# Darwins Black Box **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 7, 2001, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471 "2001-02-07T07:37:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![KeithB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/48db29/32.png) [@KeithB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KeithB)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2001, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/101 "2001-02-14T18:11:25Z")
AndyL: I thought about going into greater details about the fitness advantage of not synthesizing vitamin C, but decided not to push it since IANAB[iologist]. However, lacking the ability to make vitamin C can also prevent overdoses in vitamin C rich environments. After all, we know that megadoses of vitamin C cause the delusion that vitamin C can cure all kinds of things like colds, flu and cancer. [cf Linus Pauling] I was reading the ingredients of my dog’s food the other day and it listed vitamin C with an asterisk. The note indicated that vitamin C was not a required nutrient for dogs. I guess some people are concerned that their dogs get enough vitamin C and the dogfood mfg’s go along! ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2001, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/102 "2001-02-14T20:36:50Z")
foolsguinea wrote: > [@](#): > > The prospect of a life-form spontaneously developing with both an RNA system (to reproduce & maintain itself) and some sort of respiration system (to give it the energy to work) seems much too unlikely to me. You **do** realize, don’t you, that the earliest organisms on Earth didn’t **use** respiration to derive their energy? They use a much simpler, less efficient process called “fermentation.” Respiration as we know it didn’t evolve until both aerotolerance and oxygen-producing photosynthesis had evolved, which took several hundred million years. ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [February 14, 2001, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/103 "2001-02-14T21:06:09Z")
dylan\_73 wrote: > [@](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > \*Originally posted by KeithB \* > > **My favorite question for Intellegent Design proponents: Why did God turn-off our ability to create our own vitamin C? The genes are there, they are just part of the "junk DNA."** > > Could we turn it back on? Not likely. The gene for creating Vitamin C got turned off (became a “pseudo-gene”) before we diverged from the Chimpanzees. It’s had millions of years to pick up mutations. And mutations accumulate in pseudo-genes a **lot** faster than they do in expressed genes, because there’s no selection pressure to weed them out. We’d be better off getting hold of an animal with a working Vitamin C gene and splicing its gene into our genome. ---
**Author:** ![David\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/51bf81/32.png) [@David\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_B)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2001, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/104 "2001-02-15T00:49:20Z")
Holly said: > [@](#): > > I’ll bring the marshmallows. David, you got beer? Sorry, I’m allergic to beer. But I can bring some of the harder stuff. I’ll save ya a seat by the fire. ---
**Author:** ![David\_B](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/51bf81/32.png) [@David\_B](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_B)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2001, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/105 "2001-02-15T00:51:45Z")
[Moderator Hat: ON] Lemur866 said: > [@](#): > > …you’re such a big fat coward. I know you were probably joking around, but we still don’t allow direct insults like this here in GD. Please be more careful in the future. * * * David B, SDMB Great Debates Moderator [Moderator Hat: OFF] ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2001, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/106 "2001-02-15T00:58:22Z")
Ulp. Sorry. I was just teasing, but I’ll be more careful in the future. OK, one more time I have to eat my words. So, how’s this instead? Godsend, I’m extremely disappointed that you never kept your promise to debate. Jesus said not to hide your light under a bushel, and it seems to me that you are hiding under a bushel right about now. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2001, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/107 "2001-02-15T02:12:57Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by KeithB \* > \*\*AndyL: > > I thought about going into greater details about the fitness advantage of not synthesizing vitamin C, but decided not to push it since IANAB[iologist]. > \*\* Yeah, my point was fairly obvious - I just couldn’t resist making it. Newbie mistake, I suppose. Where is Godsend? ---
**Author:** ![quixotic78](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/3ab097/32.png) [@quixotic78](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/quixotic78)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2001, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471/108 "2001-02-15T02:21:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by tracer \* > \*\*You **do** realize, don’t you, that the earliest organisms on Earth didn’t **use** respiration to derive their energy? They use a much simpler, less efficient process called “fermentation.” Respiration as we know it didn’t evolve until both aerotolerance and oxygen-producing photosynthesis had evolved, which took several hundred million years. \*\* Just a minor nitpick, **tracer** , but respiration can be both aerobic (with oxygen) and anaerobic (w/o oxygen). Respiration can be defined (see [http://www.mblab.gla.ac.uk/~julian/dict2.cgi?5640](http://www.mblab.gla.ac.uk/~julian/dict2.cgi?5640) ) as “the intracellular oxidation of substrates coupled with production of ATP and oxidized coenzymes (NAD+ and FAD).” Even then, this definition isn’t exhaustive, as other coenzymes can be involved as well. In essence, respiration can be defined as the chemical mechanism for producing energy. At any rate, I’m pretty sure the original poster meant respiration in an anaerobic sense (e.g., glycolysis, fermentation) and not strictly in an aerobic sense. Carry on, Quix [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/darwins-black-box/53471.md?page=5)