Junk DNA goodbye!: a review of the topic (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, April 16, 2018, 21:35 (2200 days ago) @ David Turell

Why it is important to recognize the Darwin scientists were wrong:

https://evolutionnews.org/2013/11/darwin_in_the_d_3/

in the field of Darwinian evolution itself, which is based on the inviolable assumption that everything in biology must be the result of unguided material processes. Over the past century, this assumption has undoubtedly inspired many interesting research questions and scientific advances. At the same time, it also has undoubtedly discouraged and delayed many other important research questions. Witness the unhelpful Darwinian preoccupation with “vestigial” organs over the past century. Time and again, biological features we do not fully understand have been dismissed by advocates of Darwinian evolution as non-functional leftovers from a blind evolutionary process. Time and again, researchers who eventually bothered to look discovered that such supposedly “vestigial” features — the appendix and tonsils, to name two — actually perform important biological functions. The evidence of function was there all along, but scientists were discouraged by the existing paradigm from asking the questions that would elicit the evidence.

More recently, one of the biggest mistakes in the history of modern biology may turn out to be the belief that the human genome is riddled with “junk DNA.” Random mutations in protein-coding DNA are supposed to drive Darwinian evolution, and so when it was discovered that the vast majority of DNA does not code for proteins, some leading Darwinists jumped to the conclusion that non-protein-coding DNA must be mere “junk” left over from the evolutionary process just like some vestigial organs. Not only that, leading evolutionists ranging from atheist Richard Dawkins to Christian Francis Collins championed “junk DNA” as proof that human beings were the result of a Darwinian process rather than intentional design.

However, when scientists finally started to look more closely at non-coding DNA, they were shocked to learn that reality did not correspond to their ideological assumptions. Indeed, over the past decade science journals have been flooded with new research showing the rich and varied functionality of so-called “junk DNA.” In the words of biologist Jonathan Wells: “Far from consisting mainly of junk that provides evidence against intelligent design, our genome is increasingly revealing itself to be a multidimensional, integrated system in which non-protein-coding DNA performs a wide variety of functions.” Again, the evidence of functionality in non-protein-coding DNA was always there to find; but the evidence was not forthcoming because few people were asking the right questions.

Comment: The point is obvious.