Human Chromosome 2 Question

[Master_Ghost_Knight]

He keeps referencing these two sections:

"Best reciprocal nucleotide-level alignments of the chimpanzee and human genomes cover 2.4 gigabases (Gb) of high quality sequence, including 89 Mb from chromosome X and 7.5 from chromosome Y." [2]

In other words, of the 2.85 Gb (=billion base pairs) human euchromatic DNA only 2.4 Gb formed a match with that of the chimpanzee. DNA sequences that do not match do not match because they are distinct sequences. Over 15% of the sequences do not match! The difference between man and his "closest relative" is now suddenly 15% plus 6.4% is more than 21 percent! Based on this figure, and the fact that man has unique protein-coding [3] and miRNA [4] genes for which standard evolutionary theory hasn't the faintest origin clue, it is logically sound to reject common ancestry with chimpanzees. This also means that the structure and arrangement of human chromosome 2 has to be reinterpreted. The chromosome is said to be a fusion product of two ancestral primate chromosomes that are still separate in chimpanzees and is among the best molecular evidence of Darwinian common descent.

and

No, it is not compelling at all. In 2005, Hillier et al published the molecular sequence of human chromosome 2 and 4. The paper demonstrated that human chromosome 4 also has a 1.1 Mb (1.1 million base pairs) subtelomeric region (4q26) showing an abundance of subtelomeric duplications to human chromosomes 1-9, 11, 16, 19 and 20. Similar "not highly conserved" sequences could also be demonstrated in the mouse genome, but without "conclusive evidence" for an ancient fusion, (6; p729-730). Remarkably, chromosome 4 shows another region resembling non-functional subtelomeric sequences (4q32.3) that is highly conserved in mice (6; p730).

What do these data mean? As a matter of fact it means nothing at all with respect to common descent. The sequences will, of course, be interpreted by our dear Darwinian opponents as the result of common ancestry with chimpanzees, but the fact that subtelomeric regions can be found also in other parts of the human and other genomes makes the conclusion merely conclusion jumping, not compelling at all. The fact that subtelomeric repetitive regions can be found scattered throughout the human genome merely reflects the nature of repetitive sequences, i.e. they easily duplicate and translocate. Why than do the sequences present in chromosome 2 qualify as evidence for a chromosome fusion, while similar sequences in chromosome 4 do not? Because it fits the Darwinian presupposition of an ancient fusion. We call this selective data interpretation.

First get paper:
http://www.genome.gov/Pages/Research/DIR/Chimp_Analysis.pdf

Second find where they got the quote and actualy read it:

Best reciprocal nucleotide-level alignments of the chimpanzee and human genomes cover,2.4 gigabases (Gb) of high-quality sequence, including 89Mb from chromosome X and
7.5Mb from chromosome Y. Genome-wide rates. We calculate the genome-wide nucleotide divergence between human and chimpanzee to be 1.23%, confirming
limited studies12,33,34
recent results from more . The differences between one copy of the human genome and one copy of the chimpanzee genome include both the sites of fixed divergence between the species and some polymorphic sites within each species. By correcting for the estimated coalescence times in the human and chimpanzee populations (see Supplementary Information 'Genome evolution'), we estimate that polymorphism accounts for 14-22% of the observed divergence rate and thus that the fixed divergence is ,1.06% or less.

Third show this picture:

I doubt very much that our creationist knows what the hell is a subtelomeric region or what hell are any of the items and numbers that he tried to quote.

 

[Banana]

I think I blinded him with science. I took apart his argument and he started screaming chromosome fusions don't cause sheep to evolve and ran off. :?

 

[Master_Ghost_Knight]

I think I blinded him with science. I took apart his argument and he started screaming chromosome fusions don't cause sheep to evolve and ran off. :?