DILEMMAS (Evolution)

by David Turell , Saturday, November 01, 2014, 14:50 (3673 days ago) @ dhw


> dhw: You have gone back to these wretched guidelines, which we had agreed constituted the restrictions on what an organism can do, and the conditions imposed by the environment. -I look at the degree of complexity. You like to skip over the need for advanced planning. Highly complex innovations require that, and it beyond my concept of an IM, which I see as modification of patterned advances.-> dhw: Either God created a programme for three generations of the butterflies to live, reproduce and die, and the fourth to migrate, or he dabbled, or they worked it out for themselves.-Metamorphosis is highly complex, in which an early form dissolves into a pile of goo and a totally new life form appears. It is as if one new species morphs into an entirely different species, but it is the same animal in a 'now you see me now you don't'.-> dhw: Under “Nature's balance” you thought the IM of ants could handle the construction of their immensely complex cities “by learned experience”.-I remember referring to ants forming rafts for a flood. That an IM could handle. Can you show me the cities reference, so I may review it. Still mulling. -> dhw: Why do you think the monarch butterfly's IM is incapable of learning from experience and applying what it has learned? And why do you think God - whose evolutionary purpose you believe to have been the creation of humans - would have chosen to create a special programme for monarch butterflies, or would have dabbled to make the monarch behave in this special way?-Balance of nature. Butterflies help pollination and are food for others. You want a caterpillar form to figure out how to grow wings and fly.