Nylon-eating bacteria and creationism

The discovery of nylon-eating bacteria has been used to refute creationist arguments against evolution and natural selection. These bacteria can produce novel enzymes that allow them to feed on by-products of nylon manufacture which did not exist prior to the invention of nylon in the 1930s.^[1] Observation of these adaptations refutes pseudoscientific^[2] claims that no new information can be added to a genome and that proteins are too complex to evolve through a process of mutation and natural selection. Apologists have produced reactionary literature attempting to deny that evolution occurs, in turn generating input from the scientific community.

^ Kinoshita, S., Kageyama, S., Iba, K., Yamada, Y. and Okada, H. Utilization of a cyclic dimer and linear oligomers of ε-aminocapronoic acid by Achromobacter guttatus K172, Agric. Biol. Chem. 116, 547-551 (1981), FEBS 1981
^ Numbers, Ronald L. (2006) [Originally published 1992 as The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific Creationism; New York: Alfred A. Knopf]. The Creationists: From Scientific Creationism to Intelligent Design (Expanded ed., 1st Harvard University Press pbk. ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 373. ISBN 978-0-674-02339-0. LCCN 2006043675. OCLC 69734583. [ID] captured headlines for its bold attempt to rewrite the basic rules of science and its claim to have found indisputable evidence of a God-like being. Proponents, however, insisted it was 'not a religious-based idea, but instead an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins – one that challenges strictly materialistic views of evolution.' Although the intellectual roots of the design argument go back centuries, its contemporary incarnation dates from the 1980s

[1] Kinoshita, S., Kageyama, S., Iba, K., Yamada, Y. and Okada, H. Utilization of a cyclic dimer and linear oligomers of ε-aminocapronoic acid by Achromobacter guttatus K172, Agric. Biol. Chem. 116, 547-551 (1981), FEBS 1981

[2] Numbers, Ronald L. (2006) [Originally published 1992 as The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific Creationism; New York: Alfred A. Knopf]. The Creationists: From Scientific Creationism to Intelligent Design (Expanded ed., 1st Harvard University Press pbk. ed.). Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. p. 373. ISBN 978-0-674-02339-0. LCCN 2006043675. OCLC 69734583. [ID] captured headlines for its bold attempt to rewrite the basic rules of science and its claim to have found indisputable evidence of a God-like being. Proponents, however, insisted it was 'not a religious-based idea, but instead an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins – one that challenges strictly materialistic views of evolution.' Although the intellectual roots of the design argument go back centuries, its contemporary incarnation dates from the 1980s

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Nylon-eating bacteria and creationism

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