God and Evolution (Introduction)

by dhw, Monday, August 27, 2018, 09:44 (2279 days ago)

I’ve shifted this from from "Nature's Wonders", which is no longer appropriate.

DHW: Tony was talking about single organisms communicating changes to others of their kind. I am pointing out that communities subjected to the same environmental conditions will make the same changes. Multiple pre-whales, male and female, would have entered the water, and so multiple pre-whales would have developed fins from legs – not just one passing its genes onto its neighbours. But nobody knows how speciation took place. Horizontal gene transfer may well have been an important factor.

TONY: And what DHW is suggesting is so miraculous that he might as well be saying 'God did it'. How did the creatures survive long enough to determine what physiological and biochemical changes would be needed, and then how did they communicate that to the entire species? I mean, think of how much knowledge and information exchange (between members of the soon to be altered species) you are talking about, or the likelihood that they would ALL arrive at the same solution without communication.

DAVID: Those that don't get the message remain the old species, I assume. Cells communicate automatically at the multicellular level, and that must be true or the organism would not live. The single cell is an all in one and must do everything. Communication is limited to quorum sensing and gene transfer, and I consider it almost all very automatic as a series of molecular reactions.

TONY: To cells within a single organism, that is possible, however unlikely, but look at the rest of the question. How did one multi-cellular organism and another multi-cellular organism, or the cells inside them, all come to the SAME conclusion at the SAME time. It takes more than one multi-cellular organism to reproduce, in almost all cases.

DAVID: How does a single mutation in one individual get spread into the group? Chance meeting for reproduction takes too long for the times involved in the record, and species appear only after huge gaps in phenotype.

You are still talking about single organisms! So please reread what you quoted at the start of this post. I will add that the eight stages of whale development are indeed a special mystery. So please explain why your God chose to specially create these eight stages, and are you saying that he did a wooj-wooj to change every individual at the same time, or do you think he went round the world twiddling with each individual? See “Pointy eggs and whales” for more.

dhw:We know these animals are comfortable in both environments. All you’re saying is that your God did it. We are talking about your belief that your God changed organisms BEFORE the environment changed (which requires a crystal ball or total control of the environment) – as opposed to the suggestion that environmental change triggered organismal change.

DAVID: Why does an all-powerful, all-knowing God need a crystal ball?

It’s a metaphor for knowing the future, which is essential if you think your God restructured organisms before the environmental changes that they were to master or exploit.

DAVID: And why not have an unlimited God in what He knows and what He plans. You view Him as with human limitations!

dhw: Another of your straw men. In the past you have imposed limitations on him with your uncertainty as to the degree of control he exerts over the environment. The hypothesis I have proposed imposes no limitations whatsoever. Creating an evolutionary free-for-all is no different from creating free will – that would have been his choice, though of course he could intervene if he wished to.

DAVID: Not a straw man. you're the one who had Him looking into a crystal ball. And you have Him intervening or not intervening. Either He does what He wants or He can't.

You keep talking of advance planning, and that requires knowledge of the future. Why is that a limitation? Of course he does what he wants (if he exists). And if he wants a free-for-all in which he can intervene when he wants to, he is doing what he wants.

TONY: Well.....I think that is also putting a human way of thinking that I don't subscribe to. I think he does what he wants because he knows and wants whats best. I just don't think that our idea of what's best matches his idea of what's best, which causes us to question his motives and methods.
I try to take the approach of assuming that his approach is best, and then try to understand why his approach is best.

Your way of thinking is no less human than mine or David’s, and boils down to him wanting what is best, and whatever he thinks is best is best but we don’t know what it is.