In their ability to minimize the consequences of frameshift mutations, which is what Geyer and Mamlouk’s study was about? No.
After putting my sleeping infant son down, I usually leave the room with cat-like carefulness. That doesn’t make me into a cat.
I’m not talking about any study, Krauze, just high-school biology.
What’s the difference, mechanistically, between stop and start codons?
I’m sure you’re just dying to tell me.
No, I’m interested in seeing if you know high-school biology and are interested in testing predictions of your hypothesis. 
Assume I flunked it. Teach me, oh wise one.
Stop codons allow any protein to end with any residue. Do start codons allow any protein to begin with any residue?
Are you asking me because you don’t know? I just told you, assume I flunked high school biology.
No. I’m showing that you haven’t looked at translation, the thing you’re claiming to focus on, in any depth.
What does a start codon do?
How can you claim to see design if you’re clueless about high-school biology?
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You’re more than welcome to make that argument. I’m not up for playing Twenty Questions, though.
The forum software has just reminded me that this is my third reply to you in a row. So I’m going to give this part of the discussion a rest.
Just click “esc.”
Are you giving it a rest because you are seeing my point?
There haven’t been 20 questions. There’s just one:
Is the start of translation intelligently designed in the same way that you claimed that stopping was, or is it not intelligently designed by the very same standard you endorsed?
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We also infer non-human design all the time too. That also does not put you in the camp. We do not, and have never, inferred divine design.
Can you elaborate on this?
Neither do I.
Well, first, the optimality of the standard code would follow from its gradual assembly by adding amino acids. Add a similar amino acid, divide up the codons for the previous one. Or perhaps the current code evolves from a prior 2-base code during the addition of more amino acids.
Second, why should we find precursors of the current code in living organisms under the standard scenario?
Third, why does ID make either of your predictions? You haven’t really justified them.
Yes. In order to distinguish ID from natural evolution, you have to find something expected under ID but expected not to happen under natural evolution. That’s how science works. It isn’t evidence for ID unless it’s evidence against the alternative.
It would be better if your specifications were explicit rather than implicit.
Excellent. Of course those designers are not god, right? This raises the question of how those designer arose. You should consider that too.
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Animals design things too. We infer creaturely design all the time.
SETI seeks to infer the design of hypothetical creatures. Incidentally, they also have an excellent track record of avoiding false positives (unlike ID).
We do not infer divine design because God is not susceptible to scientific inquiry.
Conventional evolutionary biology does not predict optimality. Just consider the panda’s pseudo-thumb or the giraffe’s recurrent laryngeal nerve, where a suboptimal solution was locked in early. Similarly, conventional evolutionary biology would be fine with a “frozen accident” perspective on the genetic code.
Intelligent designers, unlike the blind watchmaker of evolution, can act with foresight and choose the optimal solution. Therefore, my design conjecture leads me to expect that the first life was characterized by what can be termed “good engineering principles”. If the standard genetic code had turned out to be random, no better at minimizing errors than the next code, my conjecture would have a hard time getting off the ground. Furthermore, if further investigations into the error-minimizing properties of the code revealed “scars of history”, features that required a historical explanation, my views would be in trouble.
Conventional evolutionary biology does not predict that no precursors to the standard code should be found. As we have seen, the conventional view is fine whether the code is a frozen accident that was locked in at the beginning, or if life slogged through fitness space, looking for the optimal genetic code. If, among the millions of microbial species that are waiting to be discovered, precursors to the standard genetic code should be found, conventional evolutionary biology would have no problem.
My view, on the other hand, would be in trouble. If precursors to the code existed, the first life couldn’t have used the standard code. Especially if the precursor codes turned out to be suboptimal to the standard code. This would make it more likely that geochemistry and natural selection, not intelligent design, was behind the code.
Conventional evolutionary biology can adapt to multiple, mutually incompatible scenarios. For that reason alone, it would be a fool’s errand to base any model of intelligent design on finding things that “evolution can’t explain”.
Of course, if I were to go on such a fool’s errand, critics like yourself would criticize me for making a negative, anti-evolutionary argument.
I much prefer a different approach, inspired by Popper: Take my hunch and start fleshing out what I would expect to find if it was true. Adopt a systematic approach to analyzing data. Pursue avenues of research where my views give me firm expectations, while conventional evolutionary biology is silent or expects the opposite. Gradually build my case, or abondon the project if auxillary hypotheses are constantly required to save it from falsification.
I don’t have to. As @swamidass has just reminded us, SETI is based on the assumption that non-human intelligent design can be inferred without having to explain the origin of the designers.
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Depends on what you mean by “optimality”. Is it the best of all possible codes, or is it just a pretty good code compared to a randomly chosen code? Evolutionary biology would predict a better than average code.
Anyway, I don’t think you’ve thought through your own scenario. Were the seeded organisms designed from scratch? If the designers are organic beings from a word with life, why would they reinvent the wheel? They would just tweak existing microorganisms, keeping the code that’s already working for them.
But generally, they choose the solution that’s good enough, considering effort and expense. I submit that your designers would keep whatever code their life already had. Less trouble, less possibility of disaster in re-using an already-tested format.
It has been claimed that a former 2-base code can explain some features of the code we see. Would that be a “scar of history”?
It does if the precursors are suboptimal. Selection would dispose of them if they’re competing with standard-code organisms.
Not that I like Popper all that much, but I think you’re misconstruing him. Popper would want you to flesh out what you would expect to find if it was true but not if the alternative were true. “Silent” isn’t good enough. You need “expects the opposite”.
All fine when you aren’t talking about the origin of life. In your case, though, you’re merely transferring the problem to another planet. And as I mentioned above, the designers would most likely have used their own genetic code, so you haven’t even explained its optimality.
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Krause, that’s precisely what I’m getting at and you’re running away from.
What’s the difference between start and stop codons? You agreed that being able to end a protein with any residue is an intelligent design feature.
How does the start codon work? Can any residue be used to start a protein?
I don’t see that you are doing anything of the sort.
I don’t see you as willing to do that.
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Not true. SETI always tries to infer origin of designers.
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