Most of the Human Genome is useless junk

I also want to express sincere admiration for him. He has a tall task! Note that he has agreed to defend a strong, positive claim. Now consider that there are many things we do not know about the genome, but he will not be able to leverage this fact as evidence to support his strong claim. He must provide us with good evidence to give us confidence that the genome really is mostly useless junk in spite of our current level of ignorance! I for one, can't wait to see what he has up his sleeve for us, and am very much looking forward to his opening statement. My burden in this debate is to inject a sufficient threshold of doubt against the claim that most of the human genome is useless junk. Though it is not strictly necessary, I intend to go above and beyond my burden. I intend to provide you with the confidence to believe that the entire genome could well be functional! the 20th century bore witness to an amazing revolution in our understanding of what drives all life. Just decades after society became largely convinced that Darwin had succeeded in showing what we had always assumed to be designed - life - was nothing more than the appearance of design, we learned that information lies at the heart of life[1]. We learned that DNA is in fact a linear digital code which prescribes the many various proteins necessary for life. This protein coding system lies at the very heart of our debate. Also at the heart of our debate is a clash of two very different views of the origin of this information system and the opposite predictions concerning genetic information. The seeds of conflict are born of the realization that only a tiny fraction of DNA actually codes for these proteins necessary for life. Various sources place the amount of protein coding DNA between 1.5%[2]-2.5%. What to think of the remaining DNA? It's time to introduce the players: The view that life can be explained as a chance arrangement of matter; a mere accident of physics and chemistry ( I will refer to this view as the modern synthesis going forward), quickly became the dominant view of the scientific community in advance of the revelation of genetic information. But this revelation challenged the very foundation of the modern synthesis mere decades after it had been established. Functional information[3] never arises out of the mere interplay of matter and energy; it's source is always intelligent agency. Thus, the discovery that digital code drives the processes of life gave birth to the modern Intelligent Design movement. ID acknowledges what we know to be true about the information of life and what we know to be true about the origin of functional information, and concludes that Intelligent Agency is the best explanation for the origin and diversity of life, based on the evidence. Thus, as we approached the end of the last century, we had two very opposite views of life: the entrenched view which saw life as nothing more than a purposeless accident, and the new kid on the block which saw the deliberate purpose and foresight of intelligent agency. Given that some 98% of the genome does not code for proteins, it might be expected that the former would predict that this portion of the genome served as an evolutionary relic that had mutated itself into uselessness and the latter would predict a purpose that may extend beyond protein coding. This is exactly what happened, and it is in the context of a study of opposite predictions that I intend to make my case. It is true that a fraction of the non-protein coding regions hinted at function and it is also true that some supporters of the modern synthesis (I will refer to these supporters as Darwinists going forward) urged caution, but the fact is that the view that most of the genome is junk quickly became the dominant view. It is also true that many high profile darwinists were quick to make predictions and that many of these predictions were aimed squarely against ID. Richard Dawkins, Francis Collins, Douglas Futuymana, Michael Shermer, Kenneth Miller, Jerry Coyne, and John Avise comprise a veritable who's who of leading Darwinist thinkers. All of them have declared that the presence of junk DNA constitutes dramatic evidence in favor of the modern synthesis and damning evidence against ID. For example, Shermer said, "We have to wonder why the Intelligent Designer added to our genome junk DNA"[4], and Coyne said, "the evolutionary prediction that we'll find pseudogenes has been fulfilled - amply. " He sets up the clash very well: "Perfect design would truly be the sign of a skilled and intelligent designer. Imperfect design is the mark of evolution; in fact it's precisely what we would expect from evolution"[5] Indeed, if it is true that the genome is littered with junk, the point these men make is not only reasonable, it is undeniable. But very different predictions were emerging from the ID perspective. As early as the 1990s, several independent design theorists predicted we would learn that much of so-called junk DNA does serve a purpose. [6] There are several different types of so-called junk DNA. Having laid the groundwork in this round, I will examine many of these different types in the following rounds, revealing the darwininst assumptions and then exploring how things have changed as we have progressed from ignorance into knowledge. In each case, we will find that the more we have learned about these regions of the genome that do not code for proteins ( I will refer to these regions as NCRs - non coding regions - going forward ), the more function we are discovering. The evidence will accumulate, showing an irreversible trend away from junk and toward function. Within the caveat that what needs to be explained is the origin of genetic information, I agree with Jerry Coyne and the others: if the genome is littered with junk, this constitutes strong evidence in favor of the modern synthesis and against ID. On the other hand, if most of the genome is functional, this is strong evidence in favor of "a skilled and Intelligent Designer," and the closer our knowledge brings us to a completely functional genome, the more problematic (for many reasons), this becomes for the modern synthesis. In the following rounds we will have an opportunity to explore where the evidence of unfolding revelation is taking us. It will be an exciting journey! I now look forward to my opponent's opening statement. [1] The Sequence Hypothesis, Francis Crick [2] . http://www.sciencedaily.com... [3] note that genetic information manifests the hallmarks of human language and computer information; i. e. , code, syntax, and semantics. This is in contrast to what is know as "shannon" information, which concerns itself only with probability, not with function or meaning. 4] Shermer, "Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design," 2006, pp74-75 [5] Coyne, "Why Evolution is True, 2009, pp 66-67, 81. [6] William Dembski, Perry Marshall, and Mike Gene, for example