A Simple Experiment that should Refute Creationism?

by Andy Nobles
Is there a simple experiment that can be done whereby actual empirical data can be used to disprove creationist theories on the origin of life? (Young Earth) Yes there is!

If we can show that the human race arose much earlier than 4000 B.C - the rough date given by 'Young Earth' Creationists, and similar to 200,000 B.C. - the date estimated using the evolutionary timescale, then we have effectively disproven creationism. Similarly, if the empirical evidence fits the 4000 B.C. date, then the theory of evolution could be easliy refuted.

Using Mitochondrial DNA - which is passed down from mother to child only, a date of around 200,000 years was given for the age of humanity - the age of the 'Mitochodrial Eve' - the very first human.

However, this date was built mostly on assumptions of the evolutionary time-scale and many dates given by biologists vary.

A great way to know for certain the age of humanity would be to find empirical evidence, in the shape of the mutation rate for mitochondrial DNA.

For example, by comparing the mitochondrial DNA of a man who died 500 years ago with a 20th century man (who are connected by the same Mitochondrial DNA lineage), we would have a definate mutation rate in order to accurately date the age of 'Mitochondrial Eve'. This evidence would also be a perfect way to empirically refute the 'Young Earth' creation theory.

Recently, scientists have conducted this experiment. The results were published in 'Nature Genetics': "The rate and pattern of sequence substitutions in the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) control region (CR) is of central importance to studies of human evolution and to forensic identity testing. Here, we report a direct measurement of the intergenerational substitution rate in the human CR. We compared DNA sequences of two CR hypervariable segments from close maternal relatives, from 134 independent mtDNA lineages spanning 327 generational events.

Ten subsitutions were observed, resulting in an empirical rate of 1/33 generations, or 2.5/site/Myr. This is roughly twenty-fold higher than estimates derived from phylogenetic analyses.

This disparity cannot be accounted for simply by substitutions at mutational hot spots, suggesting additional factors that produce the discrepancy between very near-term and long-term apparent rates of sequence divergence. The data also indicate that extremely rapid segregation of CR sequence variants between generations is common in humans, with a very small mtDNA bottleneck.

These results have implications for forensic applications and studies of human evolution." Parsons, Thomas J. 'A high observed substitution rate in the human mitochondrial DNA control region', Nature Genetics vol. 15, April 1997, pp. 363-367.

So the mutation rate is significantly higher than expected, but what date would this give? "The observed substitution rate reported here is very high compared to rates inferred from evolutionary studies. A wide range of CR substitution rates have been derived from phylogenetic studies, spanning roughly 0.025-0.26/site/Myr, including confidence intervals. A study yielding one of the faster estimates gave the substitution rate of the CR hypervariable regions as 0.118 +- 0.031/site/Myr.

Assuming a generation time of 20 years, this corresponds to ~1/600 generations and an age for the mtDNA MRCA of 133,000 y.a. Thus, our observation of the substitution rate, 2.5/site/Myr, is roughly 20-fold higher than would be predicted from phylogenetic analyses.


Using our empirical rate to calibrate the mtDNA molecular clock would result in an age of the mtDNA MRCA of only ~6,500 y.a., clearly incompatible with the known age of modern humans.

Even acknowledging that the MRCA of mtDNA may be younger than the MRCA of modern humans, it remains implausible to explain the known geographic distribution of mtDNA sequence variation by human migration that occurred only in the last ~6,500 years. " Parsons, Thomas J. --'A high observed substitution rate in the human mitochondrial DNA control region', Nature Genetics vol. 15, April 1997, pp. 363-367.

Another scientist comments: "Mitochondrial DNA appears to mutate much faster than expected, prompting new DNA forensics procedures and raising troubling questions about the dating of evolutionary events. ...

Regardless of the cause, evolutionists are most concerned about the effect of a faster mutation rate. For example, researchers have calculated that "mitochondrial Eve"--the woman whose mtDNA was ancestral to that in all living people--lived 100,000 to 200,000 years ago in Africa. Using the new clock, she would be a mere 6000 years old." Ann Gibbons, "Mitochondrial Eve: Wounded, But Not Dead Yet", Science, Vol. 257, 14 August 1992, p. 873.

So the empirical results, which were expected to back up the evolutionary time-scale, have actually refuted it. Not suprisingly, most scientists have tried to sidestep this evidence and come up with theories to explain it.

It's not often in the origins debate, with all it's estimates, bias and assumptions that we get to use empirical evidence like this, so when the evidence strongly supports the creationist theory, you have got to take notice.

Mitochondrial Eve is, however, not likely to be the biblical Eve. This Eve was probably part of an existing population, and merely the female that all of us can trace our ancestry back to, rather then the mother of ALL living. This is due to an extreme bottleneck in human history, which happened, according to the above data in the last 6000 years.

This fits perfectly with the biblical story of the flood, where one family would survive to repopulate the world. The mitochondrial mother is likely therefore to be Noah's wife***.

OBJECTION: But what about Adam?

We also have an ancestral father, who we shall call 'Y chromosome Adam' for now. Unfortunately, we are unsure at the moment how old he is. Here's my prediction: that emprical evidence will date him as young as 6000 years old. Does anybody know of any studies of 'Y' Adam?

OBJECTION: Isn't accepting these scientific dating methods 'picking and choosing' or data mining, where you reject the vast majority of evolutionary timescales, but accept these?

All evolutionary timescales are built on assumptions. This evidence is different in that it uses empirical data:

"The observed substitution rate reported here is very high compared to rates inferred from evolutionary studies." (Parsons 1997, above) The original rate was inferred by evolutionists, and the date of MtDNA Eve was decided by an inferred rate! But now we have an observed rate, which is much higher than the inferred rate. How is this data mining?

Real empirical evidence, which depends on observation will always be more powerful than inference. This empirical dating of Mitochondrial Eve fits in nicely with the creationist model of human origins, but is devastating to the evolutionary model.

OBJECTION: Also, if this is damaging to Evolution, why do the people who produced this data not see this? They are all evolutionists So, they must be very stupid, or you are oversimplifying things.

It's quite understandable that evolutionists should dismiss this evidence, afterall, they operate on a priori assumption that there is a naturalistic explanation for everything:

"We are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door." Richard Lewontin 'Billions and billions of demons', The New York Review, January 9, 1997, p. 31.

I have yet to be presented with any evidence that I am oversimplifying this argument, although I would be happy to listen to detailed criticism.

***Addendum
Both Jaysen Goertz and Anne C. van Rossum have written to point out that since mtDNA is only passed from mother to daughter, Noah's wife would not be the source. MtDNA passed to a son would not be passed on to offspring.
"All mtDNA after the flood belongs to the biological mother(s) of the three wives."--Jaysen Goetz
This correction does not impact the main argument but only the author's guess as to the identity of the "mitochondrial mother".

***Addendum 2
Re: "All mtDNA after the flood belongs to the biological mother(s) of the three wives." ----This is true only if you agree to the notion that Noah's wife had no further children after the flood. She was, after all, aboard the ark, and with such great life spans, there is no reason to suspect she would cease reproducing after they stepped off it into a new world.
Douglas Hirt

Irreducible Complexity or Preadaption?

What Is a Molecular Machine and Why Is It Irreducibly Complex?
Molecular machines are complex structures located inside of cells or on the surface of cells. One popular example is the bacterial flagella. This whip-like structure is composed of many proteins, and its rotation propels bacteria through their environment. The molecular machine of interest in a recent PNAS article is a protein transport machine located in the mitochondria.2 This machine transports proteins across the membrane of mitochondria so they can perform the very important function of making energy.

Molecular machines are considered to be irreducibly complex. An irreducibly complex machine is made of a number of essential parts, and all these parts must be present for it to function properly. If even one of these parts is missing the machine is non-functional. Evolution, which supposedly works in a stepwise fashion over long periods of time, can’t form these complex machines. Evolution is not goal-oriented; it cannot work towards a specific outcome. If a part of the machine would happen to form by random chance mutation (which itself is not plausible, see Are mutations part of the “engine” of evolution?), but the other parts of the machine were not formed at the same time, then the organism containing that individual part (by itself non-functional) would not have a particular survival advantage and would not be selected for. Since the part offers no advantage to the organism, it would likely be lost from the population, and evolution would be back to square one in forming the parts for the machine. There is essentially no way to collect the parts over time because the individual parts do not have a function (without the other parts) and do not give the organism a survival advantage. Remember, all the necessary parts must be present for the machine to be functional and convey a survival advantage that could be selected for.

So How Can Evolution Account for Irreducibly Complex Molecular Machines?
The inability to find mechanisms that add information to the genome necessary to form parts for the molecular machines and the inability of Darwinian evolution to collect parts for the machines (no direction or goal) have led evolutionists to develop the idea of “pre-adaptation.” Simply stated, “pre-adaptation” is the formation of new parts for a new molecular machine (from currently existing parts that perform another function) before the machine is needed by the organism. Some quotes will help clarify.

Study authors Abigail Clements et al. state, “We proposed that simple “core” machines were established in the first eukaryotes by drawing on pre-existing bacterial proteins that had previously provided distinct functions.”3

Sebastian Poggio, co-author of the study, stated, “[The pieces] were involved in some other, different function. They were recruited and acquired a new function.”4

Wired Science writer, Brandon Keim, puts it this way: “[T]he necessary pieces for one particular cellular machine . . . were lying around long ago. It was simply a matter of time before they came together into a more complex entity.” He also states,

“The process by which parts accumulate until they’re ready to snap together is called preadaptation. It’s a form of “neutral evolution,” in which the buildup of parts provides no immediate advantage or disadvantage. Neutral evolution falls outside the descriptions of Charles Darwin. But once the pieces gather, mutation and natural selection can take care of the rest . . . .”5
These quotes conjure up images of Lego building blocks from my childhood days. The same blocks could be put together in many different ways to form different structures. The study authors suggest proteins that perform one function can be altered (via mutation6) and used for a different function. This eliminates the need to add new genetic information and requires only a modification of current information. Clements et al. state, “This model agrees with Jacob’s proposition of evolution as a “tinkerer,” building new machines from salvaged parts.”7

The problem with this concept is why would evolution “keep” parts that are intermediate between their old function and a new function? The parts or proteins are more or less stuck between a rock and a hard place. They likely don’t perform their old function because they have been altered by mutation, and they don’t perform their new function in a molecular machine because not all the parts are present yet.8 Studies have shown that bacteria tend to lose genetic information that is not needed in their current environment.

For example, the well known microbial ecologist Richard Lenski has shown that bacteria cultured in a lab setting for several years will lose information for making flagella from their genome.9 Bacteria are being supplied with nutrients and do not need flagella to move to find a food source. Bacteria are model organisms when it comes to economy and efficiency, and those bacteria that lose the information to make flagella are at an advantage over bacteria that are taking energy and nutrients to build structures that are not useful in the current environment. Thus, even if new parts for a new molecular machine could be made via mutation from parts or proteins used for another function, the process of natural selection would eliminate them. The parts or proteins no longer serve their old function, and they cannot serve their new function until all the parts for the machine are present.

In particular, notice the use of verbs in the quotes above, such as drawing on, recruited, came together, and snap together. These are all action verbs that invoke the image of someone or something putting the parts together. Going back to the Lego analogy, an intelligent designer (me!) is required to put the Lego blocks together to form different structures. Just leaving the blocks lying on the floor or shaking them up in their storage container doesn’t result in anything but a big mess of blocks! Although the powers to “tinker” and “snap together” are conferred on mutation and natural selection, they are incapable of designing and building molecular machines.

Conclusion
Pre-adaptation is another “just so” evolutionary story that attempts to avoid the problems of necessary information gain and the goal-less nature of evolution. It fails to answer how parts that are intermediate between their old and new functions would be selected for and accumulated to build a molecular machine.

Michael Gray, cell biologist at Dalhousie University, states, “You look at cellular machines and say, why on earth would biology do anything like this? It’s too bizarre. But when you think about it in a neutral evolutionary fashion, in which these machineries emerge before there’s a need for them, then it makes sense.”10 It only makes sense if you start with the presupposition that evolution is true and confer powers to mutation and natural selection that the evidence shows they do not have.

Clements et al. write, “There is no question that molecular machines are remarkable devices, with independent modules capable of protein substrate recognition, unfolding, threading, and translocation through membranes.”11 The evidence is clear, as Romans 1:20 states, that the Creator God can be known through His creation. Many people will stand in awe of the complexities of molecular machines and still deny they are the result of God’s handiwork. But that doesn’t change the truth of His Word that He is the Creator of all things.

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Footnotes
1.Brandon Keim, “More ‘Evidence’ of Intelligent Design Shot Down by Science,” Wired Science; Tudor Vieru, “Intelligent Design ‘Evidence’ Unproven by Real Science,” Softpedia. Back
2.Abigail Clements, et al., “The Reducible Complexity of a Mitochondrial Molecular Machine,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 106 no. 37 (2009): 15791–15795. Back
3.Clements, ref 3. Back
4.Keim, ref 1. Back
5.Keim, ref 1. Back
6.Clements et al. state that “relatively little mutation” would be required to alter currently existing proteins to modify them for use in a molecular machine. However, her own work showed that the protein of interest required the “engineering” (in her words) of a point mutation at a specific location in the protein and the addition of several sequences (not original to the protein) to convert the function of the protein. This is more than just a little “tinkering” with pre-existing proteins. This is the addition of information to the protein for which there is no known natural mechanism. Back
7.Clements, ref 3. Back
8.The odds of random chance mutation forming all the parts of a molecular machine at one time is not plausible. Back
9.See A Poke in the Eye? Back
10.Veiru, ref 2. Back
11.Clements, ref 3. Back