I rely on his data ... too bad he doesn't trust it himself. He lays out the data, then looks for possible scenarios to wipe it away.
Oh my goodness Jose fly.
You either don't believe that yourself, or you don't understand genetics as well as I thought you did. Your statement is nonsense! As geneticist J.F. Crow said, that the decrease in viability from mutations accumulation is some 1- 2% per generation. Geneticists call it a paradox because it is not consistent with millions of years of accumulating mutations and degenerating genomes.
Geneticists who believe in millions of years have a problem. They have created models, which sometimes contradict each other as they try make the data fit their beliefs. It is a problem for those who reject God's Word. We don't need try create artificial models to wipe away the evidence. Genetic load in humans is consistent with a perfect genome that has been subjected to a few thousand years of mutations.
Again, I disagree with his attempts to make the data fit into his apriori beliefs of millions of years. In this article he relies on 2 hypothetical solutions... synergistic epistasis and truncation selection.
This is positively fascinating, in both a sad and amusing sort of way. I'll explain....
First, we need to understand that
population genetics is a sub-field of evolutionary biology that focuses on statistical modeling of how populations evolve. If populations didn't evolve, there would be no "population genetics".
In 1995, population geneticist Kondrashov publishes a paper wherein he notes that according to the understanding of the genetics of evolution at that time, the statistical models seem to indicate that when populations are reduced to low levels for very long periods of time, very slightly deleterious mutations can accumulate and cause problems for the population. He finishes by offering up 5 potential resolutions.
As the years go on, a few other population geneticists take up the issue, do some more statistical modeling, incorporate new information (e.g., the full human genome), and explore (mathematically) Kondrashov's resolutions. Eventually in 2001, they generally settle on one primary resolution (synergistic epistatsis). That pretty much resolves the issue and everyone moves on.
But now, via whatever means, 6days becomes aware of Kondrashov's 1995 paper (where he first explains the potential problem and offers 5 resolutions). However, when 6days tries to cite this paper in his efforts to discredit evolutionary biology as a whole, he fails to mention that 1) it was the seminal work on this specific issue, 2) it contained 5 potential resolutions, 3) the issue was subsequently taken up by other population geneticists, 4) population geneticists (including Kondrashov) generally agreed on one resolution in 2001, and 5) the issue itself (accumulation of VSDMs) is only problematic when populations remain very small over millions of years.
Why did 6days not bother to mention any of that? It could be that he is simply parroting what he read
at some creationist website, and since they didn't bother noting any of the above, 6days was merely unaware. Or it could be that he somehow independently came across Kondrashov's 1995 paper, only understood it as far as the title, and his posts are reflective of that level of ignorance. Finally, it could be that 6days came across the article, read it, understood it, was aware of and understood the follow-up work and conclusion, but dishonestly chose not to mention any of that and instead presented it as if it was still an outstanding and unresolved problem.
I'll let folks come to their own conclusion about which of those is the most likely scenario. Personally, I figure it's the first one....he's just mindlessly parroting what those he trusts have told him.
But the truly fascinating part comes in when I start exposing all of the context and information that 6days left out (for whatever reason).
When I note that Kondrashov presented 5 potential resolutions for further evaluation, 6days waved those away because they rely on "millions of years", which contradicts his religious beliefs.
But then if 6days doesn't believe in "millions of years", then he must also not believe that accumulation of VSDMs is an issue, since that also takes "millions of years", right? Nope. Apparently he accepts the problem but rejects the resolutions, even though both require "millions of years", because......reasons.
Multiple people point out to 6days that the alleged problem only arises when a species is reduced to very small numbers over very long periods of time, which doesn't apply to humans. 6days simply ignores that. He dodges every attempt to get him to acknowledge those factors.
6days continues to assert that the problem is real, and then cites another paper by Kondrashov (2002) about mutation rates. But what he fails to mention is that the paper actually provides yet another confirmation of human-chimp common ancestry. When I ask about that, 6days just waves it away. So yet again, he cites a paper while rejecting its methods and results.
Then 6days claims that Kondrashov (1995) relied on a specific estimate of functional/non-functional regions of our genome. When repeatedly asked to show where Kondrashov did that, 6days dodges every single time.
To me, this is fascinating behavior. What I now wonder is how long it'll be before 6days reverts back to his original talking point and pretends none of the above ever happened.
