Page 518 - Atlas of Creation Volume 3

ONCE, THERE WAS THE MYTH OF "JUNK" DNA

T he last support for faulty or vestigial structures discussed in the last chapter is the new—but re-
cently discredited—concept of "junk" DNA.

In the second half of the 20th century, as we saw in the last chapter, the myth of vestigial organs began
to collapse. Organs formerly thought to be useless turned out to have important functions, and the myth
became untenable. But evolutionists, not wanting to do without the propaganda this myth afforded, em-

braced a new version of it, which claimed that some of the genes containing the organs' genetic code but not
the organs themselves—were vestigial. The new concept that replaced "vestigial" organs was "junk" DNA.
This term "junk" referred to some sections of the huge DNA molecule in which is encoded all of a living
creature's genetic data. According to evolutionist claims, a large part of DNA is now non-functional. These

parts did have a function in the so-called past, but in time, after the alleged evolutionary changes, they be-
came vestigial—in short, "junk." The parallel with Darwinism was quite clear, and in a short time, the con-
cept of junk DNA became one of the most repeated terms in scientific literature. But this new version of the
myth did not have a long lifespan. Especially with the announcement of the results of the Human Genome

Project in 2001, it was more and more loudly proclaimed in the scientific world that the whole concept was
wrong, because the functions of so-called junk DNA were slowly being understood. Evan Eichler, an evolu-
tionist scientist from the University of Washington, admitted that "The term 'junk DNA' is a reflection of
our ignorance." 81

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