Evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Monday, March 24, 2008, 07:50 (6089 days ago) @ David Turell

My thanks to George Jelliss and David Turell for two interesting answers. - George thinks I have difficulty divesting myself of the "anthropomorphic or 'élan vital' way of thinking", speaking of matter as if it "had a 'self', was 'conscious' and had a creative will or life force of its own, urging it on to evolve. None of this is the case." - I agree totally that this is not the case, and that is precisely the problem. Since matter has no consciousness, no creative will, no urge to evolve, how could it spontaneously, randomly, accidentally transform itself in such a way that new, complex and functioning organs are created within it? Natural selection ... which I too find convincing and aesthetically pleasing ... works on what exists; it doesn't create anything new. It therefore provides no explanation. To believe in the creativity of random mutations requires absolute faith in unconscious chance to achieve wonders far beyond the scope of even our most brilliant inventors. - David's response takes us back to the very beginning, with an initial coding system that would allow for all these changes. "The issue is information. Where did it come from? My answer is from intelligence. Only an intelligence can make a code." The concept of an intelligence designing that initial self-replicating molecule with its hugely versatile programme, allowing for an infinite range of variations and developments, certainly gets rid of the need to trust in chance as an explanation of origins. Creation by mutation would be built into the programme. George asks: "Where did the intelligence come from in the first place? Only evolution can make intelligence. Your argument is circular." David is arguing for an outside intelligence (i.e. a deity), and George's statement ("Only evolution....") is simply atheist belief masquerading as fact. - However, George's question ("Where...?") is only one of many that arise from the intelligence theory. What is its nature? Is it still around? What is/was its motivation? And despite its explanatory value in relation to life on Earth, doesn't it simply replace one mystery with another which, if anything, is even further removed from our capability of knowing? How can one actually believe, with inner conviction (by which I mean emotionally as well as intellectually) in something so nebulous, so remote, so unfathomable? Religion offers answers, but they are so confused, fantastic and contradictory that they require the same irrational faith needed by those who believe in chance.