In what ways is genetics evidence for Evolution?

Question

I know that humans share 99% of their DNA with chimpanzees but couldn't that also show a common designer who slightly altered one design to make another, instead of starting all over again?

Is there any other evidence from genetics?

Answer 1

First, the similarity between Chimps and man is less than than 99%.

It looks more like about 95%

http://creationontheweb.com/content/view...

(just because this is a creation website, don't disregard it as non-scientific. It's very scientific. If you want to be also, you will look at all the available information to form you theory)

I suspect that the difference will get greater and greater the more we learn about DNA. If one were to suspect that we know all the there is to know about it, that would be comparable to saying, the cell is just a simple sac of protoplasm. We would not want to be scientifically stuck in the 1800's, or worse, with the flat earthers.

5% difference is 150,000,000 changes.

I would like to give a different way to look at a couple of things posted above.

First, when we keep hearing about "junk DNA" I cringe, again this is probably like Darwin saying that the cell is just a simple sac of protoplazm.  There is similarity between junk DNA - it probably has a function - we just don't know what it is.

It's the same with vestigial organs, there used to be over 180 of them on the list, as we figured out that each one had a use the list dropped down to just a few. The few on the list each have a use, there not vestigial, there just needed for another evidence for evolution so they stay on the list of vestigial.

Now as far as God not designing things the way you would think He should.

1. That's pretty arogant.

2. That's still not evidence for evolution.

Your logic sequence is as follows and is flawed

1. I would not have designed life in this way -therefore

2. God would not have designed life in this way

3. Life is designed in this way

4. Darwinian evolution occured.

As far as the retrovirus stuck in the DNA, that one was a tough one for me for a while too. I would like to ask you if any research has been done on where viruses come from. My hypothosis that viruses actually come from an animals DNA code. God didn't origionally create a virus to harm us, He loves us. Maybe some DNA or RNA was lost during transcription and got jumbled into a spot that it wasn't suppose to be. It messed the cell up and caused it to keep making copies of itself - it propably was an error in the message code of where to take a peticular piece of protien or messeger RNA. It got in the wrong spot and just kept making more. Virusus are just little strands of RNA. We don't even know if we should classify it as alive.

So, my hypothosis is that the little sections of DNA that contain the same code from the virusus that we see are actually because that code was

1. Origionally created, it was a fully functioning piece of information. Therefore it would be found in many different species, especially animals designed very similar with similar functions and similar needs. (Both a human and a chimp have knee caps, some of the code is probably the same for making bone and the large amount of other similar functions.)

2. That section of code, during transcription, had a mistake happen and the messenger RNA got "stuck in the system" and became a virus.

3. Now we have these little sections of RNA called a virus floating around and they happen to have the same code found in our original DNA. That's where they came from.

4. God didn't create the virus, He loves us.

The truth is that DNA, Genetics, and microbiology really prove creation.

What we are seeing is that in the 1800's, evolution was put into the mainstream. It has always been around but with Darwin this theory really stuck. The world was waiting for a good excuse to ditch God.

Now, what we have seen is that from 1859, every scientific discovery must be made under the moral law of evolution.

If you discover DNA, ... This proves evolution.

Dr. Francis Crick (Codiscovered DNA) said

"Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see is not designed, but rather ,evolved."

Anyone on here must know a bit about DNA and microbiology.

If you can still not see that this sort of informational, amazingly complex, impossibly fathomably designed system is the result of pure random processes, your fooling yourself. What you are following is your religious faith based convictions.

I urge you, open up your hearts and minds to God, you will be without excuse on judgement day. Saying that this evil world and its powerful banking and business system, under the guides of satan, tricked you, will do no good. Yes, you have been fooled. Indoctrinated with lies and propaganda since you were a young child. I was too. I used to hate God and love evolution and my sins. But now that has changed, it can for you too. Turn to Christ and become a child of God. You have been a child of the devil long enough, you were never really his child to begin with, he just kidnapped you and molested everything that was sacred and pure about you until one day, you called him father. Just like a inocent little child bought and sold in the s*x slave industry. After a time, that evil becomes a reality and the light unbearable to enter. That is the same with us. If you think the evil of this present world only affects little girls and boys in other countries or that the propagana has only affected less intelegent people in far off times and places, you need to WAKE UP.

Life doesn't spontaneously generate. It never has and it never will.

The DNA informational code shows design, not evolution.

Answer 2

Nonstructural genes (e.g. digestive enzymes) show degrees of homology that independently confirm that anatomically developed phylogenetic tree.  If there was design, there is no basis from the independent tinkering.  We see the changes in existing life which produce the distribution seen.

It is not just the genes and the "junk" DNA, but their arrangement of chromosomes.  The order of the genes corresponds to the homologous changes.

Human chromosome 2 contains the genes found on two chimp (bonobo) chromosomes with no genes lost.  In addition to the centromere (site at which the chromosome is "grabbed" to be pulled apart in cell division), there is a sequence that corresponds to the other inactivate centromere.  Nine chromosomes have the same sequence of genes but the arrangement is reverse order to other apes.  This flipping does not affect function.  Nine useless changes does not suggest design.

Of "junk" sequences, some of the most telling are inactivated genes.  All apes have a tandem repeat of the complement component 4 (C4) and the cytochrome P450 21-hydroxylase (CYP21) genes located in their major histocompatibility (tissue type) complex.  In all great apes, one copy of the CYP21 is inactivated.  In humans and chimps, it is one copy; in gorillas and orangutans, it is the other.  Duplication and inactivation is not a sign of design.

The ERVs mentioned above, I won't discuss.

Answer 3

Fennec it would help considerable if you actually read several authoritative books on evolutionary theory before asking such questions. Your series of of questions are carefully discussed and supporting evidence shown in most btreatises on evolution...perhaps by reading such tombs you can gain appreciation of the subject.

Answer 4

The similarity extends beyond the genes into noncoding sequences which do not do anything (tentatively, some do).  The only reason a designer would make them to same is to confuse us.

A few examples:

Humans and chimps have been infected by several different retroviruses that have inserted into the same location in the genome.  Since they insert randomly, it is virtually impossible for separate infection events to have caused this.  These are also very clearly 'dead' viruses.

Several pseudogenes are the same.  These are genes that do not code for a protein.  Some still have a function, but many do not, one is GULO, the last enzyme in vitamin C synthesis. This pseudogene is shared by all true primates.  Besides being why we must get vitamin C in our diet, it also shows all primates share a common ancestor whose gene was knocked down since all of us have the same fragments deleted.

Human chromosome 2 is the product of a fusion of two ape chromosomes.  There are interior telomere (normally only on the ends) sequences and a second vestigial centromere (normally one in the middle).  A fusion clearly happened, we even know down to a dozen nucleotides exactly where it occurred.

There are many more examples like this in every species whose genome has been sequenced.  Genetics provides far more evidence in favor of common descent than fossils and creationists often completely ignore it.

Answer 5

One major thing is that the DNA does not just vary within genes (where it has a phenotypic effect) - but also in the non-coding "junk DNA" regions between genes.

There is no reason for a Creator to change those, so why are they also different?

We can examine the rates of DNA change in genes and in non-coding regions experimentally. And when we back-calculate from those rates-of-change, it correlates nicely with other (fossil) evidence for when humans and the other apes diverged.

And, of course, this is all true of all other species. The farther apart they are evolutionarily, the more their non-coding regions vary.

Answer 6

1. : If you expect that all animals are designed by one creator, you could expect that genetic sequences for similar proteins (Like hemoglobin) or structures (Like wings or fins) are the same throughout the whole animal kingdom.

Let's say god had a construction kit containing different genes for different purposes. When creating a animal, god takes some building blocks and that explains why animal gene sequences are similar.

(So god took mostly the same building blocks for humans and chimpanzees)

2. : If you assume that all animals descend from one common ancestor, as evolutionists do, you must expect that gene sequences from related animals are similar.

Thats because a mutation, or a new gene, is only inherited to the children of the mutated animal.

So Hemoglobin, Cytochrome C (Or any other protein) should have very similar sequences in closely related species, but less similar sequences in distant species.

(The "Tree of life" is a tree or nested set, in which every mutation is a new bifurcation. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nested_Sets...

As far as it has been tested - and it was tested with hundreds of billions of genetic letters - the genetic sequences of closely related species are very similar in every aspect.

The second hypothesis is very useful for making predictions, while the first is not. Assuming that chimpanzees are more closely related to humans than horses are, you can predict that the hemoglobin or cytochrome c sequence of chimpanzees has less different genetic letters than that of horses - and this assumption is true. (Chimpanzees: 98% same, horses 88% same)

But in my opinion the most overwhelming proof is that of the similarity of junk DNA - it serves no known purpose, consists of random letters or of former genes that lost their functionality - and it is similar in related species, too. Why would any designer put this junk DNA in his creatures, and why should he put the same junk in related creatures?

Some evidence that contradicts the first evidence is found in animals like dolphins: They are fishlike, have fins, live in water - But they do not share many genes with fish; they share more genes with mammals!

For further information you should inform yourself about the concepts of homology http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homology_(b... and analogy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analogy_(bi...

Answer 7

Let's look at the question from a slightly different point of view.  What evidence is there in genetics for intelligent design by a all-knowing, all-powerful and benevolent being?   Of course, the genomes work.

However, what about the not-so-intelligent designs?  That is, who or what is responsible for genetic defects, e.g., sickle cell disease, phenylketonuria, Tay-Sachs disease, and so forth?  Clearly, these are bad genetic designs if they were designed at all.  If they were designed by THE intelligent designer, then that designer was not benevolent, or not all-knowing or not all-powerful.  

If, however, they are the products of natural evolution, no conflicts exist.  This is the reason that a course in genetics has been found to convince people of the truth of evolution most easily.

Answer 8

I would hope that an all-powerful deity would be able to make humans without having to copy and slightly alter an existing design out of laziness ;)  

Answer 9

Take endogenous retroviruses (ERV) as one example.  Retroviruses encode their genetic material backwards into a piece of the organism's DNA that they infect.  Think of it as a permanent scar that remains, even after the virus itself is no longer active.  If this happens in a germ line cell, it will be passed on to their children.  This is an observable idea in humans, and we can tell that a child has gotten a copy of its parents DNA when we see that it has an ERV scar in the same base pair.  Since the base pair the virus infects is random, that means there's about a 1 in 2.3 BILLION chance that the father and son would have the scar in the same base pair out of pure chance.  This is why it serves as a powerful hereditary marker.

Now, what does that have to do with evolution?  We can take other evidence that was already known, such as fossil records, and other genetic evidence for common descent.  Those are organized in a giant family tree structure, showing which species evolved from which prior species.  ERV's exactly confirm this pattern.  For example, humans have a number of ERVs in common, much more than we do with animals that had split off in the tree earlier.  While we still share some with those more distantly related species, we have less and less common ERVs with other species as we move further from them in the (previously known) family tree.  This is an AMAZING coincidence if it is not evidence for evolution.  Something along the lines of winning the powerball lottery every night straight for a month.