More about how evolution works: multicellularity (Evolution)

by dhw, Wednesday, November 02, 2016, 12:58 (2941 days ago) @ David Turell

Dhw: …What aspects of my evolutionary hypothesis and of my teleological hypothesis do not fit in with the history of life as we know it?
DAVID: …I've read some books on religion's view of God's role and the idea of 'his own entertainment' has never appeared. His state of purpose is an interpretation of his mind which cannot be derived from the history of evolution, except as a human supposition. The usual purpose is to create humans out of love and be a loving God.

If you have not had a personal meeting with your God, then of course his purpose can only be derived by supposition. And that can only be derived from human beings’ subjective experiences and interpretations of the world - either their own or other people’s (e.g. from books). You thought his purpose in designing the vast range of wonders extant and extinct was to produce humans who could have direct relations with him, although he hides behind a quantum wall. I don’t see why he had to design all the wonders in order to produce us, or how one can have direct relations with a being that is hidden. (Having faith that something exists hardly constitutes a direct relationship.) But I agree that he is hidden. So I ask why else he might be hidden. Perhaps he’s lost interest? Or perhaps he’s watching and occasionally secretly dabbling because he enjoys the ever-changing spectacle, which includes humans. Why is this hypothesis less believable and more of a supposition than yours, and what aspects do not fit in with the history of life as we know it?

DAVID: Good review of possibilities. I come down on the side of God under tight control.

dhw: Fair enough. So God was in tight control of all the environmental changes you previously described as accidental, and the extinction of organisms had nothing to do with Raup’s “bad luck” – as previously explained by you – but was tightly controlled by your God, and he ensured that certain organisms were inadequate to cope with the changes, in contrast to your earlier claim that he did not create inadequate organisms.

DAVID: He did not create inadequate organisms. On the contrary, at the time they existed they were perfectly adequate, but not for changes that appeared later on...

So although your God was in tight control of, say, Chixculub, and ensured that only pre-pre-pre-pre-humans were adequate to survive, did he lose his tight control of the organisms you described as “inadequate for the stress”? Or did he deliberately (tight control) make them “inadequate for the stress”? Or were Chicxculub and its consequences out of his control after all?

DAVID: ...That is obvious, and you seem to be twisting that understanding of evolution from the standpoint of how God acted. Both types of changes occurred, i.e., oxygen good, Chicxulub, bad, and had different effects.

Of course both occurred. And you have given your God tight control of both. So once again: how come he designed some organisms that were “adequate” and others that were “inadequate" for the stress of the bad? Or are you now going to scoot back to Raup’s “bad luck” and say goodbye to God’s “tight control”? Your next comment shows that you well aware of your problem:

DAVID: All I have raised is the possibility that God did have careful control of the environment. I have no proof, but suspect He had controls in place.

You didn’t raise it. I pointed out the contradictions in your evolutionary scenario and tried to pin you down so that we could iron them out. You came down on the side of God “under tight control”. Now you say it was possible. Just a suspicion. Therefore it was also possible that he was not in tight control. And so once again you are stuck with all the contradictions I have listed in my “fair enough” comment.
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dhw: I have no idea why your God or organisms themselves should create complexity for no reason other than complexity.
DAVID: Answer, the only road to humans is increasing complexity.
dhw: …The only road to every single multicellular organism you can think of is increasing complexity… Instead of them all saying, “I wanner be more complex so one day I might be a human”, I suggest they might have said, “I wanner try adding this bit to see if I can improve my way of life.”

DAVID: We simply continue to have different interpretations. You have never justified the complexity appearing after bacteria. I again ask, why bother? You have not demonstrated a 'need' for it to happen, only 'desire' in your current statement.

For some reason you are fixated on need, although you acknowledge that there was no need for evolution to progress beyond bacteria. I thought I’d already made it clear that I have added the drive (desire, if you like) for improvement to the need for survival, and that explains why multicellularity led to organisms (cells) combining in different ways to create new forms of life. This drive and its mechanisms may have been planted by your God at the start of life, instead of him planting billions of different programmes (some adequate and some inadequate) to be switched on whenever the environment accidentally changed or he deliberately changed it – whichever view you favour on any particular day!