…during early development, the proteins required for cell division come from the mother. The researchers speculate that the heterochromatin of the male D. melanogaster‘s X chromosome has rapidly evolved, such that after mating, the machinery involved in DNA packaging from a D. simulans mother no longer recognizes the D. melanogaster father’s “junk” DNA, Ferree said.
Basically, so-called “junk”-DNA is involved in helping to package chromosomes in the cell. If two species have different “junk” DNA, then this prevents the proteins in the egg from properly packaging the chromosomes donated by the sperm. The organism does not develop properly.
ECM sent me this awesome post from Uncommon Descent. The post explains how someone who doesn’t want to read about intelligent design can learn what intelligent design by doing. That’s right – you can learn about intelligent design by practicing intelligent design.
Excerpt:
Of course a good example of design would be engineering in all its specialties. Unfortunately almost all fields of engineering are inaccessible to laymen for many reasons. But the good news is that there is a field that is theorically and practically available (at least at a basic level) to almost all people (or at least to scientific-minded people as most ID deniers are): computer science. Our suggested patent-pending method to become IDer is based on computer programming. Developing programs gives ID refuters a lot of advantages to learn ID.
(1) Computer programming is an activity where, differently from literature, philosophy, journalism and so on, a severe control overarches all the design cycle. In programming errors matter, also the minor ones are never condoned. This is good discipline for the student, to be always forced to correct his errors. If you write a book filled with errors, no worry, it will be published the same. If you write a program with one error nothing works. This is the difference between storytelling and programming. Usually there are at least two kinds of control or filter: at compilation time and at run-time. Any program works only if it passes the two filters.
[…](2) Computer programs don’t arise by unguided evolution. They entail CSI and only intelligence can create CSI. Whether software were generable by mean of randomness and machines, software houses wouldn’t need to pay legions of expensive programmers. When you are programming you see directly your intelligence at work. Eventually other programmers can help you but no other unintelligent thing can do the job for you.
(3) To develop programs is a good exercise to learn CSI, IC, nested functional hierarchies, sub-functions, structures, dependences among parts, meta-information, libraries, etc.
Intelligent design is nothing more than sequencing a large number of parts into a chain that has function. That’s it – that’s all it is. God is a software engineer. And if you’re interested in seeing some of the published research done by ID theorists, check out this list of their publications in scientific, peer-reviewed research journals. (H/T Truthbomb Apologetics)
There is only one problem with the post at UD, though. They recomment Perl and PHP for the exercise. Perl and PHP are crappy languages for any program longer than 100 lines that needs to be maintained longer than 2 months, or maintained by another developer who did not write it. The readability and maintainability of Perl and PHP are atrocious. Stick with languages like Java, Smalltalk or C#.
Their DVDs are professional documentaries with lots of great music, stunning animations and interviews with people on both sides of the question. The first DVD (watch the whole thing on youtube) is about biological information and the origin of life. The second DVD (watch the whole thing on youtube) is about fine-tuning at the galactic, stellar and planetary levels. And now there is a new DVD, that has just come out!
Here’s the trailer:
I haven’t been able to watch it yet, but Brian Auten has, and he’s written a masterful review of the DVD on his blog Apologetics 315. His review is a play-by-play account of the DVD’s content.
Excerpt:
The first quarter of the 72-minute DVD provides the historical background of the Burgess shale and describes the Cambrian Explosion as a mystery Darwin could not resolve… This introduction provides an appropriate historical explanation of how this fossil layer was discovered and explored. Computer animations bring the fossilized animals to life, showing the full body plans and complexity of the most notable animals found in the Cambrian.
[…]In the next fifteen minutes the documentary explores the development of Darwin’s theory. This describes what Darwin expected to find in the fossil record, including step-by-step transitional forms.
[…]Half way through the documentary, further Cambrian fossils are discussed: the Chinese Chengjiang fossils, which were remarkably well preserved and many of them soft-bodied.
[…]Three quarters through the documentary, young Darwin takes his voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle and the documentary describes Darwin’s evolutionary model.
[…]At the fifty-minute mark, the documentary begins to explore the structure of DNA. Just how much change in complexity is needed to create the diversity of body plans? Impressive computer animations show DNA while describing the mechanisms of mutation and natural selection.
Go here and check it the review. By the way, I have been trying to encourage Brian to listen Ron Nash’s lectures on economics and Christianity and Jennifer Roback Morse’s lectures on marriage, economics and same-sex marriage. I think he needs to broaden out his horizons a little, and apply his Christian worldview to other topics, like fiscal and social policy, etc. He likes it when people pester him about that, so feel free to leave him an encouraging comment. Or two.
WINTERY KNIGHT 