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We're gonna dive into some of the marvels of DNA
and its stupid design and talk about ERV's with Dr.
Jean Lightner - you're watching Genesis Week
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Welcome! To this episode of Genesis Week, the
weekly program of creationary commentary on news,
views and events pertaining to the origins
controversy, made possible by the supporters of
CORE Ottawa, Citizens for Origins Research and
Education, and now carried on the Christianima
network - christianima.com - Christian cinema at
its finest. Excellence in pirate broadcasting, we
took over my best friend's garage for our studio
today so we could continue to bring you the
information the anticreationists don't want you to
see or hear, and giving glory to our Creator while
doing it. The Bible does NOT say "Put on therefore,
as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of
mercies, kindness, numbness of mind..." No! God
gave you a brain, we here at Genesis Week presume
it's because He wants you to use it! Remember if
you get lost in cyberspace, you can just punch in
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us, and also subscribe to our youtube channel to
get extras like CrEvo rants and full interviews
with our guests. I'm your host, Ian Juby.
You'll recall a few episodes back I discussed a
NATURE interview with Dr. Steven Benner who
described DNA as a "Stupid design." Well nature had
a couple of papers out this past week on the
marvels of DNA and its design. The first one was
from researchers at the Max Planck Institute of
Biochemistry who detailed a ring-like protein which
holds the DNA into its compact bundles. Now at
first, you may say "Who cares?" But you need to
understand the significance of this bundling. Your
DNA would be about 2 meters long, yet it is so
tightly and carefully wound up that it fits into
chromosomes only 1 or 2 MILLIONTHS of a meter. If
you took all of the DNA in your body, unwound all
the strands and laid them end to end, they could go
to the moon and back over 100,000 times. And yet,
the complex bundling and packaging system is so
efficient, that all the DNA in your body can fit
in a teaspoon.
Anyone who has ever packaged the good old string of
christmas lights knows the importance of packaging
the light strings properly, or - it costs you an
incredible amount of work. So now compare your DNA
to a string of christmas lights thousands of miles
long, and you can quickly see the importance of
keeping it very carefully bundled when it's not in
use! This is why there are all of these complex
bundling systems involved with the DNA. There are
molecular machines who very carefully and
meticulously bundle the DNA. Guess where the plans
for those machines comes from? You guessed it
- the DNA.
When it comes to DNA, life is on the line. While
you need to have all these systems for keeping DNA
controlled and tightly wound up, cell division must
take place. So the DNA must be unwound, a second
copy made, and the copies properly and evenly
distributed to the two cells dividing off. That's
where these ring proteins come in. These are only
ONE of many, many required complex tools and parts
for handling the very important DNA. So which came
first: The rings which hold the DNA together, or
the DNA which contains the plans for the rings
which are needed to hold the DNA together? Or the
machines which read the DNA and make the rings? Or
the machines which install the rings, very
carefully and methodically wind and unwind the DNA?
The plans for those machines come from the DNA, but
still yet other machines make those machines, based
on plans from the DNA. The plans for ALL of these
machines comes from the DNA - including the
machines that make the DNA. So which one came
first? It's a nonsense question to ask which came
first, because the correct answer is they all came
about at the same time! Like any factory, these
different systems were DESIGNED. What an incredible
designer - our best minds and technology cannot
produce even crude renditions of these system. All
of our best minds - all of our most incredible
intelligence pales in comparison to the astonishing
intelligence and design that went into DNA and the
machines that read it. Our Creator is truly
an awesome God!
But wait - wait - DNA was supposed to be a stupid
design right? Not according the researchers
attempting to use DNA in place of hard drive
storage! Publishing their paper in the journal -
NATURE, Goldman et al., used synthetic DNA as a
man-made digital storage medium - using DNA instead
of a hard drive, CD ROM, or flash stick.
Effectively, that is what your DNA is - think of it
like the hard drives that store the program on how
to build you.
So Goldman et al took that concept and ran with it:
they made a strand of DNA which contained digitally
encoded files: They recorded all of Shakespeare's
sonnets, a PDF copy of Watson and Crick's original
paper describing the structure of DNA, a JPG
photograph of the research institute that produced
the synthetic DNA, a 26 second MP3 of Martin Luther
King's "I have a dream" speech, and the code that
was used to convert all of those digital files into
a DNA sequence! All of this was recorded onto what
can only be described as a speck of dust, which the
researchers are confident can be stored in cool,
dry locations, preserving the digital data for tens
of thousands of years!
This truly is some marvelous engineering on their
part, but obviously DNA is not a stupid design,
seeing as how the researchers went to great lengths
extoling the benefits of digital storage on DNA,
and its reliability.
What's even more remarkable is when you look at how
DNA is actually used in biology, as it relates to
digital storage. For example, imagine reading
information off of your hard drive. You start at
sector 1 and read your file. If your hard drive was
written like DNA is, you could also start in the
middle of sector 1, read through until the middle
of sector 2, and get OTHER information - that's
right, completely different information is
superimposed on the letters on the hard drive of
sector 1. It would be like having this line of
instructions being the first three steps of
assembling a machine:
Our first two instructions actually overlap and are
superimposed upon each other. You can decipher the
instructions if you know where to start and stop:
So you provide more instructions with fewer letters
- your instructions take LESS SPACE. And that is
how the DNA is written. A lot of imformation is
actually superimposed upon other strings of letters
in the DNA!
As has now been discovered, other portions of the
DNA direct the reading of other portions of the DNA
so that, in our example sentence, we can extract a
third step in the assembly instructions. The
numbers on the end dictate how to extract the third
assembly instruction from seemingly random places
in the original information, by telling us to
collect the specific words by their position
in the string:
Yet in the DNA, that extra directing information -
those seemingly meaningless numbers, make up some
98% of your DNA! It was called "junk DNA" because
it didn't seem to do anything directly! We are only
now beginning to unravel how the "junk DNA" is used
- and it's mind bogglingly complex!
Our best computer programmers on earth would be
hard pressed to write programs with overlapping
lines of code, other sections of code which direct
how to retrieve more instructions from random
locations in the overall code, etc... and if a
computer programmer did such a thing, we'd call
them a genius. We certainly wouldn't say their code
was a stupid design - unless we were ignorant of
what they were doing.
So here we see Goldman et. al. using DNA to do
exactly what it does in nature: Communicate and
transmit information. No one is suggesting that
this man-made DNA happened by unguided processes.
Everyone is acknowledging it was intelligently
assembled. So why is it then that some would
suggest that OUR DNA was NOT intelligently
assembled? I'll tell you why - philosophical
reasons only. No one has ever seen DNA assemble
itself and compile information out of nothingness.
Information has only ever been observed to come
from information. That's a scientific fact. In fact
I would dare say that DNA has only ever been
observed to arise from DNA! Think about it.
Intelligence has only ever been observed to come
from intelligence, therefore the intelligence that
went into the incredible design of our DNA is the
ultimate in intelligence, because after decades of
mind-bogglingly complex research and study, we
STILL haven't found out the entirety of how our
computer program, our DNA, is used.
That ultimate intelligence is, I would suggest,
Christ Jesus, our Creator. His incredible
intelligence in baffling the pharisees, saducees
and those attempting to trap him in His words, that
intelligence He showed was only a scratch on the
surface of his ultimate intelligence.
Speaking of alleged "junk DNA" - ERV's were in the
news again this past week. Researchers from the
University of Massachusetts published a paper in
the journal Retrovirology, showing that an ERV
played a role in the production of our stem cells.
Stem cells are found in various places throughout
the body and are crucial to development, as stem
cells can turn into pretty much any cell that your
body needs. The researchers claimed this ERV was
"millions of years old," and notice what the
researchers said in their interview with
ScienceDaily:
I know, I know what you're thinking - Come on Ian -
what on earth is an ERV? To help us understand this
technical subject, Dr. Jean Lightner has joined me
via skype. Dr. Lightner obtained her bachelor's
degree in agriculture, earned a masters and DVM in
Veterinarian medicine, all from Ohio State
University. She is an excellent communicator and
I'm thrilled to have her join me today welcome
to the show Dr. Lightner.
>>Why thank you Ian
>>So let's start off with that question - just
what is an ERV and how does it relate to
the creation/evolution debate?
>>An ERV is an endogenous retrovirus. In order to
understand what that is, we should probably talk
about what a retrovirus is. There are several
different kinds of viruses, all pretty much contain
a protein outside, a coat, and inside they have a
nucleic acid, either DNA or RNA.
>>RNA is one half of the DNA ladder.
>>Essentially. Retroviruses have RNA on the inside.
When they infect a cell the RNA is injected into
the host cell. Then it does something very
interesting. Usually we think of DNA being
transcribed into RNA which is translated into
proteins. However, with the RNA from the
retrovirus, it does something kind of backwards.
The RNA is used as a template to make new DNA that
then becomes part of the host DNA. This is reverse
transcription, which is where the retro term comes
from. So a retrovirus is something outside a cell
which infects a cell. The RNA is reverse
transcribed back into DNA. Then when the host
transcribes its own DNA it will copy the virus DNA
as well. Then it will make new viruses. Then you
will have a whole bunch of new viruses to go and
infect other cells.
There are some specific features of a retrovirus
sequence that help us to identify it. For example
on either end are long terminal repeats (LTRs).
This is repetitive DNA. In between are several
specific genes. When we started looking at sequence
data from the DNA of various creatures, such as
humans or animals, we found patterns that looked
like the result of retrovirus infections. However,
these sequences are part of the DNA that is passed
down from parent to offspring. It is these
sequences which are called endogenous retroviruses
(ERVs).
>>OK. So can you briefly clarify how we know the
difference between a retrovirus and endogenous
retrovirus (ERV)?
>>With a regular retroviral infection, some of the
cells in the body are infected, but these cells do
not pass information on to the offspring. With an
endogenous retroviral sequence, it appears similar
to a retroviral sequence but it is found in all
cells of the body and is passed on to the
offspring. Many of these sequences have patterns in
them that look like damage from an ancient
infection because they do not code for all the
necessary components to make an active virus. Often
there are many copies of them, which makes it look
like they have spread in the DNA in the past.
>>So how does it relate to
the creation/evolution debate?
>>If we assume that these ERV sequences are really
from a past infection in the germ line and if we
assume that the retroviral sequences are inserted
essentially randomly, then when we find an ERV
sequence that is very similar in the same position
in two different animals it would make sense that
this came from an infection that happened in one
of their ancestors.
So evolutionists were really excited when they
found out that humans and other primates share
similar ERV sequences in the same position. To them
that was proof that humans and other primate had to
share a common ancestor. It seemed they were best
explained as an infection in a common ancestor.
>>Now I like the way Dr. Joseph Mastropaolo put it:
I mean typically a virus infects a specific type of
cell or area in the DNA, so you and I getting the
same flu does not make us relatives
>>True enough. And that is a good point, perhaps
those sequences got there independently in
humans and primates.
>>What are some of the problems with this thinking
that ERV's are, in fact,
evidence of viral infection and more importantly,
evidence of evolution?
>>As I mentioned, ERVs were believed to be junk
DNA. If ERVs were left over from an ancient viral
infection, they certainly wouldn’t be expected to
carry out important functions.
The problem is that more recent research has shown
that these portions of DNA are transcribed at
specific times in specific tissues. They appear to
be important in a number of different ways.
There is an excellent creationist article
highlighting this. In 2009 Dr. Liu and Dr. Soper
published an interesting article in the Answers
Research Journal entitled: The Natural History of
Retroviruses: Exogenization vs Endogenization. In
it, they cite research documenting ERVs directly
coding for proteins, and others associated with
gene regulation, DNA repair and recombination, and
transduction (making copies onto RNA and then
reverse transcribing them somewhere else in
the DNA).
Basically, they hypothesize that things actually
went the other direction. Retroviruses appeared
when these mobile elements within the
genome escaped.
>>So in other words ERV's weren't caused by virus
genes, but rather virus genes came from ERV's?
>>It appears so. One of the biggest problems for
the earlier claims that these are evidence for
evolution is that ERVs have been shown to have
essential roles in reproduction and development.
So how did the primate ancestor reproduce while it
was waiting for the germline retroviral infection?
>>Ya like it brings whole new meaning to
“Honey, I don't have a headache.” This is a
critical point this is the reproductive system.
So effectively, without this alleged ERV, no
reproduction, therefore, extinction of the species.
>>It would seem so. Instead of these sequences
being the result of an ancient infection, it seems
more logical that they were created for a purpose.
The article by Liu and Soper make a good
case for this.
I mentioned earlier two assumptions. The first is
that these sequences were the result of germline
infections in the distant past. We have just
discussed why this may not be the case. The second
is that they insert essentially randomly. A more
recent article by Santoni et al. challenges this.
Not only did they find a human ERV associated with
an essential part of development, but they also
found that the placement of these sequences were
associated with certain epigenetic markers.
>>For the sake of the viewers, if I may interrupt,
epigenetics is sort of the controlling of genes
with other genetic “switches,” which are called
epigenetic markers. So just think of epigenetic
markers as switches that turn on or off certain
portions of the DNA. Sorry Jean - I just had to
throw something in to make myself look smart. Carry
on with what you were saying. {laughing}
>>In this case the epigenetic marker was a specific
histone. Histones are special proteins the DNA is
wrapped around that affect how exposed the section
of DNA is so it can be translated. So the Santoni
et al paper indicates that this type of ERV in
humans is less randomly arranged than
we had thought.
Sometimes the word random can just mean we don’t
understand yet why the pattern is there.
Now there are times where ERVs are associated with
disease. In fact, we often discover the problems
associated with something before we really
understand the importance of that something. This
was true of bacteria. Because they were found to be
associated with disease, many had assumed they were
always bad. It turns out this is not the case. Most
are not harmful. In fact many are essential for
life on earth. It looks like the same may be true
of ERVs and other mobile genetic elements.
>>Well that is fascinating Dr. Lightner, I really
appreciate your taking the time to be on the show
today, I know the viewers will appreciate it too,
so for all of us, thank you for being with us
and sharing today.
>>Okay - thank you for having me.
>>Stick around, we'll be right back after this
break that is so short, your viruses won't even
have a chance to get you infected!
This show sponsored in part by Canada's first
permanent Creation Museum, in the heart of
Alberta's dinosaur beds, the Big Valley Creation
Science Museum. bvcsm.com
And by Genesis Park.com where you can pre-order
your own beautiful hard covered copy of the
Chronicles of Dinosauria, the history and mystery
of dinosaurs and man.
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Funny, fast and furious! Ian's CrEvo Rants cover a
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your brain hurt, hurt a lot less when
Ian explains them...
while wearing his anti-government mind reading
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Natural selection, thermodynamics, or...
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Wahoo! Mail for me?
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Hmmm...I wonder what it tastes like?
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In response to last week's discussion about the
population problem, YouTuber Kiwifrogg wrote in:
Thanks for writing in! Several people brought up
similar points, but you need to remember several
things: First of all, cremation is a modern
phenomena. Secondly, as I mentioned briefly,
Neanderthal graves have been found, complete with
burial artifacts - so it's not a western ideal to
bury a single plot with grave artifacts. Lastly,
you also need to remember the astronomical numbers
of bodies we're talking about here - I was
exceedingly conservative for the sake of argument,
and as several viewers pointed out, I still only
dealt with 200,000 years of people, not the two
MILLION years of alleged human ancestors right
through to *** Habilis and the like. Besides
which, none of that was my main point: to assume
deep time and explain away the missing bodies is
arguing from absence of evidence.
lunchbox420wb wrote in:
Actually, I got it from a Messianic Rabbi on
YouTube by the name of Steven DeNoon. He pointed it
out in scripture and I went and looked - and he's
right! The word "bush" that is used there in Exodus
is the word Sen-eh which according to
Strong's concordance is
a bush, thorny bush
the burning bush of Moses
perhaps a blackberry bush
And of course we see the representation of the Holy
Spirit there as well in the form of fire, and we
are told that this was all "God." So you can see
the three parts represented in one,
in that passage.
Thanks everyone for writing in, keep'em coming -
you can send in your comments, questions, letter
bombs and random hate mail to
comments@genesisweek.com, or send us a tweet
@genesisweek, or head to Genesisweek.com which is
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below the video. I'm your host, Ian Juby, signing
off for now and reminding you of those words of
warning and comfort from our Creator, the Lord
Jesus Christ, who said "I am the way, the truth,
and the life - no man comes to the Father but
through me" See you week.
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