves nothing. I remember that this reminded me of somthing. It reminded me of Duane Gish and the fundamentalist packed auditorium.
In my mind no matter is ever settled with snappy one liners and a sympathetic audience. But that's how Gish wins debates. If he had the truth on his side why would he need to resort to that. He wouldn't.

[ August 21, 2002: Message edited by: GeoTheo ]</p>

Camaban

Reasoning no-one like him touches anything online.