Sean Pitman: How then is the …

Comment on Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes by Sean Pitman.

Sean Pitman: How then is the credibility of the Bible established? Through historical evidence, to include fulfilled prophecies, the willingness of all of the disciples to put their lives on the line for their story, and the fact that no one countered the testimony of the disciples regarding the empty tomb.

I personally hold tight to each of these. However, these do not equate to “potentially falsifiable empirical evidence.”

Yes they do. They are statements about historical events that can be investigated and potentially falsify? Did the disciples in fact put their lives on the line for their story? That question is potentially falsifiable. Did the enemies of Jesus even try to counter the claim that Jesus’ tomb was empty? That also is a potentially falsifiable claim. That is empirical evidence.

None of this is “scientific.” Fulfilled prophecies, for example, are merely fulfilled interpretations of prophecies. Interpretations. There’s no problem accepting these things and labeling them as evidence, but none of these remotely resemble the level of evidence you insist your faith is based on. You cannot falsify any of these items.

Again, not true. Everything is an “interpretation” Jeff. Many of the prophecies are too specific to be rationally “interpreted” any other way than in their fulfillment in Jesus birth, life, and death. The prophecies can be effectively falsified if Jesus didn’t do what they claimed He did when He actually lived and died. This is very good empirical evidence. In fact, it is extraordinary empirical evidence.

This is based on your interpretation of the evidence, not the evidence itself.

All evidence must be interpreted in science. Otherwise, all scientists would agree all the time. That’s just not the case. This does not mean that the Biblical prophecies are “evidence” – they are evidence. They are fantastic empirical evidence in support of the Biblical claims for Divine origin.

Sean Pitman: I’d say that’s far far better evidence than any alien or Big Foot encounter story… at least for anyone who is actually looking for the Truth.

This is based on your interpretation of the evidence, not the evidence itself.

What is evidence without interpretation? Nothing. However, for those willing to consider Biblical prophecy with a candid mind, the evidence they offer, the empirical evidence, is very clear – the interpretation is obvious based on the historical evidence.

Sean Pitman: Of course there are those who will reject this evidence – obviously. However, there were those in Jesus’ day who would reject the Truth even though they themselves saw Him raise Lazarus from the dead. For such people, the weight of evidence isn’t the answer. They love their lies so much that they won’t change their minds regardless of the evidence presented – they actually want to be deceived. For such, there is no hope – nothing further God can do.

Most people who reject God and Scripture do not love lies. They use YOUR approach: they use their God-given brains and rely on the most compelling evidence available to them, evidence they interpret in a very different way than you do.

That’s not true. Most people who seriously study Scripture with the motive of actually finding the Truth do in fact find God. This is a promise of God after all. – Jeremiah 29:13

Beyond this, only God knows the heart of a person – to include the mental capabilities given. That is why this is not an issue of salvation per se. Will honestly confused people who never understood the Divine origin of the Bible or the literal nature of the Genesis account be in Heaven? To be sure! However, this does not discount the fact that learning the truth about these things here in this life comes with great rewards here and now.

Let’s get something straight. Your claim to possessing superior beliefs because they are based on science and rational thinking are based entirely on interpretation rather than empirical evidence. Your claims are vacuous. You should boast less.

You tell me the difference between evidence and interpretation of the evidence. Show me a scientific conclusion that is based on evidence without any interpretation of the evidence…

The fact is that observations are meaningless until they are interpreted. The question is, does the interpretation make rational sense? Does it match the hypothesis in a meaningful way? That’s science.

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com

Sean Pitman Also Commented

Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes

I was not clear enough in my comment. There are 14 ERV’s that are intact and able to produce virus that we share with the chimps.

This is not true. According to a study published in 2005, no human ERVs capable of replication have been identified; all appear to be defective as far as producing infective viruses is concerned due to major deletions or nonsense mutations.

Belshaw R, Dawson AL, Woolven-Allen J, Redding J, Burt A, Tristem M (Oct 2005). “Genomewide Screening Reveals High Levels of Insertional Polymorphism in the Human Endogenous Retrovirus Family HERV-K(HML2): Implications for Present-Day Activity”. J Virol. 79 (19): 12507–14.

These occur at the same location in the genome of both humans and chimps. There is no question as to the function of these 14 ERV’s. Some of these are associated with disease states in humans.

This is also not true. While many ERVs are being found to be functional, most of these functions are beneficial to one degree or another, and some are even vital to life. Also, there have been no proven cases of human ERVs causing disease.

“HERVs have frequently been proposed as etiological cofactors in chronic diseases such as cancer, autoimmunity and neurological disease. Unfortunately, despite intense effort from many groups, there remains little direct evidence to support these claims, and moreover some studies have served only to muddy the waters for others.” – http://genomebiology.com/2001/2/6/reviews/1017

“Many still manage to generate proteins, but scientists have never found one that functions properly in humans or that could make us sick.” – http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/12/03/071203fa_fact_specter

It’s like arguing that regular genes cause disease. The real reason for disease is a loss of regulation of the normal function of regular genes, and perhaps ERV sequences on occasion, due to random mutations that destroy their original functionality.

If these are a product of design by God then why is reverse transcriptase part of the code in these viruses? They could have been placed directly in the genome as DNA. Did God design us to have disease? Would it not be more likely that these represent the past viral attacks on a common ancestor which were then incorporated into the germ cell and passed on the future generations of descendants? It would only require one ERV to prove common descent and we have 14. Ask yourself what is more reasonable?

Your knowledge about ERVs is very inaccurate. There are many rational reason for ERV-type sequences to be included, by design, in our genome. As already mentioned, many ERV sequences are being discovered to produced beneficial effects – some are even vital to life. Some ERVs have even been shown to fight against infection by exogenous retriviruses:

“The HERV-W env gene product has also been shown to block infection by an exogenous retrovirus, suggesting that the expressed HERV-W env gene could have a beneficial function to the host (Ponferrada et al., 2003).” – http://vir.sgmjournals.org/cgi/content/full/85/5/1203

“However, in the case of both Fv4 and Rmcf, the mode of defense is by the domesticated env gene blocking the receptor required for retrovirus entry.” – http://genetics.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=get-document&doi=
10.1371%2Fjournal.pgen.0010044

Beyond this, the theory that the ERV sequences within the human gene pool were derived from external viral infections is untenable given the population bottlenecks that would have been required to achieve this effect within the germline of humans or any other animal. Even modern retroviral infections never insert themselves within the germline cells of their host. Such a theory is based on something that is so extraordinarily unlikely that it hasn’t even been observed.

“No current transposition activity of HERVs or endogenization of human exogenous retroviruses has been documented so far.” – http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/101/suppl_2/14572

“Most of these elements represent ancient retroviral infections, as evidenced by their wide distribution in primate species, and no infectious counterparts of human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) are known to exist today.” – http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/101/6/1668

In any case, for further details along these lines, please refer to these detailed discussions of ERVs:

http://www.detectingdesign.com/pseudogenes.html#Endogenous
http://www.whoisyourcreator.com/endogenous_retroviruses.html

Sean Pitman


Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes
We share far more than 14 ERVs with chimps.

Not too long ago it was thought that around 30,000 ERVs existed within the human/ape genomes, comprising between 1-8% of each. As of the 2005 Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium, where the entire chimpanzee genome was compared to the human genome, it is now thought that approximately 200,000 ERVs, or portions of ERVs, exist within the genomes of both humans and apes – totaling around 127 million base pairs (around 4% of the total genomic real estate). Some authors suggests a 45% ERV origin for the human genome at large (Mindell and Meyer 2001) and 50% for mammalian species in general, if all small fragments of ERV sequences are included in the estimate. In any case, of these hundreds of thousands of recognizable portions of ERVs, the vast majority of them seem to match up, at the very same loci, between humans and chimps. Less than 1% of the ERVs are lineage specific for either humans or apes. In other words, the vast majority of ERVs are shared or “orthologous” between humans and chimps (a significant increase from the seven or so that were once thought to infect both humans and chimps at identical locations).

So, doesn’t this make the case all that much stronger than humans and apes share a common ancestor? After all, what kind of intelligent designer would have put so much shared “junk” in both of our genomes?

Well, recent research is turning out some surprising discoveries on what was once thought to be junk-DNA. Much of what was thought to be junk is turning out to be functional to one degree or another – to include ERVs.

For more information on this most interesting topic, please visit:

http://www.detectingdesign.com/pseudogenes.html

Sean Pitman


Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes
Now you’re just projecting. How about putting your own ideas to the test and see where they stand? Isn’t it a bit strange that I’m willing to respond to questions and challenges regarding my position, but you are not? Are you willing to even consider that you might be wrong? What kind of evidence or demonstration would that take? – short of a conversion of most scientists?

I’ve spelled out quite clearly that my position is easily falsifiable and that I’d be more than willing to leave Adventism and even Christianity behind as convincingly falsified if reasonable evidence supporting the creative power of the Darwinian mechanism, or any other mindless naturalistic mechanism, could be produced… or that life has actually existed and evolved on this planet over hundreds of millions of years. I have no desire to believe in any falsehood – not matter how attractive it may seem to me. I really do desire to know the truth and follow where it leads as I am able to discover it.

What about you? What would make you leave agnosticism behind and consider that a personal God who thinks about you and cares for you and died for you actually exists?

Sean Pitman
www.DetectingDesign.com

P.S. By the way, science is also required to make leaps of faith. Science isn’t about absolute proof or demonstration. Science is about taking what little is known and using it to make educated leaps of faith into that which is not and cannot be known with absolute confidence.


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Thank you Colin. Just trying to save lives any way I can. Not everything that the government does or leaders do is “evil” BTW…


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I fail to see where you have convincingly supported your claim that the GC leadership contributed to the harm of anyone’s personal religious liberties? – given that the GC leadership does not and could not override personal religious liberties in this country, nor substantively change the outcome of those who lost their jobs over various vaccine mandates. That’s just not how it works here in this country. Religious liberties are personally derived. Again, they simply are not based on a corporate or church position, but rely solely upon individual convictions – regardless of what the church may or may not say or do.

Yet, you say, “Who cares if it is written into law”? You should care. Everyone should care. It’s a very important law in this country. The idea that the organized church could have changed vaccine mandates simply isn’t true – particularly given the nature of certain types of jobs dealing with the most vulnerable in society (such as health care workers for example).

Beyond this, the GC Leadership did, in fact, write in support of personal religious convictions on this topic – and there are GC lawyers who have and continue to write personal letters in support of personal religious convictions (even if these personal convictions are at odds with the position of the church on a given topic). Just because the GC leadership also supports the advances of modern medicine doesn’t mean that the GC leadership cannot support individual convictions at the same time. Both are possible. This is not an inconsistency.