Rational Faith

Evolutionist Misconceptions:
Correcting Mistakes in Memes by Evolutionists:

 


Evolutionist: Common Creationist Misconception:
"DNA Is A Code"

Meme: DNA is a code. Codes are written by an intelligence
Excerpted from: : http://rationalfaith.com/2017/04/unmasking-mistakes-in-memes-of-evolution-part-3-codes-and-complexity/#DNAandCodes

Since I was a bit harsh on our evolutionist above, let's start with what he manages to get right. He is correct in this: London is not a map, London is a city. And DNA is not a code,  it is a long molecule.  Now onto what he gets wrong. To clarify, the creationist claim is not that "DNA is a code." The claim is that DNA contains information, and that information is transmitted by a code. Or put another way, DNA contains encoded information.

Now perhaps our evolutionist would like to continue to deny that DNA contains coded information. If so, he would be claiming to know more and better than the nobel prize winning Francis  Crick, co-discoverer (along with James Watson) of the double-helix structure of DNA.  Crick argued in his "Sequence Hypothesis" that the specificity of a segment of DNA "is expressed solely by the sequence of bases," and " this sequence is a (simple) code for the amino acid sequence of a particular protein."[1] (emphasis mine). Thus DNA itself is not the code, DNA is a molecule that is a repository of coded information. Stephen Meyer  - who wrote a book on the information bearing properties of DNA and the question of the information in it - likens DNA to a library of information.[2]  Of course the information in both a book and DNA is encoded - in a book, encoded by the language the book is written in; in DNA by the four character chemical bases  adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine represented by the letters in the graphic above - ACGT.

This presents a number of problems for the evolutionists, a number of which I point out in DNA and WindTalkers, with the two main ones being:

  1. What is the source of the information in DNA?
  2. What is the source of the Code?

The problem for evolutionists is that information and codes - are both immaterial, designed entities. And immaterial entities cannot come from the material processes of evolution. Nor can anything that is designed. Such items only come only from intelligent minds. But as pointed out above, evolution claims there is no intelligence involved anywhere in the evolutionary process. Where then, did the information and the code in DNA come from?

In passing, the evolutionist comparison of DNA to a map is ironic, because even though the comparison falls far short - DNA contains much more info than a map, the same questions come up: Where did the information on the map come from? And where did the encoding system of symbols on the map come from? And for what purpose was the whole system created? If DNA is like a map, the same questions apply.


Notes  

1 Francis Crick, quoted by Jonathan Wells PhD, The Myth of Junk DNA, Seattle:Discovery Institute Press, 2011, Kindle ed, loc 210
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2. "DNA is more like a library," he [Meyer] said. "The organism accesses the information that it needs from DNA so it can build some of its critical components."
Stephen Meyer ref. from, Lee Strobel The Case For A Creator, A Journalist Investigates Scientific Evidence That Points Toward God, Grand Rapids MI: Zondervan, 2004, p. 225
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Images:
Meme by Duane Caldwell © 2017
All images - used by permission from the license holders as noted below

DNA Background, © Leigh Prather | Fotolia | used by permission