EVOLUTION AND PURPOSE (Evolution)

by David Turell , Wednesday, December 02, 2015, 03:08 (3278 days ago) @ dhw


> dhw: Not “of course brains appeared”, but new conditions enabled existing organisms to use their intelligence inventively. The sticking point is whether they have that kind of intelligence. ...If organisms used the new chance conditions inventively, their innovations were not by chance. .... it's a case of organisms using the new environment for their own purposes.-You are now proposing, perhaps inadvertently, a sort 'drive to complexity theory' like mine. Darwin proposed changes or adaptations due to challenges. Many Darwinists still view evolution this way, but we have discussed fossil series leading to current organisms for no apparent reason than advancing complexity. 
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> dhw: So if horses were free to work out their own unidactyl variation, let's see how far we can go. -I don't know if hoofed animals did this one their own. Deer use two fingers. it is part of a developmental pattern, as other patterns I've described.->dhw: If God exists, yes, I can certainly see purpose in his bringing us into existence.-Good.-> dhw: There is, however, no need to assume that it was his intention right from the start and the whole of evolution was geared to us. But you cannot bear the thought of your God experimenting, or not knowing what he was doing, or going wrong, so you would rather put up with the illogicality of dead dinosaurs and waddling platypuses and zillions of lifeless solar systems.-They are illogical to you, not to me. That is a major difference. You want everything neatly as you would have planned it. However, you are not God.