Natures wonders: ants farm fungus for food (Introduction)

by dhw, Sunday, April 23, 2017, 10:42 (2769 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: You miss the whole point. Without the physical training they could never have gotten across the Gulf of Mexico to that special set of mountains with the milkweed. And then get back following Spring again across the Gulf to those special spots in Texas, of which my ranch is one. And then again, who gave them the guidance mechanism to follow the same paths back and forth. And again you are skipping all the metamorphoses which have to carry the memory of what the first discoverers imparted to the next generation, four changes of form removed.

You wrote “Setting out helter-skelter simply leads to death”, and I pointed out that the original migrants would probably have set out helter-skelter and many would have died, but those who found the milkweed survived and passed on the information. I have now said repeatedly that no one knows how they found the physical strength to make the long journey, but I am not convinced that your God would have preprogrammed them or personally tutored them for the sake of producing humans. I am not skipping the metamorphoses. I have no idea why four generations are needed before migration, but it is clear that the information IS passed on. What is your theory about the four changes?

DAVID: I'm sure He watches and adjusts as necessary. I've agreed that an IM might exist to create the changes under His guidelines. I think tony agrees.
dhw: Guidelines” is one of your nice woolly expressions. If God created an autonomous inventive mechanism (intelligence), it would have worked autonomously. “Adjusts as necessary”? Do you mean the monarch turned left instead of right so God redirected it? The weaverbird’s knot came undone, so God gave it a twiddle? What other “guidelines” do you have in mind for the autonomous mechanism?
DAVID: Definite instructions of how to proceed with speciation, not twiddling over a messy knot.

But you do not confine your divine preprogramming/dabbling to speciation. You insist that only God could have designed all the natural wonders you have listed, including the weaverbird’s nest. That is one of the major disagreements between us. Either the bird designed it autonomously or God did. But no, according to you, God gave it “guidelines”.

dhw: I do not see how the blindingly obvious fact that all organisms needed food, still need food, and will go on needing food proves that God designed the weaverbird’s nest and every other natural wonder throughout the history of life so far, only in order that humans could have food.
DAVID: No, it is clear to see everyone who is alive has to eat, from bacteria to humans. Why do you insist it is just for humans? My point is it took time for humans to evolve and the bush of life provides a balance of nature with a source of food, so everyone has food.

It is YOU who insist that it is just for humans! We do not need to be told that it took time for humans to evolve, or that every organism needs food, or that the bush of life provides food – though not for everyone, because sometimes there is not enough food and so some species die out. These are all self-evident observations. The disagreement is over YOUR insistence that God’s one and only purpose was the production of humans and EVERYTHING ELSE WAS RELATED TO THAT. Your words, not mine!