Budikka666
2009-03-28 15:36:02 UTC
Ed Yong at www.scienceblogs.com/notrocketscience
http://tinyurl.com/d4l4yr
blogs on peer-reviewed research regarding plant evolution. His
opening paragraph is devastating to creationist claims:
"Sixty-five million years ago, life on Earth was sorely tested.
One or more catastrophic events including a massive asteroid strike
and increased volcanic activity, created wildfires on a global scale
and dust clouds that cut the planet's surface off from the sun's vital
light. The majority of animal species went extinct including, most
famously, the dinosaurs. The fate of the planet's plants is less
familiar, but 60% of those also perished. What separated the survivors
from the deceased? How did some species cross this so-called 'K/T
boundary'?"
If, as the young-Earth creationists insist, the Earth is only 6,000 to
10,000 years old (not that they have any scientific support for this
claim), and humans have been on the planet since the very first week,
how come the Bible writers never noticed this massive asteroid strike
which affected the whole globe for some considerable time and killed
off the majority of living things?
So how does this fit into the Theory of Evolution? Well, read on:
"Jeffrey Fawcett form the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology
thinks that the answer lies in their genomes and specifically how many
copies they have. Geneticists have found that the majority of plants
have duplicated their entire portfolio of genetic material at some
point in their evolution. They are called "polyploids" - species with
multiple copies of the same genome.
"By dating these doublings, Fawcett had found that the most
recent of them cluster at a specific point in geological time - 65
million years ago, at the K/T boundary. It suggests that having extra
copies of their genomes on hand gave these plants the edge they needed
to cope with the dramatic environmental changes that wiped out the
dinosaurs and other less well-endowed species."
Many plants, including, apparently, the bulk of survivors of that
asteroid, have doubled their entire genome - some more than once.
Why would a perfect designer, who had all eternity in which to work
and infinite resources at his command, need to duplicate everything if
his design was perfect? If it wasn't perfect, how did a perfect god
ever end up designing something which was so substandard to begin
with?
If this duplication was a design feature, how come it was pretty much
only in plants, and then not even all of those? Most living things do
not duplicate their genome, but in plants - modern plants, it's quite
common.
Evolutionist have no problem with this. An organism with a duplicated
gene is at an advantage, because mutations can play havoc with the
duplicate without comprising the organism's survival chances. The
extra gene can be re-tasked and as scientists have shown, these
duplications and mutations to the extra copy can provide organisms
with new genes which convey survival and reproductive advantages upon
their owner.
Curious, isn't it, that when it comes to evolution, everything ties
together, but when it comes to creation, nothing fits? Whilst the
evolutionists are regularly providing ever more evidence for
evolution, all the creationists appear able to do is bitch, and whine,
and moan, and complain. Never do they offer any positive scientific
evidence, as their responses in this thread will doubtlessly prove, if
their previous track record is anything to go by
To paraphrase and expand upon what a Christian, Theodosius Dobzhansky,
said: in biology, nothing makes sense except in the light of
evolution. In creationism, nothing makes sense, period.
Budikka
http://tinyurl.com/d4l4yr
blogs on peer-reviewed research regarding plant evolution. His
opening paragraph is devastating to creationist claims:
"Sixty-five million years ago, life on Earth was sorely tested.
One or more catastrophic events including a massive asteroid strike
and increased volcanic activity, created wildfires on a global scale
and dust clouds that cut the planet's surface off from the sun's vital
light. The majority of animal species went extinct including, most
famously, the dinosaurs. The fate of the planet's plants is less
familiar, but 60% of those also perished. What separated the survivors
from the deceased? How did some species cross this so-called 'K/T
boundary'?"
If, as the young-Earth creationists insist, the Earth is only 6,000 to
10,000 years old (not that they have any scientific support for this
claim), and humans have been on the planet since the very first week,
how come the Bible writers never noticed this massive asteroid strike
which affected the whole globe for some considerable time and killed
off the majority of living things?
So how does this fit into the Theory of Evolution? Well, read on:
"Jeffrey Fawcett form the Flanders Institute for Biotechnology
thinks that the answer lies in their genomes and specifically how many
copies they have. Geneticists have found that the majority of plants
have duplicated their entire portfolio of genetic material at some
point in their evolution. They are called "polyploids" - species with
multiple copies of the same genome.
"By dating these doublings, Fawcett had found that the most
recent of them cluster at a specific point in geological time - 65
million years ago, at the K/T boundary. It suggests that having extra
copies of their genomes on hand gave these plants the edge they needed
to cope with the dramatic environmental changes that wiped out the
dinosaurs and other less well-endowed species."
Many plants, including, apparently, the bulk of survivors of that
asteroid, have doubled their entire genome - some more than once.
Why would a perfect designer, who had all eternity in which to work
and infinite resources at his command, need to duplicate everything if
his design was perfect? If it wasn't perfect, how did a perfect god
ever end up designing something which was so substandard to begin
with?
If this duplication was a design feature, how come it was pretty much
only in plants, and then not even all of those? Most living things do
not duplicate their genome, but in plants - modern plants, it's quite
common.
Evolutionist have no problem with this. An organism with a duplicated
gene is at an advantage, because mutations can play havoc with the
duplicate without comprising the organism's survival chances. The
extra gene can be re-tasked and as scientists have shown, these
duplications and mutations to the extra copy can provide organisms
with new genes which convey survival and reproductive advantages upon
their owner.
Curious, isn't it, that when it comes to evolution, everything ties
together, but when it comes to creation, nothing fits? Whilst the
evolutionists are regularly providing ever more evidence for
evolution, all the creationists appear able to do is bitch, and whine,
and moan, and complain. Never do they offer any positive scientific
evidence, as their responses in this thread will doubtlessly prove, if
their previous track record is anything to go by
To paraphrase and expand upon what a Christian, Theodosius Dobzhansky,
said: in biology, nothing makes sense except in the light of
evolution. In creationism, nothing makes sense, period.
Budikka