ScottySatan
Well-Known Member
Not intended to debate, I'm not going to be changing anyone's mind, but this is what works for me.
In the genomic era of biology, we still don’t know the function of many genes. I take a look at the sequence of the gene in humans. I also take a look at the same gene in other organisms of various genetic distances away: monkey, mouse, frog, fly, yeast.
Assumption 1: that these organisms are different evolutionary distances away because as you read that list from left to right, the difference from the human genome goes up.
Assumption 2: that I found the homologous gene of interest in those other organisms and is not a random piece of their genome because 1) it has the structure, 2) it has mostly the same DNA sequence as my human gene, and 3) The context of the DNA sequences flanking either side of the gene (the genes before and after my piece of interest are also homologous)
I align those sequences and it looks something like this:
It matches where it’s gray. So I hypothesize that the important part of my gene is the grey bit, because it is the same in all of those organisms. Assumption 3: Because if you mutate an important part of a gene, it doesn’t work anymore and the organism suffers, they are the parts that survive billions of years of evolution.
I study the gene structure and function by modifying the grey region, areas next to the grey region, and regions that are totally white and record the different results that I get.
Modern biologists do this kind of experiment routinely and make these assumptions (they don’t even think about it) because the data was established decades ago. The analysis of this type is done because it is a primary prediction of the model of evolution and natural selection.
I’ve seen this kind of analysis done 1-2 thousand times and it has worked every single time without exception. It makes sense together as a group and behaves as predicted by the theory. THe alternative is that it all works as kind of a funny coincidence.
In the genomic era of biology, we still don’t know the function of many genes. I take a look at the sequence of the gene in humans. I also take a look at the same gene in other organisms of various genetic distances away: monkey, mouse, frog, fly, yeast.
Assumption 1: that these organisms are different evolutionary distances away because as you read that list from left to right, the difference from the human genome goes up.
Assumption 2: that I found the homologous gene of interest in those other organisms and is not a random piece of their genome because 1) it has the structure, 2) it has mostly the same DNA sequence as my human gene, and 3) The context of the DNA sequences flanking either side of the gene (the genes before and after my piece of interest are also homologous)
I align those sequences and it looks something like this:
It matches where it’s gray. So I hypothesize that the important part of my gene is the grey bit, because it is the same in all of those organisms. Assumption 3: Because if you mutate an important part of a gene, it doesn’t work anymore and the organism suffers, they are the parts that survive billions of years of evolution.
I study the gene structure and function by modifying the grey region, areas next to the grey region, and regions that are totally white and record the different results that I get.
Modern biologists do this kind of experiment routinely and make these assumptions (they don’t even think about it) because the data was established decades ago. The analysis of this type is done because it is a primary prediction of the model of evolution and natural selection.
I’ve seen this kind of analysis done 1-2 thousand times and it has worked every single time without exception. It makes sense together as a group and behaves as predicted by the theory. THe alternative is that it all works as kind of a funny coincidence.
