The Protein Problem Proteins are the building blocks of life. There are thousands of proteins in the human body, for example, that work together to enable life. Proteins are made of long chains of amino acids. 3 molecules, called nucleotides, determine each type of amino acid used in this chain. The nucleotides are represented by the letters A,G,T and C of the genetic code... So in terms of genetic information, we end up with a unique sequence of hundreds of letters that code for each special protein... Despite some redundancy in DNA, the letters must be in a specific sequence in order to code for a functional, beneficial protein. This is directly comparable to how letters in the English alphabet must be written in a specific sequence in order to produce a meaningful, readable paragraph or article. We would never observe a mindless mechanism creating a meaningful paragraph of English, let alone a specialized script that serves as instructional information used to build a functional product! And yet, that is what Darwinian theory proposes in respect to supposed protein sequence evolution, despite the impossible mathematical probability of such an idea... Darwinian theory claims that new genetic information is formed primarly by the mechanisms of random mutation (random changes in genetic information, such as the nucleotide sequences that code for proteins), and natural selection, which acts when a mutation causes a noticeable loss or gain in the fitness of an organism... But these two mechanisms are not even remotely sufficient to produce the kind of information rich genomes required to enable complex life, or even simple cells! Consider this 7 point argument against the evolution of novel protein functions: 1. All proposed Darwinian paths from non-life to complex, multicellular organisms invariably require huge volumes of specified information to faciliate thousands of novel protein functions "from scratch". 2. Natural selection acts on the phenotype (observable characteristics) of an organism, not on the genotype (genetic information). Natural selection only concerns "fitness", meaning survival, mating, and reproduction... If a mutation doesn't cause any detectable change in the fitness of an organism, it is considered a "silent" mutation. 3. Incomplete nucleotide sequences (that are said to form from random mutation and eventually code for novel proteins, per Darwinian step-wise evolution), could not produce phenotype changes unless/until they code for complete, functional proteins which "do something" (whether good or bad) in the body. 4. Most proteins require very long nucleotide sequences (hundreds of base pairs), i.e., significant amounts of specified information. 5. Factors 1-4 demonstrate that according to Darwinian theory, thousands of unique protein coding information sequences would need to have arisen purely by chance (no help from natural selection). 6. This is very similar to the problem with abiogenesis, thousands of times over, in respect to the formation of novel protein functions. What fitness benefit does an incomplete, and therefore "silent", protein coding sequence offer? None. 7. Gene duplication is of little help in this dilemma because genes require functional information to begin with, and also because new proteins require new information (unique sequential base pair arrangements). ...What this 7 point argument demonstrates is that the only mechanism Darwin theory offers for novel protein formation is indeed one of chance - and that's the problem! Incomplete (and therefore silent) protein coding sequences don't offer a selectable benefit to an organism; natural selection can only act on complete protein sequences (that affect an organism at the phenotypic level). It's certainly possible that a novel protein can form by chance on extremely rare occasions, such as where gene duplication has occurred, and only one or two chance mutations result in altered protein functionality... But the bottom line is that when when random, mindless changes are continually made to sequential information that codes for specific functionality, you're invariably going to end up with gibberish! Keep reading to find out why... The Computer Manual Conundrum Imagine that you're assigned the task of creating a more powerful supercomputer (organism), by making continual random changes (random mutation) to a 1,000 page instruction manual (DNA/genome) used to assemble the original working version from scratch... And further imagine that you're able to have endless new versions of the computer manufactured (reproduction) at the snap of a finger, in exacting accordance with the mindless changes you make to the instruction manual. ...Would you ever expect to come up with a computer better than the original this way, such that you could select for it (natural selection)? Of course not! The instruction manual would continue to degrade over time (genetic entropy resulting from near neutral and deleterious mutations), despite some auto-correct tools (repair mechanisms) built into your word processor - and therefore the computers would continue to degrade as well. As new computers are made according to each ensuing instruction manual, the manufacturers are only able to judge performance and functionality based on the computer itself (phenotype), but not your instruction manual (genotype)... As a result, thousands of sub-standard computers are sold (mating) to the public, which later overheat, crash, or have other problems that aren't recognized until much later down the road (silent and deleterious mutations spread through the population). But now, let's say that for every thousand random changes you make to this ever changing instruction manual, a chance benefit arises (beneficial mutation). In such cases, you make the conscious decision to apply the benefit to the latest batch of supercomputers - which as mentioned are assembled with a snap of your finger according to the specs of your latest set of instructions (the benefit spreads through the population)... This benefit is a nice stroke of luck. However, for every one arguable benefit that arises, hundreds of mistakes continue to accumulate. Therefore, the information invariably continues to decline; you lose far more benefits than you gain. So at this point, you've got an instruction manual that builds computers which are much worse than the original, due to all the mistakes in information caused by your random changes. Many things now go wrong (genetic disease) with these computers. And any new "benefits" (sickle cell anemia) continue to fall far behind in the ratio of benefits lost. ...And worst of all, everybody now owns these inferior computers! This is not merely an analogy. This is precisely what is happening in the human genome, and what has happened in the genomes of thousands and thousands of animals that have long since become extinct... What we observe throughout nature is not evolution in terms of a net gain of genetic information - which is what we'd need to observe if fish to philosopher evolution were true and not myth. What we observe is a net loss of genetic information over time. This is de-evolution, also known as genetic entropy. Click here for more.