The question is raised: “What are mutations?” Mutations are defined in various ways, but, generally, mutations will refer to changes in the genetic material of an individual, which are passed on to the offspring. Sometimes mutations are also defined as all those changes that are not inherited from parents, but are passed on to the offspring.
Mutations are divided in different ways. According to the nature of their origin, they can be spontaneous and induced. Spontaneous mutations are very rare, and they result solely from the imperfection of genetic code replication. So, the genetic code is copied almost perfectly. It is assumed that in higher organisms the mutation rate is 10^-6, and in bacteria, 10^-9. That means, in bacteria, one mistake occurs per one billion genes. These are spontaneous mutations.
The entire process of genetic code replication and the whole machinery responsible for replicating the genetic code is fine-tuned to give identical copies.
Induced mutations are mutations caused by different agents. These agents can be: UV radiation, gamma radiation, chemical agents, biological agents, and others. Mutations can be: gene mutations, chromosomal mutations (depending on where they occur and to what extent); then, they can be: inversions, deletions, duplications, translocations; according to the direction in which they occur, they can be reversible, direct.
A reversible mutation is when we have a gene where an A mutated into a T. Then later, T mutates back into A. This is called “reversion” – you lose the gene’s function, and then it is regained. So, this is a reversible mutation.
Natural selection can only favor or disfavour certain variants, but the key question is: “How do these variants arise?” “Where do the variants come from?” Because, if there are no variants, there is no “food” for selection, there is nothing for selection to favor or disfavour.
Evolutionists claim that the basic source of polymorphism in some populations are mutations. Variability is simultaneously the existence of multiple variants in a population. You have a population of some species “X”, and there are individuals, and there are variants a, b, c, d (different variants). When these variants stretch across generations, we call this polymorphism.
Thus, the basic source of polymorphism in some populations, according to evolutionists, are mutations. That’s why it’s said that mutations are the “motor of evolution” or the “generator of evolution” (driving force) – a motor, something that drives, that pushes. And even evolutionists say: “If there were no mutations, everything would be frozen in time.” That means, it would be unchanged. Imagine, we have a genetic pool of certain genes, and they are just copied, copied. And what happens? It stays frozen in time. There are no changes. Species would be truly “fossilized.” Not in the sense of fossil creation, but fossilized in the sense of their unchangeability over time.
Mutations, according to evolutionists, are what create new variants. They introduce novelties into existing genes. Because, if there are no variants, if you have the same organism, there is no selection. But where do the variants come from? Evolutionists say: “Mutations are the source of variants.”
What can we say? Are mutations an evolutionary factor? We can say the following:
- Mutations are very rare. Because of the perfection of the mechanism for copying genetic information (it is not absolutely perfect), mutations are a very rare event, and in relation to selection, very often, with negligible effect.
Let’s say, you have some gene A. And now we observe this gene A, which is responsible for determining a trait that should lead to some evolutionary novelty. The probability that a mutation will affect this gene is, say, 10-7. (Not taking either extreme.)
So, we need 10 million individuals to be sure (that is probability, none of them could have it) and to confidently say that we will have a mutation. Imagine these are elephants, and we observe the length of their trunks. Now we need 10 million elephants to have a mutation.
And for now, we have a small effect. Let’s assume, hypothetically, that selection worked and favored these mutated elephants. Mutations, in order to lead to a new evolutionary change, must be connected, related.
Now, for a mutation to affect the same gene, the probability is 10-14 (probabilities multiply in this case). Let’s say, we toss a coin. What is the probability that it lands on heads? 1/2. And in two attempts to get heads, the probability is 1/2 × 1/2 = 1/4. The probability of two events that need to be connected is calculated by multiplying the probabilities of the individual events.
In our case, this is 10-14. So, how many elephants do we need for two mutations to affect the same gene? We need 10 thousand trillion elephants. That wouldn’t fit here on planet Earth. Evolution would have to occur somewhere in the solar system to bring about such a change.
And these are just two mutations. And for one trait, we need, let’s say, ten. How many elephants would we need for 10 mutations? Not even an entire galaxy would be enough to create just one evolutionary novelty. And since evolution does occur within “earthly” limits, its processes stretch over long periods of time. So, the number that cannot be provided in one period is provided through long periods of time.
Therefore, mutations are a rare event, and the chance of their elimination is large. Let’s imagine that a mutation appears in one out of 10 million organisms. What is the chance that it will be accidentally removed, lost? Much greater than that it will be favored. The selective pressure must be enormous. However, if the adaptive value of that gene is large, this means that the chance that the mutation-created state can fit into the harmonious structures and functional connections of an organism is small. That’s why we calculate a small phenotypic effect of mutation, a small selective pressure, and an enormous number of generations.
- Mutations are harmful, they have a harmful, negative effect. You cannot, for example, mutate the gene for hemoglobin into a gene for skin pigmentation. That cannot happen.
You know, you have a gene, it is a complex informational system, or the entire genome, and imagine now (mutations are always random, you never know which gene will be affected, in which individual, in which generation; it is an absolutely random process, accidental, and it affects a well-organized machinery) you expect that the information will improve.
So, mutations cause a reduction or complete elimination of the function of the gene product in the gene that has been affected by the mutation.
A mutation can lead to the synthesis of an abortive protein. For function, you need the whole protein, but a specific mutation creates a “stop codon” and you get the so-called “abortive protein.” The abortive protein cannot be more functional than the original. There is an enormous number of genetic burdens that we carry, which clearly show that mutations have a negative effect. They only destroy something that exists and lead to the degeneration, degradation of the living system, which is somewhat slowed by the reproduction mechanism, so we have two sets of chromosomes.
As soon as a mutation is related to sex chromosomes, it immediately manifests in male children. If they removed one set of chromosomes from us, we would immediately fall dead. You see how good it is that we have two sets of identical chromosomes, one from the father and one from the mother. Moreover, it is also good that the genetic information is written in two chains. Genetic information is interconvertible, meaning, there is always T opposite A, G opposite C. If it gets damaged by some chemical agent, how will the repair mechanism know how to fix it? It knows because there is complementarity. Because if there were no complementarity, it wouldn’t know what to restore it to when it has four possibilities. Should it restore it to G, or C, or A, or T?
Everything is arranged in the organism to preserve the structure. And evolutionists agree that mutations are harmful, but they try to find some mutations that would be beneficial to the carrier.
Read all evolutionary textbooks, only one single example of a beneficial mutation is cited, and that is the mutation in the gene for hemoglobin, the so-called “sickle cell anemia,” because erythrocytes or red blood cells (which some call grains) have a sickle appearance.
This mutation is related to an autosomal gene (it is not, therefore, on the sex chromosomes). With “H,” we will mark, so to speak, the “normal” gene form, and with “h,” we will mark the mutant gene form. Normal individuals are of the form H/H, they are not anemic. And just one amino acid change leads to this undesired change.
h/h individuals are anemic, do not reach sexual maturity, and are eliminated. That is, their erythrocytes do not deliver enough oxygen to the cells, and they simply die. Thus, the “h” allele is eliminated from the population. According to Mendel’s laws, 1/4 or 25% of individuals are eliminated from the population due to the occurrence of this mutation. Heterozygotes H/h (which is the same as h/H) are anemic, but they reach sexual maturity and leave offspring.
What kind of beneficial mutation leads to so much death? Well, the thing is, in Africa, in areas where malaria is prevalent, these heterozygotes (H/h) are more resistant to the malaria pathogen (it is a protozoa that lives in blood cells and causes malaria, and it is transmitted by the malarial mosquito). The malaria pathogen cannot exist on sickle cell hemoglobin.
And imagine now, these heterozygotes survive more successfully, even though they are anemic, than non-anemic homozygotes (H/H). And so, in fact, the mutated gene is preserved in the population. If there were no malaria, it would be eliminated in no time, because it is harmful.
So, they (H/h) are anemic, but they are more successful in relation to another agent – malaria – and they survive. This is called “balanced polymorphism,” because as much as it is eliminated through anemic homozygotes (h/h), that genetic form is maintained through these anemic heterozygotes (H/h), and thus the unfavorable, mutated genetic variant persists in the population.
This is the only example that evolutionists cite as an example of a positive mutation.
Now, how should we understand this? First of all, it is obvious that the positive effect of this mutation comes only in a specific environment, where malaria prevails. There is no doubt that H/h heterozygotes in a non-malarial environment would be suppressed. This mutation does not lead to the improvement of erythrocyte function, but only allows the organism to more successfully fight malaria. And that effect of the mutated genetic form is expressed only when combined with the non-mutated (H). If this were truly a positive mutation, then it would express such an effect in the homozygous state (h/h), and we see that because of this mutation, 25% of individuals are eliminated. There is no question that this is, in itself, a positive mutation.
When blacks were transferred from Africa to America, the elimination of the “h” genetic form began immediately. So, this is not an improvement of genetic function.
Geri Parker, a creationist, says this: “Now imagine that evolutionists come to you and say: ‘You know, I invented a car that goes uphill without gasoline.’ And then a creationist says to him: ‘Do you want to demonstrate, let’s see what it looks like when it goes without gasoline?’ (This is theoretically impossible. Well, according to evolution, everything is possible. Evolution defies the laws of nature.) And the evolutionist says: ‘I want to demonstrate.’
And now he comes, and at the top of the hill, he places the car, lets it go downhill, and demonstrates the braking. And then he says: ‘Improvement. The first step.'”
This is mutation. This is this example. No one can claim that by finding the brake, they have found something that can push uphill. If the mutation is the engine, it means it should push uphill.
And evolutionists were terribly shocked when Chetverikov discovered genetic burdens. According to Darwinian selection, selection should eliminate all of this, so that there are almost no mutations in populations, so that everything undesirable should be eliminated by selection. And then Chetverikov went into nature, and in nature collected fruit flies, the wild type. And he brought some females and some males, and crossed them. And, he got their offspring in large numbers.
What did he then do? Then he crossed these into kinship, and compared the survival rate. This is one of the first, very serious genetic experiments. And he concluded that there is a huge increase in survival when crossing between non-relatives, which he unequivocally concluded means that with the crossing of relatives, mutations match in a homozygous state, and this lowers the rate, the percentage of survival. And here he found exactly what the percentage is. This caused great astonishment. This means, there is so much genetic load in the population. That was a shock.
Darwinism experienced a shock somewhere in the 1920s of our century. So then they pulled themselves out in the so-called “synthetic theory” proposed by Fisher, Wright, Haldane, Dobzhansky. This is called “neo-Darwinism.”
Let’s read some quotes. Here, listen to what Isaac Asimov says: “Most mutations are harmful.” He doesn’t say “all,” because if he says “all mutations are harmful,” then that’s terrible. And listen further to what he says: “It is certain that mutations over a long period of time lead to the evolutionary process going forward and upward.”
Here’s what Dobzhansky says, a famous name: “Clearly determined (specified) mutants of the fruit fly, with which many classical experiments in genetics were done, are almost, without exception, weaker in vitality, fertility, and life span than the wild type.”
Imagine, mistakes leading to the construction of the entire living world. The very thought that mutations are mistakes, that they are changes in something that already exists, directly alludes to creation. When you have something, and there is a process that degenerates it, that’s a direct reference to the act of perfect creation.
In nature, there are no creative mechanisms. In nature, there are only mechanisms of maintenance and degeneration.