How children pick up a language: new review of Wolfe (Humans)

by dhw, Tuesday, November 08, 2016, 12:07 (2936 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: In total contrast to Darwin I accept saltation, but that has nothing whatsoever to do with your brand new contention that new species appear immediately in large numbers. How can you possibly know that? A saltation can take place in a single individual. As I envisage the process, a successful innovation will be passed on by individuals and within a few generations will have created large numbers.
DAVID: You are still using Darwin, whether you recognize it or not. A saltation in a single individual is a new mutation, nothing more.

A saltation is a saltation, whether it takes place in an individual or a large number of individuals, and of course it’s a mutation. That simply means it’s a change.

DAVID: You have forgotten the Wistar Institute math conference in 1966 (quoted in my first book) on the mathematical impossibility of evolution as envisioned by Darwin. J.B.S. Haldane ten years previous, a famous math/geneticist/Darwinist had published a paper with the same conclusion, now called 'Haldane's Dilemma', not enough time.

Not enough time for Darwin’s randomness. But substitute intelligence for randomness and there is ample time. The intelligence you substitute is God’s. The intelligence I substitute is that (perhaps God-given) of the cell communities. What does that have to do with your claim that innovations must have taken place in large numbers all at the same time?

DAVID: Now it is known that it is not a single mutation but a series of cooperative mutations are required for a new species, further making the time intervals too short.

Of course the mutation involves cooperation between the cell communities. And successful mutations (= saltatory changes to an organism) will be passed on to subsequent generations, even if they only start with one or a few individuals.

DAVID: A true saltation in a new species involves body plans and new biologic processes. Look at the whale series as an example. Those gaps are huge. The human species have huge gaps with long maturity cycles that average 20 years a generation. That is the saltation issue I see.

None of this means that saltations have to take place in large numbers of organisms all at the same time, as opposed to one or just a few individuals, and there is no issue between us on the subject of gaps. A saltation is a jump, and we agree that Darwin was wrong when he said that nature does not jump.

dhw: You challenge me on the subject of God’s purpose, and when I offer an alternative to your own, you dismiss it as “humanizing” God, which is precisely what you do yourself with your own version of his purpose.
DAVID: God as 'a person like no other person' can have a goal without being humanized. His goal is obviously producing humans, since they are here against all need or reason. Enjoyment is a human emotion, and certainly does not have to be His thought!

Nothing “has to be his thought”. We can only speculate on his thought. All multicellular forms of life are here against all need. Improvement is a possible reason. If God created life he must have had a purpose. You say humans. If God produced humans, he must have had a purpose. So what was his purpose in producing humans? Try and answer without “humanizing” God. You tried: to have direct relations with him; I think you once mentioned to have them study and understand his works. We can only speculate in human terms, and why shouldn’t we? If, as you believe, we are in his image, why should that NOT mean that we have some of his attributes? Your speculation that he is without emotion has no more evidence than mine that he could have emotion.

dhw: I want to know why you cannot conceive of God creating a mechanism that will produce all the different forms of life as a spectacle he can enjoy, and why you consider complexity for its own sake a more rational driving force than complexity for the sake of improvement.

DAVID: I think God maintains full control without the human emotion of enjoyment. And complexity is the key in order to reach the most complex organisms of all, humans! Improvement, of course, comes with complexity, but evolution proves complexity is not needed as shown by bacteria. Very obvious.

And many people think God loves them. Why is your emotionless God more likely for you than theirs or mine, and why do you think God wants relations with us?

We know that neither complexity nor improvement was needed. But if you claim that the purpose of complexity was to produce humans, you might just as well say that the purpose of improvement was to produce humans. I cannot see the point of complexity for its own sake, and I cannot see how ALL the complexities of life’s history can be related to the production of humans. The motivation for complexity has to explain all the millions of innovations and natural wonders, extant and extinct, which mark that history. That is why the weaverbird’s nest is so important. I argue that each organism designs what suits it best (= an improvement for them). You argue that God designs them all for the sake of humans. I can’t see the relevance of the weaverbird’s nest to the production of humans.