The Nature of Design (Evolution)

by dhw, Tuesday, September 15, 2009, 08:37 (5358 days ago) @ George Jelliss

A postscript on George's concept of design, as outlined on 11 September at 22.43: design apparently entails "elegance and clarity and logicality and inevitability and, dare I say, simplicity", whereas "the structures and systems found in Nature are messy, untidy, illogical, inelegant, in short complex, and indeed unnecessarily complicated (e.g. the long routes taken by human nerves and ducts). These are the characteristics to be expected of something that has been produced as the result of chance and chaotic processes, i.e. has evolved."-I argued on 12 September at 14.18 that since we are unable to make functioning living things ourselves, we don't actually know what kind of design is necessary. However, I would now like to add a little fuel to the fire by inviting you into my home. The untidiest room in our house is my study, and the untidiest corner of my study is my desk, with its computer, printer, scanner, loudspeakers, webcam etc. This corner is "messy, untidy, illogical, inelegant, in short complex, and indeed unnecessarily complicated" (e.g. the long routes taken by the various leads). Why can't all the memory aids, visual aids, auditory aids, information storage systems, recording systems etc. be neatly packaged inside a single, all-in-one unit that has no external wires and leads and sockets? And for good measure, why can't it also be mobile, and self-repairing, and able to take decisions of its own, and able to produce mini-computers that will grow into full-sized computers? -Now I happen to know for a fact that the messy, untidy, illogical, inelegant, in short complex, and indeed unnecessarily complicated attachments in my study are the result of design. But apparently the elegant (my wife won't agree there), clear, logical, inevitable and, dare I say, simple, neatly packaged, all-in-one, self-contained remembering, seeing, hearing, storing, recording, mobile, self-repairing, thinking, procreative machine that is me could only have evolved "as the result of chance and chaotic processes". It's all very confusing.