Innovation and Speciation:baleen whale feeding (Evolution)

by David Turell , Wednesday, June 28, 2017, 15:22 (2487 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: I started by thinking pre-planning at 3.8 billion years is one way, and stepping in for speciation by dabbling fits the history. But I see another kind of change that is obviously a minor change/preparation as in the change in a monkey skull position showed 37 million years ago. That certainly is a dabble in the true sense of the word. I start with God in charge, whatever the terminology.

dhw: Starting with God in charge doesn’t alter the fact that your “dabbling” means direct intervention, as opposed to preprogramming (your 3.8-billion-year-old computer programme). I shall have to repeat the question I asked under “gaps are very real”: are you now saying your God is incapable of intervening without pre-planning in order to make major saltatory changes to organisms in response to environmental change?

God can intervene at any time to produce a saltation, and it doesn't necessarily have to be tied to environmental change. Saltations are planned design.

dhw: Of course “godless nature” is gratuitous. That was my point. When a scientist tells us neutrally about patterns, there is no more reason for you to say “God did it” than there is for an atheist to say “Godless nature did it.”

Fair enough