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Book by: Thomas F. Heinze · ©2005 · 96 pgs.
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| Darwin recognized that it is normal for differences to exist between individuals. Some people have black hair, some blond. Some are big and some are little. Darwin believed that, because natural selection continued to eliminate individuals having less useful traits, elephants eventually developed from one-celled animals.
Later, Mendel's laws of heredity became known, helping people understand how traits are shuffled and passed on to the offspring. As a result, scientists noticed that the process only reshuffles the same old deck of traits that has always been there. It provides nothing new, no way for bacteria to evolve to become biochemists. Because of this, Darwin's idea of how evolution took place had to be overhauled. Evolutionists now believe mutations are the source of new information that codes for new proteins, rather than redistributing the same old information. We refer to this as NeoDarwinism. NeoDarwinists believe mutations are the principle source of new genetic instructions which, starting with a single cell, have produced different plants and animals, including the more advanced species. They also trust that mutations perfected by natural selection brought all the organs into being: hands, gills, brains, etc. that a first cell did not have but that now exist. These mutations are random errors made in copying the cell's DNA instructions while passing them on to the next generation. Their frequency is increased by radiation, and other kinds of damage. |
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Mutations Usually Go "Downhill"
Thousands of diseases are known to be caused by mutations. These, however, are downhill mutations. No mutations have been identified which add complexity, or new genes containing new commands which could work together to produce the first head, or tail, or hand, or other body part that never existed before. The chance of accidental mutations making complex improvements in living things is about the same as that of an author's cat writing new and better chapters for his book by walking on his keyboard. You don't believe that aimless unplanned random happenings build better books, or that a traffic accident invented the wheel. Why believe random mutations produced your brain, or even your little toe?
Except for some mutations which are neutral, almost all are harmful. The Encyclopedia Britannica makes it clear:
"Most mutations, however, turn out to be deleterious and often lead to some impairment or to death of the organism. To illustrate, it is unlikely that one can improve the functioning of a finely crafted watch by dropping it from a tall building. The watch may run better, but this is highly improbable. Organisms are so much more finely crafted than the finest watch that any random change is even more likely to be deleterious." (1)Ample evidence supports the encyclopedia's statement. Random errors in copying DNA really do produce defects—downhill evolution. Uphill evolution, the kind claimed to start with a simple one-celled creature and develop monkeys and redwood trees, is not based on evidence, but on faith in evolution. If any uphill mutations that increase biological complexity happen, no one can cite an example. Those who disagree usually use the example of sickle cell anemia, an often-lethal hereditary disease among humans which distorts the shape of the red blood cells. The distorted cells don't carry oxygen as well, but the genes that distort the red blood cells give some resistance to malaria, and this resistance is the most common illustration evolutionists give of a "helpful" mutation. While the mutation does have a helpful side effect, is it really a helpful mutation? Even if you think it is, it is not an uphill mutation. Mutations which distort the shape of red blood cells, and make them less efficient at doing their job of carrying oxygen are not causing uphill evolution. If uphill mutations exist, they are overwhelmingly outnumbered by harmful mutations, as the The Britannica so beautifully states.
Here is an experiment you can do yourself. Radiation speeds up the mutation rate, so buy a trunk full of atomic waste and keep it under your bed. Maybe the children you have will be super evolved geniuses. Don't count on it!
The Fruit Fly Experiments
Many laboratory experiments were conducted to learn about the effect of mutations on evolution by studying the fruit fly. Since scientists could choose the mutations they wanted to preserve, many hoped to see good mutations gradually lifting the fruit flies to a higher level, developing new organs, and doing other things evolution is claimed to do.
The mutations studied caused a wide range of defects. While evolutionists believe many constructive mutations also occur, they have been difficult to pin down. People who disagree usually tell me about the mutation that repeated the genes for wings on a fruit fly, adding an extra pair. They hung down and got in the way, and did not function, so would be eliminated by natural selection.
The useless wings do help us understand what is involved in adding new organs. For mutations to write the code for wings, if they had not existed before, would have required coding for many new proteins for muscles, nerves, blood supply, etc. which would all work together. To duplicate wings that already existed and worked would only require duplication of the genes for the whole package. You can get about the same amount of totally new information by making photocopies of already existing pages of text. In the fruit fly example, however, the genes for other body parts that should have worked with the new wings were not duplicated, so the wings did not work. The observed mutations of fruit flies were not steps toward their becoming men, birds, or even butterflies. They did not add new information that would make novel new organs. They did not even duplicate enough of the already existing wing genes so the added wings could function. The famous French zoologist Pierre Grasse wrote:
"The fruit fly (Drosophila melanogaster), the favorite pet insect of the geneticists, whose geographical, biotopical, urban and rural genotypes are now known inside out, seems not to have changed since the remotest times." (2)Since fruit fly experiments did not give the desired result, E. coli bacteria began to be used. Bacteria have new generations much more rapidly than the flies. The results? According to Grasse,
"The reader will agree that it is surprising, to say the least, to want to prove evolution and to discover its mechanisms and then to choose as a material for this study a being which practically stabilized a billion years ago!" (3)More recent evolutionists tell us the situation is even worse and refer to the oldest fossils which they say "are from rocks about 3.55 billion years of age, and they look identical to bacteria still on Earth today." (4) Many of today's evolutionists believe the bacteria were "practically stabilized" not just a billion years ago, but 3.55 billion years ago.
Bacteria, which often split off another generation every 15 minutes, evolve very rapidly in theory. They are designed to adapt well to changing environments, but their mutations are not producing fish or worms, or arms or wings, just more bacteria, evidently no more advanced than those claimed to have lived 3.55 billion years ago.
David DeWitt describes what would be required if the theory of evolution were true:
"Successful macro-evolution requires the addition of NEW information and NEW genes that produce NEW proteins that are found in New organs and systems." (5)
Recessive Mutations
Public school textbooks often downplay the proportion of harmful mutations or state: "Natural selection eliminates the harmful mutations." However, around two thirds of all mutations are recessive. That is, they only show up in the offspring which inherit the same mutation from both parents. Recessive mutations cannot be rapidly eliminated, because natural selection can only eliminate the diseased offspring, not the two thirds which carry the disease and pass it on, but are not affected themselves. This school book quotation is right:
"Because natural selection operates only on genes that are expressed, it is very slow to eliminate harmful recessive mutations." (6)In addition, the same mutations tend to be repeated. Because of this and the difficulty of eliminating recessive mutations, some genetic diseases have become widespread.
Clusters of Mutations
To develop a new organ would require a number of mutations that would code for the new muscles, nerves, bones, etc. that would work in a coordinated way in the new organ. The various parts of a new organ would need to be produced at about the same time to start working together before any essential part could be eliminated. If mutations developed that coded for a few of the necessary parts, but not those which would have to work together with them, they would not be helpful. What good is a new bone without muscles to move it, with no blood supply or no nerves? Mutations that are not functional tend to be eliminated by natural selection.
Would a big cluster of mutations all at the same time solve the problem? Since most mutations are harmful, if an organism were to receive a cluster of mutations large enough to include a few helpful mutations that would work together, the cluster would also contain many more harmful mutations that cause genetic diseases. Natural selection eliminates harmful mutations by eliminating the whole organism which contains them, so organisms which receive clusters of mutations don't evolve, they die.
Point Mutations
Minimal mutations that command the change of only one amino acid in one protein are called point mutations. Because clusters of mutations tend to kill the organisms that receive them, point mutations are considered the most important to evolution. The individual that receives a point mutation often survives. Drake says:
"...point mutations are likely to allow the afflicted individual to survive and reproduce, and may thus be transmitted and affect subsequent generations. In terms of human suffering, therefore, the summed effects of single gene mutations probably exceed the deleterious effects of changes in chromosome number or arrangement." (7)Point mutations often survive, but each one only modifies one amino acid in one protein; not nearly enough to produce a new organ. Until a new organ is complete enough to be of some use to the individual it is in, it tends to be eliminated, so it is hard to see how point mutations could ever make new organs.
Once we understand that neither point mutations nor larger clusters of mutations can make new organs, we see why books promoting evolution use downhill and horizontal examples instead of uphill examples. If you are being taught that mutations have caused evolution, a not-too-threatening question to ask your teacher is: "Were new organs developed by point mutations, or larger clusters of mutations?" According to the answer, you can quote a paragraph or two from this book, and politely ask the teacher to explain it. Don't insist and flunk the course, just get some thinking started.
Endnotes
1 "Life," Encyclopedia Britannica, 2002.
2 Evolution of Living Organisms, 1977, p. 130.
3 Ibid., 1977 p.87
4 Peter D. Ward, Donald Brownlee, Rare Earth: Why Complex Life is Uncommon in the Universe, 2000, p. 57.
5 David A. DeWitt, "Hox Hype: Has Macro-evolution Been Proven?" Creation Matters, a CRS Publication, Jan./Feb. 2002, p. 10.
6 Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Modern Biology, 2002, p. 304.
7 John W. Drake, "Environmental Mutagenic Hazards," Science, Vol. 187, Feb. 14, 1985, p. 505.
<http://www.creationism.org/books/HeinzeVanishing/HeinzeVanishChap04_en.htm>
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