Natures wonders: squid eye lens focuses exactly (Introduction)

by dhw, Wednesday, August 16, 2017, 08:57 (2654 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Of course it’s an obvious truth, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with your God’s sole purpose being the production of the human brain! It simply means that all life needs energy! Life went on without the human brain, and it can continue without the human brain.
DAVID: But you have not explained the appearance of the human brain.

I challenged your claim that God’s sole purpose was the production of the human brain, which does not fit in with the higgledy-piggledy bush of evolution. You replied that the bush “provides the balance of nature for life to continue”. That is a complete non sequitur, as I have pointed out. And so you change the subject! Your anthropocentric interpretation of your God’s purpose does not fit in with the history of life.

DAVID: It is obvious the apes did not need it for survival, so that argument is out. But evolution comes with a drive to complexity, which the bacteria shows us is not needed, so that argument must lead us to the conclusion that evolution is driven by forces that do not relate to survival but do lead to improvement and/or complexity to explain the human brain. Only an outside influence/guidance can explain those unnecessary drives.

Since bacteria survived, it’s not just the human brain that requires explanation. Bacteria as you keep reminding me don’t have brains, so we have to explain EVERY brain and every other innovation that led to humans, dinosaurs, whales and the duck-billed platypus. We agree that there has to be a drive for improvement (me), complexity (you). The drive may have been initiated by your God, if he exists, but in terms of the history of evolution, I suggest that it is built into and implemented by organisms themselves, whereas you believe that every innovation was preprogrammed 3.8 billion years ago or personally dabbled by your God. I think we’ve been here before.

dhw: ...yes there has to be a first cause, which may or may not be a conscious being or unconscious energy and matter. That’s as far as we can go, unless we shut our minds and jump to faith in one explanation or the other.
DAVID: Nothing wrong with faith, when it is arrived at with logical thought.

I agree. Dawkins would also agree, if only he would recognize that his logical trust in materialism is faith.