Junk DNA?
BQ: When I was in school, I was taught that most of my DNA was "junk DNA" that had no purpose. It was just the vestigial remnant of a copying, mutational process that was "evolution." Is this true, and why is it important?
A: Deleterious (harmful) mutations were said to be rare, as much of the genome was considered "filler" that served no purpose. This meant that the number of mutations could be high in reproductive populations, as the probability of the mutations having affected "useful" DNA was quite low. Thus, geneticists reasoned, most mutations would be "neutral," causing neither harm nor gain.
In June of 2007, ENCODE, an international consortium of genome scientists, put out 29 research papers. Stunningly, it was discovered that the human genome is vastly more complex than just a simple "zipper" of nucleotides. Basically, the entire genome is transcribed bi-directionally! So not only is the genome not full of "non-functioning junk DNA," but this "junk" is actually poly-functional informational coding! One combination of nucleotides has not just one functional role, but multiple. This means that our genome's functionality exceeds 100%!
What does this mean? All these "neutral mutations," which evolution "needed to prevent error catastrophe arising from mutational meltdown," are actually not neutral at all, but instead harmful--and each single mutation is harmful on multiple levels. Since natural selection must take the entire package (that is, all 6 billion nucleotides, not just the ones it "likes"), any one good mutation is going to be coupled with hundreds to thousands of times as many harmful mutations! Biochemically, evolution just keeps striking out. Not only can it not explain how information for genomes became present, but it can't even explain how information can REMAIN there!
(See also: Behe, Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, Howell et al., "Evolution of Human mtDNA: How rapid does human mitochondrial genome evolve," Loewe, L., "Quantifying the genomic decay paradox due to Muller's ratchet in human mitochondrial DNA.")
(PN220)
"For the entire Law is fulfilled in in this one word: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."—Gal 5:14