Evolution v Creationism: guided evolution? dhw? (Evolution)

by dhw, Thursday, April 09, 2015, 19:09 (3514 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: No-one claims that individual molecules have a brain! As you know perfectly well, the argument is that cells/cell communities have a brain equivalent which coordinates all the molecular activity. As for your final sentence, Shapiro says: “Large organisms chauvinism, we like to think that only we can do things in a cognitive way.” (See also “Quorum sensing”)-DAVID: Same old problem: either the one celled act intelligently because they have a degree of it ,or they act intelligently because they are following implicit instructions. No one can tell which.-If no one knows, why do you keep insisting that they are automatons?-DAVID: There is no reason for multicellularity or for any change from just bacteria. 
dhw: An autonomous inventive mechanism would explain the change. Some single cells remained single while others merged to launch multicellularity.-DAVID: I have agreed but we still don't know why multicellularity happened by what process or for what reason. It is a difficult step for evolution, and offers a reason to consider design or guidance.-The reason would be self-improvement. I do not dismiss design or guidance. My problem is your vacillation over the concept of an inventive mechanism (possibly designed by your God) as opposed to preprogramming of the first cells or dabbling. Here you appear open to it, but in your post under “Quorum sensing” today, you are adamant that bacteria are automatons.
 
In order to save unnecessary repetition, let me point out that under “Quorum sensing” you are as usual focusing on cell communities that are already established. The whole point of the “inventive mechanism” is that it is inventive, i.e. the hypothesis explains how innovations may have taken place, not how they function once they have proved successful.
 
dhw: You have reversed my concept! My single cell guys did NOT know everything from the beginning. That is the whole point. They cooperated, and as the environment changed, so they adapted or innovated (or died). Hence the higgledy-piggledy extinctions, weird forms and lifestyles of evolution. -DAVID: It is a nice thesis. Finds a nice third way around God or UI guidance. Something makes all of life very inventive. I have my choice. you have yours.-Yet again, it does not have to find a way round God. We still need to find a source. And you can even have a bit of guidance through the occasional dabble. But continuous dabbling = Creationism. Your choice depends on your belief (a) that God set out to create humans, and (b) that he knew right from the start how to do it. This has nothing to do with science, and nothing to do with belief in God. It is entirely based on your attempt to read the mind of your God - the very danger you keep warning the rest of us to avoid!
 
I would still like to know whether you think your God preprogrammed the first cells with the weaverbird's nest, dabbled, or gave the bird a list of options while at the same time preprogramming its choice.