"The Selfish Gene." "Selfish DNA." Oh, how such phrases can get people bent out of shape.  Stephen Jay Gould hated such talk (see a little book called The Panda's Thumb ), and Richard Dawkins devoted more time to answering critics of his use of the term 'selfish' than should have been necessary.

John Farrell runs an interesting blog at Forbes.com, and he regularly discusses genetics, design, and other topics of interest around here. His latest points to work by Larry Moran and Ryan Gregory, both of whom have debunked some of the "junk DNA" misinformation concocted by design theorists, then looks at some interesting new blogging from one Stanley Rice. It's interesting stuff. Casey Luskin shows up in the comments. Nothing new there.

So, Alu elements are mobile DNA modules that can exert diverse influences on genomes and the organisms harboring them. They can affect genome function in constructive ways, by altering gene expression or supporting chromosome structure. And they can be damaging, even deadly. There are more than a million of them in the human genome, and we don't know what each one does.

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is a leading cause of blindness in humans, and the leading cause of visual impairment during advanced age. The condition comes in two basic forms, the most severe of which is untreatable.

Defenders of intelligent design theory often dwell on the topic of "junk DNA," which has been molded into a masterpiece of folk science. The ID approach to "junk DNA" involves a fictional story about "Darwinism" discouraging its study, and a contorted and simplistic picture of a "debate" about whether "junk DNA" has "function." The fictional story is ubiquitous despite being repeatedly debunked.

So why is it that I and many other biologists hypothesize that introns are mostly non-functional? (I'll assume that you've read the previous posts, and that you understand what it is that I mean when I challenge claims that introns are functional elements in an information-rich genome.

What does it mean to claim that an intron has a function? The question is obviously important, at least as long as there are disputes about whether introns have "functions" and whether science ignored them for decades. Now, I can't help the ID people with their propensity for repeating falsehoods about the history of "junk DNA" and the role of "Darwinism" in its characterization.

Before we explore what introns are and how they work, let me correct the misuse of my words by one of the ID attack kittens. Months ago, referring to Steve Meyer's claim that introns "are now known to play many important functional roles in the cell," I sought to put intron "function" into context as follows:One critic has interpreted me as claiming that I know that 189,000 introns have no function.

It's time to talk about introns and function, so at least the ID people and I can agree on what we're disagreeing about. First, though, a little housecleaning. When confronting the avalanche of misinformation on so-called "junk DNA" from intelligent design creationists, it can be hard to know where to start.

No one should take advice from this character, I'll grant you.