For 6 years, PZ Myers did graduate research with Dr. Charles B. Kimmel at the Institute of Neuroscience, University of Oregon.
Dr Kimmel has asked What do the cells do differently when they make cartilages and bones of different shapes and sizes?
Initially, I thought that PZ Myers blog was merely a biology teacher’s blog, but I have since learned that it is a blog for atheists. That explains the level of ignorance about the differentiation of cell types that continues to be displayed in a thread where I have continued to participate despite the nasty comments (including some I have made: Sorry about that! These are the most ignorant atheists I have ever encountered). However, after repeatedly being asked to fill in the blank of the sentence below.
“The spliceosome is to splicing, as __________ is to nutrient-dependent, pheromone-controlled, specifically directed base substitutions.”
Here is my response:
The spliceosome is to splicing, as pre-mRNA is to nutrient-dependent, pheromone-controlled, specifically directed base substitutions.
The difference between the ever-more ridiculous theory of mutation-driven evolution and the longstanding hypothesis that the spliceosome shares a similar RNA-based catalytic core and conserved molecular mechanisms in species from microbes to man is that the hypothesis has since been substantiated with experimental evidence.
At the atomic level, the experimental evidence involves different metal ions that enable a nutrient-dependent RNA-based mechanism, which is sufficient to effect metal catalysis of pre-mRNA splicing, without the need for direct protein involvement. My point is that amino acid substitutions clearly play the same role they always play in the differentiation of cell types. If amino acid substitutions did not play the same role at the atomic level as they play at the observable level of cell type morphogenesis, I would be left with a hypothesis of nutrient-dependent pheromone-controlled ecological adaptations instead of a model.
Now that everyone who is a serious scientist and not an atheist understands the conserved role of amino acid substitutions and pre-RNA in the context of biophysics and hydrogen-bond stability of protein folding, let’s look at it in the context of the 1996 review article I co-authored, where we (TB) wrote: “Small intranuclear proteins also participate in generating alternative splicing techniques of pre-mRNA and, by this mechanism, contribute to sexual differentiation in at least two species, Drosophila melanogaster and Caenorhabditis elegans…”
Eighteeen years ago nutrient-dependent hydrogen-bond stability was linked to sexual differentiation and the pheromone-controlled physiology of reproduction. Thus, the question arises: Did your biology teacher tell you that sex differences resulted from mutations? Did your biology teacher tell you anything about the evolution of sex differences?
I suspect that most biology teachers do not teach their students that males are mutant females or vice versa. But I also suspect that most biology teachers would still like their students to believe that other differences in cell types are caused by mutation-initiated natural selection. Did you ever ask your teachers questions about how mutations caused sex differences? If so, what were some of their best answers? Did you believe them? Do you still believe them? Do you think that most biology teachers know anything about the differentiation of any cell types? Do you want them teaching your children and grand-children about the biological basis of behavior as if we all mutated into our existence as a species?
