Intelligence & Evolution (Evolution)

by David Turell , Wednesday, November 20, 2013, 15:35 (4020 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: A cell with its own form of intelligence would also have to be amazingly complex. At least I can quote some scientists in the field who support that idea. You cite Paul Davies as supporting you, but I can find no mention of your divine preprogramming-plus-dabbling anthropocentric theory (do please give me a reference), and he doesn't even accept your attack on Darwin. -It is my idea, no reference except in my head.
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> DAVIES: "Although the pathway from microbes to complex thinking beings like humans may still be a very difficult one, at least we know the mechanism whereby it happens — Darwinian evolution."
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> dhw: Davies accepts that evolution happened, and so do you. Why, then, this constant sniping at Darwin? What else apart from random mutations and gradualism makes you so hostile?-I have every right to use Davies as I wish. I agree that some process of evolution occurred but it may not be by the simplistic way Darwin proposed from his ignorance of what we now know. The weaknesses in Darwinism are more than gradualism and randon mutations. Most mutations are detrimental. The theory sounds like a simple dramatic process, but: doesn't tell us how species appear (there is a guess); natural selection is another way of saying survival of the fittest, a tautology, so NS is a passive process; fittest is not well-defined philosophically, but most Darwinists use reproductive success, and that may not be the right approch to fitness, if fitness is even a factor. For example the first human forms were very vulnerable, a dangerous step forward. How to interpret fitness here? In summary, I look at all the critical reviews of Darwin and I find them reasonable. You should read them also. The Darwin explanation is too glib, very slick and tells us little except we evolved somehow, and it ain't simple.