Junk DNA: goodbye!: Review article (Introduction)

by dhw, Wednesday, March 11, 2015, 17:54 (3546 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

TONY: I've said it before, and I will say it again. Scientist, whether it is conscious or not, do not WANT to believe that all DNA is useful, because if they do their pet theory of evolution is dead. If the genome were to be proven 100% useful, as I strongly suspect it is, then there is no possibility of chance. There is no room for the trial and error ideology that they cling to in order to escape the inescapable conclusion that life was designed.-DHW: I've said it before, and I will say it again, both sides will always find an answer to any discovery. Whether you think God designed life, it came about by chance, or it came about via some kind of panpsychist evolution, you can twist any scenario to fit your hypothesis. Do you really mean to tell me that if scientists could prove there WAS junk, you would immediately lose your faith in the existence of a designer? Of course you wouldn't. If DNA is 100% useful, the trial and error ideology can simply claim that successful trials preserved what worked, and errors eliminated what didn't work. That is the process known as Natural Selection.-DAVID: You always skip the point. If DNA is 80% functional, that makes it so complex it could not have developed by natural selection or chance. Only a mind could have created the code.-The same argument is used of all life's complexities, but many scientists remain atheists and argue for a chance beginning. I neither skip nor reject the design argument. I am pointing out that atheists will still find a means of incorporating new discoveries into their scenario, just as theists do. In the days before ENCODE began to unravel the purposes of so-called junk, I don't recall theists getting into a mighty panic over the then prevalent view that DNA was not 100% functional. I repeat: "You can twist any scenario to fit your hypothesis."
 
TONY: No trial and error methodology can produce a 100% useful product, particularly not on par with the complexity of DNA. The chances of even 80% percent appearing via random mutation is so staggering that you would have a higher chance of securing a peaceful dinner date with the Queen of England, the Israeli and Palestinian Prime ministers, Richard Dawkins, the Easter Bunny, Santa Clause the Pope, and and Rabbi Raskin and that little leprechaun fellow off the Lucky Charms commercial while the American congress was hard at work and politicians tell the truth. -Great post, Tony, and I am no supporter of the random mutations theory. But I still maintain that “both sides will always find an answer to any discovery”. The very fact that life exists defies all the odds, and that was true even before the discovery of DNA. My point is exemplified by the fact that Francis Crick was an agnostic with a strong inclination towards atheism and James Watson is an atheist.