Death Knell for Junk DNA

Dr. Jonathan Wells predicted the downfall of “junk DNA” in his book published last year.



Joel Kontinen


Darwinian evolution predicted the existence of “junk DNA” or evolutionary leftovers in our genome. In 1972 geneticist Susumu Ohno claimed, "At least 90 [per cent] of our genomic DNA is 'junk' or 'garbage' of various sorts."

Ardent Darwinists such as Richard Dawkins and Larry Moran have eagerly promoted the junk-DNA hypothesis.

However, many discoveries suggested that it was time to re-assess this view. (Read more here, here and here.)

This week Nature, Science and some other journals published 30 papers on the results of the Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) project. The researchers found that 80 per cent of the genome has a biochemical function. Many already suspect that even the remaining 20 per cent has a function that we as yet do not know.

Writing in the journal Science, Elizabeth Pennisi says that the research sounds “the death knell” for the junk DNA view.

In contrast to Darwinism, both intelligent design and creation predicted that our genome is designed very well.


Sources:

Geddes, Linda. 2012. The ever deepening mystery of the human genome. New Scientist 2881: 40-43.

Pennisi, Elizabeth. 2012. ENCODE Project Writes Eulogy for Junk DNA. . Science 337 (6099): 1159-1161.