Darwin and DNA

[benkahuna]

I'm very skeptical. I'll give you a few reasons.

1. You need a direct lineage to hold onto a genetic lineage. Are nearest common ancester with dogs was much longer ago than that with chimps. Once there's a split, genetics alone can't hold onto this information unless there's something Lamarckian or absolutely revolutionary in genetics that has gone down and I missed it.
2. It sounds like some new agey BS to make us respect animals more. Sounds like the idea came before the evidence.
3. Nature abhors waste as a general rule. Specialization seems to be more useful than something akin to the backward compatability of windows 98 with windows 3.1. So, I doubt a bunch of those introns have all this latent potential encoded in them.

It's a compelling idea and I'm interested in the book, but I have serious doubts.

Even if there's some theory that intron DNA isn't just a bunch of junk and some regulatory genes and structurally useful DNA, I would prefer to have enough data to support this theory that there are review articles with a meta-analysis confirming this idea is likely. A couple papers along this line are not enough.

I have a friend doing post-doctoral work in genetics that I'll talk with about this idea as he keeps current in the field.

How is the referencing in the back of the book? Does it cite a lot of scientific literature from journals like Science, Nature, PNAS, Cell Genetics, etc. (I realize that the first two have fallen out of favor to some extent over the last few years)?

[Dan Mezick]

If you come across more research in this area I appreciate you posting or PM ing me the links as you find them. The entire subject of introns is wide open.

Introns comprise some 97% of the strand, and very little is understood about intronic DNA. The human genome is held in exons, comprising about 3% of the strand.

Current science labels intronic DNA 'junk DNA'. It is anything but. Introns contain non-random coding that no one to my knowledge has been able to read-- YET.

[benkahuna]

[ QUOTE ]
If you come across more research in this area I appreciate you posting or PM ing me the links as you find them. The entire subject of introns is wide open.

Introns comprise some 97% of the strand, and very little is understood about intronic DNA. The human genome is held in exons, comprising about 3% of the strand.

Current science labels intronic DNA 'junk DNA'. It is anything but. Introns contain non-random coding that no one to my knowledge has been able to read-- YET.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'll let you know what I find. I can tell you don't know much about genetics though. I don't mean it as a slight either. I'm just being completely honest. Before we can intelligently discuss an issue like this one, you need to know the basics of genetics and of current research and knowledge in genetics. My background is limited to basic biology coursework in high school and in college as well as courses in molecular biology and cell biology with section devoted to genetics but you've already made a few mistakes.

I'm also disappointed you didn't answer any of my questions.

Beyond that you didn't deal with any of my concerns either.

It strikes me as all very suspect. I swear the closest thing you have to evidence here is Mr. Ed.

[Dan Mezick]

I'm not a biologist. I'm not an authority on DNA. I am a layman curious about genetics who reads. Alot.

Consequently I cannot answer your specific questions about genetics with any authority. This explains my request for links to genetic research you may find.

What I can do is raise some obvious questions. This forum seems a perfect place to do that.