The Genetic Code and Universal Common Ancestry

[scd]

what about it? and this is the only thing at the whole code that seems to be non-optimal?

[Mercer (John Mercer)]

@scd

what about it?

The difference between them.

@scd

and this is the only thing at the whole code that seems to be non-optimal?

No, just the most obvious one.

[scd]

@Mercer

No, just the most obvious one.

so if say 90% of the code seems to be optimal and rest isnt. isnt it logical to conclude that we may be wrong about the rest 10%?

[Mercer (John Mercer)]

To date, I haven’t found anything you’ve said to be logical.

[Rumraket (Mikkel R.)]

@scd

so if say 90% of the code seems to be optimal and rest isnt. isnt it logical to conclude that we may be wrong about the rest 10%?

No. We go by the evidence we have, we don’t extrapolate away evidence we don’t like.

[scd]

@Rumraket

No. We go by the evidence we have, we don’t extrapolate away evidence we don’t like.

so even if 99% of the code was seems to be optimal you will say that the code isnt optimal?

[Rumraket (Mikkel R.)]

@scd

so even if 99% of the code was seems to be optimal you will say that the code isnt optimal?

Holy shirt, am I really reading this?

Yes. Deal with the evidence, don’t jump to the conclusion you want. It is so easy to fool yourself in the way you’re arguing for here. Where does this end? What could you not start believing despite having actual evidence against it, just because you can speculate and extrapolate that the evidence against it is wrong?

What you’re advocating is a recipe for endless self-deception and confirmation bias.

[T_aquaticus]

@Krauze

By what logic does the conventional view make these predictions? Have these predictions been published anywhere?

Evolution optimizes systems, so it is expected. You share the same genetic code with your relatives, and this is due to common descent. We observe common descent passing on the same genetic code.

What would you expect to see from evolution and common descent?

[scd]

@T_aquaticus

Evolution optimizes systems, so it is expected.

i dont think that evolution predict an optimal code at all. since evolution doesnt predict a code to be exist in the first place.

[T_aquaticus]

@scd

i dont think that evolution predict an optimal code at all.

Why do you think that?

[scd]

the code by itself is evidence for design since there is a logic between the codons and their amino acids (similar codons codes for the same amino acid).

[scd]

@T_aquaticus

Why do you think that?

evolution doesnt predict a code in the first place (remember darwins time). so of course that it will not predict an optimal code.

[gbrooks9 (GeorgeB)]

@scd

the code by itself is evidence for design since there is a logic between the codons and their amino acids (similar codons codes for the same amino acid).

@scd,

Are you saying that because a galactic cloud of hydrogen gas (virtually empty of any logic or information) can organize itself into a massive fusion reactor … that this is scientific evidence of Intelligent Design?

Or is it merely powerful inspiration for a position of intelligent creation?

[T_aquaticus]

@scd

evolution doesnt predict a code in the first place (remember darwins time). so of course that it will not predict an optimal code.

If there are many possible optimized codes then evolution wouldn’t predict which one would evolve. However, the process of evolution optimizes DNA sequences, so why couldn’t evolution optimize the genes involved in translating RNA into protein? If changes in the genetic code offered some sort of advantage, wouldn’t that be selected for?

[Rumraket (Mikkel R.)]

@scd

i dont think that evolution predict an optimal code at all. since evolution doesnt predict a code to be exist in the first place.

Neither does intelligent design. Where is your intelligent design model, and what mechanism is it that entails a code will be designed? Can I implement this model in a simulation or perform a calculation that shows a code should come to exist if a designer exists?

[scd]

i dont think that design predict a code but as we see evolution doesnt predict it either. on the other hand the design scenario is the best explanation for the existence of the genetic code.

[scd]

im not sure that i understad the question.

[Rumraket (Mikkel R.)]

@scd

i dont think that design predict a code but as we see evolution doesnt predict it either. on the other hand the design scenario is the best explanation for the existence of the genetic code.

Then explain it with your design scenario.

[Krauze]

This thread has long passed 100 replies and the discussion appears to re-tread old ground. I’ll make some scattered comments, and then I’ll let y’all have the last words.

@Rumraket

Right, but that’s a prediction given certain premises . If the standard genetic code evolved gradually by adding amino acids. Of course there’s another hidden premise there about there having been time for such gradual change to occur, that the code didn’t “freeze” all that hard before this happened and so on. So it’s not just a prediction of evolutionary theory, it’s a prediction given certain initial conditions and a number of other assumptions. If you adjust the premises, you get other predictions. So it’s not really true to say conventional evolutionary theory, at least all by itself, predicts any particular level of optimality of the standard genetic code.

Exactly. This is the point I’ve been trying (and failing, apparently) to make. Hypotheses are tested in bundles.

And therefore, it’s unrealistic to demand that intelligent design make predictions that conventional evolutionary biology can’t explain, when conventional evolutionary biology can explain mutually incompatible observations, depending on which auxiliary hypotheses you pair it with.

@John_Harshman

If you try to explain the origin of life on earth by invoking aliens, because you think a natural origin is implausible, you are left with the equal implausibility of a natural origin for the aliens. And I point out that everything you are using as evidence for these aliens would most likely have been true about the aliens themselves, so your theory implies an infinite regress.

First of all, I’m not “advocating for aliens”. I’m agnostic when it comes to the nature of the designers. They could be from an extraterrestrial civilization, yes. They could also be researchers from another universe, with very differing physical conditions. “They” could be an unknown, impersonal force of nature which merely gives the appearance of acting with foresight, the way the man in Searle’s Chinese room gives the appearance of knowing Chinese. They don’t have to employ DNA. They don’t even have to be carbon-based. They could be composed of an unknown substance which, when exposed to background radiation, spontaneously rearranges itself into conscious beings. Lots of other scenarios, even more far-out sci-fi-like, can be imagined.

Second of all, my suspicion of design isn’t based on an argument where “Feature X couldn’t possible evolve”. I’m ready to accept, for the sake of the argument, that all the features of life on Earth could have evolved. As John McDonald’s mousetrap sequence shows, it’s possible to imagine a gradual evolutionary transition leading to a structure, even when that transition never took place.

I’m interested in what actually happened. And that question can only be answered through a detective investigation of clues, not abstract speculation about whether or not something couldn’t possibly have evolved.

@swamidass

That is quite easy for us to imagine as scientists. Would you like to learn how?

I have no problem imagining scenarios. I doubt that’ll satisfy @John_Harshman when he’s demanding that I explain who designed the designers.

@T_aquaticus

Evolution optimizes systems, so it is expected.

Yet we’re also lead to expect frozen accidents, with inferior solutions being locked in. As Stephen J. Gould wrote in “The Panda’s Thumb”: “Odd arrangements and funny solutions are the proof of evolution - paths that a sensible God would never tread but that a natural process, constrained by history, follows perforce.”

[T_aquaticus]

@scd

on the other hand the design scenario is the best explanation for the existence of the genetic code.

Based on what?