ODDS AGAINST EVOLUTION (You listenin', t.o.?)

"Ross Langerak" wrote:

Jack has a point here. The formation of amino and nucleic acids is
determined by the laws of chemistry, and was demonstrated by the
Urey-Miller experiment. But as far as I know, the order that nucleic
acids can be strung together to form RNA is not determined by any laws
of chemistry. One sequence is just as valid as any other.


Well, not really. This is where *selection* comes in. Some are more
stable than others, and last longer. Some catalyze various reactions,
including RNA polymerization. These variants are *not* equal.
The peace of God be with you.

Stanley Friesen

Jack Crenshaw wrote:
Mike Painter wrote:
snip
It should be noted that Hoyle was an astronomer (and fair sci-fi writer).
I'm not sure what Wickramasinghe was but neither were biologists.

Though Fred Hoyle was almost certainly wrong more than once in his
career, it was still
an illustrious one -- surely moreso than yours or mine. It was Hoyle
who worked out the
mechanism for the production of heavier elements inside supernovae:

So? How does this make him qualified to speak on *biology*? *Every*
time I have heard him speak on biology he has been wrong. His "ideas"
about _Archaeopteryx_ were totally uninformed, for instance.

I wouldn't discount his knowledge so quickly.


I would - nucleosynthesis in stars has *nothing* to do with abiogenesis,
except in the trivial sense that it supplied the elements involved.

Before I listen to his ideas on biology he has to demonstrate knowledge
of *biology*.
The peace of God be with you.

Stanley Friesen

In talk.origins, "Ross Langerak" wrote in
. net:

....

Some creationists like to use hemoglobin as an example of something
that could not evolve by chance. They typically make the same error
that Hoyle and Wickramasinghe did, in that they calculate the odds
against a particular sequence of residues occurring, rather than the
odds against producing a protein or enzymes with the desired
characteristics. I am not familiar with any enzymes, so I used
hemoglobin as an example instead. Presumably, the results would be
similar.

I recall hearing, maybe on NPR's Science Friday, that there are
hemoglobin substitutes in development and that they are dramatically
smaller molecules. Does anyone have any useful details or a
recommendation about where to read about it?

"David Jensen" schrieb im Newsbeitrag ...
In talk.origins, "Ross Langerak" wrote in
. net:

...

Some creationists like to use hemoglobin as an example of something
that could not evolve by chance. They typically make the same error
that Hoyle and Wickramasinghe did, in that they calculate the odds
against a particular sequence of residues occurring, rather than the
odds against producing a protein or enzymes with the desired
characteristics. I am not familiar with any enzymes, so I used
hemoglobin as an example instead. Presumably, the results would be
similar.

I recall hearing, maybe on NPR's Science Friday, that there are
hemoglobin substitutes in development and that they are dramatically
smaller molecules. Does anyone have any useful details or a
recommendation about where to read about it?
Besides, there are lots of organisms that don't use hemoglobin.

Greetings!
Volker

"Stanley Friesen" wrote in message
...
"Ross Langerak" wrote:

Jack has a point here. The formation of amino and nucleic acids is
determined by the laws of chemistry, and was demonstrated by the
Urey-Miller experiment. But as far as I know, the order that
nucleic
acids can be strung together to form RNA is not determined by any
laws
of chemistry. One sequence is just as valid as any other.


Well, not really. This is where *selection* comes in. Some are
more
stable than others, and last longer. Some catalyze various
reactions,
including RNA polymerization. These variants are *not* equal.

I had considered that, but I didn't see how that would help, as the
likelyhood that a stable chain of nucleotides would be able to
self-replicate isn't any more likely than an unstable chain. Are you
suggesting that there are only a few stable chains, and that one of
them just happens to self-replicate?

"Volker Hetzer" wrote in message
...

"David Jensen" schrieb im Newsbeitrag
...
In talk.origins, "Ross Langerak" wrote
in
. net:

...

Some creationists like to use hemoglobin as an example of
something
that could not evolve by chance. They typically make the same
error
that Hoyle and Wickramasinghe did, in that they calculate the
odds
against a particular sequence of residues occurring, rather than
the
odds against producing a protein or enzymes with the desired
characteristics. I am not familiar with any enzymes, so I used
hemoglobin as an example instead. Presumably, the results would
be
similar.

I recall hearing, maybe on NPR's Science Friday, that there are
hemoglobin substitutes in development and that they are
dramatically
smaller molecules. Does anyone have any useful details or a
recommendation about where to read about it?

Besides, there are lots of organisms that don't use hemoglobin.

Obvious examples would be plants, and single-celled and small
multicelled organisms that allow oxygen to diffuse through their
bodies. But, can you provide an example of a larger organism that
transports oxygen by some means other than hemoglobin? Do insects
actually tranport oxygen, or do they just let it diffuse into and out
of their bodily fluids?

(dave e) wrote in message om...
(Pavil Natanovich) wrote in message . com...

The real question is: What is the complexity of a simple molecule --
simple enough to form spontaneously,
complex enough to be self-reproducing -- constructing itself through
random chance?

Self replicating RNA molecules have arisen via natural means in the
lab.

Not that I doubt you, but please cite the reference. I am interested
to know if there were any limitations to this claim (say, only 12
ribonucleotides faithfully replicated, or the like).

Dave

http://www.astrobiology.com/asc2002/....html?ascid=21

http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/People/ka...-peptides.html

http://nai.arc.nasa.gov/news_stories...rint.cfm?ID=81

I may have mispoken. RNA has been produced, and self replicating RNA
has been produced, but we apparently have not quite bridged the gap
between these yet. Of course, even then, there is still a very long
way to go from RNA to cellular organisms, and from single celled
organisms to multicelled creatures.

Jack Crenshaw wrote in message ...
Pavil Natanovich wrote:

Jack Crenshaw wrote in message ...
Ok, here's the problem with your mathematics. Say -- just for
argument's sake -- that Hoyle and
Wickramasinghe got it right, and the odds against life arising
spontaneously really are 10^(10,000).

Your argument goes: but there's 6 billion people on earth. Let's
include all people who ever lived,
and make it 10^10 people. Now the odds drop "dramatically," to 10^9990.

Same with your other points. Take off "several orders of magnitude."
How many is that? 10? 20?

Ok, now we're down to 10^9970 against.

I guess you can see how this is going to go. Use up all the possible
alternative DNA sequences you
mention, and all the ones no one has thought of yet, and you're still
not going to make much of a dent
in that enormous number.

The number of people have absolutely nothing to do with the number of
potential possible combinations. For that matter, neither do the
number of organisms that have ever lived, which incidentally is
enormous. Count all the bacteria that have ever existed, over the
course of the last several billion years.

The problem is that the 10^9970 number is entirely bogus. It
represents nonsense on so many different levels it is difficult to
know where to begin.

Therefore, you choose not to?

I did not think it was necessary to belabor the obvious.

First let us examine the assumptions. When we look at a chain of
events from the end, the final product of probabilities becomes
vanishingly small. To reduce the likelihood of any event all that is
necessary is multiplying the independent probabilities of yet more
events in the chain.

At the beginning there is no chain. There are only branching
possibilties, and it is impossible to know what will be the final
result. As a simple illustration, suppose we flip a fair coin, and
limit the outcome to one of two states: H or T. If we decide to flip
the coin twice in succession there are four possible outcomes. If we
remove some restrictions the number of outcomes increases.

We don't have a good idea what the restrictions are on evolution. We
have no idea how the first organisms formed. How can someone assign
probabilities based on ignorance? When flipping a coin, what percent
of the time does the coin fall on an uneven surface where it is
difficult to determine which side is up? I've played many games
spoiled by arguments over the state of the chance cubes.

What is the probability you flip an coin and lose it, or flip it and
it rolls into a pile of other indistinguishable coins?

Select a DNA molecule. How many atoms does it contain? Suppose we
arrange these in a line, and substitute any random element from the
periodic table (roughly 92 naturally occurring elements). The odds of
creating that one specific DNA molecule using this obscenely stupid
process is probably less than 10^10000.

Better would be to limit the choice of elements to those forming A, T,
G, & C bases. But that is still nothing like how it probably happened
originally.

Of course, one DNA molecule is not life. But it would be just as
stupid to use the same type of logic to calculate the odds of a water
molecule spontaneously forming. Water is H2O. The odds against this
particular molecule forming are 92^3, or a little under 10^6. On the
other hand, water forms spontaneously when oxygen and hydrogen
combine. How easy is that?

In an environment that favors the natural synthesis of complex
molecules, the probability of life forming might easily approach 1.
Since know neither how it happened or what combinations viable, it
seems a stretch to assign probabilities.

The real question is: What is the complexity of a simple molecule --
simple enough to form spontaneously,
complex enough to be self-reproducing -- constructing itself through
random chance?

Self replicating RNA molecules have arisen via natural means in the
lab.

Citation?

Jack

I misspoke. RNA has been synthesized. Self replicating RNA has also
been synthesized, but not apparently not yet from plausbible prebiotic
conditions.

http://www.santafe.edu/sfi/publicati...ract/199811098

http://www.emc.maricopa.edu/faculty/...okPROTSYn.html

In our last episode, "Ross Langerak" wrote:
... But, can you provide an example of a larger organism that
transports oxygen by some means other than hemoglobin? ...

Easy. Just Google up the word "hemocyanin". One example: the
octopus.


--
Mark Meyer

(Nick Keighley) wrote in
:

"Ross Langerak" wrote in message
link.net...

There are about 6 million humans on the Earth today

where'd all the others go?!


Apparantly the rapture was a *lot* less exclusive than it's promoters had
thought.