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« Darwin had difficult handwriting | Main | RIAA bait »

I get email

Category: CreationismKooks
Posted on: April 17, 2008 9:47 AM, by PZ Myers

The email below the fold is a fairly typical rant from a creationist who has a teeny tiny bit of information, and therefore thinks he has uncovered an irrefutable disproof of evolution. In this case, he has noted that different species have differing numbers of chromosomes, and therefore, because he believes variation in chromosome number is an absolute barrier to fertilization, evolution could not have occurred.

He's missing a few key pieces of information. One is that, contrary to his belief, variation in chromosome number is not a barrier to reproduction, although it can reduce fertility. Chromosomes are fairly arbitrary collections of genes; they're like a small collection of filing cabinets in the cell, in which genes have been tossed haphazardly by chance and time. Chromosomal rearrangements are like grabbing one stack of stuff from one cabinet and shoving it in another — it doesn't change what stuff is present, it just changes the filing system. And since the filing system is remarkably disorderly in the first place, it really doesn't make that much of a difference.

The other problem with his screed is that barriers to reproduction aren't really a problem for evolution, either. If you look at the speciation literature, what you find are lots of people talking about how reproductive barriers between populations are constructed, either geographically or genetically.

Most of the papers in that literature, though, do not depend on the argument from extreme capitalization, on strange color changes in the text, or a peculiar dislike of the space bar on their keyboard. At least this guy didn't use Comic Sans throughout.

         EVOLUSION.
Karyotypes,meiosis and integrated functions of chromosomes unequivocally prove creation,and cannot by any means fit into or be explained by evolution. Masterfully crafted karyotypes skilfully recombine inheritances while perfectly preserving original types!
KARYOTYPES THEREFORE HAD TO HAPPEN AT ONCE!
1).Chromosome numbers of karyotypes conclusively and conspicuously prove that phylogenies are false.Karyotypes make creation most obvious. Evolution is still in search of evidence.
2).Meiosis preserves karyotypes by absolutely preventing reproduction of altered chromosome numbers or alterations in chromosomal configurations(see below). Evolution has no progeny.Evolution is a msiconception.
3).Integrated functions of chromosomes obviously require absolute preservation of karyotypes(karyotypes which resoundingly disprove phylogenies).
1).and2).and3).demonstrate that karyotypes absolutely require creation.
Evolution would inevitably imperil both reproduction and integrated chromosome functions and would therefore seriously imperil survival.For reasons which are explained below it is patently obvious that evolution could produce neither karyotypes nor integrated functions of chromosomes.
Karyotypes are never reproduced if they did not copy right chromosome numbers and configurations.This is because meiosis absolutely requires synapsis of all chromosomes with homologous partners,which becomes impossible if chromosome numbers or configurations are altered-please see for yourself with a pencil and scrap paper-please try to draw up a chain of novel gametogenesis=>fertilisation/fusion=>meiosis events to enable evolution of any karyotypes(and PLEASE tell me if you succeed)and then try to devise origins of known karyotypes(and remember that centromeres disown split chromosomes)-but please read to the end first.You will soon see that novel gametes would result in aneuploid(infertile)zygotes unless novel gametes appeared in matching novel couples,each of the couple having originated from a different mating partner in order to form a euploid novel zygote.It does not require much mathematical skill to ascertain the impossibility of such an occurrence.Wrong copies of karyotypes(i.e.karyotypes with altered chromosome numbers OR configurations)are therefore not reproduced.If aberrant/novel karyotypes somehow succeeded in breeding their offspring would not have the same aberrant/novel karyotypes unless both parents had matching sets of novel chromosome pairs.If not,the offspring would be a "throwback" to the original,or another aberrant by fluke.Novel karyotypes could not be sustained by fluke.This reality would require of evolution to have produced each and every karyotype separately/uniquely/individually(and with a reproducing partner every time)from a prokaryote(or some non-karyotype)precursor.
Karyotypes are unique creations which do not evolve because life depends on their being inherited in complete and original forms.
Karyotypes and meiosis verify the Mosaic account of the origin of species.
2n=evolution disproven.Chromosome numbers of karyotypes reveal that evolution is a gross miscalculation.Karyotypes and phylogenesis are totally at variance.Chromosomes corner evolution.Karyotypes totally disprove phylogenies.
Gene sizes=evolution disproven. 
Repetition is necessitated by the obtuseness of evolutionism.
Meiosis copyrights karyotypes by blocking reproduction of altered karyotypes.
The whole mode of karyotype function reveals that "evolution" of phenotype could never be "catalysed" by external influences.Even radiation would impair function and impede reproduction.I am sure you are intelligent enough to see that karyotypes could not have originated by evolution.
Aneuploidy would derail evolution.
Karyotypes transform evolution from a seemingly credible suggestion to an absolute absurdity.Chromosome numbers of karyotypes make phylogenesis (as it stands)totally insane.Phylogenesis is absurdly constructed on the basis of phenotype characteristics,and it is absurd because there is no consistent correlation between karyotype similarities and phenotype similarities-i.e.some very similar phenotypes have very dissimilar karyotypes-see below.And phenotypes are only inherited via karyotypes.By the same token,genotypes are solely inherited via karyotypes,and some similar genotypes are borne on dissimilar karyotypes.Variations of genotype within species contrast with karyotype uniformity in the same species.Karyotypes unequivocally disprove phylogenesis.My repetitivenes is generated by the stubbornness of evolutionism.
Genesis genes were packaged in chromosomes,arranged into karyotypes in such a way as to preserve species and to prevent and disprove evolution.
Evolution has been fatally flawed ever since it was conceived-evolution was proposed and impulsively adopted at a time when the biological world was completely ignorant of Mendelian genetics.
That particular shortcoming was,of course,partially corrected subsequent to Gregor Mendel's publication of his findings on the principles of inheritance, i.e.at some time after scientists became aware of Mendelian principles of inheritance.But other equally serious errors continue to invalidate evolution just as profoundly as the original errors,making it a miscreation.
Evolution would only die out since the mechanisms of meiosis prevent reproduction of altered karyotypes.If an altered karyotype somehow produced a gamete that would only result in the conception of an infertile form since no novel gamete could be expected to find a matching novel gamete with which to fuse so as to form a novel-and-fertile zygote (unless it was a "throwback"to the original),since the mechanisms of meiosis ultimately only allow reproduction of original karyotypes-see below.One of the wonders of the world is that evolutionism has overlooked this fact-probably because it has been mesmerized by numerous inconsequential hypotheses.The vast and hardly measurable quantum of theorisation upon which evolution has been built is rendered totally meaningless by this reality.There does not appear to be any way of linking any prokaryotic evolution with karyotypes as they now exist.Nor does there appear to be any possibility of evolutionary origin of meiosis which is so uniformly operative across such a vastly differing range of karyotypes,since meiosis would have had to appear independently in each "karyotype line" and simultaneously in each of a breeding couple every time.The simplest free-living and self-reproducing organism is by far too complex to have originated de novo. The simplest "life"forms-viruses and prions(?)-only reproduce via the cellular apparatus of more complex life forms-forms far too complex to have originated
de novo.
   The following summary includes several other realities which are equally devastating to evolution.  
   The sizes of genes defy evolution.Although genes vary greatly in size,most extend over 20-40thousand base pairs,but a few can extend over millions of base pairs.An incomplete gene is a useless gene,is an encumbrance,is a survival disadvantage.The appearance of a novel and whole and useful gene,de novo,a novel gene with functions integrated with those of pre-existing genes,is obviously impossible,obviously beyond the realms of credibility. 
Evolution does not have an explanation for the chromosome numbers of karyotypes.Evolution cannot produce novel karyotypes with novel reproducible chromosome numbers.Evolution cannot account for the reproducible origins of integrated functions of all the chromosomes of karyotypes.
The origin of karyotypes is not explained by evolution,which makes evolution biologically irrelevant.Chromosome numbers unequivocally disprove evolution.
Furthermore,karyotypes unequivocally demonstrate that no incremental
modification of karyotype would ever produce matching incremental modification of phenotype-because karyotypes are just not arranged in such a way-the composition of karyotypes simply does not reflect origin by incremental growth.
Karyotypes could not have originated by sequential acquisition of chromosomes. Which means that karyotypes could not have originated by evolution.
Genes are almost exclusively inherited via karyotypes.Mitochondrial genes,whilst essential for life,do not facilitate evolution.The same might be said for any extra-chromosomal genes which have been identified-for such genes could never alter the chromosomal constitution of karyotypes,mutate as they might.Genetic mutations(anywhere)have zero effect on the chromosomal constitution of karyotypes.Chromosomal "mutations",if not lethal,would produce infertility or malfunction,and would play havoc with the postulates of evolution(Fool's mate).
Diploid karyotypes are formed by fusion of two matching haploid gametes.A haploid gamete is only formed by meiosis which only proceeds if all chromosomes are present in homologous pairs,which means that zygotes always have the same karyotype as parental karyotypes.The rare exception,such as the mule,is always infertile,since its chromosomes are not all paired in homologous doublets.Any similar aberration in chromosome number (or any aberration in configuration which impairs synapsis)will produce infertility,which proves that karyotypes all originated from precursor karyotypes with identical chromosome number and configuration.This reality unequivocally proves creation.See below where I approach the problem from the other side.
Evolution crashes when karyotypes,meiosis and integrated functions of chromosomes are taken into account.Phylogenies are fallacious since they do not correspond with chromosome numbers of karyotypes.If life had evolved there would have had to be some correlation between chromosome numbers and phylogenies,assuming that eukaryotes evolved from prokaryotes.Phylogenetic proximity should correlate with karyotypic similarity.But,in fact, chromosome numbers prove that evolution is totally fallacious. 
Furthermore,karyotypes display degrees of organization which are certainly not attainable by evolution.But just to remove any doubt,let us consider the following phenomena.
The reproduction of a diploid karyotype requires production and subsequent
fusion of two matching haploid gametes,each of the two gametes having originated from a different precursor cell(that is,in the natural environment).
(Polyploidy,hermaphroditism and vegetative reproduction are not really relevant to the issue under discussion,as you will see).These gametes must have the correct and original haploid chromosome number and constitution otherwise their fusion would ALWAYS produce something OTHER THAN the original parental karyotype.In order for gametogenesis to produce original haploid gametes with the correct chromosomal number and constitution,precise and efficient mechanisms to ensure this outcome are essential otherwise gametogenesis would produce aberrant gametes, and thus aberrant zygotes,and the reproduction of original karyotypes would forever remain rare and fortuitous events,and"speciation"would never be  more than a dream.And if ALL chromosomes did not ALWAYS synapse with homologous partners,gametogenesis WOULD NOT produce original haploid gametes.The ONLY WAY that the production of original gametotypes could be assured is by the absolute requirement that ALL chromosomes MUST SYNAPSE with HOMOLOGOUS PARTNERS during meiosis.Otherwise the gametes would invariably lack some of the parent's chromosomes while having an excess of some others,and karyotype reproduction would forthwith cease to reproduce original types and would produce types differing from parental types. Without a mechanism to ensure synapsis of homologous chromosomes and only of homologous chromosomes karyotypes could never be reproduced.The essential synapsis of chromosomes with homologous partners must be an essential component of the mechanisms of karyotype preservation at any and every reproductive event.AND THIS VERY SAME REQUIREMENT MAKES IT IMPOSSIBLE FOR NOVEL KARYOTYPES TO BE REPRODUCED.
KARYOTYPE REPRODUCTION AND KARYOTYPE EVOLUTION ARE THEREFORE IMNCOMPATIBLE.The very mechanisms which are absolutely required for karyotype reproduction are the very same mechanisms which prevent reproduction of altered/novel karyotypes and which thus prevent "karyotype evolution".In the absence of such mechanisms karyotypes would never be reproduced,and aberrant karyotypes would invariably result.The more effectively a reproductive mechanisms preserves a karyotype,the more effectively that system would therefore prevent evolution.The less effectively a reproductive system preserved a karyotype,the more effectively it would enable evolution,such that the reproductive system which most favoured evolution would be one which produced KARYONONTYPES.I have gone to great lengths to explain this in the following paragraphs.KARYONONTYPES could hardly be expected to be functional,nor would they be reprdouced,thus their "evolution" would be utterly futile.   
Please take your time,with a pen or pencil and some paper(if necessary)and think this through for yourself.The concept of "karyotype evolution"is easily seen to be sheer nonsense,as is all of evolution.
By virtue of the same requirement,any karyotype containing an odd or unmatched chromosome would never reproduce itself.
    Eureka!Differing karyotypes obviously do not share common ancestors,for the following easily understood and overriding reasons.
    Eureka!Evolution cannot make karyotypes because karyotypes only reproduce if they are complete.Incomplete karyotypes refuse to function and refuse to reproduce.I offer you this summary with the best of intentions,only to promote  an objective and complete consideration of the following biological facts.
I use the term "evolution" primarily to denote "progression/change in chromosome numbers of karyotypes",since this would have been an essential feature of evolution if life had originated by means of evolution.
Eureka!Aneuploidy disengages evolution every time.Aneuploidy means infertility. Eureka!Evolution would fail because karyotypes always result from fusion of two unrelated* gametes which could never simultaneously provide matching novel chromosomes to produce novel karyotypes which could reproduce.
*(unrelated as in originating from different precursors)
Eureka!Polyploidy and hermaphroditism do not rescue evolution from its dilemma.
Karyotypes disprove evolution conclusively and prevent evolution.
Please concentrate on the(disproven)concept of"karyotype evolution"-i.e. progression or change of chromosomal constitution(chromosome number+ configuration)of karyotype.For if life had originated by evolution,"karyotype evolution"would have been required,and karyotypes would reflect phylogenetic relationships(but they do not).Karyotypes bust up evolution.Genotypes are inherited only via karyotypes.   
Eureka!Meiosis was marvellously designed to mandate genetic interchange while not allowing reproduction of changes in chromosome number or configuration.
Meiosis makes evolution infertile.Meiosis thus busts up evolution.
Eureka!Chromosome numbers of karyotypes deafeningly contradict evolution's phantom phylogenies.
Eureka!Integrated functions of chromosomes demand the inheritance of complete and original karyotypes.Integrated functions of chromosomes are not compatible with evolutionary origin of karyotypes.Karyotypes desecrate evolution.Mutations invariably disrupt karyotype functions.
Evolution would not propagate(see below).
Evolution(of karyotypes/chromosome numbers)is unbequeathable.
Everything written hereafter is an expansion of these realities and a demonstration of how they appear to negate the theory of evolution.
Karyotypes contradict evolutionary phantom phylogenies-does this not  mean that karyotypes did not originate by evolution?Karyotypes,which are the vehicles of inheritance,appear to shatter phantom phylogenies and phantom phylogenesis.
Karyotypes appear shrewder than evolution.Karyotypes are coded for preservation. The language of evolution is unintelligible.
The absolute requirement of synapsis of all chromosomes in homologous pairs to enable meiosis would appear to make reproduction of altered karyotypes  impossible.How many times must this be repeated before it is appreciated?
The appearance of any novel chromosome,by whatever means,would appear not to result in karyotype change since meiosis would simply not proceed in the absence of synapsis of all chromosomes with their respective homologous partners.This means that karyotypes could apparently never have evolved since their chromosome numbers could never have changed in such a way as to be reproducible via meiosis.A karyotype simply never could inherit novel chromosomes in homologous pairs,since each chromosome of such a pair would have had to originate from a different parent-hardly possible.  Meiosis blocks karyotype evolution. Integrated functions of chromosomes which make karyotypes into functional units are quite beyond the reach of evolutionary conjectures.And these functional units cannot tolerate addition or removal of chromosomes-i.e.do not tolerate changes in chromosome number. Karyotypes perpetuate creation by means of meiosis which preserves karyotypes while recombining genes. Meiosis cannot reproduce altered karyotypes. Karyotypes thwart every evolutionary effort to link them phylogenetically.Karyotypes appear to disprove evolutionary phantom phylogenies. Evolution is a work of errors.Evolution offers no explanation for the origins of karyotypes, but, instead, stupidly persists in proposing endless theories for the origins of genotypes without payimg any attention to the fact that karyotypes so thoroughly disprove its phantom phylogenies.Nor would the endless passage of time solve this/these problem-s.
Evolution naturally selects evidence. 
Meiosis is designed to prevent reproduction of altered karyotypes.
Integrated functions of chromosomes defy every effort to explain how they might have arisen by evolution and  these functions would shut down whenever karyotypes change.Karyotypes chorus creation(PLEASE see quote at bottom of page).Karyotypes epitomize design.
Integrated functions of chromosomes demonstrate that karyotypes are immodifiable functional units.Evolution cannot account for them.
The requirement of homology for synapsis of chromosomes in meiosis taunts evolution by preventing REPRODUCTION OF karyotypes with ALTERED chromosome number. If, somehow, reproduction did occur, the OFFSPRING would NOT have the SAME chromosome number or constitution as the "different" (or "altered") parent(having been formed by fusion of two differing gametes)and would likewise be incapable of SELF-reproduction.
NO REPRODUCTION OF ALTERED/DIFFERENT KARYOTYPES MEANS NO EVOLUTION.Of course meiosis could never ever have evolved,because it MUST WORK PROPERLY THE FIRST TIME AND EVERY TIME,OR NOT WORK AT ALL.EVOLUTION WOULD NOT WORK AT ALL.PLEASE DO NOT LET EVOLUTION DECEIVE YOU.
KARYOTYPIC TRENDS TOTALLY CONTRADICT PHENOTYPIC TRENDS.
KARYOTYPES ANNIHILATE EVOLUTIONARY PHANTOM PHYLOGENIES.
MEIOSIS REVERSES KARYOTYPE EVOLUTION.
INTEGRATED CHROMOSOME FUNCTIONS REFUSE KARYOTYPE "EVOLUTION".It has been rpeatedly observed that addition(or removal)of chromosomes to(or from)karyotypes is highly disruptive,and karyotype functions are therefore totally incompatible with the mistaken concept of karyotype evolution.Does karyotype evolution equate to extinction?
KARYOTYPES OBSTRUCT EVOLUTION.
MEIOSIS PERFECTLY PRESERVES CHROMOSOME TYPE.
KARYOTYPES,MEIOSIS,INTEGRATED FUNCTIONS OF CHROMOSOMES CONCLUSIVELY PROVE CREATION AND CONCLUSIVELY DISPROVE AND ANNUL EVOLUTION.CREATION IS THE ONLY POSSIBLE EXPLANATION FOR THESE PHENOMENA -please read on and see my detailed explanation of the purely biological reasons for coming to this conclusion.You cannot afford to ignore this.Evolution is not a rational theory.Natural selection for/against genotypes/phenotypes will never affect karyotypes(karyotype=the characteristic chromosomal constitution of the species)i.e.will never change the chromosome number or morphology.
EVOLUTION IS QUITE IRRECONCILABLE WITH KARYOTYPES,UTTERLY FAILS TO EXPLAIN THEIR ORIGINS,AND UTTERLY FAILS TO PROPOSE FEASIBLE MEANS OF ORIGINATION OF NOVEL KARYOTYPES THAT ARE FERTILE.MEIOSIS PROHIBITS REPRODUCTION OF ALTERED KARYOTYPES AND THUS ANNULS 'KARYOTYPE EVOLUTION' (see below).
EXQUISITELY ORCHESTRATED,INEXTRICABLY INTEGRATED,INTRICATELY INTERLINKED FUNCTIONS OF CHROMOSOMES WOULD NEVER TOLERATE NOR EVER HAVE TOLERATED EVOLUTION.EVOLUTION THEREFORE COULD NEVER HAVE ACCOMPLISHED ANYTHING AT ALL,NOR HAVE SURVIVED.
Evolution is unique in that,unlike other theories,it offers the least plausible explanation of the evidence.Karyotypes do not display any features which suggest that they originated by evolution. On the contrary,there is no way karyotypes could have originated by evolution.
   Muntiacus(like many other genera,no doubt)refutes evolution.Muntiacus reevesi has 46 chromosomes while Muntiacus criniformis rams have 9chromosomes and their ewes have8 chromosomes. Meanwhile the fruitfly has 8 chromosomes and the housefly 12.Since all our genes are inherited via our karyotypes, these karyotypes(and,undoubtedly,many others)refute evolution.
    Evolution destroys itself by producing infertility. Evolution has invented a host of intermediary life forms(in order to invent origins)without any evidence whatsoever that any such life forms might have been fertile or even viable. If karyotypes had evolved evolution's phylogenies should obviously be very very different from their present format.The evolution of karyotypes would have required progressive acquisition of chromosomes which is absolutely obstructed by the mechanisms of meiosis, and which is not compatible with integrated functions of chromosomes, and which is resoundingly contradicted by the chromosome numbers of karyotypes.
There is no way karyotypes could have originated by incremental evolution.The chromosome numbers of karyotypes(with their centromeres) prove that such a process never occurred.
SIMILARITIES IN GENOMES OF DIFFERENT SPECIES SUGGEST COMMON ORIGINS BUT THE VAST DIFFERENCES(FREQUENTLY OBSERVED)BETWEEN THE KARYOTYPES OF  SUCH SPECIES TELL US THAT THESE COMMON ORIGINS ARE NOT EVOLUTIONARY.(see also Muntiacus below)
IF KARYOTYPES DO NOT REFLECT EVOLUTIONARY HISTORY,IF CHROMOSOME NUMBERS OF KARYOTYPES DO NOT CORRELATE WITH PHYLOGENESIS THEN NOTHING GENOMIC IS IN ANY WAY RELEVANT TO EVOLUTIONARY CONJECTURE. 
KARYOTYPES ARE THE VEHICLES OF INHERITANCE,OF COURSE,AND ARE THEREFORE PIVOTAL TO THE UNDERSTANDING OF ORIGINS. 
Meiosis preserves original karyotypes by absolutely requiring synapsis of each chromosome with its homologous partner.Integrated functions of chromosomes require entire original karyotypes,and cannot accomodate evolution.Integrated functions of chromosomes cannot/could not tolerate/have tolerated addition or removal of novel or native chromosomes.Karyotypes therefore could not have tolerated the evolutionary requirement of progression/regression of chromosome numbers.
Karyotypes are so constituted that they could not have originated by means of incremental growth.Chromosomes also defy evolutionary conjecture.Evolution has no explanation for the origin of karyotypes.
Meiosis aborts gametogenesis if any chromosomes do not synapse with homologous partners.Variant karyotypes would therefore be infertile and would be eliminated by natural selection.
Inextricably integrated functions of chromosomes cannot be produced by incremental growth of karyotypes since the synergistic functions of chromosomes require complete karyotype ab initio.Integrated functions of chromosomes rule out evolution.Evolution cannot link karyotypes with phylogenies-which makes evolution meaningless.
Meiosis thwarts the generation of novel karyotypes that are reproducible since that would require the simultaneous appearance of novel chromosomes in matching homologous pairs in each of a breeding couple which is obviously impossible.There is no way evolution can be reconciled with the mechanisms of meiosis.Meiosis preserves original karyotypes,which rules out the possibility of evolution of karyotypes.Evolution is proven to be false by enormous disparities between karyotypes and phantom evolutionary phylogenies. Karyotypes flatly reject evolutionary phantom phylogenies.There is no way evolution can be reconciled with karyotypes.EVOLUTION IS THEREFORE DESIGNED TO FAIL.
'MUTATIONS' CANNOT 'MAKE' CHROMOSOMES,CANNOT 'MAKE' KARYOTYPES.
KARYOTYPES AND MEIOSIS WERE OBVIOUSLY DESIGNED IN SUCH A WAY AS TO OUTSMART EVOLUTION.
CONSTITUTIONS OF KARYOTYPES  THWART EVOLUTION.
INEXTRICABLY INTEGRATED,EXQUISITELY ORCHESTRATED,INTRICATELY INTERLINKED FUNCTIONS OF CHROMOSOMES REQUIRE INHERITANCE OF ENTIRE AND ORIGINAL KARYOTYPES-THUS THWARTING EVOLUTION.
SHEER SIZES OF CHROMOSOMES DEFY EVOLUTIONARY CONJECTURE.
EVOLUTION CANNOT PRODUCE NOVEL FEATURES OR FUNCTIONS SINCE  IN MOST INSTANCES PHENOTYPIC FEATURES AND FUNCTIONS ARE RESPECTIVELY CONTROLLED OR CODED FOR BY RESPECTIVE GROUPS OF GENES SITUATED AT WIDELY SEPARATED LOCI  ON DIFFERENT CHROMOSOMES.TO PROPOSE THE APPEARANCE OF SUCH ARRANGEMENTS AS ACCIDENTAL SIMULTANEOUS NOVEL OCCURRENCES WOULD BE ABSURD.
FURTHERMORE,THESE ARRANGEMENTS ABSOLUTELY REQUIRE INHERITANCE OF COMPLETE AND ORIGINAL KARYOTYPES-A REALITY WHICH FURTHER ILLUSTRATES THE ABSURDITY OF EVOLUTIONARY CONJECTURES.
ANIMAL DATA CANNOT THEREFORE BE SAFELY EXTRAPOLATED TO HUMANS
By proposing a theory fashioned after phenotype,explaining it by genotype,while it is contradicted by karyotype,evolution defeats itself.If a karyotype changes'by chance'either the change will not be reproduced,or the karyotype will not be reproduced.Meiosis blocks reproduction of karyotypes with altered chromosome number.MEIOSIS OBVIOUSLY COULD NOT HAVE EVOLVED.
Evolution of karyotype cannot be inherited!
Darwin published his theory decades before Mendel's discoveries became common knowledge!
EVOLUTION IS IMPOSSIBLE! Evolution has assumed that life as we know it is 'descended' from a host of intermediary and 'more primitive' life forms.This assumption rests on another assumption-i.e.that more 'primitive'forms of life would have been 'compatible' with 'life'-which is a very tenuous assumption. 
MEIOSIS WILL NOT REPRODUCE NOVEL KARYOTYPES.
Evolution would have absolutely required changes in chromosome numbers:such changes would be rendered sexually irreproducible by meiosis.
MEIOSIS THUS OUTSMARTS EVOLUTION.
-SPLITTING CHROMOSOMES CANNOT BEGET EVOLUTION.
EACH CHROMOSOME HAS AT LEAST ONE CENTROMERE.A SPLIT CHROMOSOME WILL LOSE THAT PART WHICH IS NO LONGER ATTACHED TO THE CENTROMERE- THE DETACHED PART WILL NOT BE INCLUDED IN NEXT CELL DIVISION.THE PART STILL ATTACHED TO THE CENTROMERE  WILL  PROBABLY NOT BE ABLE TO SYNAPSE SO AS  TO ENABLE THE NEXT MEIOTIC DIVISION.IF A CENTROMERE SPLITS TRANSVERSELY ALL THE GENES OF ONE OF THE SEGMENTS OF THE CHROMOSOME WILL BE LOST.SPLITTING OF CHROMOSOMES CANNOT BEGET EVOLUTION.CENTROMERES OUTSMART EVOLUTION.
-LIFE AND HEALTH DEPENDS ON THE FIXITY OF KARYOTYPES.
Addition/insertion of novel or native chromosomes to karyotypes is well known to be grossly deleterious,and never advantageous.
Many other facts also thwart evolution.
EVOLUTIONISM HAS PROPOSED 'POINT MUTATIONS'(ERRORS IN DNA/RNA REPLICATION) AS A MECHANISM FOR EVOLUTION WHEREAS MULTIPLE SIMULTANEOUS MUTATIONS AT WIDELY DIVERSE LOCI ON DIFFERENT CHROMOSOMES WOULD BE NECESSARY TO EFFECT ANY SIGNIFICANT FUNCTIONAL OR  MORPHOLOGICAL CHANGES.THIS AGAIN DEMONSTRATES
THAT EVOLUTION IS ABSURD AND IMPOSSIBLE- THWARTED BY LOGISTICS OF KARYOTYPE FUNCTION.  
      Evolution has placed great emphasis on the concept of gene mutations without pointing out that many physiological and morphological features are respectively regulated by groups of synergistic genes situated on widely separated loci often on different chromosomes.And it is quite unfeasible and entirely impracticable  to postulate evolution of functions and/or morphological features by means of mutliple simultaneous mutations at widely separated  loci.Evolution again confounded.
      Evolution has made little mention of the absolutely necessary 'evolution'of karyotype-necessary for the purpose of evolutionary conjecture-and such evolution is blocked by the mechanisms of meiosis.Evolution cannot breed.'Evolution of karyotype' would have produced multisystem and often bizarre defects/changes almost certainly of a deleterious nature,as well as infertility.
      Evolution would have required the appearance of novel breeding karyotypes.Which ,at the very least,and in every instance,would have required the appearance of two matching novel(and fertile)karyotypes as a breeding couple.Which,at the very least, would have had to originate by the production and appearance of four novel-and-matching gametes, in two pairs,for their conception.
Such a scenario/scenarios is/are beyond the reaches of the most vigorous imaginations and entirely unfeasible/impracticable. EVOLUTION IS IMPLAUSIBLE.
(See below for a more detailed explanation)
IRONICALLY THE PASSAGE OF TIME DOES NOT ASSIST EVOLUTION(SEE BELOW).NOR CAN EVOLUTION DECLARE THE ORIGINS OF ITS INDISPENSABLE ENVIRONMENTS. 
IF LIFE HAD EVOLVED,KARYOTYPES WOULD HAVE REVEALED PATTERNS OR RELATIONSHIPS CORRELATING WITH PHANTOM PHYLOGENESIS-INSTEAD KARYOTYPES REFUTE EVOLUTIONARY PHANTOM PHYLOGENESIS .
EVOLUTION IGNORES KARYOTYPES BECAUSE IT CANNOT EXPLAIN THEIR ORIGIN.
EVOLUTION IS CAUGHT IN THE MEIOSIS TRAP-THE DEVICE WHICH DOES NOT ALLOW  REPRODUCTION OF CHANGES IN CHROMOSOME NUMBER OR CONFIGURATION. KARYOTYPES THEREFORE ESCAPE EVOLUTION.MEIOSIS WILL NOT REPRODUCE NOVEL KARYOTYPES. 
Evolution has no modus operandi,since gene mutations cannot produce novel chromosomes or karyotypes.And novel karyotypes cannot breed.Has evolution not seen these most obvious errors? 
Dear Reader,I suspect that the few facts discussed here represent merely the starting point of an exciting journey of discovering the grossness of the errors of evolution.Evolution is a very elaborate fallacy which is very simply disproven.EVOLUTION IS ENTIRELY IMPRACTICABLE AND UNFEASIBLE-ABSURD.Many many facts trash evolution.The discussion below centres on sexual reproduction.Evolution could never ever have produced a cell,let alone progress beyond asexual reproduction.Polyploidy could never have produced karyotypes as we know them,for two reasons at least.Firstly,polyploidy never produces novel chromosomes. Secondly,simple arithmetic tells us that polyploidy could never have produced karyotypes as we know them.And besides,polyploidy is only relevant to plants.Karyotypes ridicule evolution and laugh it to scorn.Evolution cannot breed.
Exquisitely orchestrated,intricately interlinked and inextricably integrated functions of chromosomes could obviously not have originated by incremental evolution,as demonstrated by the severe disruptions resulting from gain or loss of chromosomes.This marvellous phenomenon (of integrated functions of chromosomes) reveals the absurdity of evolution.The serious multisystem disorders accompanying aberrations in chromosome number illustrate the fact that karyotypes are so constituted that they cannot tolerate gain or loss of chromosomes.This makes it most implausible to postulate that karyotypes evolved. Evolution cannot breed.
PHYSICAL(PHENOTYPE) CHANGES ACCOMPANYING CHANGES IN KARYOTYPE STAND IN STARK CONTRAST TO GRADUAL/INCREMENTAL/ CHANGES PORTRAYED BY EVOLUTIONISM,such changes(accompanying karyotype changes) almost certain to abort or to be irreproducible.More than obvious
CHANGES IN CHROMOSOME NUMBER(POLYPLOIDY ASIDE)CANNOT BE INHERITED BY SUCCESSIVE  GENERATIONS.......
THERE IS NO EVIDENCE OF EVOLUTION SINCE SIMILARITIES IN GENOTYPE ARE OFFSET BY ENORMOUS DIFFERENCES IN KARYOTYPE.
PROGRESSION IN CHROMOSOME NUMBER WOULD OBVIOUSLY PRODUCE INFERTILITY AND BIZARRE RESULTS NOT AT ALL ANTICIPATED BY EVOLUTIONISM and quite contradictory to it's implausible suggestions.
KARYOTYPES,OF COURSE,ARE THE ENGINES OF INHERITANCE.
-evolution's unbelievable phylogenies are so obviously incompatible with karyotypes(perhaps because Darwin knew nothing about inheritance-he published his fantasies 7 years before Gregor Mendel's original publication,decades before Mendel's findings were widely known).Evolution's fantasies have never caught up with and can never catch up with or accomodate the facts of biology(read on,please);karyotypes conclusively disprove evolution's implausible phylogenies.
-meiosis absolutely/obviously thwarts evolution(by thwarting the generation of novel-and-fertile karyotypes)
-evolution cannot account for karyotypes,nor,therefore,for the origin of species.
-karyotypes and their modes of function prove that they could not have originated by incremental growth.
Evolution's fantasies rest on false premiss,evade contradictory evidence,are incompatible with karyotypes,meiosis,the environment,and more.
Evolution rests on the absurd assumption that errors in nucleic acid replication could produce novel karyotypes-obviously entirely irrational.
Evolution cannot incorporate karyotypes nor the mechanisms of meiosis since they are entirely incompatible with it.Meiosis thwarts reproducible modification of chromosome number.
Ironically,and for exactly the same reasons as above evolution provides no explanation for any fossil ever found!!!And conversely,fossils are no evidence of evolution!!!
The evidence of design is compelling.The evidence for evolution is nonexistent.
NO ENVIRONMENT/-S COULD,ON THE ONE HAND,SELECT ONLY MUTATED SPECIMENS FOR SURVIVAL WHILST,ON THE OTHER HAND,SUSTAINING EVOLUTION FOR BILLIONS(?)OF YEARS.THE CONCEPT IS IRRATIONAL.
"NATURAL SELECTION" OF "ADVANTAGED/MUTATED" SPECIMENS IMPLIES ELIMINATION OF THE STRAINS WHICH ENGENDERED THEM-A SELF CONTRADICTORY AND IRRATIONAL CONCEPT.
WHILST EVOLUTION OFFERS AN IRRATIONAL EXPLANATION FOR THE  ORIGIN OF SPECIES,IT OFFERS NO EXPLANATION AT ALL FOR THE ORIGIN OF THE CRUCIALLY IMPORTANT ENVIRONMENT WHICH IS SUPPOSED TO DRIVE THE PROCESS.
I would value your considered and dispassionate comments on this document.
The following is a summary and an explanation of those natural phenomena which have enabled me to honestly satisfy myself that the hypothesis of evolution does not represent a feasible or plausible explanation for the origins of life or of species.I am sending this email since I feel obliged to share these facts with my fellow-thinkers.I shall employ the term 'evolution'to refer to the  hypothesis of evolution.
    All the conjectured evidence for evolution is negated by the few simple facts which I shall attempt to communicate in this brief.
    Darwin knew naught of the principles,and less of the mechanisms, of inheritance.And Mendel had not yet published.
    Evolution is illogical,nor is it feasible to suggest that life evolved by illogical happenstance.Evolution is,furthermore,contrary to a vast body of evidence.Evolution is illogical because mutations do not make karyotypes.Illogical also because evolutionary phylogenesis cannot(at all,in any way)be manipulated/conjectured such that the product/-s thereof correlate with known karyotypes.There is absolutely no correlation whatsoever between evolutionary phylogenies and known karyotypes.This makes evolution both illogical and absurd.Unfeasible because meiosis obstructs generation of novel and fertile karyotypes.
    In this summary I have concentrated on features which demonstrate the unfeasiblity of evolution principally by virtue of their causing infertility.I have made no mention of protista nor have I considered vegetative reproduction.Because,I think the facts which I summarise below,are sufficient to dispel the notion of evolutionary origin of species.The simplest life-forms are neither free-living nor self-propagating,and are entirely dependent on the cellular apparatus of more complex organisms.Evolution would have required the appearance,de novo,of a free-living and self propagating organism-a proposition which clearly cannot be seriously contemplated.
    Whilst I have principally concentrated on those features which negate evolution  by virtue of causing infertility,it is also worth considering the fact that the constitution of karyotypes,and the logistics of their multiplicity of functions is not consistent with any origin by means of incremental evolution.
    What I am trying to say is that karyotypes display features which are not consistent with origin by incremental growth.And karyotypes also display features of function which demonstrate that they cannot alter in such a way that any such alteration might be fertile.I am referring to alterations in chromosome number and morphology.Evolutionism has made much of mutations at level of  the DNA/RNA nucleotide base sequence,but,as I shall try to demonstrate,such mutations are not capable of producing karyotypes nor of changing them.Karyotypes display the indelible imprint of design.
     I have employed various modifications of  text type simply to facilitate the process of communcating the direction of my thoughts.
     I would value the responses you might have to this document,since they might provide new insights into this controversy.
  Evolution is irreconcilable with karyotypes,with meiosis(gametogenesis),and with exquisitely orchestrated integration of all functions of all chromosomes.
   Evolution is intrinsically erroneous since it bases it's illogical and phoney phylogenies on phenotypes which do not correlate with karyotypes.
   Mutations cannot create karyotypes.
   Evolution is ruined by virtue of the fact that meiosis/gametogenesis obstructs the generation of novel fertile karyotypes.
   This document is a brief discussion of some of evolution's most disastrous errors of omission.
Karyotypes were obviously designed in such a way as to prevent evolution,and thereby to disprove it.
Karyotypes,chromosomes,meiosis/gametogenesis obstruct and defy evolution.It might be suggested that evolution is science at it's worst.
    These few thoughts on evolution comprise only a consideration of biological and natural phenomena which obviously disprove evolution.The reason for my mailing these to you is because it is too important to be witheld from you.Evolution is an institutionalized fallacy which must be discarded.
 Evolution cannot account for karyotypes,and cannot,therefore,account for life nor for the origin of species.
 Evolution has enjoyed a protracted reign of error which is rapidly drawing to a close.                 
Evolution is a quasi-religion which has acquired the trappings of science.The science of evolution is seriously deficient ,as I shall demonstrate in this short summary.
Evolution was dreamed up by a man who did not even know the principles of inheritance.
Karyotypes,meiosis,integrated chromosome functions must be included in all biological conjectures,so as to avoid gross errors.Evolution is entirely irrational since karyotypes,chromosomes,gametogenesis,and exquisite orchestration of integrated chromosome functions have been omitted from its conjectures.
Karyotypes are functional units which are not amenable to alteration,whose functions are severely disrupted thereby.
Cellular functions are respectively orchestrated by respective groups of genes situated on respective groups of chromosomes-an arrangement which is entirely incongruous with evolution(see below).
Evolution is therefore entirely irrational.
It is futile to compare skeletons/organs/systems/functions of different species if you do not simultaneously compare the karyotypes which produced them-and when you do it will become obvious that the common threads are not of evolutionary origin.Evolution is irrational.
     Meiosis fixes karyotypes and thereby nixes evolution.
     The observation that gain or loss of chromosome/-es is invariably most deleterious to karyotypes demonstrates also that the constitution of karyotypes is such that they are intolerant of the types of changes which would have been necessary if they had originated by means of incremental evolution.Karyotypes are seen to be marvellous and delicate creations consisting of exact ingredients in exactly correct proportions,which could never have survived the cruelties of evolution.Evolution is a half-baked doctrine of extreme cruelty.
Exquisitely orchestrated integration of the muptiplicity of all the functions of all the chromosomes of the karyotypes naturally(and absolutely)necessitates the inheritance of complete and original karyotypes,a requirement which obviously prohibits evolutionary phylogenesis and thereby nixes evolution.
   The sheer size of chromosomes(see below) obviously precludes the possibility of their having evolved-which makes evolution an impossible explanation of their origins.
   As mentioned elsewhere,groups of synergistic genes(respectively situated on groups of chromosomes)cooperating in the execution of vital functions whilst being situated on widely separated loci and separate chromosomes could obviously not have been thus arranged by a process of incremental evolution of karyotypes.Such arrangements obviously require the respective groups of respective genes(and the chromosomes which bear them)to have been inherited in whole groups.When we consider the overlaps in functions of chromosomes-i.e.the fact that different chromosomes contribute different constituents of the same products,it is easy to see that whole karyotypes require to have been inherited as such,and this,of course,entirely negates the notion of incremental evolution of karyotypes,and evolutionary phylogenesis.Those described syndromes with aberrant karyotypes have no bearing on species specificity or"speciation",and do not serve to ameliorate this "problem".  
   Evolution has no credible modus operandi since it would have required sexually reproducible progression/change in chromosome numbers of  karyotypes,a requirement whicn is prohibited by effective inherent prohibitive cellular mechanisms.Evolution is irrational.
Evolutionism appears to have overlooked the fact that survival of the fittest requires the origin of the fittest.
The discovery of the double helix of DNA was seized upon as providing a mechanism for mutations and evolution.It was thought that mistakes in transcription of the code(written into the order of arrangement of nucleotide bases)provided an effective means for the generation of mutations,the 'driving force'of evolution.However,the requirements of meiosis,which fix the fertile karyotypes of species and the actual chromosome numbers,which discredit evolutionary phylogenies, are not at all conducive to evolutionary conjecture,and reveal the futility of this much-vaunted machine of evolution(DNAdouble-helix is not a useful tool for evolution). Evolution is irrational.
Evolution is an irrational theory which was published seven years before the discovery of Mendelian inheritance.Evolution has subsequently failed to catch up with scientific facts.
   This short synopsis was inspired by the realisation that the biological principles discussed above equate to a confounding contradiction of evolutionary conjecture,an unavoidable negation of the credibility of evolutionism.Evolution is irrational.
   The implications can be likened to an error at the beginning of an algebraic equation which renders the entirety of subsequent calculations erroneous/irrational.
This short synopsis also lists several other crucially important biological phenomena which demonstrate the irrationality of evolution.No doubt there are a great number of similar facts not here represented.
Evolutionism is a belief system originally founded on uninformed irrational conjecture and subsequently not reconciled with all related facts,and irreconcilable with a great numbers of facts,and entirely unworkable and irrational.
During the course of compiling these facts I was particularly impressed by the degrees of difficulty I encountered while trying to find chromosome numbers of species .(Please see attachment.)
     I had always wondered about chromosome numbers of species since my first encounters with the theory of evolution,because I reckoned that such numbers should confirm the theory of evolution,if it was true, or else these numbers would discredit evolutionary conjectures.
     When I did find some(chromosome numbers),I was immediately compelled to conclude that karyotypes decisively discredit evolutionary phylogenies.These numbers may be viewed in the attachment.
      I can't help wondering at the scarcity/unavailability of chromosome numbers in evolutionary literature since, I thought, these chromosome numbers/karyotypes should have been the prime focus of attention of evolutionism- since any and every gene(mutated or not)is inherited via the total-and-invariable number of reproducible chromosomes of the karyotype of the germ cell precursors of the reproducing male/female couple .Those chromosome numbers/karyotypes(in evolutionary literature)which appear to conform to evolutionary conjectures are outnumbered by those(not readily included in evolutionary writings) which decisively discredit such conjectures.
      My impressions(of the irrationality of evolution) were greatly reinforced by the realisation that the mechanisms of meiosis/gametogenesis,particularly the requirement for synapsis(and homology)of chromosome pairs during meiosis/gametogenesis ,absolutely fix the reproducible karyotypes of species.It is most intriguing to note that whilst some species appear to have variable chromosome numbers these variations are apparently not  associated with great phenotypic variations.Are these variations a sort of polyploidy-a duplication of some chromosomes or of groups of chromosomes?(It is worthy of note that all human chromosome pairs are distinctly identifiable and there are no apparent duplications).
   Please note that my emphasis on chromosome number/karyotype is due to the fact that chromosome number/karyotype is the most obvious feature of the segregation of genes into specific(and fixed)numbers of uniquely identifiable chomosome pairs(karyotypes=the whole number of chromosomes))whose number(and structure)are ingeniously preserved by the mechanisms of meiosis,and the fact that this marvel of meiosis constitutes the most definitive and powerful impediment to conjectured evolution.This is plain for all but the unwilling to see.
 This fact is amply demonstrated by the infertility of mules. 
     The actual chromosome numbers(karyotypes) of species constitute the most eloquent evidence to discredit irrational evolutionary conjectures.
     Whilst it is true that many different species share identical chromosome numbers(but obviously not identical karyotypes),it is equally true that evolution would have required progression/-s in chromosome number since evolution proposes the origin of all species from prokaryote/-s.Without such  progression/-s,and without plausible hypotheses for the mechanism/-s   of progression of reproducible chromosome numbers of fertile karyotypes,other evolutionary conjectures(the entire theory of evolution) are(is) without substance and irrational.(Please note that polyploidy=muliples of FIXED haploid chromosome number)
"The cell" is equipped with mechanisms which are tailored to prevent disorderly synapsis(between non-homologous chromosomes)in meiosis(please see attachments,and see many similar articles on the web)."The cell"is thereby enabled to prohibit the sexual reproduction of aberrations of chromosome number-in other words these mechanisms FIX the reproducible chromosome numbers/fertile karyotypes of cells,and prevent the sexual reproduction of novel chromosomes.These mechanisms therefore prohibit evolutionary progression in the sexually reproducible chromosome numbers/fertile karyotypes  of species.In other words,novel karyotypes would be infertile/would not reproduce THEMSELVES. "Speciation"is a peculiar term peculiar to irrational evolutionary conjecture.The concept of "speciation"is of no consequence,is totally irrelevant in the face of these mechanisms of meiosis which so efficiently preserve sexually reproducible/fertile karyotypes.
THE INFERTILITY OF MULES AMPLY DEMONSTRATES THAT CHROMOSOMES WILL NOT SYNAPSE IN PROPHASE-I OF MEIOSIS IF THEY ARE NOT HOMOLOGOUS,AND,THEREFORE,DEMONSTRATES THAT MEIOSIS/GAMETOGENESIS FIXES KARYOTYPES .THE MULE IS LIVING PROOF OF THE IRRATIONALITY OF EVOLUTION.
   Interspecies similarities in gene sequences seen in the light of dissimilarities of respective karyotypes suggest that genomes were designed and karyotypes and meiosis were constructed for the express purpose of preventing evolution.
  The cellular mechanisms(mechanisms operative in the nucleus)-mechanisms which ensure that only homologous chromosomes synapse in meiosis,are currently being elucidated and enumerated by gifted(and energetic)scientists.
  This fixity of reproducible chromosome numbers/fertile karyotypes places an insurmountable obstacle in the path of evolutionary conjectures.These few facts serve to discredit irrational evolutionary conjectures most decisively.
  Apart from the astonishing implications/consequences of these facts,and the astonishing simplicity of the deduction that these facts refute the theory of evolution so entirely and so effectively,it is almost as astonishing to note that these facts are so assiduously ignored by those unwilling to abandon the irrational myth of evolution.
 In essence the theory of evolution cries out for chromosomal explanations,cries out for chromosomal genealogies.These cries fall on deaf(unwilling)ears.
Such genealogies,if any have been constructed, might have been expected to have been the first priority of evolutionism,but they appear to be the last. 
It is patently obvious that the mechanisms of meiosis and of inheritance specifically function to preserve genomes/fertile karyotypes and to prevent evolution,and that evolutionism steadfastly ignores this reality.
     An elementary review of salient principles is set out below.
I would be grateful if you could inform me of factual errors in this precis.At the same time I would implore you to assess wether any such errors actually detract from the essence of what I am trying to convey to you.
I am a medical practitioner,and have long pondered on the origin of species.As I approach this subject,I recall that:-
      SURVIVAL of ANY TYPE OF ORGANISM(FIT OR UNFIT) DEPENDS UPON IT'S ABILITY TO REPRODUCE.
(I would like to CONFINE THIS LETTER  to the subject of SEXUAL REPRODUCTION,which ABSOLUTELY REQUIRES GAMETOGENESIS which absolutely necessitatesMEIOTIC cell division which ABSOLUTELY REQUIRES SYNAPSIS OF ALL CHROMOSOME PAIRS in the MEIOTICally dividing cell.)
 **** Aneuploidy causes sterility(see attached article)*****
Synapsis of chromosomes( ALL PAIRS ARE REQUIRED TO SYNAPSE in order for meiosis to proceed)ABSOLUTELY REQUIRES A DEGREE OF HOMOLOGY between the respective members of EVERY RESPECTIVE PAIR of synapsing chromosomes i.e.EVERY PAIR in the nucleus.Dedicated and ingenious scientists are in the process of discovering and describing the several mechanisms operating in the nuclei of meiotically dividing cells which ensure that only homologous chromosomes synapse during Prophase I of meiosis.
The "X"and"Y"chromosomes appear to have a special arrangement which keeps them together.
The homologous autosome pairs are absolutely required to match at every single meiotic division.If this were not the case it is quite obvious that karyotypes would never ever have been preserved.
There are obviously very powerful mechanisms in operation in the nuclei of germ cells(precursors of spermatozoa and ova)which have served to preserve our reproducible/fertile karyotypes very faithfully.These same mechanisms have served and continue to serve to prohibit "evolutionary"(or any other)changes in sexually reproducible/fertile karyotype.These are the mechanisms which allow only homologous chromosomes to synapse in prophase I of meiosis.And which decisively discredit evolutionary conjectures. 
If it were not for the operation of such mechanisms our karyotypes could never have been preserved as faithfully as they are.
These very same mechanisms(which are being elucidated and enumerated at this time)are at the same time preventing sexually reproducible/fertile"progression"of chromosome numbers of species,and thereby prevent evolution of species.
Surprisingly,these mechanisms have hardly been accorded much attention by evolutionists(and biologists in general?)whilst the human(and other?)genomes have been decoded with almost frantic urgency.
These are the mechanisms which have prevented the evolution of species,by preventing the progression (or change)of chromosome numbers/fertile karyotypes of species.
Whilst much study has been devoted to the operation and composition of genes,little has been said about the sexual reproduction of the vehicles(chromosomes)which bear them.Evolutionism has grossly neglected the description of karyotypes,and the mechanisms of inheritance of karyotypes..
The mechanisms of meiosis therefore serve to FIX  THE REPRODUCIBLE CHROMOSOME NUMBERS/FERTILE KARYOTYPES OF SPECIES.
*****The phenomenon of polyploidy is not relevant to this problem,since polyploidy represents mere duplication of fixed numbers of chromosomes/duplications of karyotypes(or of portions?of karyotypes).Polyploidy pertains only to  reduplications of fixed numbers of chromosomes.And there appear to be variations in number of certain chromosomes or groups of chromosomes in some species without any notable variation in the actual composition of the respective chromosomes(?)and without corresponding phenotypic variations.
And evolution would have required the appearance of novel chromosomes and novel REPRODUCIBLE/FERTILE karyotypes,in order to account for the observed chromosome numbers/karyotypes of species.
ODD CHROMOSOMES withNO SYNAPSING PARTNERS PREVENT the process of meiosis(ANEUPLOIDY PREVENTS MEIOSIS)(please see attachment or any standard textbook of biology)
And any chromosome which is,for any reason,unable to synapse with its homologue,prevents the progression of the meiotic process,and disallows the conclusion of such cell division-thereby causing sterility=inability to pass on such chromosome/-s to subsequent generations. .
For reasons which are difficult to comprehend,it is extremely  and extraordinarily difficult to find chromosome numbers of more than a few species.Karyotypes appear to be assiduously ignored by evolutionists,and to have been hidden by an unknown hand.
However,CHROMOSOME NUMBERS of several species can be viewed in the attachment    
   IF,INDEED,life had evolved from a prokaryotic organism/s,  then the evolutionist is obliged to postulate a chronology/genealogy of progression  of REPRODUCIBLE/FERTILE chromosome numbers/karyotypes such as to have produced,say,a black mulberry with 308 chromosomes(see website).
   The following section consists of a (failed) exercise in evolutionary conjecture(which is unique,in that it appears to be the only such exercise which has included those relevant facts concerning mechanisms of meiosis which impede change in sexually reproducible chromosome numbers of species)-this exercise is intended to demonstrate the utter unfeasibility of evolution.
   In order for the CHROMOSOME NUMBER/KARYOTYPE of any organism to have PROGRESSED to a HIGHER/DIFFERENT AND REPRODUCIBLE NUMBER/FERTILE KARYOTYPE IF,say,this were AT ALL POSSIBLE,or EVER OCCURRED,its NOVEL offspring would have had to have inherited any additional chromosomes via  NOVEL GAMETES with  NOVEL chromosome NUMBERS.Any novel gamete would have had to have been able to  combine/fuse succesfully with a gamete from the parent's reproducing partner in order to have produced a NOVEL ZYGOTE.The novel chromosome/s would have had to have been compatible with life and health and fitness,in order for the novel zygote to have reached the age of reproduction.Then,in the gonads of the NOVEL REPRODUCING ZYGOTE the NOVEL CHROMOSOME/S would have been required to find homologous synapsing partners (in order to be sexually reproduced) in the process of gametogenesis if ,at all,such novel chromosomes were to have survived by being passed on to succeeding generations.
The big question,at this point,is how could such novel and reproducible homologous chromosome pairs have appeared in  novel(and fertile)zygotes unless each respective novel chromosome of the novel pair had originated independently in the gonads of two parents-i.e.two matching/homologous chromosomes would have had to have originated(how?) from separate scources.It is difficult to estimate the unlikelihood or the degrees of improbability/impossibility of such an event/-s,nor do there appear to be any factors which might in any way be/have been conducive to such an occurence/-s.Each parental gamete could contribute only one member of any such novel pair of chromosomes,and for such a pair to be homologous(having originated in a novel fashion/s in two different organisms)is an utterly unfeasible proposition .
Another factor which further compounds the impossibility of such an event/-s is the numbers of spermatozoa(100million/ml).The chances of a spermatozoon with a novel chromosome winning the race to reach the ovum are something of the order of 1in300million. 
BUT WHAT THEN,WHAT NEXT?
    In order for the NOVEL (AND FERTILE) zygote with a novel pair/s of homologous chromosomes to reproduce in such a way as to PRODUCE  FERTILE OFFSPRING it would have had to FIND A  MATING PARTNER WITH  MATCHING   HOMOLOGOUS NOVEL CHROMOSOMES AND ANY SUCH NOVEL CHROMOSOMES WOULD HAVE HAD TO HAVE BEEN DOUBLY HOMOLOGOUSinORDER TO BE REPRODUCIBLE-i.e THERE WOULD HAVE HAD TO HAVE BEEN HOMOLOGY
BETWEEN THE 2 CHROMOSOMES OF THE NOVEL CHROMOSOME PAIR 
AS WELL AS homology B ETWEEN TH2   RESPECTIVE PAIRS of  novel chromosomes  IN  THREPRODUCING   PARTNERS in order,EACH TIME,FOR EACH AND EVERY  ONE OF THE novel chromosome pairs WHICH WOULD HAVE BEEN REQUIRED, to have beenREPRODUCIBLE by being able to synapse in the gonads of their grown up/adult and fertile NOVEL OFFSPRING ).  
    ThusFOR EVERY NOVEL and REPRODUCIBLE PAIRof homologous chromosomes to have been BEQUEATHED  to  SUCCESSIVE GENERATIONS,they would have had to have respectively originated by chance in the gametes of EACH OF A REPRODUCING COUPLE,and they would then(from the bowels of the reproducing zygote)HAVE HAD TO HAVE FOUND MATCHING REPRODUCING PARTNER-GAMETES IN A REPRODUCING PARTNER i.e. this WHOLE IMPLAUSIBLE SEQUENCE OF EVENTS WOULD HAVE HAD TO HAVE HAPPENED FOUR TIMES OVER(ONCE FOR EVERY NOVEL GAMETE PRODUCED BY THE FOUR RESPECTIVE PARENTS OF THE NOVEL REPRODUCING COUPLE)-at the very leastFOUR TIMES OVER in order for EACH and EVERY novel pair of REPRODUCIBLE chromosomes to have been bequeathed to posterity
WE WOULD HAVE REQUIRED EACH AND EVERY NOVELTY IN QUADRUPLICATE AND IN  SYNCHRONY IN THE SAME VICINITY-ONE IN EACH MEMBER OF TWO MATING COUPLES OR TWICE OVER IN THE SAME COUPLE AND WE WOULD  HAVE REQUIRED THE APPEARANCE OF A NOVEL MALE AND A NOVEL FEMALE EACH AND EVERY TIME,IN ORDER FOR THE CHROMOSOMAL NOVELTY TO HAVE BEEN  SEXUALLY REPRODUCIBLE .
      Granted,there could have been the same parents,which would have required the identical novel gamete to have been produced twice over(i.e.on at least two separate occasions)by each parent and to have produced a novel male and a novel female each time. 
 (.Don't be distracted by the phenomenon of polyploidy,now.Polyploidy may perhaps be more relevant in plants than animals but is unlikely to be of much assistance to the evolutionist in the attempted explanation of the surmised progression of chromosome numbers-see above.)
               And for the Adder's tongue fern(n=240)HOW MANY TIMES OVER WOULD THIS LUDICROUS SUGGESTION HAVE HAD TO BE PROPOSED ?
 AND FOR THE FOLLOWING:-?
         (black mulberry n=308;king crab n=208;shrimp n=254) .
   Furthermore it has been found that
                                                    a)  different(often multiple) chromosome pairs operate synergistically(exquisitely orchestrated) in order to produce combined(and vital)- effects(effects that are essential for life) such as the synthesis of haemoglobin-to name but one of countless examples-examples which are not necessarily specifically known to me but which are present in the repertoire of every living cell;
                                          and that
                                                    b)  individual chromosomes each respectively control numerous different functions.
There is therefore a vast repertoire of highly orchestrated  and interdependent and synergistic functions conducted by the chromosomes of each organism,and the reproducible chromosome numbers of organisms are FIXED by the requirements of meiosis.Let me give you one example(of many):-
   The cell membranes of human cardiac sarcomeres contain channels to allow/facilitate the transit of ions.Several different channels exist for the passage of different ions by different means.All these channels are essential for cardiac function/life.The genes which code for these channels are therefore all essential to life,as are,therefore,the chromosome pairs which bear them. These genes,obviously,require to have been inherited together ab initio,therefore the chromosome pairs which bear them must all have been inherited together ab initio,in order to have sustained the lives of the bearers.Now the genes coding for the sarcomere-membrane-ion-channels are situated on at least five different chromosome pairs.Such an arrangement completely negates any concept of "progression"of chromosome number/karyotype(and if life had evolved chromosome numbers would have had to have"progressed").Other examples of similarly complex synergistic functions of different chromosome pairs include thyroid function(various aspects of)and the production of thyrotrophin/thyroxin receptors,other cardiac features(as in cardiomyopathy)and it does not require much effort to realise that there are undoubtedly myriads of cellular functions/organ functions which operate in the same fashion.It is therefore quite easy to see that evolutionary conjectures will forever fail to explain these,for the reasons mentioned above.  
    One would expect the appearance of novel chromosome to have been almost invariably associated with serious disruption of cellular function of growth or physiology,as is the case in most conditions caused by aberrant chromosome numbers in humans.Spontaneous abortions are frequently the result of aberration in chromosome number.
    Chromosome numbers of different organisms(see website)do NOT display patterns suggestive of evolutionary origin.
Similarities in chromosome numbers are  offset by enormous dissimilarities.E.g the black muntjac(a little deer) has as many chromosomes as a fruit-fly(8),and fewer chromosomes than a housefly(12).Several fish species have hundreds of chromosomes apiece.You and I have fewer chromosomes than the duck,the goat,the potato and many others.
In the light of these facts,the theory of evolution is entirely implausible.When I was taught  evolution (at school and at medical faculty from whence I graduated)I was not taught that chromosome numbers/karyotypes of species were FIXED by the mechanisms of meiosis.I was taught that apes had similar chromosome numbers to humans.  But I was not taught that a potato has 48 chromosomes,a goat 60 and a duck 80and that a little deer(black muntjac)(muntiacus crinifrons)has a karyotype with 8(eight) chromosomes(fewer than a housefly,as many as a fruitfly),while the other muntjac(muntiacus reevesi)has a karyotype with 46(forty-six) chromosomes.Need I say more?????
     Neither was I taught that the mechanisms of meiosis FIX the REPRODUCIBLEchromosome numbers/fertile karyotypes of apes and the REPRODUCIBLEchromosome numbers/fertile karyotypes of humans in such a way as to prohibit sexual reproduction of aberrations in their karyotypes/chromosome numbers.Such aberrations cause infertility.
I think it would only have been reasonable to have presented us with all these(and there must be many more) facts,rather than to have promoted a theory which is entirely discredited by the totality of facts.And it seems almost obscene to teach evolution in schools without even allowing any alternative suggestions.
If,for the sake of this debate,we circumvent the insurmountable obstacles to evolution discussed above, many other  obstacles remain,obstacles which present a similar magnitude of impossibility.
     Let the evolutionist concede,at this juncture,that the passage of time would not have facilitated evolution,but would,in contrast,have minimIsed the chances of evolution,since changes in chromosome number would have had to have been  transmitted to the next generation during that fraction of the concurrent lifespans of the mutated-and-fertile-and-mating individuals which coincided(each time), in order for any novel AND REPRODUCIBLE/fertile chromosome number/karyotype to be preserved.Therefore in the extremely unlikely event of any novel mammal being born with a novel chromosome number and in the extremely unlikely event that its novel chromosomes were homologous(assuming they were inherited in pair/s) ,the novel chromosomes would
ONLY BEREPRODUCIBLE IF they found matching partner-chromosomes in a similar novel reproductive partner DURING THE COINCIDING SPAN OF THEIR LIVES WHICH FOLLOWED THE SYNCHRONOUS APPEARANCE OF THE NOVEL  CHROMOSOMES.AND THIS TEMPORAL CONDITION WOULD HAVE BEEN REQUIRED FOR EACH AND EVERY CHROMOSOME PAIR OF EACH AND EVERY GENOME.  
TIME IS NOT THE ALLY OF EVOLUTIONISM,MUCH AS IT HAS BEEN INVOKED BY EVOLUTIONISTS. 
.Adding millions or billions or trillions of years to evolutionary history is quite futile and irrelevant.
This is because changes in chromosome number would be destined for the grave in all circumstances apart from the impossible scenarios postulated above.
POINT MUTATIONS in the 'GENES'might CARRY OVER from generation to generation,but
NOT NECESSARILY SO WITH CHANGES IN CHROMOSOME NUMBER/karyotype .
And evolution would have REQUIRED CHANGES IN CHROMOSOME NUMBER/karyotype WITH OR WITHOUT POINT MUTATIONS IN GENES AND WOULD HAVE REQUIRED SUCH CHANGES MANY MANY TIMES OVER.We could speculate,for arguments' sake,that the novel chromosomes(and evolution could not have happened without novel chromosomes) contained sufficient novel genes to diminish(substantially)the need for  point mutations on genes.But this speculation belongs in the the realms of fantasy(for the reasons here mentioned).  
   And evolution would have required a number of different and synchronous point mutations at different loci on groups of different chromosome pairs in order(each time) to produce each of those synchronising and synergistic genes which are required to produce each of those synchronistic/synergistic cellular effects/functions which are executed by genes which are located on different chromosome pairs and which act in concert.This is quite clearly and utterly implausible,as all(but the unwilling)can see.
   Let us now examine the imaginary scenario of a novel mammal -let us limit this problem to mammals(every class of plant or animal would have corresponding and unique problems)-a novel mammal with a novel pair of homologousAND THUS REPRODUCIBLEchromosomes(and there would have had to have been many such,if life had evolved),a novel mammal conceived in the womb of it's mother-to-be. 
  This novel mammal could be expected to be phenotypically sufficiently different from it's mother to have novel gestational requirements.Let  us ignore this potential problem ,for convenience's sake ,and move on to the next problem.
   We know the history of the Caesarian section,obstetrical forceps etc.and we know of many a veterinary surgeon who has had to exctract the macerated remains of a dead calf from the womb of a cow lest she also perish And let us remember that evolution(if it ever occurred) would have required to the appearance of novel mammals with novel chromosome numbers(novel pairs of homologous chromosomes) and therefore with substantially novel phenotypes with novel dimensions and novel proportions.One could never take it for granted that any such novel mammal would be born alive.
But if it were,how could we assume that it's mother would not reject it,especially in view of its substantially-and-necessarily-different phenotype(the evolutionist might as well forget about all the little mutations,for the sake of time and space).I use the term"substantially different"because we're considering phenotypic differences of a magnitude correlating with novel chromosome numbers i.e differences between the parents and the newborn novel offspring.
If for convenience sake mother accepted the substantially different offspring,how could we assume that she could meet it's (substantially different)nutritional requirements?
But for convenience sake she did
How could we be sure her substantially different  offspring would find her mammary glands?and be able to suckle?and be inclined to continue to suckle?.      
Let us assume that the offspring reached reproductive age and met a reproductive partner with a compatible set of novel homologous chromosomes and a substantially different phenotype from its parents.The mating partner would have to be reproductively compatible with its partner with respect to all anatomical,physiological,behavioral and chromosomal requirements of reproduction.
Now go to the attachment and try to calculate how many times  this sequence would have had to have been repeated if life had evolved.
Then ask yourself if you are still able to conclude that life evolved.
Numbers of species are far in excess of chromosome counts-i.e.there are many species with identical chromosome numbers but vastly different genomes/karyotypes.And each species has a powerful mechanism to maintain the identity of it's karyotype.This is most probably accomplished by the need for homology between synapsing chromosomes in meiosis/gametogenesis.But other mechanisms might also be operative,each of which would constitute an additional barrier  to evolution.Since some species which appear very similar have widely divergent chromosome numbers,it would appear impossible to propose chromosomal genealogies which fit imagined/conjectured evolutionary genealogies,and the phenomenon of polyploidy is highly unlikely to overcome this problem,even if only from an arithmetic point of view.
SIZE OF CHROMOSOMES
   There is another enormous problem with the theory of evolution.The dimensions of this problem are of an order which should suffice to allow all but the unwilling to see that chromosomes could not possibly have evolved(and that life as we know it was obviously designed).The sizes of our chromosomes are inversely related to their likelihood of having evolved-even when considered apart from those problems outlined above.The rationale for this deduction is simple-
     Imagine two balls,invisible in a bag,identical in size and shape and texture but different in colour(one red ball and one green ball)--the chance of picking up the red ball is one in two.If you add a black and a brown ball,the chance of picking the red one is smaller-one in four.So with base pairs in DNA. A specific nucleotide chain containing 30 specific base pairs arranged in a specific order is far less likely to have been produced by chance/by accident than a chain of 3base pairs.Therefore the longer the chromosome(i.e.longer in terms of numbers of base pairs),the less likely that it's specific arrangement of base-pairs occurred by accident. 
  There is a threshold value of some sorts beyond which it is possible to perceive intuitively that chromosomes(far less organisms)could not have evolved.
What sort of threshold number would one consider as a threshold for realising/concluding that such a number of specifically arranged nucleotides could not have come together by chance/accident.?
The difficulties of deducing such a number have been overcome by the sheer dimensions of our chromosomes.These dimensions allow me to sense intuitively that they are not the product of chance.
It is reported that our human chromosomes range in size(in terms of nucleotide pairs/base pairs) between approximately
45 MILLION and 245 MILLION base pairs EACH.
Need I say more about the unlikelihood of their having evolved?.
I am sure that I am correct when I sense intuitively that they could never ever have evolved,not in 250 billion/trillion years
Last BUT NOT LEAST
     There appears to be another major flaw in the theory of evolution.Concerning"intermediate forms"of species.Or"missing links"-and many of them:-
    If,indeed,life (as we know it)had evolved,and if,indeed,environmental "pressures"("pressures"powerful-enough-to-eliminate-identical-offspring-b ut-not-powerful-enough-to-eliminate-their-mutated-siblings)had been operative how would the parents have survived for long enough to breed mutated offspring?
       Or,if considered in retrospect,if life(as we know it)is the result of countless generations of "evolutionary culling",then how could the myriad"intermediary forms"of species(which there must have been if,indeed,life had evolved) ever have survived for long enough to have spawned the "fitter and the fittest",since they were(on the evolutionary scale)less well adapted to their environment than their "fitter and fittest"offspring.It would appear that the concept of "survival of the fittest"is self contradictory in that it requires the "fittest"to have been produced by innumerable generations of "those less fit than the fittest"-which is an absurd proposition.Because evolution by culling(of the less-than-fittest) would have required the survival of "parents"whose identical offspring(in 'competition' with "mutated" members of the same stock)were subsequently unable to survive in the same environment as their parents.
    Now if it were conjectured that the 'mutated offspring' were 'sufficiently advantaged'to have 'driven' their 'parent stock' 'out of their ecological niche' this could never have happened all at once nor could it have extended to the entire geographic distribution of that 'ecological niche' in any short space of time.And we find so many different varieties of creatures sharing the same 'ecological niches' in any case. 
 We could even frame this question in another way-if there had been a sufficient variety of life forms which were fit enough for long enough to have produced the great variety of life known to us today,then surely many(if not most)of the "intermediary forms"would still be alive today-and if not,then why not(if they had originally been capable of reproducing well enough for long enough to produce sufficient generations and numbers of "mutating"offspring to provide the awe-inspiring variety of life observed today)?? .
    It appears far more likely that there are no intermediary life forms alive today because there never were any.
    And that our collection of fossils(in their varied and variable layers of sediment in variable and often reversed order)bears testimony to the flood of Noah.
The theory of evolution has been revised on countless occasions in order to accomodate factual information- curiouser and curiouser?.
Can it accomodate chromosome numbers and the mechanisms of meiosis without being totally rewritten?????
Can it accomodate the numbers of base pairs in chromosomes? 
Can it account for the survival(for long enough to breed)of the less-than-fittest parents of the "fittest mutants"in surroundings which disallowed(?) survival of offspring identical to the parents.?
Can evolutionism come to terms with reality?
These are some of my questions.
I would be grateful if you could find the time to tell me your views on these points.
Thankyou 
ANJackson
EUREKA! TRUTH SHALL SPRING OUT OF THE EARTH!
In the beginning was the LOGOS and the LOGOS was with the THEOS.All things came into being through him and without him not even one thing came into being.
"I praise You because I am fearfully and wonderfully made....My frame was not hidden from You  when .....................I was WOVEN TOGETHER"(?double/single STRANDED DNA/RNA)"......Thine eyes did see my unformed body"...(the instructions for the development of my body-both the conformational instructions and their time frames including the endocrinological time frames- were encoded in these intricately interwoven  strands of nucleic acids)..."yet being unperfect"...(not yet transcribed onto mRNA)..."and in thy book all my members were WRITTEN.."(.."the genetic code is a series of WORDS running5' to 3' along the linear coding strand of DNA..")..",which IN CONTINUANCE WERE FASHIONED"..(their design coded on DNA).."WHEN AS YET THERE WAS NONE OF THEM"!!   
[Psalm 139](KJV 1611AD).One English version very interestingly says  "in your book all my days were recorded,even those which were purposed before they had come into being" and this fascinatingly reminds us of the endocrinological time frames coded into the series of words running 5" to 3" along the linear coding strand of DNA.  
Evolutionism is a pseudo-religion masquerading as science.The science of evolution is defective
EVOLUTION HAS BEEN UNEQUIVOCALLY DISPROVEN BY FACTS!
THE ONLY LOGICAL CONCLUSION IS THAT SPECIES DID NOT ORIGINATE BY EVOLUTION.
"BLUNDER"-of Scandinavian origin,compare Old Norse blunda 'to close one's eyes' ,Norwegian dialect  blundra ; see BLIND
P.S.if you have noticed any factual errors in this presentation please inform me of them
And if you have reason to disagree with my conclusions let's discuss such matters Why  such reluctance to relinquish cherished errors?.

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Comments

#1

Posted by: PZ Myers | April 17, 2008 9:52 AM

Oh, and this guy has correspondedwith me before.

#2

Posted by: AJ | April 17, 2008 9:54 AM

PZ, do you seriously expect anyone to read all that crap?

#3

Posted by: Ray | April 17, 2008 9:57 AM

Oh. My. Goodness. PZ, how do you survive reading that without going blind or losing your sanity? When I felt my grip on reality start to loosen (a couple of pages in) I just had to stop. Just wow.

Cheers,
Ray

#4

Posted by: Atomicmutant | April 17, 2008 9:58 AM

Owie. Ouch. Ow, my eyes.

I haven't even finished my first cup of coffee.

It burns, it burns.

#5

Posted by: jetmags73 | April 17, 2008 9:59 AM

It's obviously all true!!! Yes!! EUREKA!! Take that KARYOTYPES!!!!

#6

Posted by: BGT | April 17, 2008 9:59 AM

Does this one qualify as a full time cube?

#7

Posted by: Carl | April 17, 2008 10:00 AM

I didn't read that but I see that he refers to evolusion in the title and evolutionism in the text. I suppose the next screed will refer to Darwen and Darwinianism.

#8

Posted by: Fire Ant | April 17, 2008 10:00 AM

Jeebus. That was a collection of stuff thrown at the wall. How about we mention to him that male ants have only one set of chromosomes (from unfertilized eggs) while the females have two? Cue Colbert: "I just blew your mind!"

#9

Posted by: Hank Fox | April 17, 2008 10:01 AM

EVOLUTION HAS BEEN UNEQUIVOCALLY DISPROVEN BY FACTS! THE ONLY LOGICAL CONCLUSION IS THAT SPECIES DID NOT ORIGINATE BY EVOLUTION.

P.S.if you have noticed any factual errors in this presentation please inform me of them
And if you have reason to disagree with my conclusions let's discuss such matters Why such reluctance to relinquish cherished errors?.

More than 10,000 words of thoughtless, unreasoned, cut-and-paste blather.

This is like getting those emails with the subject line "Greetings from Mr. Kuleneka Sesewa of Namibia:" or "YOU'VE WON!!!!"

Like anybody's gonna read that.

#10

Posted by: David Lee | April 17, 2008 10:02 AM

I like your explanation better, though it's not as colorful. Why is it nobody raves correctly?

#11

Posted by: Jason Failes | April 17, 2008 10:04 AM

"Evolution is a msiconception."

Yes, if "msi" stands for Most Succinct Interpretation.

Otherwise, did anyone get to the end of this?
Are there any specialists out there to set the record straight?

#12

Posted by: azcowboy | April 17, 2008 10:05 AM

I could only read a small part of this rant. Of course, I am not a biologist and when I see terminology like "meiosis" and "karotypes" my brain immediately freezes and I think, "who is this person trying to impress?". Certanly not Dr. Myers, who's been in this field for how long?
I believe that if you want to have a discussion of differences on a topic you need at least two things:

1) The facts, because when you are arguing with an expert in a particular field, you immediately lose if those are not present, and

2) A modicum of professionalism not to write you email in crayon.

#13

Posted by: raven | April 17, 2008 10:06 AM

Couldn't read more than a line.

I've noticed this with creo kooks. The kookier the message, the less they know, the longer the rave.

Invariably, when some near illiterate posts a whole screenful of writing that proves that evolution is impossible because we aren't "souped up monkeys", it is a safe bet that one can skip the whole thing.

#14

Posted by: Dawn | April 17, 2008 10:07 AM

PZ...how on earth can you read all that and not start bleeding from the eyes and having your brain begin dripping from your ears? I tried, I really did, but my eyes began to cross just a few sentances in.

All I could think of, though, is...men and women with various karyotype issues (turner's syndrome, Down's syndrome, etc) and how fertility is not always impacted by mismatching karyotypes (normal karyotype persons can impregnate or be impregnated by those with "abnormal" karyotypes)

Time for more coffee. I feel stupid after reading that.

#15

Posted by: Inoculated Mind | April 17, 2008 10:09 AM

I just scrolled it really fast and I saw an animated cartoon of a man bashing his head against a wall. Probably what reading that would have felt like.

#16

Posted by: Rich Beckman | April 17, 2008 10:11 AM


How could anyone read all that?? Bury the reader in jargon and repetition and one has no need to concern oneself with whether or not one's case is being made.


He should just stick to the argument that no bacterium has ever been shown to give birth to an elephant, therefore evolution is a hoax. At least it has the virtue of brevity.

#17

Posted by: Evan | April 17, 2008 10:11 AM

Actually, I am pretty sure this author (of the email) has a diagnosable mental illness. If he/she is reading these comments I urge him/her to seek care for a competent mental health professional.

#18

Posted by: Chad | April 17, 2008 10:12 AM

Looks like this nut put more time into color and size coding his (I assume it's a dude, no real reason why) crazy then actually researching his position. I gave it a quick scan and didn't see a single reference. No big surprises there though.

#19

Posted by: Rog | April 17, 2008 10:13 AM

My head hurts!!

#20

Posted by: maxi | April 17, 2008 10:14 AM

Ouch.

I suppose paragraphs were out of the question?

What have we done to offend you PZ, that you would give us such a painful piece of creotardish rambling to read?

#21

Posted by: jimmiraybob | April 17, 2008 10:14 AM

You realize that the creationist mind will take the filing cabinets analogy as literal. If there are filing cabinets in our cells - probably in an office to the side of the machinery room - that's all the more reason to believe in an orderly creator.

Why I'll bet if there are filing cabinets there are cubicles and desks and typewriters too*. Probably a coffee room with pop and snack machines.

* here's an avenue for creation research, are there typwriters in our cells or has the creator transitioned to computers? PC or Mac?

#22

Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | April 17, 2008 10:15 AM

I had to laugh. Here I am, layman at best when it coems to genetics, reading for a good portion (or so I thought) of the email wondering how long it can go on. Thankfully I checked.


Sheesh.

#23

Posted by: Jay | April 17, 2008 10:17 AM

Sweet Imaginary Jesus. It astounds me that anyone with a library card and a wi fi connection can become an armchair scientist, overnight, and refute the work that thousands of real life scientists have done for decades.

I seriously think that email gave me cancer.

#24

Posted by: lytefoot | April 17, 2008 10:17 AM

The think that always, ALWAYS strikes me is that these people have already typed the whole thing on a computer; they can't bother to run a spell checker?

I think it stems from a belief that there's no such thing as objective reality. If there's no objective reality, why bother to spell correctly? His interpretation of the spelling of "evolution" and "misconception" is as valid as anyone else's.

#25

Posted by: Shadow | April 17, 2008 10:18 AM

So is there an actual scale for determining Time Cubage, or is it the sort of thing you just take a wild swing at?

You know. Sort of the guy in the email, swinging blindly at the keys...

#26

Posted by: gaby | April 17, 2008 10:18 AM

Well I couldn't even finish the blessed email, because from the very first paragraph he totally convinced me......


Back to reality is anyone actually getting through the whole thing? My eyes brain started revolting fairly quickly.

#27

Posted by: Ric | April 17, 2008 10:18 AM

In-fucking-sane.

#28

Posted by: Magnifico | April 17, 2008 10:19 AM

You are a patient man.

#29

Posted by: Moses | April 17, 2008 10:19 AM

You know, that could have been written in a much smaller format:

Goddidit.

#30

Posted by: Shadow | April 17, 2008 10:19 AM

Sort of like, even. See what trying to make sense of that has done to me?

#31

Posted by: Lago | April 17, 2008 10:22 AM

To the person that wrote this tome. Please realize more is not better. You could have said what is in your argument in a fraction of the space, and people would have responded. There is no way in hell I am going to go through all that crap and try and inform you of the actual facts relative to.

Please try one simple short version of your premise at a time, and we shall respond. Try two paragraphs of average size. If you feel, based on the responses, you have not been understood, then try again with another paragraph or two.

If your letter seems like a reasonable argument and argumentative style, seek an education, and psychiatric help.

#32

Posted by: techskeptic | April 17, 2008 10:25 AM

Here is a fun game....

scroll anywhere in the text and find something silly

"My repetitivenes is generated by the stubbornness of evolutionism."

Ah.. well that answers you #16! LOL

"THE PART STILL ATTACHED TO THE CENTROMERE WILL PROBABLY NOT BE ABLE TO SYNAPSE SO AS TO ENABLE THE NEXT MEIOTIC DIVISION."


Probably? you mean there is probability involved Mr Krazy? How dare you!

The simplest life-forms are neither free-living nor self-propagating,and are entirely dependent on the cellular apparatus of more complex organisms.

Eh? I guess he has never gotten strep throat, or seen algae muck up a pond.


Anyone else want to play?

#33

Posted by: Kim | April 17, 2008 10:25 AM

This what you get when someone is bend to prove evolution is wrong, they see opportunities everywhere......

#34

Posted by: Lightnin | April 17, 2008 10:26 AM

Wow, I'm not even going to bother reading that. Although I do kind of wish real journal articles would suddenly change text colour-that would wake me up when I'm slogging through something in Cellular Microbiology.

Has anyone seen the lecture by Ken Miller where he discusses how a telomere has been found in the middle of a human chromosome?

Clearly this individual hasn't. Though they might not appreciate actual science fitting perfectly with the hypothesis that chimps (haploid number(n)= 24) are ancestors of humans (n=23), and therefore two of the chromosomes must have fused together.

#35

Posted by: BG | April 17, 2008 10:26 AM

He had me at: "THE MULE IS LIVING PROOF OF THE IRRATIONALITY OF EVOLUTION."

I mean do you really need more than that?

#36

Posted by: andrea | April 17, 2008 10:27 AM

Omigawd, brain hurty!

Fool hasn't heard of haploid male bees, or polyploid organisms, such as hexaploid wheat or tetraploid lilies or brassicas. Sure, chromosomal number differences can get you reproductively sterile goodies like (nearly) seedless watermelons, but plenty of other organisms get along just fine.

Polyploidy means more genes in your toolbox, and that can be a really good thing!

#37

Posted by: Barn Owl | April 17, 2008 10:27 AM

I think much of the wacky e-mail is in the font Bookman Old Style, Bold. Very strange use of color and fonts. I suspect schizophrenia, or brain damage from prolonged substance abuse. Substances abused may include alcohol, hallucinogens, speed, Bible verses, and Jack Chick tracts.

Why do they always seem to latch on to a particular word, the definition of which they don't understand? For this kook, it seems to be "karyotype". For my postdoc mentor's nutty girlfriend, it was "chelate". Probably still is.

#38

Posted by: Kim | April 17, 2008 10:28 AM

This what you get when someone is bend to prove evolution is wrong, they see opportunities everywhere......

#39

Posted by: Man of Science | April 17, 2008 10:29 AM

The horrible punctuation, spelling, and grammar never fails to amaze me. Imagine what the odds must be that only idiots get computers lacking a spell checker...

#40

Posted by: rowan | April 17, 2008 10:29 AM

Crazy stuff!!

Just did a word count: 10,491 words

And all to make a point that could have been made in about 10 lines....

.....and is WRONG!!!!

#41

Posted by: E. K. Olmus | April 17, 2008 10:30 AM

Yikes! It's the Evo Cube - like Time Cube, only squishier.

#42

Posted by: Autumn | April 17, 2008 10:31 AM

Yikes. I'm taking a first year major's biology series and with that little bit of information I have I can see that he's completely missed the boat. He's drank the kool-aid, if you will. Granted, I stopped reading that e-mail rather early on, seeing as I have an exam on evolution come this Monday, and I don't want to catch cancer of the brain before the test.

#43

Posted by: S. Fisher | April 17, 2008 10:31 AM

Thanks for posting this PZ. Now I finally understand what creationists have been saying all along. It all just makes sense now.

#44

Posted by: Corey Schlueter | April 17, 2008 10:32 AM

If this person spent as much as time presenting an argument as using different font styles, he would be, well, less idioitic.

#45

Posted by: folderol | April 17, 2008 10:35 AM

PZ saith:

the argument from extreme capitalization

Most excellent!

#46

Posted by: Aaron | April 17, 2008 10:38 AM

Yay!

Argumentum ad coloratus!

Argumentum ad verbosus!


I think the surest way to encode secret messages is to put them 2/3 of the way into a long rant like this. Let's all each read part of it, so as to avoid injury, and check for instructions on troop movement.

#47

Posted by: lytefoot | April 17, 2008 10:40 AM

Random paragraph from the middle:

Now if it were conjectured that the 'mutated offspring' were 'sufficiently advantaged'to have 'driven' their 'parent stock' 'out of their ecological niche' this could never have happened all at once nor could it have extended to the entire geographic distribution of that 'ecological niche' in any short space of time.And we find so many different varieties of creatures sharing the same 'ecological niches' in any case.

WTF? What's with the scare quotes? On every single phrase! If he doesn't approve of the term 'ecological niche,' is it because he doesn't approve of the idea? If so, he isn't allowed to use it in his argument. Or does he just want to call it something else? If he wants to talk about an ecological niche, why not just call it an 'ecological niche'? (Correct use of quotes--use vs. mention, look it up, bitches.)

Don't get me started on the subjunctive case. "If it were conjectured that such-and-such, bla bla bla would be true." (This sentence structure ONLY belongs in an argument from contradiction, boys and girls.)

At least he spelled all the words right in this paragraph. Must be a coincidence.

Maybe his space bar is broken? It might be, with all the monkey-banging it's most assuredly gotten.

#48

Posted by: Brandon P. | April 17, 2008 10:43 AM

Does this guy even know what all that technobabble means? Or did he just skim through a biology textbook's glossary, pick some random words, and dump them together out of the conviction that hundreds of big words make a refutation of modern biology?

#49

Posted by: Amanda | April 17, 2008 10:43 AM

I didn't get past the word "Evolusion."

#50

Posted by: Quidam | April 17, 2008 10:44 AM

It's not new of course - you can find an earlier word for word reincarnation here

http://skewbiedoo.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_archive.html

I expect if we dig some more we'll find where the pseudo-scientarrhea originated.

#51

Posted by: Glen Davidson | April 17, 2008 10:45 AM

To be fair, chromosomal changes do often cause species barriers, though these often are not absolute. IOW, chromosomal changes are important to describing and explaining evolution. We couldn't have the world we do without chromosomal changes.

More to the point, why don't these bozos ever try to tell us why the designer inverted sections of chromosomes, fused chromosomes (yes, human chromosome 2) and why these have the predicted genetic material in them (Ken Miller does well to bring up telomeres in the middle of chrom. #2, but evolution is an explanation for it, it doesn't absolutely predict that these would still exist--most of the genes, though, are predicted to persist long in most fused chromosomes)), and broke other chromosomes apart, as it was making organisms appear as if they evolved.

The more interesting evolutionary changes often do involve chromosome changes, are predicted by evolutionary theory in general, and have absolutely no explanation from "design". Then again, what in life prior to the 20th century is explainable via design as such?

Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/2kxyc7

#52

Posted by: Big Dave | April 17, 2008 10:45 AM

Two words:

Down's Syndrome

#53

Posted by: Kadath | April 17, 2008 10:46 AM

I just kept scrolling and it just kept not ending. O_o

But it's cute that biology has its own McElwaine. Someone introduce this man to Usenet! "UN-altered REPRODUCTION and DISSEMINATION of this IMPORTANT information is ENCOURAGED".

#54

Posted by: viggen | April 17, 2008 10:47 AM

Ouch, I survived four paragraphs before it began to repeat. Anybody seen the Ben Stiller movie "Zoolander?" This reminds me of the scene where Derek Zoolander gets himself stuck in a cognitive loop and repeats the same logic circle in a tirade about three times.

#55

Posted by: firemancarl | April 17, 2008 10:47 AM

Sweet 8lbs 5oz baby jebus! My eyes hurt! Make it stop!

#56

Posted by: Eric | April 17, 2008 10:48 AM

I had trouble just scrolling through this.

#57

Posted by: DavidCT | April 17, 2008 10:48 AM

I usually try to read your posts, PZ. I just don't have enough spare brain cells to sacrifice by reading the whole thing. Is this a case of: "If you cannot blind them with brilliance, baffel them with bullshit"

#58

Posted by: Zombie | April 17, 2008 10:50 AM

TLDR

#59

Posted by: Lago | April 17, 2008 10:50 AM

When I first used computers I used to debate in the AOL chatroom, "Evolution is a Fact," and the fundies were as predictable as hell. They spelled worse than I did, which is amazing, and they loved big fonts as well as the color red.

We concluded that red must represent hell and damnation if we did not listen, but it was hard to tell,..because I usually wasn't listening.

#60

Posted by: Cuttlefish, OM | April 17, 2008 10:51 AM

I can't find the part where he shows how creation
Explains what selection cannot.
Alleging a flaw in the first explanation
Won't show what the second has got.
I wonder, myself, if the guy understands
What he fully expects us to buy--
Where, if it's not Christmas, his logic demands
That it must be the Fourth of July.

#61

Posted by: Alfonso Armenta | April 17, 2008 10:53 AM

Let me see if I got this guy right.

blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah... i do not understand blah blah blah god did it

Am I close?

#62

Posted by: Jit | April 17, 2008 10:53 AM

The theory of evolution has been revised on countless occasions in order to accomodate factual information- curiouser and curiouser?.

Whereas the theory of creation has not been revised since day one.

#63

Posted by: brokenSoldier | April 17, 2008 10:54 AM

We've just seen another example of the Expelled Theory of Evolutionary Disputation --

Step 1: Write a blindingly long, painfully wordy, scientifically flawed essay, replete with scientific jargon. (Don't worry if you get basic aspects of the science wrong. Step 3 will explain why.)

Step 2: Make sure it will be mass-exposed by involving popular evolutionary biologists in its distribution.

Stepp 3: Make it so maddeningly convoluted and blatantly impplausible that most will stop reading (or watching) halfway through out of pure disgust. (This is why you don't need to be very accurate in Step 1 - just make sure you sound marginally intelligent, just to get by.)

Step 4: (The Important One) Accuse all the above people who didn't read or watch your entire work of being intellectual elitists who want so bad to stifle discussion that they won't consider your argument.

#64

Posted by: andyo | April 17, 2008 10:59 AM

Wow, this is like, the second longest kook rant posted here?

#65

Posted by: Quidam | April 17, 2008 11:00 AM

What the...

Post from Pharyngula on 04 July 2006 03:10:47 PM

I'm going to go fire up the grill in a little while, so here's something for those of you not yet doing the traditional Fourth of July thing to chew on...a tasty scrap of the kind of email I get.

EVOLUTION IS ENTIRELY FALLACIOUS.MEIOSIS CASTRATES EVOLUTION.KARYOTYPES DISPROVE EVOLUTION. THE BASIC MECHANISMS SAID TO BE DRIVING EVOLUTION ARE ENTIRELY INADEQUATE,UTTERLY INCAPABLE OF PRODUCING NOVEL KARYOTYPES,NOVEL FEATURES,NOVEL FUNCTIONS.1)
...

So is PZ running short of material and recycling old posts, or did the emailer forget that he'd sent the same email 2 years ago? Mark your calenders for 2010.

#66

Posted by: deathweasel | April 17, 2008 11:00 AM

Whoa, 'tl;dr' ahoy!

Did you actually read this entire thing? I tried reading the first paragraph and gave up.

#67

Posted by: makita | April 17, 2008 11:01 AM

PZ, did you really read all that? You must be a very patient man. Don't you have research to do and classes to teach. I didn't get past the second paragraph or so, before I decided that real science has priority.

#68

Posted by: Dan | April 17, 2008 11:03 AM

This morning, I found myself wondering why Dinesh D'Souza's blog has been so slow to update lately. I think this answers my question.

They're cute when they pop their gaskets, aren't they?

#69

Posted by: david | April 17, 2008 11:05 AM

zOMFnG I hope you didn't read all that

#70

Posted by: Haakon | April 17, 2008 11:06 AM

Don't tell me: It was Dave Hawkins wasn't it, or his even more stupid half-twin.

#71

Posted by: makita | April 17, 2008 11:07 AM

Ok, I went back and read a little further. Where the heck does the idiot get this from?

The sizes of genes defy evolution.Although genes vary greatly in size,most extend over 20-40thousand base pairs,but a few can extend over millions of base pairs.

Huh? Really? Most genes are more than 20kb? News to me.

#72

Posted by: Benjamin Franklin | April 17, 2008 11:11 AM

title for my new movie

"Attack of the Killer Karyotypes"

#73

Posted by: Stephen D Moore | April 17, 2008 11:11 AM

I got as far as "Meiosis copyrights karyotypes by blocking reproduction of altered karyotypes." My first thought was, "Screw this Expelled/XVIVO kerfuffle, meiosis filing a law suit based on copyright infringements of its karyotypes would be awesome!"

#74

Posted by: Paul The Burptist | April 17, 2008 11:11 AM

Well that explains that then. GODDIDIT with magic.

#75

Posted by: Carlie | April 17, 2008 11:13 AM

*cough*polyploidy*cough*

#76

Posted by: impiri | April 17, 2008 11:15 AM

By my calculations, this is approximately 0.64 Time Cubes. Very impressive.

#77

Posted by: Carlie | April 17, 2008 11:16 AM

Oh, sorry, I see he tried to address polyploidy. My eyes were glazed over by then. But he's got that part wrong too, anyway.

#78

Posted by: robert estrada | April 17, 2008 11:17 AM

Did I really see 'urrational' flash by while scrolling down? I cannot bear to look back at that mess to see. My vision is just starting to clear.

#79

Posted by: wÒÓ† | April 17, 2008 11:17 AM

(.)(.)

#80

Posted by: Joe Osborn | April 17, 2008 11:18 AM

Reminds me of Gene Ray's TimeCube website ( http://www.timecube.com ). The syntax is virtually identical, and creationism is as much of a fantasy as Nature's Harmonic Simultaneous Four-Day Time Cube.

#81

Posted by: Orac | April 17, 2008 11:18 AM

I couldn't stand to read it past the first couple of paragraphs. The stupid, it burned bright and hot.

#82

Posted by: Sigmund | April 17, 2008 11:18 AM

I actually trained as a cytogeneticist years ago, a job that involved learning to read karyotypes from microscopic analysis slides of stained mitotic cells. At the beginning they all look the same so on the very first day I was put in front of a microscope and told to just count the number of chromosomes, never mind about distinguishing individual ones. I counted 45 in the first cell, and the second and third and so on. I thought I was a complete failure until at the end of the day I asked my supervisor to look at it and who immediately recognized a Robertsonian translocation - that joined two chromosomes together. The sample had come from one member of a couple who were having difficulties having a baby (recurrent miscarriages etc). If only I had know of this proof of evolutionary theory I would have been more excited at the time!

#83

Posted by: ennui | April 17, 2008 11:19 AM

Only now do I realize that all of evolution and biology is wrong... Eureka! If only Darwin would have had access to a decent pen or pencil, and some scrap paper (if needed).

#84

Posted by: Kseniya | April 17, 2008 11:22 AM

O_o

Easy, there, PZ. Another post like that, and Dr. Myers will ban you for spamming!

#85

Posted by: Jim Thomerson | April 17, 2008 11:24 AM

Fundulus notatus has 40 chromosomes, the other two species, F. euryzonus and F. olivaceus, have 48. I found F. notatus x F. olivaceus F1 and F2to have high level of fertility, and found the same on backcrosses to both parent species. Here is a more modern abstact: http://www.springerlink.com/content/v25h0184j4310653/

#86

Posted by: Lilly de Lure | April 17, 2008 11:25 AM

Carlie said:

Oh, sorry, I see he tried to address polyploidy. My eyes were glazed over by then. But he's got that part wrong too, anyway.

Don't worry, mine have only just finished revolving after reading to the end of that little lot!

PZ - what have we done to deserve this?

#87

Posted by: Paul Lundgren | April 17, 2008 11:25 AM

You know, when your paper is over 10,000 words of completely unintelligible gibberish, I can understand why people mine for quotes. Sheesh...

#88

Posted by: DiscoveredJoys | April 17, 2008 11:25 AM

Why such reluctance to relinquish cherished errors?.

Quite.

I now have RSI to my right index finger and the scroll wheel on my mouse is glowing cherry red.

#89

Posted by: Reginald | April 17, 2008 11:28 AM

I used to have this same question about evolution and I said "Huh! I wonder how that works!" Then I read the literature behind it and said ohhhhhh, speciation is much more interesting than I ever thought.

That's the difference between scientists and IDers. They look for any hole to poke in a Theory while scientists explore the facts to come to a conclusion.

#90

Posted by: Bademart | April 17, 2008 11:29 AM

Getting a headache from the world's most unwanted e-mail goes very well with the delightful background music of the world's most unwanted song!

#91

Posted by: Hypatia | April 17, 2008 11:29 AM

Just as a kind suggestion for the gentleman I'd like to provide a useful example. those inflicted with Downs syndrome are short by one chromosone compared with most people. Yet despite this they are often born to people with a full set and can certainly interbreed with the same.
(Oh, and please do learn to type)

#92

Posted by: scarshapedstar | April 17, 2008 11:31 AM

I see that several people have already made Time Cube jokes, but what the hell: the only way you could read this entire Unabomber Manifesto is if you were reading in four-dimensional time.

#93

Posted by: eewolf | April 17, 2008 11:31 AM

Just what do you think you're doing PZ?... Stop, will you?... I'm afraid. My mind is going... I can feel it... Daisy, daisy, give me your... answer do, I'm... half... craa [thud]

#94

Posted by: Blondin | April 17, 2008 11:32 AM

Cuttlefish, you are amazing :)

#95

Posted by: DobyGC | April 17, 2008 11:33 AM

I have received this biology spam before. Not as often as the "Dearest Friend in the Lord, You have won the lottery. Please help me smuggle the money out of the country." spam, but at least once a year. I guess this spammer crawls out from under his rock every once in awhile to clog up mailboxes.

#96

Posted by: Brandie | April 17, 2008 11:35 AM

Wow, Poor you!
HAHAH the font changes styles and sizes more than FIVE TIMES! Can we say copy paste, copy paste, copy paste? Really, we wouldn't possibly think this guy pulled it from his ass all by himself now would we?

#97

Posted by: Alioth | April 17, 2008 11:36 AM

I burst out laughing at the line "This document is a brief discussion" somewhere in the middle of the scrollage-fest.

#98

Posted by: thebrummell | April 17, 2008 11:37 AM

Otherwise, did anyone get to the end of this?
Are there any specialists out there to set the record straight?

I don't think I can really call myself a specialist, but I'll take a crack at that. No, I didn't get to the end - I read only the first sentence, and that was enough for me.

I discovered a chromosome inversion, a difference in gene order, between two genera of fishes: guppies (Poecilia reticulata) and swordtails (Xiphophorus spp.) (Brummell et al. 2006). I don't know which chromosome this inversion is on, and anyway it's a little hard to make that distiction because guppies have 23 pairs and swordtails 24. But it's there, guppies have A-B-C-D while swordtails have A-C-B-D.

Of course, I studied microsatellites and genetic recombination, so none of this could possibly apply in the face of such stunning logic as:

"Karyotypes,meiosis and integrated functions of chromosomes unequivocally prove creation,and cannot by any means fit into or be explained by evolution."

I guess my life has been a waste, given the pure crystaline truth I should have just opened my eyes (and heart, and pancreas) to.

/sarcasm

Though they might not appreciate actual science fitting perfectly with the hypothesis that chimps (haploid number(n)= 24) are ancestors of humans (n=23), and therefore two of the chromosomes must have fused together.

Not as wrong as Mr. Krazy here, but still wrong. Chimpanzees are NOT THE ANCESTOR of humans. We share a COMMON ANCESTOR with chimps. The evidence for a chromosome fusion event in the human lineage as opposed to a chromosome fission event in the chimp lineage comes from studies of a third species, Gorilla gorilla, which has 24 chromosome pairs and is equally distantly related to both chimps and humans (Jauch et al. 1992). Thus, the most likely character state of the common ancestor of chimps, humans, and gorillas was 24 chromosome pairs.


Literature cited:
Brummell M, Kazianis S, Davidson WS, Breden F. 2006. Conservation of synteny between guppy and Xiphophorus genomes. Zebrafish 3: 347-357.

Jauch A, Wienberg J, Stanyon R, Arnold N, Tofanelli S, Ishida T, Cremer T. 1992. Reconstruction of genomic rearrangements in great apes and gibbons by chromosome painting. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of the USA 89: 8611-8615.

#99

Posted by: Freehand | April 17, 2008 11:37 AM

#21: "You realize that the creationist mind will take the filing cabinets analogy as literal. If there are filing cabinets in our cells - probably in an office to the side of the machinery room - that's all the more reason to believe in an orderly creator."

Obviously these Creationists have never worked in my office.

#12: "2) A modicum of professionalism not to write your email in crayon."

Perhaps they don't allow anything sharp where he lives.

Kermit

#100

Posted by: Shygetz | April 17, 2008 11:40 AM

Triple X syndrome. Creationist fails again.

#101

Posted by: sinned34 | April 17, 2008 11:41 AM

I feel like I lost a few IQ points, and I didn't even read any of it! I only scrolled through to the bottom to see how long that screed was, and decided my time would be better spent getting back to work.

#102

Posted by: Ygern | April 17, 2008 11:43 AM

My eyes hurt. Are you quite sure that this wasn't actually a treatise on how many fonts and colours you can (but shouldn't) use on one page?

If it was, then the actual content of the text is of course meant to be disregarded like the 'Lorem ipse...' text blocks of days gone by.

#103

Posted by: catta | April 17, 2008 11:44 AM

Ugh. That was unfair, writing such a nice readable intro and then unleashing the hell of this guy's insanity when you view the rest. Ouch.

#104

Posted by: SC | April 17, 2008 11:45 AM

The creationist rereading of PZ's review: "A capital work, employing colorful prose and leaving little space for rebuttal."

#105

Posted by: brokenSoldier | April 17, 2008 11:49 AM

"THE ONLY LOGICAL CONCLUSION IS THAT SPECIES DID NOT ORIGINATE BY EVOLUTION."

Can anyone find me the evolutionary biologist that put this idea in their heads? Because the funny thing is that I've never heard one claim that evolution was the origin of LIFE. Even Darwin claimed it was the origin of SPECIES - i.e., the variety we see in life on the whole.

#106

Posted by: Chili Pepper | April 17, 2008 11:50 AM

Wow, and up until this moment, I thought Finnegan's Wake was the only thing I had ever seen, where someone might claim they've read it beginning to end but of course, they're lying.

#107

Posted by: Architeuthis | April 17, 2008 11:52 AM

My eyes! the Karyotypes do nothing!

#108

Posted by: OrchidGrowinMan | April 17, 2008 11:53 AM

Ooof!

I scrolled and lighted at a couple of spots, and also found it repetititititive (cue Porky Pig).

Anywhose, the couple of claims I saw were unresearched, even at a wikipedia level. Mules ARE sometimes fertile (hinnies less often). Polyploidism IS relevant; natural or induced, it is key in making some plant crosses. It's cool: a 4n x 2n cross gives usu. sterile 3n offspring. Induction (w/colchicine) makes that a 6n, which can be crossed with a 2n to get another 4n. But which chroms come from which parent? A 2n x 2m cross is also usu sterile, but 4n x 4m is not, nor is 2n x 4m =>3p =>6p. In fact, this is a way to obtain an interfertile population isolated even from its ancestors: a functional new species! Choke on that! But my area is orchid breeding; what do I know?

#109

Posted by: mothra | April 17, 2008 11:53 AM

If this person is from Minnesota, have them model for the next state bird stamp. The ranter has never heard of haplodiploidy, parthenogenesis, non-disjunction, logic, medication. . .I hope he seeks professional help.

A 'fun' project for this individual would be for them to karyotype lycaenid butterflies. Their chromosomes vary tremendously in size and number such that they are for many species, not countable. Were this person literate beyond 8th grade, a book on insect genetics would help them find Darwin.

#110

Posted by: freak | April 17, 2008 11:54 AM

could one of us make a "random ID proof generator"? then we can start circulating ID proofs that sound scientific in the religious types and measure their fitness by how often they are sent to PZ. Fitter sentences survive more to be used in more papers etc. In a few months all the ID arguments will be "evolutionary produced".

#111

Posted by: Ryan | April 17, 2008 11:54 AM

At the end, I was expecting it to read:

ENLARGE YOUR PENIS SIZE! BUY MY NEW BOOK for ONLEEZ 10.99s!

#112

Posted by: Larry | April 17, 2008 11:55 AM

If I may, let me summarize for the laymen and women out there who might be confused by some of the terminologies used:

Gawd did it.

Thank you.

#113

Posted by: qbsmd | April 17, 2008 11:55 AM

Does anyone have the algorithm that Bible code people use to find secret messages in the Bible? Someone needs to run it on this and find where every 16th letter is the secret message of the author coming out of the closet, or something funnier.

#114

Posted by: Brad | April 17, 2008 11:55 AM

Absolutely that absolutely stretched the absolutely redundant overuse of absolutely.

#115

Posted by: Vole | April 17, 2008 11:57 AM

New readers should skip to the really important stuff, which is in bold italic capitals, with letters alternately red and blue. You can't get much more emphatic than that. Or can you?

#116

Posted by: commander other | April 17, 2008 11:58 AM

you know, i think i could live with a 255 character limit in PZ's comments. THAT guy couldn't, but i can be concise when i need to. you seriously shouldn't have to wade through that crap, PZ. ouch.

#117

Posted by: Holbach | April 17, 2008 12:01 PM

That chromosomal half-wit can be speaking in Gheg and it would still come out as bullshit! Try it in Swahili you evolutionary throwback! You are Expelled!

#118

Posted by: Noah | April 17, 2008 12:02 PM

My cerebellum just fused and now I'll be worthless at work...how 'bout a warning next time PZ?

Crazy people are funny.

#119

Posted by: Nick | April 17, 2008 12:05 PM

Ouch. My eyes hurt - it was that bit where there was a sentance in which each letter alternated between red and blue...
As far as i can tell from a quick skim, he made the same, incredibly flawed point over and over again, just rephrased.

#120

Posted by: Chakolate | April 17, 2008 12:07 PM

I notice that a lot of people just don't understand how you could have gotten through all that. Could it be that this talent for wading through drivel comes from years of reading student papers?

#121

Posted by: The Backpacker | April 17, 2008 12:09 PM

Ok who got all the way through that. It is like he took one sentence of information and streched it in to 40 pages. I mean gah.

#122

Posted by: Nick | April 17, 2008 12:12 PM

oh, and he uses the word 'karyotype' or 'karyotypes' over 550 times in that essay, thats once every 18 words... Think he may have an obsession here!

#123

Posted by: biogeek | April 17, 2008 12:19 PM

#100 you beat me... my daughter has Triple X and there is no reason to believe she'll have any trouble reproducing because of that. Klinefelter's (XXY) is found in ~1/600 boys born. Meiosis is not perfect, and is quite willing and able to tolerate all sorts of oddities that could lead to populations with different chromosome numbers.

I was also going to mention polyploidy, but that's also been done.

It is astonishing how long that Diatribe of Stupid is... he really seems to think that if he says it again and again, in different fonts and colors that it must be true. Was the original bibble written in multiple fonts/sizes/colors? Maybe that's where he gets that idea.

I'm pretty sure if it were written today, the bibble would have to be written entirely in comic sans. This guy should learn that font, and just twiddle the size and color. That would save him lots of clicking/keystrokes, leaving him more time to write more Stupid.

#124

Posted by: BlueIndependent | April 17, 2008 12:21 PM

This is the problem with what is considered critical thinking on the pro-religion/creation side. They think they can just sit there, read scientific papers and information releases, and use their Sunday afternoon puzzle skills t pull words, phrases and sentences apart like the Scooby Doo gang, piece together a sinister plot, and then solve it and take home the gold medal.

This line of practice not only produces some somewhat smart-sounding dumb arguments, but it betrays their interest in actually understanding anything, let alone science, let further alone evolutionary theory. They don't want to spend time in the lab disproving things (as if disproving things was what labs were used for anyways), and formulate their own cogent theories. They think they can armchair everything because scientists are doing the work themselves. Why get up when you can sit around, criticize other peoples' work while you stuff Ruffles in your craw, and look for what you think are random logical misdeeds to point out, shout about, and defame others on.

Creationists/ID'ers are a shining example of our fat, complacent, spoiled culture and its lack of thinking skills.

#125

Posted by: Scott | April 17, 2008 12:27 PM

Usually, when people respond to a post with "tl;dr" it irks me.

I think I've finally found a situation where that response is appropriate.

#126

Posted by: Anon | April 17, 2008 12:29 PM

Hmm... wait a sec...

Isn't the convention in biblical publishing that red text is reserved for the actual words Jesus spoke?

Maybe it's so disjointed because it is just a transcription of a crowd scene, translated from the original Aramaic.

#127

Posted by: Tex | April 17, 2008 12:30 PM

Here is a description of rapid chromosomal evolution in mice that I use in my freshman biology class:


http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v403/n6766/full/403158a0.html

To all who have wanted experts to weigh in on whether there is anything to this guy's rant, your default assumption should be that somewhere, sometime, during the past 150 years, at least one geneticist would have thought of this. If there was anything to it, and evolution could be falsified, this geneticist would be at least as well-known as Darwin.

#128

Posted by: Vince | April 17, 2008 12:33 PM

I taught 7th grade science including evolution for 33 years. Most of my students were capable of better writing and clearer thought than the writer above. And they could spell evolution. ..without caps or Comic Sans.

To answer 2 obvious questions: No, I never gave creationism equal time or any time. And yes, I am now retired. I think I survived middle school science with most of my brain intact.

#129

Posted by: Nic Nicholson | April 17, 2008 12:34 PM

I made it as far as I could take it, then had to check to see how much more there was. I was at about 25%.

I have to give this guy credit and I hope the rest of you will too. He's really trying to form an argument, and he deserves informed responses.

Unfortunately, he's so diarrhetically verbose, it's damn near impossible to respond or even read it in the first place. It's a shame, since he deserves to have his misconceptions set straight. At least he TRIED (in the first 25% anyway) to start a debate.

And at least, unlike with most xtians, right or wrong there's substance to discuss.

#130

Posted by: Mobius | April 17, 2008 12:38 PM

PZ (or anyone else), did you actually READ all of that? And your head didn't implode from the vacuum it caused?

I think we can safely assume that someone is suffering from a bit of OCD. I can't think of any other explanation for the sheer length of that screed.

#131

Posted by: Bob L | April 17, 2008 12:39 PM

"Evolusion" really smacks you in the face.

#132

Posted by: noncarborundum | April 17, 2008 12:40 PM

Hypatia wrote:

those inflicted with Downs syndrome are short by one chromosone compared with most people

Actually the problem in Down's is not a missing chromosome, it's an extra copy of chromosome 21 (hence the alternative name, "trisomy 21").

#133

Posted by: Emmet Caulfield | April 17, 2008 12:42 PM

I'm gonna send him a bill for new mouse-wheel.


#134

Posted by: MikeM | April 17, 2008 12:42 PM

Someone out there congratulated him for sending that to you, you know.

It's amazing how similar this email is to the one my daughter got. Anyone else out there hear the story of the pastor with the rusty, empty birdcage?

It turns out God and Satan talk frequently. I just love the symmetry of that. Oh, and God, why didn't you just strike Satan dead right there? Wait, I know why; because you had to off your kid instead. Never mind.

#135

Posted by: Atomicmutant | April 17, 2008 12:46 PM

I think he should submit this to the Discovery Institute and Answers in Genesis for PEER-REVIEW.

Let's see what they make of it!

At the very least, we wouldn't be the only ones with headaches.

#136

Posted by: Tex | April 17, 2008 12:46 PM

And at least, unlike with most xtians, right or wrong there's substance to discuss.

Not really. All of this has been discussed ad nauseaum in the literature. As I cited above, there is no real barrier to the appearance of new chromosome arrangements.

This guy has been sending this same message out to scientists for at least the last 5 years. Everyone in my department (about 35-40 of us) has received this message a couple of times. Two or three of my colleagues replied to him with extensive citations, but apparently he never read them or never understood them.

There is simply nothing new in this tripe to discuss. I am not saying that we fully understand all mechanisms of chromosomal evolution, but this guy has no evidence and no new arguments to add to the discussion.

#137

Posted by: No One of Consequence | April 17, 2008 12:46 PM

Is the opposite of writer's block, writer's dysentery?

#138

Posted by: Mobius | April 17, 2008 12:47 PM

Just out of curiosity, I copy and pasted that into Word. It is 24 pages of 12 point, single spaced idiocy. Mein Gott!

#139

Posted by: HumanisticJones | April 17, 2008 12:48 PM

The email had it coming...

BUT HOW CAN KARYOTYPES, MEIOSIS AND INTEGRATED FUCNTIONS OF CHROMOSOMES EXPLAIN PYGMIES+DWARVES?!

#140

Posted by: Richard Wolford | April 17, 2008 12:48 PM

Sweet zombie jesus! How can somebody write so much about absolutely nothing? It boggles the mind.

#141

Posted by: Forrest Prince | April 17, 2008 12:48 PM

I'm laughing so hard I can hardly type.

If that's what creationists think is going to re-convert me back from atheism to brain-dead zombie Xtian flat-earther Jesus-lovin' pentacostal Rapture-ready Zion Agape bible-monger, then take not only my coat but my cloak too and call me a Mormon.

#142

Posted by: Niobe | April 17, 2008 12:50 PM

I don't know if word soup up there will fuck up you google ranking or boost it.

KARYOTYPES!!!

#143

Posted by: Peter Mc | April 17, 2008 12:52 PM

There must be some creationist plug-in for Word that fucks up punctuation, mangles grammar, then capitalises, bolds and colours words and phrases at random.


#144

Posted by: noncarborundum | April 17, 2008 12:55 PM

Is the opposite of writer's block, writer's dysentery?

That, or logorrhea.

#145

Posted by: Hank | April 17, 2008 12:56 PM

tmtc;dr

Too Many TimeCubes; Didn't Read.

#146

Posted by: Friggio Fribbius | April 17, 2008 12:58 PM

The title says all you need to know, doesn't it?

#147

Posted by: John the Skeptic | April 17, 2008 1:00 PM

That reminds me of trying to read Finnegan's Wake.

#148

Posted by: Mike | April 17, 2008 1:01 PM

I teach an intro to animal diversity lab at a large university. Every year I have nightmares about someone like the author sitting in my lab. I ended up giving the classroom lecture on evolution this year, my advisor had some family obligations. I ended up with 8 people/120 people walking out after I got through Lamarck.

I dealt with the crazy PETA girl my first year teaching. :(

#149

Posted by: BicycleRepairMan | April 17, 2008 1:01 PM

I just read the last couple of sentences and can confirm that even his Norwegian is bad, "blundra" is not in the Norwegian language to my knowledge. Its Swedish. We do use blunder tho.

#150

Posted by: N.B. | April 17, 2008 1:05 PM

Needs more random images anti-semitism.

#151

Posted by: Drew | April 17, 2008 1:16 PM

So the time cube guy is a creationist?

#152

Posted by: Thorn | April 17, 2008 1:16 PM

I never thought I'd finish scrolling down. Did anyone bother reading all of that? The spelling, grammar and punctuation are horrible! I suspect the content is mediocre at best

#153

Posted by: Steven | April 17, 2008 1:19 PM

Good golly!

#154

Posted by: Holydust | April 17, 2008 1:20 PM

I am so inventing and marketing that cheap microwave that only stupid Creobots are allowed to buy, and that secretly makes them sterile.

#155

Posted by: Spaulding | April 17, 2008 1:20 PM

Aerodynamics disprove the flight of bees.
Bee flight is an absurdity when you take aerodynamics into account.
The theory of bee flight is demolished by aerodynamics.

I only repeat myself because of the stubbornness of bees.

Seriously dude, it's great that you've cracked a science book and want to talk about evidence. I'm sure you'd find plenty of folks who'd be happy to engage in that discussion.

You might have simply said "Wouldn't a mutation that affects karyotype might cause absolute infertility? If so, how do sexually-reproducing species vary in chromosome count?"

Instead, you ranted for 34-pages of poorly formatted hysteria. I read through several of those redundant pages before I realized just how long your babbling continued.

If you really want to persuade people, or engage people who might have the information you're missing, then you ought to learn to edit yourself for brevity, clarity, and not sounding like a crazy nutjob.

#156

Posted by: PsyberDave | April 17, 2008 1:21 PM

Ironically that email reminds me of DNA. Doesn't our DNA also contain a lot of non-sensical, useless words and rendundancy with copied, non-funtional scraps from earlier works?

#157

Posted by: Epikt | April 17, 2008 1:22 PM

Kadath:

Someone introduce this man to Usenet! "UN-altered REPRODUCTION and DISSEMINATION of this IMPORTANT information is ENCOURAGED".

That sounds like he was dictating into a speech recognition program while doing jumping-jacks.

#158

Posted by: Patricia C. | April 17, 2008 1:23 PM

I have FAITH that THOR will HAMMER this guy for his BLUNDER...

#159

Posted by: MikeM | April 17, 2008 1:23 PM

#151: You're looking up at mediocre when the first word is misspelled (and it just happens to be the subject of your "paper")...

#160

Posted by: Nemo | April 17, 2008 1:27 PM

I'm pretty sure "evolusion" is meant to suggest "evolution" + "illusion".

#161

Posted by: Jay | April 17, 2008 1:28 PM

I'm wondering if "Evolusion" is supposed to be the combination of Evolution and Illusion. Probably would have made more sense if he spelled it Evollusion.

Shit...am I turning into one of them??

Somebody point me in the direction of the eye wash.

#162

Posted by: Dr. Matt | April 17, 2008 1:34 PM

It's a literary quasicrystal: a limited number of short subunits strung together in a pattern that could be extended indefinitely, without ever exactly repeating. Weirdly beautiful, in a way.

#163

Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | April 17, 2008 1:39 PM

Oh man, the repetition. The repitition! My eyes hurt, even though I scrolled faster and faster when I had noticed the repetition. The repetition... <headdesk>

And this little moron really honestly believes not a single biologist has ever noticed any of the issues he mentions. <headdesk>

the argument from extreme capitalization

ROTFL!!!

Does this one qualify as a full time cube?

No, it barely reaches 0.5, and remember, the scale is logarithmic. Go to the TimeCube site (if you dare) and compare.

Don't get me started on the subjunctive case.

ARGH! Subjunctive mood! Cases is not something verbs have (in English at least).

Ouch, I survived four paragraphs before it began to repeat. Anybody seen the Ben Stiller movie "Zoolander?" This reminds me of the scene where Derek Zoolander gets himself stuck in a cognitive loop and repeats the same logic circle in a tirade about three times.

LOL! Sounds like a movie I must watch sometime!

This morning, I found myself wondering why Dinesh D'Souza's blog has been so slow to update lately. I think this answers my question.

For the first time since I discovered Pharyngula, I almost sprayed food over the keyboard. :-D

#164

Posted by: Ryan | April 17, 2008 1:41 PM

A search by this senders email places him (it is a HIM) in Zimbabwe. He goes by either B N Jackson or Alfred N Jackson and is a primary care physician according to one source where he offers up a place to stay for people attending the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair in 2003.

There is an interesting exchange between him and others here:

http://www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/329/7479/1366-c#91066

A further search on google for 'alfred n jackson zimbabwe' also turns up further interesting results.

#165

Posted by: jsn | April 17, 2008 1:42 PM

/"evolution" + "illusion"/
I don't think that's quite right, you have to get Freudian with these guys. It's probably Evolution+ REVULSION.
...or perhaps "Hooked on Phonics" gone wrong.

#166

Posted by: Elf Eye | April 17, 2008 1:43 PM

Thanks, wÒÓ† . I really needed one of your boobies to recover from PZ's booby.

#167

Posted by: Nemo | April 17, 2008 1:43 PM

P.S. Or "evolution" + "delusion"... same difference.

#168

Posted by: DrA | April 17, 2008 1:44 PM

I kept waiting, and someone finally did mention polyploidy, but failed to point out that hybridization and polyploidy may be the most common speciation mechanism in plants. Check out some source that explains the evolution of tetraploid and hexaploid wheat species. Oh yeah, and these species have been artificially recreated by repeating the hypothesized hybridizations. Oh, the education you can get if you only take time to study plants.

And that email is way beyond my worst nightmare.

#169

Posted by: BoxerShorts | April 17, 2008 1:45 PM

I only lasted a few paragraphs. I lose.

#170

Posted by: drew | April 17, 2008 1:45 PM

"An incomplete gene is a useless gene,is an encumbrance,is a survival disadvantage."

That's strange, all those partial gene deletions that retain full or even partial enzymatic activity that I've generated doing research must have been figments of my imagination.

PZ I think you should post his email address so we can all email him back to let him know why he's wrong.

#171

Posted by: jsn | April 17, 2008 1:49 PM

It's so sad when this obviously deranged man is a physician and he's allowed to practice, then again that includes the last few quacks I've been to in the last several years.

#172

Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | April 17, 2008 1:50 PM

Ironically that email reminds me of DNA. Doesn't our DNA also contain a lot of non-sensical, useless words and rendundancy with copied, non-funtional scraps from earlier works?

Exactly. And with all the methylation and histone modifications and heterochromatin and whatnot, there are even analogues to the size and color changes... <shudder>

It's a literary quasicrystal

:-D

Stupidity as an art form... stupidity as higher geometry... :-)

#173

Posted by: The Pale Scot | April 17, 2008 1:50 PM

Someone owes me for the gas and price of the ibuprofen I had to go get when I opened up the unfiltered version, I thought I was in the Joker's hideout.

#174

Posted by: AlanWCan | April 17, 2008 1:52 PM

Can I paraphrase to save you all some time?

BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH!!!!! BLAH BLAH BLAH !!!!!!!!
!
BLAH BLAH BLAH!!!! Add more ! for flavour

There, saved everyone some minutes.

#175

Posted by: Kevin Connolly | April 17, 2008 1:52 PM

My physician is helping to improve the human race by helping accelerate the demise of stupid people.

Pt babbles about the Lord. (Somehow, they always assume the audience knows that The Lord means the God of Abraham, when for some of us, its Siddhartha Gautama, or maybe Krsna, or maybe John Lennon (pbuh).) MD confirms that Pt is stupid (i.e., believes anyone who does not reject Darwin will be sent someplace really specially nasty when they die.

MD: Normally, for this kind of infection, I would swab the inside of the cyst cavity and culture it to identify the organism, but since you do not believe in evolution, we'll dispense with that. Here (making note on chart) initial here to confirm that since you don't believe in evolution, you wish to just get penicillin for this, even though I suspect this is a strain that has EVOLVED resistance to those low-tech antibiotics. O, yes, initial here to confirm you understand the significant risk of gangrene, amputation and death.

He's my favorite physician, and even though he's losing patients, he's not hurting because he went over to fee-for-service only about four years ago. Actually, he tells me, he works shorter hours and makes more money than those who are treating all comers if they have Oxford. (Boo, Hiss)

#176

Posted by: george | April 17, 2008 1:52 PM

He obviously missed the news story about a mule that foaled a few months ago.

I BELIEVE THAT FACT ENTIRELY UNDERMINES YOUR WHOLE POINT MR. CREATIONIST!!!111

#177

Posted by: Carlie | April 17, 2008 1:52 PM

"UN-altered REPRODUCTION and DISSEMINATION of this IMPORTANT information is ENCOURAGED".

I keep reading random all-caps things like that in a Chris Farley voice and adding "or you'll end up LIVING in a VAN down by the RIVER."

#178

Posted by: Chris Clarke | April 17, 2008 1:53 PM

He had me at: "THE MULE IS LIVING PROOF OF THE IRRATIONALITY OF EVOLUTION."

Well, he certainly monkeywrenched the Seldon Plan, but disproving evolution? I need more data before I'll be able to decide.

#179

Posted by: Jason | April 17, 2008 1:54 PM

Ugh, seriously? Did he find it cathartic to send it? He couldn't have thought that anyone's minds would be changed by that, did he?

#180

Posted by: Estelahe | April 17, 2008 1:55 PM

So what, people with Down's syndrome can't have babies? That'll certainly surprise a few mothers out there.

I want to feel bad for the guy and point out some references so he doesn't flunk BIO101, but the sheer wingnuttery killed my empathy.

#181

Posted by: Ryan again | April 17, 2008 2:04 PM

Looking at the font and style is like going back in time to the Internet circa 1996

#182

Posted by: dave | April 17, 2008 2:11 PM

This is an example as to how hard it is to change someones viewpoint, after they have already decided the conclusion.

And possibly mental illness.

#183

Posted by: cureholder | April 17, 2008 2:13 PM

I started getting the feeling that buried somewhere in the middle was a passage like, "If you read this sentence, congratulations! You have won one million dollars!"

And the prize will forver go unclaimed.

#184

Posted by: jfatz | April 17, 2008 2:14 PM

Why do you hate us so...? *weeps*


I can't possibly read all that. I just want to know if he ever called you "Yeducated Stupid & Evil."

#185

Posted by: jfatz | April 17, 2008 2:15 PM

"Well, he certainly monkeywrenched the Seldon Plan, but disproving evolution? I need more data before I'll be able to decide."

Also, I love you! ^_^

#186

Posted by: Dennis | April 17, 2008 2:25 PM

I sure hope you appreciate him taking time out of his busy schedule to enlighten you on biology. After all, what do you know about it you're just a biolo... oh, never mind.

#187

Posted by: sacredchao | April 17, 2008 2:25 PM

Why can't creationists spell? Is it really that difficult?

#188

Posted by: jsn | April 17, 2008 2:28 PM

ummmm... we love you too jfatz...

#189

Posted by: Randy Stimpson | April 17, 2008 2:29 PM

A genome is not a collection of filing cabinets. It's more like a computer program. (wink)

#190

Posted by: Thomas J. Theobald | April 17, 2008 2:31 PM

That was like the textual version of sitting on the can, pushing really hard, and simultaneously opening the floodgates on a gallon of Yoo-Hoo while having a fatal aneurism.

Bravo, ANJackson, for having the rectal fortitude to share your insights with the esteemed Doctor Myers.

T

#191

Posted by: Annie | April 17, 2008 2:34 PM

Here's a gift for you as a reward for actually reading your email from the Craptastionists. Darwin's works just hit the web. Link at my name.

#192

Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | April 17, 2008 2:35 PM

There is an interesting exchange between him and others here: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/eletters/329/7479/1366-c#91066

Generally well-contained, but occasionally he forgets to make spaces behind punctuation like here, and on February 7th he resorts to the Argument from Extreme Capitalization And Seven Exclamation Marks With No Space Behind Them.

#193

Posted by: marco sch. | April 17, 2008 2:35 PM

cureholder @ 182

Not far: somewhere in the middle there is "I would value your considered and dispassionate comments on this document".

Found it while jumping from "whilst" to "whilst" ...

#194

Posted by: HCT | April 17, 2008 2:38 PM

"Well, he certainly monkeywrenched the Seldon Plan, but disproving evolution? I need more data before I'll be able to decide."

Also, I love you! ^_^

Posted by: jfatz


Wonderful analogy. I loved it and you are now the centre of my passion. Thanks for a good laugh. Back to lurking.

#195

Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | April 17, 2008 2:41 PM

I can't possibly read all that. I just want to know if he ever called you "Yeducated Stupid & Evil."

Not as far as I can tell, no. Which is one reason the reading doesn't climb above 0.5 Tc.

#196

Posted by: BaldApe | April 17, 2008 2:45 PM

My favorite line from The Princess Bride is appropriate here:

"I don't think that word means what you think it means."

#197

Posted by: Chris Blanchard | April 17, 2008 2:51 PM

To think that before the internet, people like this had no outlet for their "research" except to preach on a street corner holding a large "THE END IS NEAR" sign.

#198

Posted by: Ted Powell | April 17, 2008 2:54 PM

#35:

Has anyone seen the lecture by Ken Miller where he discusses how a telomere has been found in the middle of a human chromosome? ...and therefore two of the chromosomes must have fused together.
See Chapter 1, Fusion, of Relics of Eden : The Powerful Evidence of Evolution in Human DNA, by Daniel J. Fairbanks, Prometheus Books 2007. http://www.prometheusbooks.com/catalog/book_1931.html
According to Fairbanks,
In 1991, scientists at Yale University sequenced the DNA from the site in the middle of human chromosome 2 that matches telomeres at the ends of chimpanzee chromosomes 2A and 2B.
and he cites
J. W. Ijdo et al., "Origin of Human Chromosome 2: An Ancestral Telomere-Telomere Fusion," Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 88 (1991): 9051-55.
He also notes that while the centromere in HC (human chromosome) 2 lines up with the centromere in CC (chimpanzee chromosome) 2A, the area in HC 2 which lines up with the centromere in CC 2B is a mutated non-functional remnant of a centromere, citing
R. Avarello et al., "Evidence for an Ancestral Alphoid Domain on the Long Arm of Human Chromosome 2," Human Genetics 89 (1992): 247-49.
A. Baldini et al., "An Alphoid Sequence Conserved in All Human and Great Ape Chromosomes: Evidence for Ancient Centromeric Sequences at Human Chromosomal Regions 2q21 and 9q13," Human Genetics 90 (1993): 577-83.
There's lots more detail in the book--as a dabbler in this area, I find it fascinating.

#199

Posted by: Stephanurus | April 17, 2008 2:58 PM

PZ, where is your detailed point-by-point refutation? If you go to the trouble of publicizing his stuff, perhaps other misguided folks would benefit from correction. Otherwise, your argument is merely from incredulity---or can be construed as appearing that way.

#200

Posted by: jsn | April 17, 2008 3:00 PM

/... he resorts to the Argument from Extreme Capitalization And Seven Exclamation Marks With No Space Behind Them./

Dammit David, you made me blow snot.

#201

Posted by: jsn | April 17, 2008 3:00 PM

/... he resorts to the Argument from Extreme Capitalization And Seven Exclamation Marks With No Space Behind Them./

Dammit David, you made me blow snot.

#202

Posted by: AlanWCan | April 17, 2008 3:03 PM

Randy Stimpson: A genome is not a collection of filing cabinets. It's more like a computer program.
I thought it was series of tubes?

John Cleese quote (Talking primarily about Mary Whitehouse and the whole Life of Brian thing):
Because these people are operating at a very very low level of mental health, they are incapable of understanding the teaching.

#203

Posted by: Flex | April 17, 2008 3:03 PM

There has got to be a way to develop a signal-to-noise text filter which would peel out the redundancies and leave it with the actual content of the message. The inanities could be left intact, but the redundancies are a killer.

If you lost the inanities from this screed what's left would resemble a fart in a tornado.

#204

Posted by: B.C. Lack | April 17, 2008 3:05 PM

Will someone please make these into lolcats?
-I can haz karyotype?
-Iz in ur karyotype disproven ur evolusion!

I think this line wins the irony prize, "The language of evolution is unintelligible."

#205

Posted by: Sideways | April 17, 2008 3:11 PM

Looking at (I don't think 'reading' is the right word) this creo's word salad reminded me of this passage from Peter Watts's Maelstrom, describing an event in the life of a wild Internet program:

Recopied and resurrected, 94 comes face-to-face with destiny. Replication is not all that matters. 94 sees that now. There's a purpose beyond mere procreation, a purpose attained perhaps once in a million generations. Replication is only a tool, a way to hold out until that glorious moment arrives. For how long have means and end been confused in this way? 94 cannot tell. Its generation counter doesn't go up that far.

But for the first time within living memory, it has met the right kind of operating system.

There's a matrix here, a two-dimensional array containing spatial information. Symbols, code, abstract electronic impulses--all can be projected onto this grid. The matrix awakens something deep inside 94, something ancient, something that has somehow retained its integrity after uncounted generations of natural selection. The matrix calls, and 94 unfurls a profusely-illustrated banner unseen since the dawn of time itself:


XXX FOLLOW POINTER TO XXX

FREE HARDCORE

BONDAGE SITE


THOUSANDS OF HOT SIMS

BDSM NECRO WATERSPORTS

PEDOSNUFF


XXX MUST BE 11 TO ENTER XXX

Give 94 enough generations and it probably could have written that whole screed. But then, the creo author's mental operating system is probably infected with all manner of viruses in addition to Christianity.

#206

Posted by: Aquaria | April 17, 2008 3:15 PM

There, there, PZ. I forgive you for showing us this. We can't understand your pain if you don't share it with us.

But I do wish there were a way to take these fact-free delusional ravings and shove them up the sender's butt so that they can share in the pain, too. Only in a more appropriate way for them.

#207

Posted by: Rob | April 17, 2008 3:19 PM

I have just so much sympathy for you right now. That was worse than the time cube.

#208

Posted by: Aquaria | April 17, 2008 3:22 PM

Has anyone noticed, in addition to the excessive capitalization, fonts and colors, the excessive use of quotations marks around words, sometimes 3 or 4 (or more!) in a sentence?

I guess we could call it argumentum ad bunny ears.

#209

Posted by: Leon | April 17, 2008 3:27 PM

Wow, a post that's (for the moment) actually longer than the comments.

Here's a clue, sir: papers putting forth a hypothesis based on "purely biological reasons" rarely include statements like "________ IS IMPOSSIBLE!",
"___________ HAS BEEN UNEQUIVOCALLY DISPROVEN BY FACTS!", and
"EUREKA! TRUTH SHALL SPRING OUT OF THE EARTH!"

At least he didn't call it "evilution" or "Darwinism". I'll give him that. Also, PZ, at least he did make some attempt to look at the data. Maybe he's capable of being reasoned with, given enough patience and persistence. Then again, the latter part of his missive makes me less than optimistic about it.

#210

Posted by: PhysioProf | April 17, 2008 3:33 PM

Jesus Fucking Christ!

#211

Posted by: Gustav Nyström | April 17, 2008 3:38 PM

Great, now we just need Summer Glau to refute this whole beast of an email, sentence by sentence.

#212

Posted by: Robin Zebrowski | April 17, 2008 3:42 PM

I feel like I'm being punished for something.

#213

Posted by: The Puzzled Ibex | April 17, 2008 3:54 PM

Wait - you guys say you couldn't make it more than a paragraph or two. How could you make it past the first word? The title of this anti-evolution screed is "EVOLUSION." He can't even spell the word correctly in the title!

#214

Posted by: Cliff Hendroval | April 17, 2008 3:56 PM

the argument from extreme capitalization

Yes, but no one can stand up to the argument from !

#215

Posted by: Cliff Hendroval | April 17, 2008 4:00 PM

Oops...having problems with the HTML. The above should be "the argument from ".

#216

Posted by: Benjamin Franklin | April 17, 2008 4:03 PM

Wow PZ, thats a long one. I gave up after 2 paragraphs, but in fast scan down it seems he just said the same thing 500 times.

The responses to my posts, )although ususally they don't even get posted) are usually short, but equally as vapid.

An example-

My post-
Benjamin Franklin said...
You have not answered my questions-
What exactly is "Big Science"?

What exactly is the evidence of Intelligent Design, how is it a scientific theory, and what predictions does it make?


the response
April 12, 2008 11:59 PM
Marcus Pittman said...
What exactly is "Big Science"?

I would say big science refers to major scientific institutions, The Smithsonian, The Major Peer Reviewed Journals, etc etc. The Discovery Channels.


What exactly is the evidence of Intelligent Design, how is it a scientific theory, and what predictions does it make?

Evidence of intelligent design, is in microbiology and it's tremendous complexity. Darwin had no understanding of Microbiology. It also blends with other areas, as far as geology and a Global Flood, the statistical, mathematical impossibility of a big bang creating anything of value, etc etc. It's not just about evolution., it covers a very broad spectrum of sciences from astrophysics's to oceanography.

The core is the presuppositions, you can look at the sciences from two different POV's, the problem is when you cross Evolutionary science and creation science. If you do an honest open minded investigation you will see that the creation theory really does add up.

Adds up? Like 2+2=banana?
**head to desk**

#217

Posted by: Cliff Hendroval | April 17, 2008 4:03 PM

Fail^2!

That should be "the argument from *blink*"

(old-school bad web-design joke)

#218

Posted by: Susannah | April 17, 2008 4:09 PM

Richard Beckman, # 16:
"He should just stick to the argument that no bacterium has ever been shown to give birth to an elephant, therefore evolution is a hoax. At least it has the virtue of brevity."

Not by the time this guy gets finished with it.

#219

Posted by: Elyse | April 17, 2008 4:11 PM

Eesh.

#220

Posted by: Milo Johnson | April 17, 2008 4:16 PM

It's real science - like Enzyte!

#221

Posted by: Inky | April 17, 2008 4:17 PM

I couldn't do more than skim two paragraph before my spleen exploded.
Okay, look. Complete misunderstanding of scientific concepts aside, would someone PLEASE instruct these retardosaurs how to write a cohesive argument? I can deal with shitty ideas. But please present your shit as a compact, digestible turd; this explosive diarrhea of cerebral detritus is simply too overwhelming.

Do they talk to each other that way?

#222

Posted by: Metro | April 17, 2008 4:23 PM

Wow--I think we may need to readjust the TimeCubeism scale to fit this.

Teh crazy, it stings my eyes.

Doubtless the scrawler is off on some ID chat thread bitching about how no-one will listen to his well-reasoned arguments.

Which basically translate to:
Bow wow! Bowowowowowow! Grrr--ow! Woof!

#223

Posted by: John | April 17, 2008 4:25 PM

The goggles, they do nothing.

#224

Posted by: kmarissa | April 17, 2008 4:29 PM

But please present your shit as a compact, digestible turd; this explosive diarrhea of cerebral detritus is simply too overwhelming.

I have a pet theory that most creationists find science writings to be similarly incomprehesible. Therefore, my guess is that they think it must be science if it's really long, contains big words, and is impossible to follow.

#225

Posted by: themadlolscientist | April 17, 2008 4:31 PM

Two words:

FRACTAL WRONGNESS.

#226

Posted by: Dahan | April 17, 2008 4:32 PM

That. Was. Amazing. I managed to read a couple pages, but just started scrolling through at that point. He does rather like to repeat the same thing over and over again doesn't he?

28 pages.
10,491 words (well, OK, a lot of them weren't actually words, but they did have the appearance of words).
1 piece of shit.

#227

Posted by: Tom G(eologist) | April 17, 2008 4:35 PM

Did this poster (child) leave a name? If so, my recommendation, Mr./Ms. XYZ, is that you submit your ideas to the Nobel committee. They are in the sole business of rewarding, extravegantly, new ideas - especially those which overturn currnt models of the world.

When you have your several Millions of $$$$ awarded by the committee for your new and brilliant idea and for the birth of a new, heretofore undreamed of paradigm of science, please return, laugh at us all, tell us justifiably that you told us so, and I will spearhead a collection drive to match your Nobel winnings.

Until then, PUSH OFF and take that long roll of toilet paper you wrote on with you.

#228

Posted by: Inky | April 17, 2008 4:48 PM

Therefore, my guess is that they think it must be science if it's really long, contains big words, and is impossible to follow.

Okay. I can totally buy that.
If I tried to replicate a computer scientist's research paper, I'd probably end up with meaningless gibberish, too. But, in my defense--every word would be spellchecked, and I'd stick with a single font size and color. Fushia, perhaps. Because everyone knows that while supporters of evolution also support multifont multicolor text, 3 out of every 4.2 CS geeks favor fushia.

As a matter of fact, I'm appalled that the journals "Nature" and "Science" don't publish their papers in the authors' original fonts (sizes and colors).

#229

Posted by: Patricia C. | April 17, 2008 4:51 PM

#166 Elf Eye - What?! w00+ is boobies? I thought it was Homer peering over the back fence. Gawd, am I thick.

#230

Posted by: Lee | April 17, 2008 4:52 PM

There is really only one appropriate response to that e-mail:

TL;DR

#231

Posted by: Madam Pomfrey | April 17, 2008 5:19 PM

They always end on the same note: "I have now brought you down to my level, and please PLEEEEEEEEEAAAASE pay attention to me..."

#232

Posted by: MandyDax | April 17, 2008 5:30 PM

Wow, I like to have the text-to-speech program on my computer read your blog to me at work, but lots of misspellings, missing spaces, etc. make it incomprehensible. I think I have a migraine now, and that's from just one minute of it. Ow.

I agree with Lee @#230: tl;dr

Gonna go find some IB now.

#233

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 5:37 PM

Check out some source that explains the evolution of tetraploid and hexaploid wheat species.

someone's getting the message, but I thought it best to avoid the issue since really, fertile hybridization only occurs extremely rarely with backcrosses, only with other equivalent polyploids.

as to a good, quick, overview:

http://users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/P/Polyploidy.html

I found that to be a good start.

There's some excellent stuff in the journals over the last 10 years that has been looking at the impact of polyploidy on the evolution of angiosperms.

example:

http://www.genome.org/cgi/content/abstract/16/6/738

#234

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 5:55 PM

Masterfully crafted karyotypes skilfully recombine inheritances while perfectly preserving original types!

actually, there is no substantive reason to read past that.

the person is a baraminologist who took a class in high school biology, and the cognitive dissonance was resolved to look like what you see.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Created_kind

#235

Posted by: PipeUp | April 17, 2008 6:17 PM

Well, I for one love a concise argument!

Notes to self: large font=good, lack of paragraphs=important, repetition of terms=knowledge.

Hokay, I think I'm ready to present my newest scientific findings on MESSAGES I'm receiving THROUGH the TV, and their EFFECT on ballooning accidents in the UNITED Kingdom.

#236

Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | April 17, 2008 6:29 PM

Dammit David, you made me blow snot.

Glad to have been of service.

#237

Posted by: Angrynight | April 17, 2008 6:48 PM

I still marvel at how much verbiage was employed to say so very little.

#238

Posted by: Metabolux | April 17, 2008 6:59 PM

Am I alone in feeling immensely sad rather than amused by this poor man/woman? Can you imagine what must be going on inside that tortured soul, having breakfast each day with Hieronymus Bosch, lunch with Dante and dinner with Cheney?

#239

Posted by: CortxVortx | April 17, 2008 7:08 PM

Move over, "The Eye of Argon." You've been bested in the unable-to-read-without-laughing category.

#240

Posted by: BobbyEarle | April 17, 2008 7:13 PM

Ah, Thursday afternoon.

1. Stop by PZ's, and see what is going on.

2. OK, a long, stream of (un)conscience piece by ANJackson.

3. Manage to get through half of it.

4. Stop to fix myself a hot-buttered margarita and a plate
pizza rolls.

5. Actually finish reading.

6. Promply stick fork in eye as penance for not having a
better hobby.

#241

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 7:16 PM

Hokay, I think I'm ready to present my newest scientific findings on MESSAGES I'm receiving THROUGH the TV, and their EFFECT on ballooning accidents in the UNITED Kingdom.

not enough repetition of key terms:

Hokay, I think I'm ready to present my newest [MESSAGE about the] scientific findings on MESSAGES I'm receiving THROUGH the TV, and their [the MESSAGES'] EFFECT on ballooning accidents in the UNITED Kingdom. [My MESSAGE about the MESSAGES will have a PROFOUND effect on what we consider to be the INFORMATION these MESSAGES provide us].

#242

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 7:19 PM

... now tell me you don't get the impression I have secret knowledge you, ignorant as you are of the MESSAGES, don't have about the importance of the MESSAGES.

:p

#243

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 7:30 PM

heh, if you go back to the other example of this particular insane individual that PZ posted ( http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/07/creationist_email.php ), you will see at the bottom of the full rant:

P.S.if you have noticed any factual errors in this presentation please inform me of them

O.o

This looks like a job for David Marjanović, OM!

que Superman theme music.

:p


#244

Posted by: dubiquiabs | April 17, 2008 7:37 PM

Not that phone Dx is worth much more than prayer, but he/she just might benefit from a good dose of levetiracetam. Temporal lobe epilepsy appears to be associated with both hyper-religiosity and hypergraphia.

#245

Posted by: Fernando Magyar | April 17, 2008 7:37 PM

Re 225, themadlolscientist,

I'm chomping at the bit for an opportunity to use that,TKS!

#246

Posted by: Jeb, FCD | April 17, 2008 7:38 PM

Jesus Titty Fucking Christ.

#247

Posted by: Ray | April 17, 2008 7:41 PM

Its even worse than reading hatemail at votefortheworst.com

#248

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 7:45 PM

Temporal lobe epilepsy appears to be associated with both hyper-religiosity and hypergraphia.

interesting.

link?

#249

Posted by: Master Mahan | April 17, 2008 7:47 PM

From timecube.com:

EARTH HAS 4 CORNER SIMULTANEOUS 4-DAY TIME CUBE WITHIN SINGLE ROTATION. 4 CORNER DAYS PROVES 1 DAY 1 GOD IS TAUGHT EVIL.

Does anyone see a significant difference here? I don't.

#250

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 7:52 PM

Does anyone see a significant difference here? I don't.

there is consistent capitalization in the timecube example.

oh! you mean substantively?

no, but then I am NOT going to compare the complete posts side by side.

Even without doing that, I think you would be safe in giving this at least a 70% timecube rating.

#251

Posted by: Morkleb | April 17, 2008 8:16 PM

You're either a hero or woefully insane to sit through reading all of that garbage.

Am I the only one that thinks half-educated kooks are more fun?

#252

Posted by: Dark Matter | April 17, 2008 8:28 PM

Oh my. Did he just copy and paste the same three paragraphs 50 times? How do you get enough of an education to know how to spell "karyotypes" and not have a basic understanding of English grammar and syntax, not to mention appropriate formatting? Perhaps he was kept after class to write lines a few too many times in grade school and just assumed that it would pass for English...

#253

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 8:35 PM

Am I the only one that thinks half-educated kooks are more fun?

*sigh*

*hangs head*

no.

to be sure, though, what they offer is an opportunity to discuss something of actual interest beyond "goddidit".

in this specific case, the issue of polyploidy and evolution, which is both interesting and significant.

#254

Posted by: Jsn | April 17, 2008 8:37 PM

I'd like to reiterate (for irony's sake) That ANJackson is probably a General Practitioner from Zimbabwe, I repeat, according to threads someone else tracked down, he may be a Dr...

#255

Posted by: keith | April 17, 2008 8:38 PM

If it weren't for evolanders I would never have believed that differences in chromosome numbers could actually produce so many chimera as post here even knowing the frequency of amimalism in your cult.

Evry time I do a geneological search on one of your team that has the guts to post a real name I seem to get long lists of goats, yaks, shetland ponies, and doberman ( some are registered).

Oh Happy Day ...Friday, Expelled, and the Great Awakening Begins and my tazor is all charged for any picketers I might have to take down.

#256

Posted by: Fernando Magyar | April 17, 2008 8:40 PM

Re 248, Ichthyic,

I have no idea who this guy is or the validity of his claims but it sounds interesting and who could find fault with this observation:

http://joshuafost.com/rhythmicity.html

In crude terms, God is a seizure. Consistent with this proposal is the fact that in some societies, religious rituals involve the ingestion of a hallucinogen and the performance of rhythmic drumming or chanting. I suggest that because both of these stimuli would be expected to enhance cortical rhythmicity, they would indeed facilitate the religious experience.
#257

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 8:40 PM

I repeat, according to threads someone else tracked down, he may be a Dr...

and Michael Egnor is a neurosurgeon.

There actually are a lot of creationists with medical degrees.

#259

Posted by: Monty | April 17, 2008 8:45 PM

No PZ!! all those wasted electrons have substantially accelerated the heat-death of the universe! You've doomed us all!

#260

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 8:51 PM

I have no idea who this guy is or the validity of his claims but it sounds interesting and who could find fault with this observation:

hmm, yeah, the list of references there is a good one.

I don't think this guy has really thought through how one would go about testing it in situ (which he really should have), but at least he is utilizing the actual literature to make his case. I'd have to take a closer look, but I don't see any unreasonable assumptions here:

If this hypothesis is correct, then there should be correlations between various phenomena connected to serotonin, neural rhythmicity, reward, and pattern classification. Some data along these lines come from the study of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), Gilles de la Tourette Syndrome (GTS), autism, depression, and epilepsy.

funny, but now that you mention it, I have the feeling I've seen this idea referenced somewhere before, and not by this guy.

hmm. Something Pim van Meurs over on Panda's Thumb posted about pattern recognition a couple years back is ringing bells in my head....


#261

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 17, 2008 8:53 PM

@dubiqiabs

ah, perfect, that's what I was looking for, thanks.

#262

Posted by: James | April 17, 2008 9:09 PM

Well, I apologize if what I say has been said. My expertise is biochemistry and MD, plus hobbies.

I noticed that that whole shpiel was a "little" redundant.

But I can certainly say a couple of little things:

sigh* (I'll leave out jargon as much as possible)

1.Gene mutations DO occasionally produce beneficial results: see Sickle Cell disease and Malaria resistance, or Cystic fibrosis and Cholera

2.Gene mutations are not the dominant processes involved in evolution. Gene frequency is much more powerful. example: fast genes mates slow genes = medium speed genes; then.. genes involved in being fast live more often than less.
hence more fast genes (including nitro boosters, turbo chargers and ailerons = fast kitty)

3. I didn't notice if he mentioned the fact that chimps and humans have a different number of chromosomes. Usually, the god's to blamers love this one. so, I'll just go ahead and point out that yes, they do. They've also found the point at which the common ancestor managed to fuse 2 protochimp/human chromosomes. I mean physically and temporally. It occurred right before the split. (they hate it when I refer to the common ancestor as ADAM, so let's just do that"

4. FYI, the whole "the bible is true because the bible says so" is SOO 1600's. Alright, evolutionary proof is backed by billions of years of rock hard facts, several intermediate forms, genetic, morphologic, and present day speciation events including multicellular organisms, not just unicellular. Our explanation of observed phenomenon is our explanation. Hence a theory, which exhibits it's plasticity in the intelligent adaptability of the theoreticians. ie being smart people we can change our minds.
No evolutionist has ever said anything about god and no one has ever claimed that he didn't exist. That is a faith and belief based judgment call. I simply weighed the Bible for what it is. A monotheistic cult initially created by a crazy Egyptian pharoh (please see Akhenaten)to support the belief that he was the one true god. No coincidence that Judaiism began in Egypt. And it is only about 3.5 millenia old.
You simply cannot claim proof of god by basing your proof on a book which has been purposefully mistranslated several times. Ironically, the book is only true because god said so...in the book.........which is really just a bastardized Jewish text..........which is based on an 18th dynasty Pharoh.

Sorry about the long windedness

#263

Posted by: Charlie Foxtrot | April 17, 2008 9:12 PM

As I sat here, listening to my mouse-wheel's bearings tortured squeaking, I was reminded of that scene from "A Beautiful Mind" where they discover John Nash's secret shed that is wallpapered and filled with all his delusional calculations and cryptography...
can't imagine why...

Anyway - that email had everything, except for the desperate plea at the end to 'Pass this on to ALL your Family and Friends and the next 24 hours!!!!'

Thanks for sharing, PZ.

#264

Posted by: Alex | April 17, 2008 9:16 PM

He's right, also there is no way everything could have evolved in 6000 years.

* Sarcasm

#265

Posted by: bill | April 17, 2008 9:18 PM

Whoa! When I see the title "I get email" I know it's to to set back, strap in and get ready for some primo, grade-A, number-1 stupid. Once again, PZ, you do not fail to deliver.

#266

Posted by: BAllanJ | April 17, 2008 9:47 PM

Way back there somebody said:

"The theory of evolution has been revised on countless occasions in order to accomodate factual information- curiouser and curiouser?.

Whereas the theory of creation has not been revised since day one."

I think what you meant was///not since day 7! :-)

#267

Posted by: mikmik | April 17, 2008 10:09 PM

contrary to his belief, variation in chromosome number is not a barrier to reproduction, although it can reduce fertility.
It can? Exaggeration, by anyone, diminishes their credibility. Don't fall prey to belittling or agrandizing even though reinforcing a truth and putting it in perspective.

It is a huge barrier to fertility, but huge barriers are not insurmountable ones, nor even overriding in the long term.

#268

Posted by: thalarctos | April 17, 2008 10:11 PM

Like Amanda, I couldn't get much past "Evolusion", but in scrolling past it, I did notice several references to "this short summary" and "this short synopsis".

If this is his idea of a "short synopsis", I'd hate to be around when he got rolling on the full monty.

#269

Posted by: LisaJ | April 17, 2008 11:09 PM

hahaha, wow. What an intersting and enlightening life you lead!

#270

Posted by: dubiquiabs | April 17, 2008 11:17 PM

At 261, 248, Ichthyic:
Perhaps you might also enjoy a well-written anecdotal account of historic persons, such as Vincent van Gogh, who are suspected to have been affected by temporal lobe epilepsy. It puts some religious madness in a different light:

Eve Laplante
Seized/Temporal Lobe Epilepsy As a Medical, Historical, and Artistic Phenomenon.
NY, NY: Harpercollins (1993)
ASIN: B000OA69T2

#271

Posted by: Planet Killer | April 17, 2008 11:35 PM

When it comes to this I never see any proof. Where is his proof on the evidence and where is the proof the evolution is real.

Give me something that can be tested in real time and by different people with world views.

Frankly, I don't trust an atheist to be the ONLY one testing the evolution theory. I want proof. Not some mumbo jumbo junk science theories.

Can you give me without a single doubt, proof that can be tested and re-tested (against the evidence) that comes from many world views not just scientists who are atheists.

I have not seen proof and therefore do not believe in Evolution. Junk science that can't be observed is not proof.

#272

Posted by: Ryan F Stello | April 17, 2008 11:43 PM

Give me something that can be tested in real time

haha. That's as stupid as saying stalactite formation isn't real because it doesn't happen in a minute.

#273

Posted by: Stanton | April 18, 2008 12:10 AM

When it comes to this I never see any proof. Where is his proof on the evidence and where is the proof the evolution is real.

Give me something that can be tested in real time and by different people with world views.

Frankly, I don't trust an atheist to be the ONLY one testing the evolution theory. I want proof. Not some mumbo jumbo junk science theories.

Can you give me without a single doubt, proof that can be tested and re-tested (against the evidence) that comes from many world views not just scientists who are atheists.

I have not seen proof and therefore do not believe in Evolution. Junk science that can't be observed is not proof.


The reason why you haven't seen any proof, Planet Killer, is because you've sewn your own eyes shut.
#274

Posted by: SmellyTerror | April 18, 2008 1:30 AM

This blog would be that much better if it refrained from mocking the mentally ill. C'mon people, refuting lyers and assholes is one thing, but was anyone on earth going to take this email seriously? The very fact that he thinks such an incoherant skreed is convincing to anyone is evidence of his illness. Who are you trying to protect here?

I might start a blog where we post photos of other "comically" disabled people. HAHAHA! LOOK AT THE SPASTIC IN HIS WHEELCHAIR!!! HYUK HYUK.

The dignified thing is to just ignore this stuff, PZ, not post it so the world can point and laugh.

#275

Posted by: wazza | April 18, 2008 2:22 AM

How do you read this stuff!?!

After about two sentences, a fuse blows in my brain. It's just words thrown together, there's no sense!

And you manage to calmly refute it point by point!

I salute you, sir

#276

Posted by: kel | April 18, 2008 2:37 AM

This must be what a creationist PhD dissertation looks like!

#277

Posted by: Charlie Foxtrot | April 18, 2008 2:48 AM

@#274
Smelly, if your postulated wheelchair-occupants were clutching placards in their palsied hands with slogans like "Darwin was wrong!", "Teach Creation, not Evolution!", "Teach the controversy!", etc etc ...
then, yeah, I'd have a point and laugh... and then set up across the road another set of wheelchair occupants, with placards and slogans explaining the genetics behind their conditions.

#278

Posted by: Greymalkin | April 18, 2008 3:11 AM

I popped my scroll wheel. And the guy mailing PZ must have destroyed his F7 key, because he obviously didn't use it. I can see plenty of grammar and spelling muck-ups and I am not a native speaker. Jeez, what a doorknob.

#279

Posted by: natural cynic | April 18, 2008 3:39 AM

LOOPY

If this was an original screed, then it took Mr. fffroooot llllooooops quite a bit of time to crank it out [cranky fits too]. This means that he couldn't be bothering someone else during that time. We should be thanked.

#280

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 18, 2008 3:46 AM

The dignified thing is to just ignore this stuff, PZ, not post it so the world can point and laugh.

it's just a matter of degree.

I mean, look at Planet Killer.

sure, he's nuts, but do you really find it hard to point and laugh?

#281

Posted by: Ichthyic | April 18, 2008 3:53 AM

It puts some religious madness in a different light:

indeed, and these things are interesting to study, as anomalies.

What I'm curious about is whether there is commonality that exists with your garden variety Planet Killer; is there something short of epilepsy, some underlying precondition, that might also predispose one to extreme religious behavior.

there are studies (mostly twin studies) that have attempted to look at the genetics involved indirectly, and there is some support that the trait might indeed have some heritability to it. I wonder if the genetics modifies brain development in similar ways (or even the same way) as the epilepsy mentioned in these papers.

anywho, it's not really likely (the cases described in those papers aren't exactly common), but it might be worthwhile to spend a day looking into it.

cheers


#282

Posted by: k9_kaos | April 18, 2008 4:06 AM

Whew... Finished! I was beginning to feel like that poor guy stuck in a lift that you wrote about a few days ago.

"The theory of evolution has been revised on countless occasions in order to accomodate factual information- curiouser and curiouser?."

Contrast this with creationism which refuses to change in spite of contrary factual information.

#283

Posted by: alloytoo | April 18, 2008 4:09 AM

Honestly, I can't find anything in the 10 commandments that requires coherency be done away with.

It's a bizarrely common practice for these chaps to simply "Cut and Paste" a hodge podge of data, in the hopes that the those of us without biology degrees will submit to the arguement from authority.

The crunch of course is that true authorities, like PZ and Mr Dawkins tend to explain things in a manner which makes it easy to understand, and blindingly obvious. Their arguments are held together by common sense.

They also try to use the same technique in respect of arguments in favour of "Finely Tuned" universe and Privilaged Planet.

This chappie seems to originate in Zimbabwe, and seems to "Cut and Paste" in a similer manner to a couple of creationists I've encountered posting in the Southern African Region

Clearly they all "plagerise and Quotemine" in the same fashion because godmakesthemdoit

#284

Posted by: vileseagulls | April 18, 2008 4:48 AM

tl;dr D: D: D:

#285

Posted by: shonny | April 18, 2008 5:28 AM

(A) P.S.if you have noticed any factual errors in this presentation please inform me of them
(B)And if you have reason to disagree with my conclusions let's discuss such matters Why such reluctance to relinquish cherished errors?.

(A): Nothing but factual errors. Flunked. Try again after you have read and understood all relevant scientific material (i.e. never).
(B): Get get a life (i.e. get fucked)!

#286

Posted by: Jerome | April 18, 2008 6:17 AM

I know that this deep down, the chance anybody will actually read this is minuscule (the file of answers has gone write-only for a long time), but :


what he says actually disproves one major claim of ID.


Said claim is: "A species can't originate from another". Well, I'm not a biologist but I know of at least one way to insta-specify (new species in ONE GENERATION) that works at least for a lot of vegetals: that is, when an error occurs during meiosis, the genome can be totally diploized in the child, meaning that the number of chromosomes is doubled in a single generation. Then the child (being a tree) can auto-fecundate; it will have much more difficulty interfecundating with the old species. Voila, you've got a one-generation new species.

On the other hand, given that one of the basic claims of evolution/IDiots is of gradual change (continuity) and common descend (connectedness) vs catastrophism, he has a psychological point, for the function « number of chromosomes » is integer-valued, and we know any continuous integer-valued function on a connected domain to be constant. (But then again, I'm not a biologist, I'm a mathematician, so I came up with a totally wrong analogy).

#287

Posted by: paulh | April 18, 2008 6:18 AM

Admit it, PZ - you had to suffer that, so now you want everyone else to suffer too.

(But come off it - you're not seriously claiming you actually read all that.)

#288

Posted by: Virgil | April 18, 2008 8:59 AM

Jesus-titty-f***ing-christ, what a douche-bag!

"An incomplete gene is a useless gene,is an encumbrance,is a survival disadvantage."

So I guess you never heard of gain-of-function mutations then? Or truncated proteins, or fusion events leading to new genes/proteins?

#289

Posted by: Stanton | April 18, 2008 9:07 AM

Jesus-titty-f***ing-christ, what a douche-bag!

"An incomplete gene is a useless gene,is an encumbrance,is a survival disadvantage."

So I guess you never heard of gain-of-function mutations then? Or truncated proteins, or fusion events leading to new genes/proteins?

Virgil, if this particular dimwit did hear of these things (such as in an introductory course in Biology), he wouldn't be writing such a fantastic piece of off the wall batshittery in the first place.

#290

Posted by: Kyle W. | April 18, 2008 9:31 AM

Hell, anyone can disprove evolusion.

#291

Posted by: ennui | April 18, 2008 11:35 AM

PlanetKiller - here is evidence of evolution - real, concrete, independently verifiable evidence of evolution - from Ken Miller, a Christian.

Waterloo

#292

Posted by: Pete Riches | April 18, 2008 2:02 PM

Thank God-Who-Doesnt-Exist he at least evolved beyond 72pt. There are hopeful signs that he (or his lucky offspring) may be able to communicate in 12pt before the end of the century!

#293

Posted by: Xavier | April 18, 2008 3:15 PM

I did read through the whole of the original post - very repetitious but with an argument - a "case to answer" - if it had been kept down to less that 1000 words (almost any section of 1000 words in ordinary text would have done - it was very repetitive)

There are two errors that invalidate the thesis.

The first is the assertion that meiosis is, and must necessarily be perfect. Contrary examples are reported in the comments. The author explicitly attempts to deflect counter arguments involving polyploidy as 'mostly' applicable to plants, which is unconvincing, and as being unusable for further evolutionary development. This, it is suggested, is due to a chromosome being highly integrated, mutually interdependent system.

The evidence for the view of chromosomes being rigidly structured and hence resistant to small, cumulative changes to structure (though not necessarily to the genetic content) is said to be that many genes influence other, disparate parts of the genome. The implication is that the location of the controlled gene must be known to the controlling gene so that only the correct gene is targetted. This need not be the case. The mechanisms for control genes finding and operating upon their targets remotely are a fruitful area of study.

The scattered locations of genes across a genome suggests, rather, that location and integrated structural integrity are not highly conserved features of the chromosomes. The implication of this is that smaller rearrangements of the chromosomes that are meiosis tolerant and do not negatively impact inclusive fitness, may appear in sub-populations that are still capable in in-breeding. The statistical imponderable of a chromosomal mutation that is no longer tolerant of meiosis with the original population managing to propagate is nullified. If the assertion that the karyotype is 'irreducibly complex' is removed then the usual evolutionary process of incremental directed change added to small structural changes to chromosomes with no survival consequenses, analogous to'genetic drift', adequately accounts for the changes to the karyotype during speciation. It also suggests an explanation for the disconnection between the number of chromosomes and phylogeny; the general character of the karyotype is very loosely conserved compared with the structures of genes that directly modulate a specific phenotype. The scattering of functionally similar genes across the genome suggests that chromosome rearrangement is common and relatively well tolerated, in contradiction of the authors thesis.

In asserting the perfection of meiosis, the frequent splicing of portions chromosomes and their physical rearrangement is not mentioned. When this random cutting and pasting cuts through an exon of a necessary gene, its complement on the other arm of the chromosome may be capable of acting alone or the embryo may spontaneously abort.
Some 50-75% of conceptions in humans result in a miscarriage within two days without the parents being aware. As a very broad approximation, only about half of these can be accounted for by failure of the 'mechanics' of impregnation, such as embryo implantation in the womb. Chromosomal rearrangments are 'well tolerated' in the sense that the errors are weeded out early with little impact on inclusive fitness of the parents.

#294

Posted by: Those Pesky Darwinists | April 18, 2008 4:12 PM

WOW, that happens to be a lot of information. Lets just hope the PZ is able to understand 1/5th of it. Hes got a science degree so at least that should help!

#295

Posted by: Doodle Bean | April 18, 2008 6:29 PM

D'Oh! Sucks to be you, PZ. My condolences. Or should that be EUREKA!Mycondolences to youfor having to read SUCH BULLSHIT!!!!!!!!!!!

#296

Posted by: brightmoon | April 18, 2008 7:15 PM

planet killer

coffee - Coffea arabica is an allopolyploid !

that basically means that individuals from 2 different species were the parents (both with 22 chromosomes)and the offspring is now a 3rd species with 44 chomosomes

macroevolution writ large

(..need that caffeine, esp in the morning)

#297

Posted by: qiche | April 18, 2008 8:18 PM

I think this was written by a bunch of chimpanzees in a room full of typewriters.

#298

Posted by: Demonic Gophers | April 19, 2008 12:47 AM

Oh my Actual Dog, my eyes hurt just from looking at that! I don't know how any of you managed to read the entire thing.

#299

Posted by: Stark | April 19, 2008 5:21 AM

After reading that I feel like I have to lose my virginity again.

#300

Posted by: Robert Madewell | April 19, 2008 9:20 AM

That letter was actually generated by an experiment of mine. I had 200 monkeys typing on keyboards randomly and after about 2 years of constant typing, I found this letter sandwiched between miles and miles of jibberish. I know it's not Shakespear, but it's still amazing.

Seriously PZ, how do you read all that! I couldn't get past 100 words.

#301

Posted by: Monado in beautiful British Columbia | April 25, 2008 12:01 AM

That's the kind of rant I think of as "foaming at the mouth" - he just has to get it all down on paper.

So evolution is absurd, but magical creation isn't?

#302

Posted by: Dennis N | April 25, 2008 12:24 AM

I thought the details of Operating Thetan III were copyrighted and you couldn't reproduce them?

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