Where Did the Cell Come From?

[St.Roymond]

@RichardG

You can’t back down can you. What gives you the right to preach at me.

St. Paul does.
And the fact that you preach at everyone else.

[RichardG (Richard Gillett)]

@St.Roymond

@RichardG

You can’t back down can you. What gives you the right to preach at me.

St. Paul does

Neither he or you is St Paul
(And St Paul was not preaching to me then, or now.)

@St.Roymond

And the fact that you preach at everyone else.

no I do not.

You have never heard or seen me preach.
I only preach to those who want to listen to me and in a place where I have the authority to do so.

Richard

[biochemist (doug)]

Marty,

Thanks for the info on Edward Peltzer’s interview on Origin of Life.
As I stated way back in reply 36, the cell is a unit, such that all the key biochemical parts, the team of enzymes, the DNA/RNA code, the 20 amino acid alphabet, the ATP energy currency, the protein/lipid membrane, are inter-related, and all are required to be present for there to be a working cell. Here is a key question (pg 20 of interview) from William Dembski about OoL and Edward Peltzer’s answer -

WD: What do you see as the most promising current naturalistic hypotheses for how life originated—e.g., hydrothermal vents, surface-based chemistry, RNA world, lipid world, or something else? Are any of these hypotheses in your view well supported in the sense that you see them as live candidates for truly uncovering the details of a naturalistic origin of life?

EP: To be totally candid, none of the current theories are what we might call promising. They all suffer from various fatal errors and as a group ignore the most important issue: a living cell is an irreducibly complex organism. Take any part of it away, and it fails as a living organism and dies. It cannot be built piece-meal. It must be assembled whole, with everything in its proper place, in order to function at all. That means, in addition to needing to gather all the required parts, they must be assembled in the proper fashion in 3D space and done so quickly or else bits and pieces will react chemically and doom the project to failure. So far, the only thing that we know that can make a living cell is another living cell.

[Vinnie]

@glipsnort

Given the frequency with which religions proclaiming objective standards of morality have endorsed, mandated, and sometimes celebrated the killing of babies, this was perhaps not the best test case Vinnie could have offered.

What does this have to do with whether or not objective morality exists? It would be like saying since some people do bad science, good science doesn’t exist. This seems to be a red herring and has no real impact on my belief. I think we all agree contradictory claims to objective morality exist, if nothing else. I don’t think child sacrifice or people murdering children or throwing babies in rivers because they were girls is subjectively wrong. It is objectively wrong and I would bet my life on it without hesitation and wouldn’t care if I was wrong. The alternative is a world I genuinely don’t care to live in. Every fiber of my being tells me murdering little girls because they aren’t little boys is objectively wrong. If you disagree with that I am inclined to just dismiss you out of hand. I’m certainly never going to break bread with a person like that. Also note, I have never said I think all my moral thoughts or even opinions are objective. Nor did I say that I take all the commands in the Bible as the literal word of God.

@Roy

Apart from Mother Theresa not being as appropriate an example as you seem to think, your willingness to declare something false simply because you don’t like the consequences of it being true is enough to invalidate your conclusion.

Wow. You actually fell for the Mother Theresa critiques? I suppose it is fashionable in some circles online to avoid thinking critically and follow bad arguments by Hitchens about Mother Theresa. They tend to circulate in echo chambers and people who like to attack religion. If you really want to educate yourself on this issue, try this reddit post in r/badhistory.

https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/gcxpr5/saint_mother_teresa_was_documented_mass_murderer/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

@Roy

What does your objective moral code say about selling women into sexual slavery?

It is objectively wrong. Humans have intrinsic value as they are made in God’s image. Enslaving and selling them like livestock against their will for hedonistic and depraved sexual pleasure is an objective moral evil.

@Roy

Humanism, utilitarianism, the golden rule, among others.

Humanism is not objective. Utilitarianism can revert to moral evil very quickly. As I said before, we should do the right thing because it is right, and not just because it practical or produces ideal results for me. Because if helping my neighbor doesn’t help me in a particulate instance I have lost the moral reason for doing so in a utilitarian framework. That is not a good moral system in my view. Do the right thing because it is right. Atheists can and do do this, but materialism cannot justify it.

@Roy

That appears to be just your opinion, and doesn’t take into account that objective moral systems do not have to be based on religion

As long as materialism is dropped.

@Roy

You definitely can’t tell slave traders that what they did was wrong, because slave trading is explicitly sanctioned within your religion.

Slave trading was sanctioned by virtually the entire world. It was also significantly abolished by my religion, not yours.

@Roy

Or like arguing which religion is the correct one.

There are only a few which are realistic options consistent with sound metaphysical arguments proving the God of classical theism exists necessarily. You just think religion is a guessing game. In fact, I’m guessing the same universal arguments you make for morality can easily be extended to religion since it has always been the default position in the world. I actually wonder what your purpose is on this forum since you let the village atheism on strong in this post. Nitpicking believers seems to be all I can come up with. Take this gem for example:

@Roy

Telling some-one that they are wrong, you are right, and you know more about the source of their ethics than they do, is neither gracious nor humble.

You accused me of saying atheists cannot be moral. I said atheists are moral and pointed out, on an allegedly Christian message board, what is an extremely common Christian view of general revelation based on Paul’s thoughts, that everyone has God’s law on their heart. I quoted it to refute your nonsense that suggested I didn’t distinguish between atheists actually being moral people and atheism as a philosophy being inconsistent with morality. @T_aquaticus literally referenced the very same scripture earlier in this thread. Here look:

@T_aquaticus

I also think there is a lot of overlap with Christian theology. I can’t cite the chapter and verse, but the Bible does say something to the effect that God has written the laws on our hearts.

@T_aquaticus its Romans 1:20

As usual, @Roy, you misunderstand…mainly because this isn’t the secular web or r/atheism and you are not debating a fundamentalist. Is T doing all that you accuse me of by quoting the same verse? You approach things from the wrong direction and make no effort to understand what is being written. You just assume I am citing scripture definitively to an atheist? I’d save those pearls for someone who would appreciate them.

@Roy

You can’t tell Nazis what they did was wrong because you seem to have nothing to justify your assertion that your religion is the true one and theirs is false other than “this is my opinion.”

Moral systems are very complex and none of us can escape where and when we were born or our life experiences. Rationally, my objective moral system is tied to the incarnation and as a Christian, the Holy Spirit at work in my life. But my moral system generally rises and falls with Jesus and His sacrifice.

@Roy

You can’t tell Nazis what they did was wrong because you seem to have nothing to justify your assertion that your religion is the true one and theirs is false other than “this is my opinion.”

Imagine saying this in a public forum that is not the internet. At your next dinner party, lead a conversation with “Ican’t tell Nazis what they did was wrong because I seem to have nothing to justify my assertion that my moral code is the true one and theirs is false other than “this is my opinion.” Or maybe you can state something similar on the news after the next school shooting.

@Roy

As far as I can tell, your choice of religion (Christianity/Islam/Hinduism/Zoroastrianism/Baltic Finnic paganism/…) is based entirely on just your opinion.

Define opinion.

@T_aquaticus

I see no reason why morality is impossible if you don’t believe the universe has intrinsic meaning or purpose. All you need is desire for the world to be a certain way and for humans to treat each other in a certain way. I don’t see why wanting to see human beings happy and fulfilled in their lives requires a belief in teleology and the rest.

You are just restating that you believe in subjective morality. This isn’t changing anything from my perspective. You could just as easily believe the opposite or believe only your family’s happiness matters. Or want to see humans suffer and be in pain. It doesn’t resolve the issue of who is right when people disagree or if there even is a correct position (you deny this).

Imagine if the age of the earth was just a subjective opinion. A person might think its old while another thinks its young. Okay. I mean, if there is no actual truth to either proposition, whatever, I guess. I find how we behave to the most important aspect of being human. To make that a subjective guessing game based solely on fickle whims and not objectively tying it into our nature by virtue of our being, is just a worldview playing make believe with life. When you embrace materialism or scientism, you detach yourself from reality.

And I find your comment interesting because because believing evolution is false helps make some human beings (young earth creationists) happy and fulfilled in their lives. I guess believing in bad science here is good. @Roy should appreciate the utilitarian perspective. Shouldn’t you then encourage these humans to continue in their happy ignorance? Or should we worship at the altar of atheism where being right about science is more important than being happy?

Vinnie

[Marty]

@Argon

I do wonder, however, what ‘intelligent design’ brings to the table in this regards.

Yowza! I’ll take a swing at this. ID gathers the data and shows how the science itself (at this time) indicates life is not an accident. That has the most profound implications! It says life here was intentional, and most likely there is a reason for it, so my life very probably has meaning.

There’s a lot that does NOT say, in terms of the nature of the agent. If we want to know more, he must poke through from “the other side.” Which I think he did.

[Argon]

Hi Marty, thanks for the ideas.

I think it’s hard to prove a negative. Instead, I would try to make alternate, positive hypotheses about what a designer might have done and when. Can one make a positive case for ideas like which steps or eras over life’s history did a designer directly influence the path of evolution or release new organisms? What was the nature of the intervention(s)?

Historically, modern science emerged from the efforts of natural philosophy and most of the founders simply assumed that God was involved. I’ve come to think that most attempts at formulating a theistic science naturally lead to what we see today, i.e. Forever uncertain about what God wanted with so many beetles but knowing a lot of details of their genetic relationship, abilities to adapt to particular environments, and understanding the physics behind the iridescence of many shells

We have fields of research that investigate at least ‘terrestrially localized designers’ like humans & organisms that produce patterns in the environment. So in practice, some effects can be detected. Normally, when invoking agents like humans or a particular culture, we rely on additional criteria like “were there humans around at the time?”, and “is there auxiliary evidence to corroborate their local presence?”

Now, there are some hypotheses about how ‘agents’ may have affected the pattern of life in the past. For example, there are Special Creationists that proposed that organisms arose from different sets of created kinds. Each kind represented distinct creation or release event. That idea lends itself to positive theorizing about how organisms relate to each other and implies that species could demonstrate very different properties, based on which kind that a species came from. Basically, not the nested hierarchy we currently observe. Additionally, there remains no evident method of demarcation between organisms of different kinds. So, special creation is a ‘design model’, that can be formulated to make specific and positively distinguishable hypotheses.

Another set of models falls under ‘progressive creationism’ (PC). The formulation can be a bit fuzzy but depending on the particular flavor such as ‘the introduction of smallish changes over time’, it can accommodate nested hierarchies, the fossil record, and observations like the time since emergence of a species is correlated to the divergence of sequences. The downside is that progressive creation can be very hard to distinguish from basic evolution, and posits unspecified numbers of interactions with species over time while providing little auxiliary evidence of a distinct ‘agent’ existing or operating on Earth at the proposed times. Consequently, much of PC seems to fall back on proving the negative (needing a lot of negative proofs, to be honest), e.g. that evolution “can’t do it”, rather than making a useful, positive case about what we might expect to see in contrast, if a particular formulation of PC is correct.

In my opinion, one of the squishiest of ‘design’ proposals are those of ‘underspecified design’‘ or ‘sterile design’ where the actions, intent, identity, capabilities, mechanisms, and impact of design events are not specified (in contrast to the work of terrestrial designers which may possess many of these properties in abundance). Let’s assume that life did not originate spontaneously on Earth. This is all that a negative argument can provide. It doesn’t demonstrate whether something is an ‘accident’ or not. It doesn’t imply that a purpose must exist (I don’t think Christians believe that anything which occurs ‘in accord with the regularities of nature’ lacks ‘purpose’). We have an event and an approximate time in Earth’s history. What specific models would people like to propose for evaluation about how life appeared? If something deposited life on Earth 3-4 billions of years ago, how would you like to investigate the event? I know of several, non-supernatural hypotheses (including Fred Hoyle’s variant of panspermia) which might be differentiated and investigated but I’m not sure how theistic science would address it differently from current science.

[St.Roymond]

@Roy

doesn’t take into account that objective moral systems do not have to be based on religion

All moral systems are based on assumptions – so there really is no such thing as an objective moral system. The closest thing I’ve ever seen is based on the proposition that each individual person is self-owning, but that itself is disputed by many moral systems.

@Roy

because slave trading is explicitly sanctioned within your religion.

Please provide documentation that Rome approves of slavery.
Even some second-Temple Jews recognized that slavery verges on blasphemy due to every person being in the image of God; the early church elevated this by noting that Christ died for all – and to claim ownership of the image of God for whom the Son of God died was regarded as blasphemous.

[St.Roymond]

@biochemist

To be totally candid, none of the current theories are what we might call promising. They all suffer from various fatal errors and as a group ignore the most important issue: a living cell is an irreducibly complex organism. Take any part of it away, and it fails as a living organism and dies. It cannot be built piece-meal. It must be assembled whole, with everything in its proper place, in order to function at all. That means, in addition to needing to gather all the required parts, they must be assembled in the proper fashion in 3D space and done so quickly or else bits and pieces will react chemically and doom the project to failure. So far, the only thing that we know that can make a living cell is another living cell.

An issue here is that just because what we see now can’t be dismantled and still function doesn’t mean it couldn’t have worked up by simple steps. That means two things: first, just because we can’t work backwards doesn’t mean there wasn’t a forward process; second, if it indeed did work forward and has now passed beyond where it can be reversed, we’ll never be able to work backwards.
Quite the dilemma.

[RichardG (Richard Gillett)]

@St.Roymond

An issue here is that just because what we see now can’t be dismantled and still function doesn’t mean it couldn’t have worked up by simple steps. That means two things: first, just because we can’t work backwards doesn’t mean there wasn’t a forward process; second, if it indeed did work forward and has now passed beyond where it can be reversed, we’ll never be able to work backwards.

What wonderful reasoning. It solves so many problems about irreducibility and means that you do not have to beleive it exists. And this is all I have ever heard from Sceintists here, that they do not accept even the possiblity that something cannot be made piece by piece desite numerous examples in the human world of consrtruction. not to mention the eitence of thiings like the womb to protect lefe that cannot survive on its own while developing.
It is a basic lack of beleif, or accpetance of a principle. it is blinkered. , but cannot be argued against. No matter what item or system is cited, it will always be inconclusive enough to dismiss.
Billiant.

Richard

[Roy (Roy (Listener twice correct))]

@Vinnie

@Roy

Apart from Mother Theresa not being as appropriate an example as you seem to think, your willingness to declare something false simply because you don’t like the consequences of it being true is enough to invalidate your conclusion.

Wow. You actually fell for the Mother Theresa critiques?

I understand she prevented women accessing contraception, and helped to reinstate a child abuser into a position of power in the church. Unless you have some source that shows otherwise…?

I note that you have no defence against your fallacious appeal to consequences.

@Vinnie

Do the right thing because it is right. Atheists can and do do this, but materialism cannot justify it.

So what? Neither can heliocentrism, catastrophism, atomism or emergentism. They’re ideas about how the world/universe works, not bases for behaviour. Criticising materialism because it can’t be used to justify moral behaviour is like criticising plate tectonics for the same reason. It shows a complete failure to understand materialism (and atheism) as well as a lack of awareness of Hume’s is-ought problem.

@Vinnie

@Roy

You definitely can’t tell slave traders that what they did was wrong, because slave trading is explicitly sanctioned within your religion.

Slave trading was sanctioned by virtually the entire world. It was also significantly abolished by my religion, not yours.

That’s a ridiculously simplified version of abolitionism and yet another confirmation that you are completely clueless about atheism.

@Vinnie

@Roy

Or like arguing which religion is the correct one.

There are only a few which are realistic options consistent with sound metaphysical arguments proving the God of classical theism exists necessarily.

“Sound metaphysical arguments”??? Yet you accuse me of avoiding thinking critically? You’re a joke.

@Vinnie

@Roy

Telling some-one that they are wrong, you are right, and you know more about the source of their ethics than they do, is neither gracious nor humble.

You accused me of saying atheists cannot be moral.

Codswallop. I quoted you saying that “Atheism … doesn’t even allow for any sort of moral growth”.

@Vinnie

I said atheists are moral and pointed out, on an allegedly Christian message board, what is an extremely common Christian view of general revelation based on Paul’s thoughts, that everyone has God’s law on their heart. I quoted it …

You didn’t quote it, you stated it as fact.

@Vinnie

@Roy

You can’t tell Nazis what they did was wrong because you seem to have nothing to justify your assertion that your religion is the true one and theirs is false other than “this is my opinion.”

Moral systems are very complex and none of us can escape where and when we were born or our life experiences. Rationally, my objective moral system is tied to the incarnation and as a Christian, the Holy Spirit at work in my life. But my moral system generally rises and falls with Jesus and His sacrifice.

Oh, it’s your ‘objective’ moral system, is it? Not your god’s objective moral system, or your religion’s objective moral system, or your scripture’s objective moral system?

If your moral system can be objective without being based on some external source, then so can mine or anyone else’s.

If your moral system is objective because it is based on some external source, then identify it and show that it says what you claim it does.

@Vinnie

@Roy

You can’t tell Nazis what they did was wrong because you seem to have nothing to justify your assertion that your religion is the true one and theirs is false other than “this is my opinion.”

Imagine saying this in a public forum that is not the internet.

No problem.

@Vinnie

At your next dinner party, lead a conversation with “Ican’t tell Nazis what they did was wrong because I seem to have nothing to justify my assertion that my moral code is the true one and theirs is false other than “this is my opinion.”

I’ve never asserted that my moral code is the true one.

@Vinnie

@Roy

As far as I can tell, your choice of religion (Christianity/Islam/Hinduism/Zoroastrianism/Baltic Finnic paganism/…) is based entirely on just your opinion.

Define opinion.

“a view or judgement formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge”.

Your habit of avoiding questions about the basis of your ‘objective’ morality suggests to me that it is based entirely on your own opinions, and that every criticism you have made of subjective morality applies even more to your own moral code.

@Vinnie

And I find your comment interesting because because believing evolution is false helps make some human beings (young earth creationists) happy and fulfilled in their lives. I guess believing in bad science here is good. @Roy should appreciate the utilitarian perspective.

Why? I’ve never said that I was a utilitarian, and I don’t believe that keeping a segment of the population ignorant is good for the population as a whole.

@Vinnie

Shouldn’t you then encourage these humans to continue in their happy ignorance? Or should we worship at the altar of atheism where being right about science is more important than being happy?

You don’t seem to realise that being right about science can lead to advances in technology, agriculture and medicine, and thus affect levels of happiness. Perhaps you think those who are overworked, disease-ridden and barely surviving are happier than those who have leisure, health and sufficient food.

Finally:

@Vinnie

@Roy

What does your objective moral code say about selling women into sexual slavery?

It is objectively wrong. Humans have intrinsic value as they are made in God’s image. Enslaving and selling them like livestock against their will for hedonistic and depraved sexual pleasure is an objective moral evil.

That’s not taken from an objective moral code. It is your opinion.

So I’ll ask again.

What does your objective moral code say about selling women into sexual slavery?

Don’t try to paraphrase it or give your understanding of it, because those are subjective, not objective. You claim to be following an objective moral code. Quote it. Or stop pretending you have one.

[Roy (Roy (Listener twice correct))]

@St.Roymond

@Roy

because slave trading is explicitly sanctioned within your religion.

Please provide documentation that Rome approves of slavery.

Rome?

Well, there’s the Papal bull of 1452 which granted permission to reduce Saracens and pagans to perpetual slavery.

Against that, there’s the Evangelium Vitae that describes slavery as an infamy.

But the views of past or present followers of Christianity, which have changed over time and location, are not necessarily the same as the religion itself. Christian scripture retains unrenounced the OT verses that permit slaves to be purchased from foreign countries and children to be sold into slavery, and there are NT verses that call on slaves to obey their masters and call on masters to treat their slaves well. Nowhere in the NT does it say that slavery is in any way wrong, or forbidden, or that slave-owners should free their slaves.

@St.Roymond

Even some second-Temple Jews recognized that slavery verges on blasphemy due to every person being in the image of God; the early church elevated this by noting that Christ died for all – and to claim ownership of the image of God for whom the Son of God died was regarded as blasphemous.

A pity they didn’t incorporate that into the epistles, or include it in the NT. That might have saved a lot of people from slavery.

P.S. What Rome (dis)approves of won’t apply to Vinnie if he’s not Catholic.

[T_aquaticus (The Friendly Neighborhood Atheist)]

@biochemist

As I stated way back in reply 36, the cell is a unit, such that all the key biochemical parts, the team of enzymes, the DNA/RNA code, the 20 amino acid alphabet, the ATP energy currency, the protein/lipid membrane, are inter-related, and all are required to be present for there to be a working cell.

That’s the modern cell. We have no way of knowing if that is what cells looked like throughout history. As many have pointed out, RNA can act as both a molecule of inheritance and as an enzyme. In fact, RNA still acts as an enzyme in ribosomes. A modern city requires a whole lot of things to function, such as electricity and running water. Would it then be correct to claim that all cities through history had these things?

@biochemist

Here is a key question (pg 20 of interview) from William Dembski about OoL and Edward Peltzer’s answer -

What I would like to hear is what research projects he thinks should be pursued to understand the origin of life.

[T_aquaticus (The Friendly Neighborhood Atheist)]

@Marty

ID gathers the data and shows how the science itself (at this time) indicates life is not an accident.

How does ID do this?

[T_aquaticus (The Friendly Neighborhood Atheist)]

@Vinnie

You are just restating that you believe in subjective morality. This isn’t changing anything from my perspective.

That’s fine. What I am pointing out is that people are able to figure out morality without also needing to believe that the universe has intrinsic meaning and purpose.

@Vinnie

You could just as easily believe the opposite or believe only your family’s happiness matters. Or want to see humans suffer and be in pain. It doesn’t resolve the issue of who is right when people disagree or if there even is a correct position (you deny this).

That’s why morality is not determined by a single person. Morality is determined by communities and societies, and I think the best way to do that is to argue about it. Debate it. That’s the best way to at least get close to a consensus.

@Vinnie

To make that a subjective guessing game based solely on fickle whims and not objectively tying it into our nature by virtue of our being, is just a worldview playing make believe with life. When you embrace materialism or scientism, you detach yourself from reality.

Subjective does not mean arbitrary. Human feelings are not arbitrary. It is not arbitrary that we love our children while most of us dislike and fear spiders and snakes, nor that most of us like the taste of chocolate while shunning excrement. Our feelings and attitudes are rooted in human nature, being a product of our evolutionary heritage, programmed by genes. None of that is arbitrary.

Six reasons why objective morality is nonsense | coelsblog

@Vinnie

And I find your comment interesting because because believing evolution is false helps make some human beings (young earth creationists) happy and fulfilled in their lives. I guess believing in bad science here is good.

Or not believing in well supported scientific theories is not immoral. No one here is saying people should be punished for not believing in evolution, nor do I personally think people are immoral for not accepting evolution.

@Vinnie

Or should we worship at the altar of atheism where being right about science is more important than being happy?

The “altar of atheism”? Really?

[Argon]

@RichardG

What wonderful reasoning. It solves so many problems about irreducibility and means that you do not have to beleive it exists

No. It doesn’t ‘solve’ the problems. It suggests a means by which that an IC system, as it exists today, could have evolved. We still need to investigate specific details. For example, I know many systems in the cell which fit the criteria of IC under Mike Behe’s first definition: Remove or damage a part today and the system breaks in some way. That observation is not largely disputed – The question of evolvability is. Addressing that question relies heavily of the level of information we have about: the current system, the system as it appears in other organisms, and details we can collect about a likely ancestral state. That information is best found in the most recent and well-sequenced systems. Over time, entropy and decay tend to destroy historical data, making reconstruction very hard and leaving the question unresolved in either direction.

A simple, evolvable, reconstructable, IC case involves the persistence of streptomycin antibiotic resistance in bacteria. In E. coli, strep resistance can be conferred via a mutation in a gene for ribosomal protein, rspL. This alters the structure of the protein, reducing the binding and disruption of protein synthesis by streptomycin. However, this mutation incurs a fitness cost: When that mutation is introduced to cells, it inhibits their growth rates making them unable to compete with the original strain when streptomycin is not present in the media. This observation suggested that streptomycin-resistant mutants shouldn’t persist for long in environments without the antibiotic, but it turned out to not be the case. Strains with strep resistance continued to be found at a much higher frequency than expected. (Aside: This presents a big problem in the medical world).

It turned out that these persistent strains had acquired secondary, compensatory mutations that mitigated the effects of the mutation in rspL. Interestingly, many of these compensatory mutations were themselves detrimental for growth in the absence of the rspL mutations: Cells required pairs of mutations (many of the secondary mutations affected other ribosomal proteins which interacted with the rspL protein) to allow strep resistance persistence, i.e. a simple irreducibly complex interaction.

So how did these mutation pairs come about? If they needed to be generated at the same time, those would be a very low probability events. And, how would they appear together in the absence of of antibiotic through a sequential process if each mutation alone caused growth defects that made cells unable to compete with their unmutated siblings?

Well, the key is that the environments and selective pressures changed. E. coli don’t need to acquire double mutations at the same time: a step-wise path exists. When exposed to inhibitory amounts of streptomycin, this pressure leads to selection of rspL mutants (resistance) first. This is because the growth problems produced by the mutation are lower in magnitude than the inhibitory effects of the antibiotics.

OK, so what drives the selection of the second, compensatory mutations? The key is that the antibiotic enriches the local population for the rspL mutation. These rspL mutants still face selective pressure (growth rate competition) among each other, so mutations that suppress the negative effects of the rspL mutation can arise and be selected. These second mutations are what allows these strains to persist among the original strains long after the antibiotic is removed from the environment.

Thus, what appears as an irreducible complex interaction now, was acquired via bridgeable steps in the past. Much of this work emerged in papers from papers in the late 1990s to mid-2000s and there remains very active work through today. A decent review is here.

[T_aquaticus (The Friendly Neighborhood Atheist)]

@RichardG

It solves so many problems about irreducibility and means that you do not have to beleive it exists.

We all agree that there are systems where the removal of one part results in the loss of function for the whole system. What we don’t agree with is these systems pose a problem for evolution, and the only argument for IC systems being a problem for evolution is “because I say so”. It is an argument based on false confidence and personal incredulity.

Can evolution produce reducibly complex systems? Can evolution remove redundant parts that aren’t needed for the function of the system? If the answer to both is yes, then the evolutionary pathways to irreducible systems is pretty obvious. In addition, there is the Mullerian two step where a new part is at first beneficial and then only later made necessary.

“… thus a complicated machine was gradually built up whose effective working was dependent upon the interlocking action of very numerous different elementary parts or factors, and many of the characters and factors which, when new, were originally merely an asset finally became necessary because other necessary characters and factors had subsequently become changed so as to be dependent on the former. It must result, in consequence, that a dropping out of, or even a slight change in any one of these parts is very likely to disturb fatally the whole machinery; for this reason we should expect very many, if not most, mutations to result in lethal factors …”

Muller, H. J. (1918) “Genetic variability, twin hybrids and constant hybrids, in a case of balanced lethal factors.” Genetics 3:422-499.

The Mullerian Two-Step, or Why Behe's "Irreducible Complexity" is silly

So not only are IC systems not a problem for evolution, they were predicted to be the product of evolution more than 100 years ago.

[RichardG (Richard Gillett)]

@T_aquaticus

the only argument for IC systems being a problem for evolution is “because I say so”.

Brilliant reponse.

no need to answer it then.

If IC exists, Evolution fails, it iis as simple as that. So it can’t exist

Richard

[Argon]

The definitions of IC have undergone a number of revisions over time. Originally, it was defined as interacting parts, the removal or damage of any component leading to a loss or serve impairment of function. Mike Behe proposed that such systems were unevolvable, however the positive evidence for being unevolvable is difficult to assess and remains disputed. To assess the claim either way requires sufficient data about ancestral states which typically are collected from a deep search of related organisms with and without the system in question. As one might expect, the necessary data tends to be erased over time with older systems being harder to assess.

Later, Behe revised the definition (while keeping the same name… go figure) as an IC system that had to go through numerous unselected steps to emerge (IC Mark-II, as others have since named for clarification). Unfortunately, this mixed the operational characteristics of a system with a mechanism of evolution, making the argument a form of ‘begging the question’, i.e. An IC Mark-II system being one which is mechanistically IC and could only arise through an improbable pathway. Later versions seem to further embed the assumption of unevolvability into the definition.

Today, it’s hard to know which IC version is refered to without explicitly describing the criteria. Among ID discussions, I’ve seen these incorrectly used interchangeably, and even with making IC synonymous with ‘unevolvable’. Note that the latter assertion is not commonly accepted by scientists familiar with the work – at least not for IC version 1.

[T_aquaticus (The Friendly Neighborhood Atheist)]

@RichardG

If IC exists, Evolution fails, it iis as simple as that.

Why? Because you say so?

I also stated that IC systems do exist. Did you miss that part?

[Argon]

I noticed that disconnect too. Perhaps he was responding to a different thread? Or, maybe he’s using an IC Mark-II or later definition that begs the question. If one’s definition of IC includes ‘unevolvable’ as a criterion, I suppose it makes sense. Missing the point, though.