Intelligent Design: Coming To A State Legislature Near You

[TheGavin]

Cvvl wrote:

A digression -
Havn't quotes attributed to Einstein often been used by theists to support ID? I don't remember the quotes, but they were always presented as though saying "see, even one of your best scientists believes".
How is it then that one of Einstein's personal letters today was auctioned for $400K, and in which he writes, "the word God is for me nothing more than the expression and product of human weaknesses, the Bible a collection of honorable but still primitive legends which are nevertheless pretty childish."?
Can anyone shed light on this for me? I have more familiarity with the man's work than the man.

I suspect (mind you, my personal opinion) that this will be dealt with in the same fashion as many ID/Creationism proponents deal with things...deflection or obfuscation.

I would cite the presumptions made on behalf of Lady Hope, over and over again. I can imagine something the likes of which will be, "What does ONE letter prove? We don't know his emotions at the time, maybe he was bitter, perhaps disillusioned with a recent happening that shook his faith." The latter of the sentence which concludes, not assumes, he had faith in the religious capacity to begin with and always did.

DOK couldn't imagine that Darwin didn't reach out on his death bed for christian forgiveness. That ultimatley, he "most assuredly" saught redemption in that final moment. So therefore, the prescence of Christ must have always been in him, on some level, all along...so that validates any "what if's" as concretely as anything...not to mention it can't be imagined otherwise.

Even with absolute evidence to the contrary (his daughter at his bed side during his final moments, who refuted any such claims or even that Lady Hope was there)...DOK and others are resolute and say with all due affirmation, "well, how do you/we know?...were you/we there?" This (to them) carries with it all due logic and substance.

To us we just go, "ummmmm...wow"...to her and other fundamentalists...it makes perfect sense and isn't invalidated in anyway.

You'll see the same here. I say before next weekend you will see refutiations, via unaware emotional states or "that doesn't take away from the fact that he was a religious person overall"...*huh?!* OR "I know it's been authenticated, but it's surely a fake."...*wha?*

[Primewonk]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
No one denies the importance of the continued advancement of genetic science in medical research. But how would that science suffer if it should turn out that an Intelligent Designer was involved in abiogenesis, say?
Does that research depend on a belief in "goo-to-you" evolution?
No, because it is only what can be produced, observed and replicated in the lab or field that results in new cancer treatments, etc.
Like Newton, I don't see any danger in positing a creator behind it all. If anything, it brings new respect for life and its preservation!

You can posit a creator all you want. But unless you can test for god, it isn't science. It has no part in evolution. And teaching evolution does not include abiogenesis or cosmology.

My high school junior son just had his AP Bio test this week (along with AP Physics, AP Calc, and AP English - yeah I'm bragging on him - he rocks!). Like me, he's a science geek. I asked him if they mentioned creationism/ID/abiogenesis/cos mology during class.

He said that when they started on evolution, the teacher told them that this was the material to be covered to meet both the AP standards and the state high school standards. He said that nobody asked inappropriate questions or made inappropriate comments. I asked what he meant, and he said that "no one condemned me to hell". We live in a fairly conservative area with a high number of both mormons and 7th day adventists. My son has a T Shirt with a parody of the Che Guevara shirt - the one with Che in the beret saying "Via la Revolution" - except on this shirt is a chimp wearing a beret saying Via la Evolution. He was wearing it downtown one day and actually got kicked out of a store because the owner didn't "want no monkey loving satan" in her shop.

[LWsciencejunkie]

Primewonk wrote:

<quoted text>
With the new research, and the WHO putting shift work on the list of known carcinogens, as you might expect this raises some interesting issues. Employers generally have a duty to protect employees or at least mitigate exposure to harmful conditions. So knowing that shift work in and of itself can increase cancer risk, what is the duty of the employer to protect the employee?

Oh, yeah...My dad and I are both insomniac's insomniacs, but have never had a weight problem. We both have (no $hit-its in the DSM) "nightmare disorder". Bigtime, and none of our dreams ever have anything to do with past trauma.

[Primewonk]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
I've decided that it's "much ado about nothing."
Time and time again you and others have said here that ID has no mechanism or reaearch to demonstrate. If you are really convinced of that then the amount of time that could be devoted to ID in a science class should be maybe ten minutes?
Just enough time to let the students know that evolution does not explain everything - especially abiogenesis...

So should we also throw in 10 minutes explaining that evolution does not explain iambic pentameter? Maybe 10 minutes explaining that evolution has nothing to do with Elizabethan Literature. Another 10 minutes to talk about how evolution says diddly about setting the timing on a '57 Chevy?

[Primewonk]

LWsciencejunkie wrote:

<quoted text>
Oh, yeah...My dad and I are both insomniac's insomniacs, but have never had a weight problem. We both have (no $hit-its in the DSM) "nightmare disorder". Bigtime, and none of our dreams ever have anything to do with past trauma.

It used to be thought that insomnia was a symptom, not a disorder. Find what's causing the insomnia, treat that, and the insomnia should go away. Wrong. Now we know that there is a condition of Primary Insomnia. It may be a hyper-arousal type of disorder. When we do studies on these folks we frequently see different patterns of brainwaves. We can induce this in normal controls by using a caffeine model. What we typically see in the primary insomniacs is an inability to fall asleep (no kidding!) and maintain sleep. The sleep pattern is very fragmented with an excess of beta frequencies, and an intrusion of alpha frequencies. So even if you are sleeping, the brain doesn't "recognize" that you've sleeping, or that you've slept. Everyone normally awakens every 90 minutes or so - it's evolutionary - then quickly falls back asleep. If you're awake for less than a few minutes, you won't remember being awake in the morning. Insomniacs do remember. And since their sleep is fragments - waking up more often - there is often a misperception of total sleep time - ie, an severe insomniac may state that they only slept for one hour during the night, but when you look at actual sleep activity it may be 4 or 5 hours of actual sleep. Along with this hyper-arousal type sleep, they have a hard time napping the day. If we do a yoke control study and every time the insomniac is awake, you wake up the "normal", then test them the next day to see what the propensity to sleep is - the control would fall asleep very easily while the insomniac would not.

You and your dad have my sympathy - my sister is a severe insomniac. I've seen what she's gone through and her troubles in dealing with her medical community. I've tried to help her - but I'm just her kid brother (I'm 51 for god's sake) so what can I know!

[LWsciencejunkie]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
No one denies the importance of the continued advancement of genetic science in medical research. But how would that science suffer if it should turn out that an Intelligent Designer was involved in abiogenesis, say?
Does that research depend on a belief in "goo-to-you" evolution?
No, because it is only what can be produced, observed and replicated in the lab or field that results in new cancer treatments, etc.
Like Newton, I don't see any danger in positing a creator behind it all. If anything, it brings new respect for life and its preservation!

It is absolutely beyond me to comprehend what on earth is meant when those such as yourself say what you did in your last sentence. It just floors me; leaves me with my eyes popping and my mouth hanging open.(Most unattractive.)
Exactly what do you think the biological sciences, which use ToE as the very foundation of research into the treatment and prevention of disease, but hunger, the protection of our environment, social problems...an endless list that has, at its core "respect for life and its preservation"?

Have you been told that ambiguity or doubt about a supreme being will somehow make life less precious? I am absolutely 100% certain that it is not necessary for me to recite the long and bloody list of the history of how the practice of religion has made countless lives cheaper than dirt.

Here is another puzzle; the big reward for adhering to (fill in ONE TRUE religion of choice) is some sort of afterlife that is endless and wonderful. Beats the heck out of our years here on earth, I'd say. Christianity even gives you the "get out of hell free card" of salvation. You are aware, no doubt, of what those horny little heroes; the suicide-jihadis are looking forward to when they blow themselves up along with who-cares-who-else. I'd say the whole concept kind of cheapens life. It makes people fatalistic, passive and so fearful of hellfire that they will submit to an endless history of hurt and injustice, exploitation and humiliation.
I do not know if you have been told that religion/God is the source of morality and/or the intrinsic value of life or being human, or whether you thought that up all by yourself, but an objective look at how obviously dead wrong those notions are would be a good idea. And, trust me. You won't go to hell for it.

[MichiganGEL]

Primewonk wrote:

<quoted text>
So should we also throw in 10 minutes explaining that evolution does not explain iambic pentameter? Maybe 10 minutes explaining that evolution has nothing to do with Elizabethan Literature. Another 10 minutes to talk about how evolution says diddly about setting the timing on a '57 Chevy?

Probably a better approach is to first define terms for the students, most of whom probably equate "evolution" with the goo-to-you scenario.

As you stated in your previous post, "teaching evolution does not include abiogenesis or cosmology." This is where the ID concept could be mentioned (since it is so much in the news) as just another way of "allowing" them to believe in a creator without feeling intimidated.

[No Taqiyya]

If we learn that there is a creator who is wiser than we are, we will have to obey Him. OMG! We must by any and all means stop the evidence in whatever ways we can. If is proven that there is something to creation, we will have to admit that something is more intelligent than us. Therefore we must stop the proof. We are only evolved into this mass of life and moving surroundings by chance, and circumstance. We must stop the madness before they drive us insane, and we do not have that far to go. After all, freedom of speech does not mean they can say what they want, but we can
But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

[polymath257]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
I guess if the something-from-nothing (ex-nihilo) "Big Bang" is the mechanism that somehow satisfies scientists, then why shouldn't a big "Let there be..." mechanism suffice in the case of a supernatural Creator?

You seem to think that the Big Bang is some hair-brained concept that people came up with to avoid the idea of a creator. That is very far from the truth. First of all, the basic theory is the theory of general relativity, which is Einstein's description for gravity as a curvature of spacetime. In this, the curvature is related to the density of matter and energy in a very specific way. This theory of gravity is the best we have at this point and has passed all experimental tests with flying colors. When GR was applied to the universe as a whole, and assuming a universe that 'looks the same' at all points, it was found that 'space' would either expand over time or contract over time. In the first case, there was a time before which GR simply doesn't apply. In the latter case, that time is in the future and you can't talk about a time past that.

The original version of the Big Bang model (which is just GR applied to the universe as a whole) was proposed by a Catholic priest. When the Pope at the time started claiming that it proved Genesis correct, LeMaitre (the priest) told him to stop because it could be interpreted many ways.

Later, thermodynamics was brought into the description with the realization that the expansion causes a cooling. If this is run backwards, it is found that the universe was much hotter in the past. Using our knowledge of nuclear physics, we could use the hot Big Bang model to predict the amounts of hydrogen, deuterium, helium, and lithium that we should see today. These abundances have been verified.

Next, the hot Big Bang also predicted a 'afterglow' that would be seen in all directions and be of a very specific form (a Planck distribution). This background radiation has been found and currently is what gives us some of our best information about the early universe.

After all, since there was neither matter, time, nor space beforehand - only a pre-existing spiritual First Cause, then it is impossible to describe a mechanism.

And I think most religious cosmologists believe something along these lines. The question is not whether it is a possibility. The question is whether there is any actual evidence that this is, in fact, the case. It really is quite easy to spin a variety of stories about how the universe came to be. Some even are consistent with what we know about the laws of physics. But the proposal that there is no mechanism that can be described automatically takes your proposal out of the realm of science.

Similarly, can the mechanism from pre-Big Bang to the first instant of the Big Bang be described?

You are assuming that there *was* a 'pre-Big Bang'. In the description given by general relativity, time itself is affected by the density of matter and energy. As you go backwards in time, the curvature increases to the point that there is literally no way to continue time past the instant of the Big Bang. It is analogous, but not identical, to what happens at the north pole of the earth with latitude lines. If I asked you what is north of the north pole, you would say that it is impossible; that the north pole is as far north as you can go. In a similar way, the instant of the Big Bang is as far backwards in time as you can go. There is no cause because there is no previous time. There is no 'something from nothing' because the conservation laws ALL describe comparisons between different TIMES.

[polymath257]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
No one denies the importance of the continued advancement of genetic science in medical research. But how would that science suffer if it should turn out that an Intelligent Designer was involved in abiogenesis, say?

If *evidence* was given for that proposition, then no.

Does that research depend on a belief in "goo-to-you" evolution?
No, because it is only what can be produced, observed and replicated in the lab or field that results in new cancer treatments, etc.

But it relies on exactly thew same type of reasoning that is the foundation of that goo-to-you evolution. What you want to do is argue against the conclusions when applied to one realm when they work perfectly well in every situation where they have been applied.

Like Newton, I don't see any danger in positing a creator behind it all. If anything, it brings new respect for life and its preservation!

And religion does *such* a good job of respecting life. That's why the Reformation was so peaceful and serene. That's why the Middle East is an example of peaceful co-existence. That's why scientists have tried to hinder every major advancement made by religious organizations from vaccination, to birth control, to stem cell research.</sarcasm>

[MichiganGEL]

LWsciencejunkie wrote:

<quoted text>
Oh, yeah...My dad and I are both insomniac's insomniacs, but have never had a weight problem. We both have (no $hit-its in the DSM) "nightmare disorder". Bigtime, and none of our dreams ever have anything to do with past trauma.

Question to all here discussing sleep:
Has anyone ever studied the place of sleep in the evolutionary scheme of things?
It would seem obvious that an organism is most vulnerable while asleep. So how did it not reduce its chances of survival?
Yes, we know sleep is necessary to repair the body, but has that always been the case? Do microorganisms have to sleep or is it a function of complexity?
[I think I've talked myself into doing a bit of Googling, but maybe someone can suggest a reference?]
I was fascinated to learn that (some?) birds can sleep half their brain at a time. They've been observed perching side-by-side, each sleeping the vulnerable half of their brains while keeping watch with the other. After awhile they switch positions and sleep the other half!!
So much time "wasted" in sleep... Too bad we can pull the bird trick!

[LWsciencejunkie]

No Taqiyya wrote:

If we learn that there is a creator who is wiser than we are, we will have to obey Him. OMG! We must by any and all means stop the evidence in whatever ways we can. If is proven that there is something to creation, we will have to admit that something is more intelligent than us. Therefore we must stop the proof. We are only evolved into this mass of life and moving surroundings by chance, and circumstance. We must stop the madness before they drive us insane, and we do not have that far to go. After all, freedom of speech does not mean they can say what they want, but we can
But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty;

Bleah. If there is a Supreme Being, it does not live up to my own moral and ethical standards. The hell with it.

[StopTheInsanity]

Primewonk wrote:

<quoted text>
It used to be thought that insomnia was a symptom, not a disorder. Find what's causing the insomnia, treat that, and the insomnia should go away. Wrong. Now we know that there is a condition of Primary Insomnia. It may be a hyper-arousal type of disorder. When we do studies on these folks we frequently see different patterns of brainwaves. We can induce this in normal controls by using a caffeine model. What we typically see in the primary insomniacs is an inability to fall asleep (no kidding!) and maintain sleep. The sleep pattern is very fragmented with an excess of beta frequencies, and an intrusion of alpha frequencies. So even if you are sleeping, the brain doesn't "recognize" that you've sleeping, or that you've slept. Everyone normally awakens every 90 minutes or so - it's evolutionary - then quickly falls back asleep. If you're awake for less than a few minutes, you won't remember being awake in the morning. Insomniacs do remember. And since their sleep is fragments - waking up more often - there is often a misperception of total sleep time - ie, an severe insomniac may state that they only slept for one hour during the night, but when you look at actual sleep activity it may be 4 or 5 hours of actual sleep. Along with this hyper-arousal type sleep, they have a hard time napping the day. If we do a yoke control study and every time the insomniac is awake, you wake up the "normal", then test them the next day to see what the propensity to sleep is - the control would fall asleep very easily while the insomniac would not.
You and your dad have my sympathy - my sister is a severe insomniac. I've seen what she's gone through and her troubles in dealing with her medical community. I've tried to help her - but I'm just her kid brother (I'm 51 for god's sake) so what can I know!

OK, time for some humor.

What does an agnostic, dyslexic insomniac do at night?

Lie awake wondering if there really is a dog..........

[LWsciencejunkie]

Primewonk wrote:

<quoted text>
It used to be thought that insomnia was a symptom, not a disorder. Find what's causing the insomnia, treat that, and the insomnia should go away. Wrong. Now we know that there is a condition of Primary Insomnia. It may be a hyper-arousal type of disorder. When we do studies on these folks we frequently see different patterns of brainwaves. We can induce this in normal controls by using a caffeine model. What we typically see in the primary insomniacs is an inability to fall asleep (no kidding!) and maintain sleep. The sleep pattern is very fragmented with an excess of beta frequencies, and an intrusion of alpha frequencies. So even if you are sleeping, the brain doesn't "recognize" that you've sleeping, or that you've slept. Everyone normally awakens every 90 minutes or so - it's evolutionary - then quickly falls back asleep. If you're awake for less than a few minutes, you won't remember being awake in the morning. Insomniacs do remember. And since their sleep is fragments - waking up more often - there is often a misperception of total sleep time - ie, an severe insomniac may state that they only slept for one hour during the night, but when you look at actual sleep activity it may be 4 or 5 hours of actual sleep. Along with this hyper-arousal type sleep, they have a hard time napping the day. If we do a yoke control study and every time the insomniac is awake, you wake up the "normal", then test them the next day to see what the propensity to sleep is - the control would fall asleep very easily while the insomniac would not.
You and your dad have my sympathy - my sister is a severe insomniac. I've seen what she's gone through and her troubles in dealing with her medical community. I've tried to help her - but I'm just her kid brother (I'm 51 for god's sake) so what can I know!

Yar. The insomniac science-junkie knows the info. Thanks for the kind words, but like Zeke, I learned to just go with it. I am fortunate in that I am a hermit and can do pretty much as I like.

[Primewonk]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
Probably a better approach is to first define terms for the students, most of whom probably equate "evolution" with the goo-to-you scenario.

Maybe for the kids from fundamentalist homes. My sons and their friends - who have all taken AP Bio - knew the difference. Of course, both my sons have student memberships in AAAS too, and get the journal Science on line.

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>As you stated in your previous post, "teaching evolution does not include abiogenesis or cosmology." This is where the ID concept could be mentioned (since it is so much in the news) as just another way of "allowing" them to believe in a creator without feeling intimidated.

ID IS RELIGION. It was invented by right-wing creationists pissed off that they got spanked by SCOTUS. ID cannot not be religious. Positing an intelligent designer begs the question of who designed him/her/it. Eventually you reach the point of A - first life, somewhere in the universe, originated naturally and then this life seeded the rest of the universe; or B - goddidit. If you are claiming that A is true, then it isn't ID. If you're claiming B, that is religion - and this god is no more, nor no less special than the thousands of other gods man has invented.

An "intelligent designer" should have designed things a whole lot more intelligently. Why not put a monolith on the moon that said - Congrats! You've made it this far. Tag - you're it! Why not stick a numerical message inside pi? Why not have Zork come up to Spirit or Opportunity and hold up a sign that reads, "Hi! How are you? We've been waiting a loooooonnnggg time".

[LWsciencejunkie]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
Question to all here discussing sleep:
Has anyone ever studied the place of sleep in the evolutionary scheme of things?
It would seem obvious that an organism is most vulnerable while asleep. So how did it not reduce its chances of survival?
Yes, we know sleep is necessary to repair the body, but has that always been the case? Do microorganisms have to sleep or is it a function of complexity?

[I think I've talked myself into doing a bit of Googling, but maybe someone can suggest a reference?]
I was fascinated to learn that (some?) birds can sleep half their brain at a time. They've been observed perching side-by-side, each sleeping the vulnerable half of their brains while keeping watch with the other. After awhile they switch positions and sleep the other half!!
So much time "wasted" in sleep... Too bad we can pull the bird trick!

I don't think you read one damn word of anyone else's posts. Much of what you mentioned above has, in fact, been discussed. There is no point to responding to you because you simply don't register anything that does not stroke your god gene.

[Primewonk]

polymath257 wrote:

<quoted text>
You seem to think that the Big Bang is some hair-brained concept that people came up with to avoid the idea of a creator. That is very far from the truth. First of all, the basic theory is the theory of general relativity, which is Einstein's description for gravity as a curvature of spacetime. In this, the curvature is related to the density of matter and energy in a very specific way. This theory of gravity is the best we have at this point and has passed all experimental tests with flying colors. When GR was applied to the universe as a whole, and assuming a universe that 'looks the same' at all points, it was found that 'space' would either expand over time or contract over time. In the first case, there was a time before which GR simply doesn't apply. In the latter case, that time is in the future and you can't talk about a time past that.
The original version of the Big Bang model (which is just GR applied to the universe as a whole) was proposed by a Catholic priest. When the Pope at the time started claiming that it proved Genesis correct, LeMaitre (the priest) told him to stop because it could be interpreted many ways.
Later, thermodynamics was brought into the description with the realization that the expansion causes a cooling. If this is run backwards, it is found that the universe was much hotter in the past. Using our knowledge of nuclear physics, we could use the hot Big Bang model to predict the amounts of hydrogen, deuterium, helium, and lithium that we should see today. These abundances have been verified.
Next, the hot Big Bang also predicted a 'afterglow' that would be seen in all directions and be of a very specific form (a Planck distribution). This background radiation has been found and currently is what gives us some of our best information about the early universe.
<quoted text>
And I think most religious cosmologists believe something along these lines. The question is not whether it is a possibility. The question is whether there is any actual evidence that this is, in fact, the case. It really is quite easy to spin a variety of stories about how the universe came to be. Some even are consistent with what we know about the laws of physics. But the proposal that there is no mechanism that can be described automatically takes your proposal out of the realm of science.
<quoted text>
You are assuming that there *was* a 'pre-Big Bang'. In the description given by general relativity, time itself is affected by the density of matter and energy. As you go backwards in time, the curvature increases to the point that there is literally no way to continue time past the instant of the Big Bang. It is analogous, but not identical, to what happens at the north pole of the earth with latitude lines. If I asked you what is north of the north pole, you would say that it is impossible; that the north pole is as far north as you can go. In a similar way, the instant of the Big Bang is as far backwards in time as you can go. There is no cause because there is no previous time. There is no 'something from nothing' because the conservation laws ALL describe comparisons between different TIMES.

Damn! I can see why LW swoons over you. I'm a straight guy, and I think I'd date you! Very well stated and eloquent. Thanks for keeping it simple for us laymen!

[LWsciencejunkie]

polymath257 wrote:

<quoted text>
If *evidence* was given for that proposition, then no.
<quoted text>
But it relies on exactly thew same type of reasoning that is the foundation of that goo-to-you evolution. What you want to do is argue against the conclusions when applied to one realm when they work perfectly well in every situation where they have been applied.
<quoted text>
And religion does *such* a good job of respecting life. That's why the Reformation was so peaceful and serene. That's why the Middle East is an example of peaceful co-existence. That's why scientists have tried to hinder every major advancement made by religious organizations from vaccination, to birth control, to stem cell research.</sarcasm>

This guy is getting on my last nerve. As if Newton ever considered a godless universe. Time to garden.

[Katydid]

MichiganGEL wrote:

<quoted text>
No one denies the importance of the continued advancement of genetic science in medical research. But how would that science suffer if it should turn out that an Intelligent Designer was involved in abiogenesis, say?!

Genetic science would not suffer at all, because it is based on biological evolution, not abiogenesis. If you believe that the Creator or Intelligent Designer was involved in abiogenesis that is your right. Right now there are several very plausible hypotheses of abiogenesis.

Again though abiogenesis has nothing to do with the facts and theory of evolution.

Believing in something is not using the scientific method and therefore has no place in a high school bio, honors bio or AP bio class.

I judge the science fair about every other year, looking at the research that has made it to the state level. These kids are in 9-12 grade and fortunately, or unfortunately, depending upon your perspective, understand the scientific method more thoroughly than many of the posters on TOPIX that will not accept the ToE.

MichiganGEL wrote:

Does that research depend on a belief in "goo-to-you" evolution?

Our research depends on biological evolution, yes.

MichiganGEL wrote:

No, because it is only what can be produced, observed and replicated in the lab or field that results in new cancer treatments, etc.

Unlike ID, the mutations that drive biological evolution employ mechanisms that we are able to observe. One is the mechanism of transposons, another is retroelements.

Once a mutation is established in DNA it is perpetuated each time the DNA molecule replicates, so the mutation is passed from generation to generation.

When transposable elements slip into the gene it will cause a mutation and usually eliminate the gene’s function, when this element slips back out the gene’s original function is restored. This transposable element can now go and insert itself into another gene and if it does, it will cause a new mutation there. So you can have stable mutations and mutations caused by transposable elements.

Transposons are cut-and-paste transposable elements and retroelements are copy-and-paste transposable elements (makes a RNA copy of itself, the RNA copy is then “recopied” back into DNA and the DNA copy then inserts itself at a new position).

[Katydid]

Mutations in the genome as manipulated or artificially induced by man are quite often beneficial; this is the whole purpose of oncogene therapy.

The properties that make transposons so useful in oncogene therapy are their ability to move from one chromosomal position to another. In particular, transposons can be harnessed to stably integrate sizeable pieces of DNA into a host's chromosome.

Gene therapy in oncology has been employed to utilize gene transfer into tumor cells to induce tumor cell death, stimulate anti-tumor immune response, inhibit angiogenesis, and control tumor cell growth (replace defective genes with normal ones).

The problem was how to obtain an efficient delivery of nucleic acids into the cells? Viral vectors were first employed. Vectors based on viruses offered a very efficient way to introduce gene constructs into the cancerous cells, but they were hard to control, had genotoxic effects and immunological complications (patients died).

To solve the problem oncogeneticists are working with transposon- based gene vectors.

Last year, a team of researchers studied a gene that produced a protein called Myc (pronounced “Mick”), which promotes cell division. A mutation of this gene causes cells to overproduce the protein, prompting perpetual cell division and tumor growth. By turning off the mutated gene, the researchers found that not only did uncontrolled cell division cease, but the cells also reactivated a normal physiological mechanism, called senescence, which makes it possible for a cell to eventually die (senescence is like a fail-safe mechanism to stop cancer in the cell, normally, when a cell detects a deleterious mutation, it launches the senescence process, resulting in the permanent loss of the cell's ability to proliferate, and halting cancer; so in order to become tumor cells, those cells have to overcome senescence). Researchers were amazed that senescence was reactivated, that the cells had retained this mechanism. It was a long held school of thought that as the cells proliferated uncontrollably, they also irreversibly circumvented this mechanism that causes normal cells to die when they get old or malfunction, literally making the cancerous cell immortal.

Imagine their shock when they found that by switching off a single malfunctioning gene, not only did they halt the endless division but also restored the cells own natural mechanism to ensure its mortality.

This has opened a whole new field in oncogene therapy, use the cell's own natural mechanism to destroy itself (cancerous cell).

None of this would be possible without evolutionary biology and the in-depth understanding of the facts of evolution.

Luckily for you though we do not ask patients if they accept the facts and theory of evolution prior to sending off a genetic assay.