Precambrian environment (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, October 31, 2013, 17:32 (4018 days ago) @ dhw


> dhw: One theory is that the Cambrian explosion occurred because of an increase in oxygen. I really can't see anything in the article that undermines that theory. But of course it needn't be so. We just feel there must have been a trigger. Presumably your suggestion is that your God suddenly stepped in...but to do what, exactly? Change the environment (back to oxygen), or shove a few extra programmes into the automatons?-I have no idea. It is clear that Darwin was worried about the Cambrian. His worry has only gotten much worse. No honest precursors, and then extreme complexity.
 
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> dhw: Cooperation between cells and cell communities. That is how innovations take place, whether preprogrammed or not! Cooperation has been observed on a huge scale. You as a doctor are more aware of the science than I am, but even I know that without cooperation between the different cell communities in my body, I would be dead. The question is not whether they cooperate, but why they cooperate. You say they are preprogrammed to do so, and of course once the pattern of behaviour is established (the organ works), each cell ... like each ant ... plays its assigned role(s), but that does not explain how already functioning cell communities came up with new ideas. THAT is the great mystery.-Not to me. They follow a plan they were given. You cannot make a kidney from scratch. And there were kidney-like organs in the Cambrian. Plans require a preexisting intelligence to make the plan.