Balance of nature: man making a bad balance (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, November 08, 2016, 11:57 (2937 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: …. There is no balance of nature that "works correctly" - there is only a particular balance of nature that suits particular organisms at any given time.

DAVID: You are right, but, there is a vast difference between your examples: " This process may result in innovations (the Cambrian) or extinctions (Chicxulub)". Chicxulub has an obvious mechanism, while the Cambrian is unexplained. This is an important difference to think about. The Cambrian requires agency, while Chicxulub is simply an extension of objects flying around all through the development of the solar system, a physical process.

Why would the Cambrian not have been a physical process? Whatever changes in the environment - an increase in oxygen? - triggered all the innovations would surely have had a physical cause. (Or are you suggesting that there was no change in the environment?) You can argue that God was the "agency" that threw Chixculub and organized the physical factors that caused the changed environment. Or you can argue that in one case or both, the factors were determined by luck – good or bad.