You should like governors and regulators. No, I’m not talking politics; I’m talking about gene regulation, the next impassable step on the stairway to life (artwork, right). Life as we know it governs and regulates all growth in a state of homeostasis, which Dr. Change L. Tan defines as “the maintenance of internal stability despite environmental fluctuations and disruptions.” Left unchecked, organelles which continuously replicate inside a cell will needlessly consume resources until the cell dies; this is the same behavior as cancer.
How gene regulation occurs in a cell is complex and requires technical language. For this audience, simple illustrations will approximate what’s happening. Consider the thermostat for a furnace. The thermostat senses the room temperature, then turns on (if set to heat mode); when a preset temperature is reached, it sends a signal to stop heating. Gene regulation needs the same things: a sensor, a way to make a decision based on the sensor, and means to act on the decision to reach a specific goal. In E. Coli, one enzyme (the furnace) produces the amino acid tryptophan. If left alone, it would consume many resources to flood the cell with parts; so, E. Coli’s DNA makes a regulatory protein which detects tryptophan then stops production. Dr. Tan observes “this coordination of separate components toward a shared purpose poses a challenge” for evolution and random creation.
A more stunning example involves making sure the cell only contains native DNA, since foreign DNA would wreak havoc. Enter the restriction enzyme system, or the Kluth home security system, with its killer robots (called endonuclease enzymes) and taggers (methyltransferase enzymes). The robots work by targeting only humans (i.e., DNA) for destruction. They are effective and accurate, only killing people, not pets or plants. The problem is the robot will eventually kill everybody in the house (cell), even the homeowner. The tagger must first be released to place a tag on those who belong in the house (by adding 4 atoms [CH3] to its DNA), then disappear. When the robot comes out, anyone who’s not tagged is killed (by adding a water molecule to its DNA). If the family grows, or guests arrive, the tagger must reappear to keep the occupants safe. Dr. Tan says these toxin-antitoxin systems “play important cellular functions, including maintaining plasmid, responding to stress, arresting and persisting bacterial growth, shaping prokaryotic genomes, protecting against [viral] infection, and maintaining the integrity of genomes.”
Over her research career, Dr. Tan hasn’t come across any naturalistic explanation for how these restriction enzymes ever arrived; evolutionists simply assume them to be present. Yeah, right! Such highly sophisticated controls which maintain the cell’s critical engines strongly implies a Designer. Without a restriction enzyme, the cell has rampant growth (i.e., no thermostat on the furnace). The random appearance of only one restrictor (e.g., only killer robots) won’t prevent cell death. Worse yet for evolutionists, short but unregulated RNA like those in viruses would appear first, then multiply quickly. Regulated RNA codes for more information and thus needs more time to randomly show up. Thus, in a warm little pond of fast-growing viruses, a good and healthy RNA isn’t likely to appear because the viral RNA eats up all the resources. Regulated RNA wouldn’t arrive, let alone survive.
We can only declare with the Psalmist that we are fearfully and wonderfully made with an express purpose, made in the image of God, Who doeth all things well, inside and out. You are not an accident!
Source: Dr. Change Laura Tan and Rob Stadler, The Stairway To Life: An Origin-of-Life Reality Check, Evorevo Books, 2020, chapter 13.
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