Convoluted human evolution: a branch is missing (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, August 11, 2017, 10:40 (2662 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: You wrote that God allowed “invention under guidelines”. I am only trying to find out how you distinguish between guidelines (provided by God) and invention (by the organisms). If you are now saying that God drew up all the plans, what exactly did the pre-whales invent? Or, to use your building analogy, are you now defining invention as automatically carrying out instructions?

DAVID: You want exactitude and I don't have it. God does not let me in on his methods. I start with the premise that God is in control and uses an evolutionary method. Advances in form follow plans or guidelines. Perhaps it is better to leave out the word invention and say the advancing animal form is initiated on a timetable. Since evolution requires so much time it is possible the organisms play a role in when to initiate.

If God exists, and if you believe in evolution, then of course God uses evolutionary methods. But you are very precise in your account of his methods. Over and over again you tell us that either he preprogrammed every innovation, lifestyle and natural wonder 3.8 billion years ago, or he personally dabbled them. You even go so far as to tell us that he restructured organisms before their environment changed. And you tell us that all of these programmes and dabblings served the single purpose of producing the human brain. These are the “exactitudes” I keep challenging because they simply don’t add up. (No need for us to go over the long list of illogicalities again.) Now, when challenged, you jettison your “invention under guidelines” and have pre-whales making no decisions or changes of their own other than possibly deciding when to switch on God’s 3.8-billion-year-old programme for blowholes, all for the sake of the human brain. Does that really make sense to you?