Evolution: mutational clocks don't fit Darwin theory (Evolution)

by dhw, Friday, April 29, 2022, 11:35 (729 days ago) @ David Turell

I shan’t bother to repeat my objections to Bechly’s arguments, as you have ignored them.

dhw: You yourself believe in a mixture of common descent and direct speciation without precursors. Have you now decided that although you believe - despite the absence of fossils - in a continuous line from bacteria to humans (your God’s purpose from the very start of life), there is no continuous line from bacteria to humans (because of the absence of fossils)?

DAVID: The fossil gaps are real in the sense that phenotypic gaps are real. Bechly has previously been presented here explaining that in these 'gaps' are not fossil gaps, in that over time most fossils at those gaps have been found. In the current God/designer theory, God jumps ahead when He wishes to do so. No itty-bitty steps exist; all speciation creates a gap.

I don’t know how Bechly knows that most fossils have been found, but again I don’t know why anyone would expect a complete record covering the last 3.X billion years. However, I asked you what you believe, since you have always maintained that there is a continuous line from bacteria to humans, but this is contradicted by your belief that we are descended from Cambrian species without precursors. Your previous explanation was that all life forms are biochemical, but that doesn’t explain why, if your God’s one and only purpose was to design us and our food, he didn’t design our species and food directly. Even your version of the current theory is inconsistent. He jumps ahead when he wants to, but there are no itty bitty steps, which can only mean he always wanted to jump. Exit common descent.

DAVID:: […] it answers dhw worries about the Cambrian gap indicating God can directly create when He wishes. That is exactly what God does, hop, skip, and jump through His form of evolution.

dhw: I don’t worry about it, but I’m surprised that you can’t see how it shows up the inconsistency of your own theories. If God “can directly create when He wishes”, and his only wish was to create sapiens plus food, why did he not create us directly? Your explanation is that you can’t explain it, and “God makes sense only to Himself.”

DAVID: What is inconsistent is your wish for understanding God clarity. I can see what history shows us God did. I simply accept it. I have no need to explain it as my quotes indicate. That is why I tell you it is wholly your problem you invent for yourself to wallow in.

For the umpteenth time: history shows us a vast variety of organisms and econiches that have come and gone, with humans and current econiches as the latest. If, for argument’s sake, we accept the existence of God, history does NOT show us that God created all species and econiches individually, and it does NOT show us that every previous species and econiche was specially designed in preparation for and as part of “the goal of evolving (= designing) humans” plus our food. You do not “accept” this theory – you have invented it, and you can’t find any logic behind it, any more than you can find any logic behind the Cambrian problem outlined above.

Your unwillingness to discuss the problem of your God’s motives, methods and nature is in itself surprising, since you have devoted years of your life to thinking and also writing (brilliantly) about the problem of his existence. It seems that your interest in God ends where for some of us it would begin. Even as an agnostic, I am – just like many scientists, philosophers and theologians – eager to discuss how we got here and, if God exists, why he would have created life and what sort of being he might be. This website exists to discuss all facets of the subject, and if your only defence of your theories is that I and others should accept your inability to explain them as an explanation, I fear you are unlikely to make many converts!