The Genetic Code and Universal Common Ancestry

No, I actually know that, I don’t assume it.

What a great discussion we’re having here.

so if a watch is able to reproduce we cant conclude design base on its structure?

if you know that it means that you can prove that. so prove me that you are related to a cat.

@scd is already trying to argue with this paper in the comments section of my blog post about it:


I think this is a much better venue for the discussion, being a discussion forum and all.

@scd

If i came across a watch that was able to reproduce itself… i would conclude it was enchanted!!!

actually scientists have made something similar:

here is my comment to your last response:

as for the time- i agree that it doesnt fit naturally with a young earth (unless we will claim for higher mutation rate in the past). but it will be possible with an old one.

as for the second claim: there are many cases of convergent evolution at the molecular level. even if we are dealing with traits that are suppose to be morphology- neutral (mitochondrial proteins):

so i think that they are not morphology neutral after all (it also happened in 2 similar species).

I’ll put this comment under my blog post with a link to this post, since this is a better forum.

It would be “possible” in an old earth scenario with a few single comparisons, not on multiple taxonomic levels as the paper points out. The crux of the conversation is this second part.

Yes, molecular convergence exists, although cases like this are pretty rare. However, it’s still true that those mitochondrial genes are “morphology-neutral” - the hypothesised shared adaptive pressures that led to convergence in this case would be metabolic, not morphological. That should be obvious anyway: snakes are quite morphologically distinct from agamids. It’s also clear that this is a case of convergent evolution, not likely to be the result of some kind of design plan. The paper shows that 4-fold degenerate sites, those least susceptible to selective pressures, are not convergent between the 2 groups, and instead support the expected phylogeny. This is a key signature of molecular convergence: the neutral sites fit the expected phylogeny while the adaptive sites do not.

It would be interesting to see how a case like this would look after being analysed using the method in White et al.'s paper. The prediction from the traditional phylogeny, common descent, and convergent evolution is quite simple: as you go further back in time (to a point), the snake and agamid sequences should diverge instead of converging. At the same time, the agamid sequences should converge with the iguanid lizards. Want a challenge @Rumraket?

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if it can happen in several lineages why it cant happen in more?

isnt metabolic process can also be effected by morphology? for instance: isnt it logical to colclude that a metabolic process should be more similar between 2 mammals then between a mammal and a reptile?

You’re confusing a metabolic process (as in the chain of reactions being catalyzed) with the genetic sequence encoding a metabolic enzyme (the catalysts). So no.

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if the metabolic process is similar the sequence should be similar too in general.

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No, that’s just plain wrong.

Observing the pattern at multiple different taxonomic levels is qualitatively different from single comparisons, not just quantitative.

They will sometimes be broadly correlated, but I don’t think morphology is a particularly good predictor of metabolism, or vice versa. The example you cited is actually a good example of this: agamids are morphologically more similar to the iguanids, and yet may have some metabolic process that are more similar to snakes.

If a watch reproduces then we have to consider evolution as possible mechanism.

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May I asking a question about this very interesting idea? I am afraid you will not understand it because my world view is unknown and never imagined before. Seeding of Earth with a diverse population could be the result of a common ancestor that have this genetic code, but the common ancestor was not at Earth surface. It was the final result of cosmological evolution, so, an astronomical system, attacked by entropy, having its body and code fragmented into bits-information. We know that a creature is identical to its parents because the chromosome is enclosed inside a membrane, we never thought what happens if the genes are splitted, separated, and falls at a planet’s surface. The tendency of these genes-bits-information would be to search and to connect with their antique pairs, and in the same sequence of prior neighborhood. If these bits were photons, entering electrons of terrestrial atoms and driving these atoms to make these connections, the final result would be lots of different packages of non-complete genetic codes generating diversity, but it was the same code for all. Then, this guy was ot intelligent, ut it could do it without knowing what was doing, merely by natural genetic reproductive process.
Do you know? Please apply comparative anatomy between this galaxy and the first cell system and you will find the lost evolutionary link showing that there is a unique universal evolution, no two different evolution. But when you find LUCA you will see that his all body has the same shape and configuration of our genetic code.
Few words for something so different I know, you will not understand the whole picture. But I am trying… it is a unique opportunity to investigate what other people think about. Cheers,…

You say this, but then you also make statements indicating it’s clear you are interested in the ontological nature of the designer, and have even already made several assumptions about the ontological nature of the designer.

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By “ontological nature of the designer”, I mean pertaining to the “true nature” of the designer, as opposed to methodological assumptions about the designer.

To reuse the example I referred to in the post you’re quoting, under the shell model of the atom, one can make detailed statements about the number of shells of a given atom, the number of electrons in each shell, and the energy required to bring an electron from one shell to another, without being comitted to the claim that atoms actually have shells (i.e. the ontological nature of the shell model of the atom).

Or, to use another example closer to home, one can explain the moves of chess computer Deep Blue in its 1997 match against Garry Kasparov with reference to concepts like “intentionality” and “strategy” without comitting oneself to the ontological claim that Deep Blue was aware that it was playing chess.

In saying that I’m not interested in the ontological nature of the designers, I’m not saying I can’t make certain methodological assumptions about them, merely that I’m not comitting myself to the claim that those methodological assumptions correspond to the ontological “true nature” of the designers.

I don’t see how that makes any difference. In the cases I quoted, you’re making clear ontological assumptions about the true nature of the designer.

How about you just put forward a scientific theory of ID creationism, explain how it can be validated or falsified, and demonstrate how it is validated through successful predictions and persistent resistance to falsification?

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But start codons are not analogous.

Wouldn’t the use of analogous start codons make just as much sense? How do you explain their senseless (in the context of design) absence? The evidence and evolutionary theory do so.

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