theyeti

Technically speaking, the phrase "genetic code" refers to the nucleotide codons in an mRNA that code for specific amino acids. (64 codons, 20 amino acids.) This is what determines which protein a given strand of mRNA will make. The code was solved back in the 1960s.

Popular news outlets talk about the "genetic code" all the time when what they really mean is the genome sequence. The genome is of course the sum total of DNA residing in a cell, which uses the genetic code to make proteins, among other things. This is something different entirely, but of course you can think of a genome as a "code" to make a fully grown living thing, so it's easy to see where the confusion comes from. However, it's more accurate in this case to say that the genome's sequence was solved, because the genetic code was solved a long time ago.

theyeti

theyeti

I can just see creationists making a deal about this because it provides a function for junk DNA. However, the highly conserved non-coding portions make up only about 3% of the genome, leaving >90% with no known function. Furthermore, these regions have hypothesized functions only because they're highly conserved, which relies on an evolutionary viewpoint. A creationist would have no reason to posit a function for these regions, other than perhaps because he thinks that all genetic material must be functional.

If creationists/IDists want to claim that the genome "looks" designed, they need to find a function for all of it, not just little bits and pieces here and there, which everyone expected would be found to be functional. And this ignores the fact that we know how many genetic tid bits originate -- like retrotransposons, microsatellites, and processed pseudogenes -- and given how they come about, there is good reason to expect that the majority of them have no function. So if the creationist insists that these sequences are functional, then he's admitting that new information can be created from random processes. The creationist is screwed either way.

theyeti

MrDarwin

I'm not so sure that they do. My computer was designed, and it has an awful lot of useless junk on it! Some of the "junk" may well prove to be useful in the future, even though it's not doing anything right now; some of it would be useful if I took the time to find out about it; much of it I will probably never use. But there is definitely a lot of stuff that counts as "junk", like old files, cookies, etc. that are absolutely useless, and only remain because I'm too lazy to clean them out periodically, and they don't substantially harm my computer.

Writer@Large

Hmmm ... this would explain my love of cheese.

Seriously, though: It's a bit unclear. Is the entire genome being published in NATURE? Or just an article on the publication?

--W@L

theyeti

Sounds like evolution.

So how does this relate to the genome? Would a creationist claim that all of it is useful and that we just haven't found out yet? It's not like no one takes the time to study the genome. And remember, by finding out about many genomic sequences, we've discovered how they came about, which suggests that they don't have a function.

Yeah, but you're not God. At least I hope not.

I guess we can safely say that your hard drive content is not the result of inteligent design.

Remember, the creationists position is that God put these things there on purpose. This is how they get around the "junk DNA" evidence for common ancestry. If they claim that it was inserted separately for a reason, then they can claim that it's not evidence of common descent. But absent a non-evolutionary reason for their existence, things like pseudogenes cannot be explained away as "common design" because they are not the products of design at all. The creationist might then claim that God put them there anyway because he's capricious, but then we can't say that the genome "looks" designed. In fact, if God (or some other space monster) is capricious, then we have no way of recognizing his designs at all.

theyeti

MrDarwin

Which is precisely why the ID'ists assiduously avoid identifying the "designer" as God.

MrDarwin

I guess you didn't see what I posted in <a href="http://iidb.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic&f=44&t=001978&p=5" target="_blank">this discussion</a>.

l-bow

What is the official creationist response to the claim that the human genome contain the gene for a tail? If we don't need a tail, then why would a God insert a gene needed for a tail in a tailess creature (os coccyx, according to creationists, is a device to prevent the gut from falling out and not a vestigial tail).

theyeti

But you know as well as I that they're full of shit. They believe it's God. Sure, it makes them far more slipery to say otherwise, but they have to account for the designer at some point.

Anyway, the same logic applies with any rational designer. If the genome was rationally designed, then things like pseudogenes make no sense. Maybe they weren't designed and are the result of an evolutionary process of some sort, but in that case they're incontrovertible evidence of common ancestry. On the other hand, if the designer is not rational, then there is no way to detect its designs. An irrational designer could have just as easily designed a pile of dog poo, so we can't go around categorizing what is and isn't a sign of design.

IMO, an IDist who accepts common ancestry can reconcile these facts, but a creationist cannot. IMO, this also punctures the but it "looks" designed! argument. It doesn't "look" designed at all, except maybe some of it.

You don't have to "guess" if you're omniscient.

theyeti

WinAce

Hey, you should see just how well they reply to <a href="http://www.christianforums.com/threads/28690.html" target="_blank">humans occasionally born with FULLY FUNCTIONAL tails!</a>

<img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />