Sunspots 973

Things I have spotted that may be of interest to others:      

Earth.com reports on amazing mental ability in a butterfly.

Gizmodo reports that DNA has been used to store and retrieve graphic information. Another means of digital storage!

LiveScience suggests that the wheel was invented about 6000 years ago, in Carpathian mines.

Joel Edmund Anderson discusses inerrancy of the Bible, and related concepts, pretty thoroughly.

Thanks for reading!

BioLogos: New genetic information added

One of the arguments against evolution by natural selection is that information can only come from an intelligent agent. This article, in BioLogos, by Dennis Venema, refutes that assertion.

This article is not new, but it is important, and, after recently re-reading it, I wanted to call attention to it. It doesn't rule out divine activity, and, at the least, shows us, indirectly, that the God-produced systems of cellular biology are wonderfully complex, and have the power to bring about novel structures and molecules.

Thanks for reading.

Can evolution by natural selection be responsible for new information/new genes?

Last month, Stephen C. Meyer, an advocate for the Intelligent Design movement*, debated with two other persons.  I did not see, hear, or read the debate, but Meyer has posted about it, and Dennis Venema, of BioLogos, has also done so.

*Intelligent design is, in simplest terms, the idea that God planned the universe. The Intelligent Design movement, (ID) however, also believes this, but furthermore believes that God did not plan that natural selection would be capable of generating new information or new genes. ID also believes that it is possible to prove God's planning, and, by inference, His occasional intervention in living systems, scientifically, and that Intelligent Design should be taught as an alternative to evolution by natural selection in the public schools of the US. Some ID adherents also believe in a young earth. Some do not. I am not an IDer, but I do believe in intelligent design.

What was the debate about? Well, one thing that the debate was about was the question posed by the title. If the answer to that question is definitely shown to be "no," then ID gains considerable credibility. Not only that, but evolution by natural selection should not be taught in public (or private) schools as an explanation for the vast diversity of living things. Meyer believes that the answer is, indeed, no. He is wrong.

Why is he wrong?

One reason is that Meyer, and others, cite a paper by Douglas Axe. The paper was published in what I take to be a scientific, peer-reviewed, journal. Axe claims to have shown that the probability of protein being able to perform a new function is vanishingly small. However, there are some problems with Axe's work, or at least his conclusions. Some of them are detailed here. To summarize, Axe wasn't working with a normal protein, but with a chosen small subset of normal proteins. That means that his estimate of probability is too small. How much too small is impossible to state, but enough that it seriously weakens his argument. More criticism of the validity of using Axe's work to show that the answer to the question of the title of this post should be answered with a "no" is here.

The problem with Meyer's answer (and that of others) to the question is not only reliance on Axe. There is also a misunderstanding of probability. See here for more on that.

Dennis Venema argues, here, that the antibody-producing mechanism of vertebrates is, in fact, able, by natural means, to generate new DNA sequences, which can help defend against organisms, or substances, which have newly arisen. If the antibody-producing mechanism can do that, this shows that the answer to the question above is, at least partly, "yes."

Finally, what is probably the strongest argument that the answer to the question posed is, in fact, "yes," is that new genes have arisen within the recent past. One example of this is a gene in some bacteria which codes for a protein that allows them to use nylon as a food. (Nylon is a synthetic fiber which did not occur at all until the twentieth century.) That gene has arisen since the production of nylon, and its release into the environment. 

Another example of a new gene arising, in the recent past, is discussed here.  This post, discusses some posts by Venema, which describe another example of functional genetic material arising, apparently through natural selection.

It appears that part of God's design was the mechanism of natural selection, which makes it possible for natural systems to come up with new means of coping with new or unique environmental conditions. To me, and others, that is at least as amazing as it would be if God had, as it were, stepped in to specially create such solutions. 

Thanks for reading!

Sunspots 403

Things I have recently spotted that may be of interest to someone else:

 

Science:  National Public Radio reports that sweet potatoes most likely originated in the Americas, and that some of them were taken to Asia by traffic between what is now Latin America and Polynesia, all before Columbus came from Europe.

The Atlantic reports on using DNA to store information, such as the works of Shakespeare.

The Washington Post reports that dogs, who descended from wolves, had a change in diet preference, associated with becoming and remaining domestication.

NPR says that, instead of flu, you may have a Norovirus, which, if anything, is worse.

The Arts:  A James Kibble has recorded all of the organ works of J. S. Bach for free download.

Computing: A social scientist has shown that people are reluctant to wipe the memory of robots, even if they understand that these are not real people.

Image source (public domain)

I'm an information junkie. Are you?

I confess. I'm an information junkie. If I see part of a sporting event on TV, I want to know who won it, even if I've never seen the team, or individual, before. I listen to National Public Radio news programs a lot, and I often stay in the car after arriving at my destination, because I want to hear the rest of the story. I read a lot, on-line and in classical media. When the Watergate Hearings were on TV, I watched a lot of them. I didn't need to, but I wanted to. My wife and I have four information appliances in our home. I don't think we are ever actively using all four at once, but we often use two at a time, and occasionally three. Maybe you are like that. Maybe not. In this day of Twitter, texting while driving, libraries, magazine sales at the checkout counter, GPS devices, walking with earbuds in your ears, hundreds of TV channels, and lots and lots of on-line sites, including some apparently important ones that I've never heard of, a lot of people out there must be like that.

I guess I should stop and say that "information" has a technical meaning, or several such. I used an information appliance to look that linked source up, by the way.

Why am I like this? Why are you? I'm not sure. Part of it is that we need to know things for various reasons, such as to rear our children, do our job, study the Bible, converse with other people. Some of it must be that wanting to know things must be part of the image of God in us. Unfortunately, some of our information searching is sinful, however. Seeking out pornography, stealing someone's identity, finding out about things that we covet, when we don't need them, being a fan of the wrong sort of celebrity, seeking out stuff to gossip about, in various ways, are bending information hunger into wrong directions.

Am I ever going to see all of the sports events on TV, no matter how many channels I have at my disposal? Am I ever going to know all of the news being pumped out? Am I ever going to read all the books I've thought about reading? No. Neither are you.

Is that bad? Not necessarily. Most of the stories I can look at, in all kinds of media, have little value now. Almost none of them will have much importance ten years from now. Very, very few of them will have any importance in 2112.

There's a moral in that last paragraph. I need to pay attention to it. What's that moral? Ultimately, there's only one story that's of eternal importance. That's the story of Christ. He created, He sustains, He lived for us, died for us, was resurrected for us, and, by His death and resurrection, paid the penalty for our sins. He is now waiting for us. That story makes the Southeast Conference, National Public Radio, NBC, the local newspaper, all the magazines available at the supermarket, all the sites on the Internet, all the books in the library, all the tweets in cyberspace seem so insignificant that it's hardly worth paying attention to them, in comparison.

Thanks for reading. I hope that wasn't too much information!

On being an information addict

I recently mused on the question of whether or not St. Paul was a multi-tasker. (The post contains a link to a report on research indicating that multitasking is bad for your thinking.) I'd like to muse, in this post, on the broader question of why anyone might want to be one.

One answer is that some of us have more to do than we really can do. So we feed the baby while we catch up on the news, or take phone calls while stirring the recipe, or checking the e-mail. That's an unfortunately legitimate reason for multitasking, provided, of course, that we haven't taken on more than we should have, doing things we really don't need to.

Another reason is that we have tools which enable us to multitask. I am using an information appliance to write this. You are using an information appliance to read this -- unless someone else has used an information appliance to print this out for you. We have this equipment, so we think we should use it. I didn't have many opportunities to multitask when I was a boy. Although I am not yet eighty years old, I did grow up in a home with no telephone, until I had been in college for a while. If I wanted to communicate with my parents from college, I wrote a post card. I also made sure that I had made future arrangements carefully, since I usually couldn't change them. We certainly had no computer, no television, and no newspaper. (We did have radios.) I couldn't multitask then like I can now, although my father set an example of how to multitask without a phone, TV, or computer, by listening to the radio in the barn, while he was milking cows, with a pulp magazine opened on one leg, pumping out the milk while reading and listening. (He read a lot of fantastic literature.) The radio was the only information appliance he had, and, except for being able to change stations, or the volume, it was a one-way appliance. We received. We didn't broadcast to anybody else.

Not only do some people almost have to multitask, because they have too much to do, and some because they have an information appliance which helps them multitask, but, I submit, there is a third reason -- all of us are information addicts, to a greater or less degree.

Babies show this by paying attention to all sorts of things. Some people show it by watching soap operas. Some show it by paying close attention to the minutiae of some sport, or some favorite team. Some show it by paying close attention to some politician, or to a performer, or even a person prominent because of their religion, or to our own little clique of friends or co-workers. I remember paying far more attention than I should have to the Watergate affair. If I'm not careful, I'll pay too much attention to the trials and tribulations of my current state governor. Some of us are news junkies, with CNN or some other such venue on the TV all the time, or sent regularly to another information appliance. Some of us have way too many Facebook or Twitter contacts, far more than we can reasonably keep up with. (One of my Facebook Friends once suggested -- on Facebook, of course -- that there should be a "Who Cares" button for new entries.) Some of us want to know and hear the latest music, or see the latest fashions, or the news from the markets, the latest recipes, or (oh-oh!) the latest gossip, pure and simple -- not that a lot of the other activities in this paragraph aren't also gossip.

Why do we do this? One reason is that we are suckers for anything new. I suspect that one reason that Eve listened to the serpent was that the serpent said something she hadn't heard or thought of before. Acts 17:21 gives us a description of the Athenians: "Now all the Athenians and the foreigners who lived there would spend their time in nothing except telling or hearing something new." (ESV) (Not to challenge the truth of the Bible, but surely there were slaves, and probably other working people in Athens who didn't have time to spend in such a pursuit.) But we like to do this. We are, to some extent, information addicts.

New isn't necessarily bad. The Gospel, after all, is Good News. To people who have never heard it, getting this new information, by whatever means, is critical. Do I still have that hunger to know what God wants to say to me? I hope so, but I fear not.

New can be bad, and the worst thing it can do is to distract from the timeless. There are truths we must not forget, that are far more important than the latest doings in the organizations that are important to us. What are these truths? The Gospel, for one. God's love, and His goodness and holiness, for another. The beauty we see, hear, feel, and smell, in flowers, sunsets, dewdrops, good food, music, children, and laughter. A grandchild's laugh is more important than a sports score or whatever the President may have said. The existence of butterflies, waterfalls, rainbows, and bird songs is far more important than our current bank balance or how our mutual fund is doing. Does this mean that we should never pay attention to the news? Of course not. But it does mean that we need to cut back on our information addiction, and pay attention to what those we love, especially God, are telling us in common, ordinary, slow ways. Perhaps we should be more like J. R. R. Tolkien's hobbits, who, he wrote, ". . . like to have books filled with things they already know, set out fair and square with no contradictions." (Prologue, The Fellowship of the Ring -- Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1954, p. 18.)

The Gospel, God's love, God's creation, and the possibility of meaningful relationships with others, are things that no information appliance will ever give you, or me. May I not forget what's really important, and eternal.

Thanks for using your information appliance.

Jan has written a good, and shorter, post which overlaps with this one.

Too much information, too soon?

"You gals ought to keep abreast of things," said Mr. Feebles. "Why?" asked Tilly grumpily. "What good does it do you? It seems to me, from what you've been telling us, that everyone these days know everything about everyone and the split second it happens, too. What do they do with all this information? What does it get them? It just clutters up their peaceful quiet time. It seems to me, from what you've been describing, nobody has peaceful quiet time anymore. Television, bah! Radio, bah! Newspapers, magazines, bah, bah! Sounds like the world is running off half-cocked, people getting zapped with their little bits of information. Needing it every day. Zap, zap, zap. Well, deliver me. Contagious. Like hoof-and-mouth disease. I hope you're not contaminated. Don't go trekking all over our property." Polly Horvath, The Canning Season. New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 2003, p. 99. Mr. Feebles is a minor character. Tilly is, with her twin sister, an old woman who lives way out in the Maine woods, with a telephone that only receives calls, can't initiate them, and, of course, has no Internet access.

The book received the National Book Award for literature for young people.

Are you just hearing and reading yourself?

A recent op-ed piece in the New York Times (free log-in required) confirmed something I was pretty sure of already: ". . . there’s pretty good evidence that we generally don’t truly want good information — but rather information that confirms our prejudices."

I don't expect many, if any, atheists to read this blog. I have occasionally had comments from self-professed atheists, most of which were pretty nasty. Conversely, I don't read any blogs that advocate atheism, at least not as the main emphasis. I'm pretty sure that I frequently read items written by atheists, but they aren't all about atheism.

I get e-mail, and read Facebook posts, by people who don't agree with me politically. Usually I ignore such twaddle (although I still love these individuals) but occasionally I try to convince someone of the error of their ways. It doesn't work.

How about you? Do you expose yourself to viewpoints you don't agree with? I should, so that I can be prepared to give an answer to non-believers. As 1 Peter 3:15 puts it: 15 but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect (ESV)

Note that this doesn't command us to defend our political positions, or the peculiarities of our own particular theology, but to give a reason for our hope, which is Christ.

Thanks for reading.

Information theory and genetics

I am no expert in information theory. A scientist who says that he is such an expert has recently dealt with claims that genetic mutations and other genetic changes cannot add information to the previously existing genome, and says that such processes can, indeed, add information.

Thanks for reading.