Could Genetic Mutations Be Non-Random? New Evidence for Mutational Bias

Africa, African sleeping sickness, APOL1, Daniel Melamed, diseases, Engineering, Evolution, genes, genetic mutations, genetics, genomes, germline genome, haploid, heterozygotes, HindIII, homozygotes, Intelligent Design, Israel, malaria, MEMDS, mutation DNA, Mutation Enrichment followed by Maximum Depth Sequencing, mutation frequency, mutations, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, randomness, restriction enzyme, sperm, sperm DNA, Trypanosoma brucei, University of Haifa, wild-type DNA
The researchers examined the emergence of a mutation in the human APOL1 gene that confers protection from African sleeping sickness. Source
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New Paper Has Bad News for Popular “Oxygen Theory” of the Cambrian Explosion

Cambrian animals, Cambrian Explosion, clades, Darwin's Doubt, David Coppedge, Douglas Erwin, Evolution, evolutionary precursors, Gizmodo, Intelligent Design, James Valentine, oxygen, oxygen theory, oxygen trigger model, oxygenation, paleontologists, paleontology, partial pressure of oxygen, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, The Cambrian Explosion (book)
The technical paper acknowledges that this level of oxygenation, if sustained, would indeed “challenge the view” that oxygen was a trigger for animal evolution. Source
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Evolution Is Not Like Physics

Animal Algorithms, asymmetric information flow, biology, Boyle’s Law, Casey Luskin, Darwin's Doubt, E = mc2, Eigen catastrophe, Elliott Sober, Eric Cassell, Ernst Mayr, Erwin Schrödinger, Eugene V. Koonin, Evolution, Granville Sewell, gravitation, Isaac Newton, Kirk Durston, National Academy of Sciences, National Institute for Biotechnology Information, naturalism, neo-Darwinian theory, No Free Lunch, physics, Physics, Earth & Space, PNAS, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, punctuated equilibria, Richard Weikart, RNA, Signature in the Cell, Stephen Meyer, thermodynamics, vitalism, Vitaly Vanchurin, William Dembski, Yuri I. Wolf
A new theory of evolution extends Darwinian processes, making them into physical laws based on “learning theory.” Source
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Lessons Not Learned from the Evangelical Debate over Adam and Eve

Adam and Eve, Ann Gauger, Annual Review of Genetics, apes, beta-globin, BioEssays, BioLogos, chimpanzees, Christianity, common ancestry, CRISPR, Dennis Venema, Evangelicals, Evolution, evolutionary theory, Faith & Science, functionality, Genealogical Adam and Eve, gorillas, hominids, Human Origins, In Quest of the Historical Adam, Intelligent Design, Jesus Christ, Joshua Swamidass, Junk DNA, Kenneth Miller, Kitzmiller v. Dover, macaques, methodological naturalism, microRNA response elements, Nature (journal), Nature Reviews Genetics, Ola Hössjer, Paul Nelson, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, pseudogenes, RNA (journal), Science Signaling, Springer, Theist Evolution, theology, william lane craig
To his credit, William Lane Craig is among those evangelicals who have been willing to question arguments against Adam and Eve. Source
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Phylogenetic Conflict Is Common and the “Hierarchy” Is Far from “Perfect”

angiosperms, Biological Reviews, Cambrian Explosion, Darwin's Doubt, Evolution, evolutionary tree, FORA.tv, Genome Research, hierarchy, Intelligent Design, mammals, Metazoa, New Scientist, phylogenetic data, phylogenomic conflict, Precambrian, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Richard Dawkins, Sean B. Carroll, Stephen Meyer, Trends in Ecology and Evolution, U.C. Davis, universal common ancestry, University of Wisconsin-Madison
It’s simply false for Dawkins to claim that when you compare genes of different animals, they “fall on a perfectly hierarchy — a perfect family tree.” Source
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Ancestor of All Animals in 555-Million-Year-Old Ediacaran Sediments?

annelids, arthropods, bilaterian animals, Buddenbrockia plumatellae, burrowing, Cambrian Explosion, Cambrian News, China, cnidarians, Deuterostomia, Ediacaran animals, Evolution, Germany, habitus, Helminthoidichnites, Ikaria wariootia, incertae sedis, microbial mats, mortichnia, Nephrozoa, PNAS, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Protostomia, Scyphozoa, South Australia, UC Riverside, University of California, Xenacoelomorpha, Yilingia spiciformis
For my series of articles about alleged Ediacaran animals predating the Cambrian explosion there is a new candidate that deserves a closer view: New research on Ediacaran fossils was just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by a team of scientists from UC Riverside (Evans et al. 2020), and it has already made global news headlines including, “Ancestor of all animals identified in Australian fossils” (University of California 2020) and the even more sensational, “Fossil hunters find evidence of 555m-year-old human relative” (Davis 2020). What did those scientists discover and are their far-reaching conclusions really justified?  Grains of Rice The authors of this study looked at fossil layers from the National Heritage Nilpena site in the Flinders Range of South Australia, which are slightly older than…
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No Harm, No Foul — What If Darwinism Were Excised from Biology?

Adam C. Soloff, Amir Marcovitz, appendectomy, bacteria, bats, behavior, cephalectomy, Daphne Major island, Darwin Devolves, Darwin's Finches, Darwinism, Darwinspeak, dolphins, echolocation, Evolution, Galápagos Islands, Hippocratic Oath, homeostasis, Illustra Media, Immune System, introgressive hybridization, Jerry Coyne, Marcos Eberlin, Michael Behe, Michael T. Lotze, Peter and Rosemary Grant, pharynx, Philip Skell, phylogeny, PNAS, primum non nocere, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Richard Dawkins, sound generation, tonsillectomy, turtles, whales
Some biologists might shudder at the thought of eliminating Darwinism from their scientific work. A “Darwin-ectomy” sounds more painful than a tonsillectomy or appendectomy. To hard-core evolutionists, it might sound like a cephalectomy (removal of the head)! If Darwinism is as essential to biology as Richard Dawkins or Jerry Coyne argues, then removing evolutionary words and concepts should make research incomprehensible.  If, on the other hand, Darwinism is more of a “narrative gloss” applied to the conclusions after the scientific work is done, as the late Philip Skell observed, then biology would survive the operation just fine. It might even be healthier, slimmed down after disposing of unnecessary philosophical baggage. Here are some recent scientific papers in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) to use as test…
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