Topoisomerase

One of the amazing discoveries in biology in the last couple of decades is the discovery in the cells of living things dozens of incredibly complex molecular machines. One such machine is a protein named topoisomerase II. Topoisomerase II is an enzyme, that is, it's a protein that facilitates some process in the cell, and Casey Luskin at Evolution News describes what this amazing enzyme does:

The topoisomerase II enzyme is designed to untangle knots and supercoils in DNA strands which arise during replication and transcription. It does this by grabbing two tangled DNA segments, holding one steady while it breaks the other segment in two, and then passing the first segment through the break.

The second segment is then reconnected, and the two DNA segments are released, having been successfully untangled. Without topoisomerases, chromosomes would become an impossible mess, making DNA replication, transcription, and cell duplication impossible.

This sounds relatively simple, perhaps, but as the video below illustrates, it's anything but simple. It's an extremely complex mechanism and an extremely complex process, and here's an important point to keep in mind: The topoisomerase enzyme is necessary for DNA to function, but DNA produces the enzyme.

This is an intractable problem for any theory of the origin of life based on unguided, mindless processes. DNA can't function until there are topoisomerase enzymes, but the enzymes can't be produced until the DNA functions. How did such a system evolve by chance?

Darwinian evolutionists would probably argue that this process evolved gradually over millions of years, but how could evolution even get started if primitive strands of DNA got knotted up before they could do anything?

Do biologists think that the tangle problem only arose in DNA after the topoisomerase enzyme had evolved to fix it? If so, what did the enzyme do before DNA developed tangles, and how did it evolve just the right structure to perform a function for which there was no need?

Another aspect of this astonishing system is that somehow the topoisomerase is able to find the tangles on the DNA and manipulate the DNA into the enzyme in order to untangle it. How did that ability come about as a result of purposeless, random processes?

Anyway, watch the video and see what you think:

It takes a lot of faith in blind chance to think that this system could evolve naturalistically, and this is just one of dozens, possibly hundreds of molecular machines that are inexplicable in terms of genetic mutation and natural selection. How do mindless undirected accidents produce something like this?

I'm reminded of the words of biologist Francis Crick who said that "Biologists must constantly keep in mind that what they see was not designed, but rather evolved." In other words, biologists must just keep telling themselves that seemingly impossible things happen all the time.

Belief in Darwinian evolution really is a testament to the power of faith in a naturalistic worldview on the part of those who are committed to that worldview.