Big brain evolution: comparing chimp and brain organoids (Evolution)

by David Turell , Wednesday, February 20, 2019, 22:06 (2101 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: If you believe in common descent, as opposed to separate creation, then all new organisms (apart from the very first few forms or one) are descended from earlier organisms. Put the above two comments together and you have new conditions which either require (= demands) or allow (= opportunities) existing organisms to restructure themselves as they find new ways to improve their chances of survival. Demands directly drive change, opportunities allow change, but in both cases the “immediate driving force”, to quote your own apt description, is to improve chances of survival.

From my standpoint, you are totally backwards, by agnostically ignoring God's role.."Demands directly drive" are pure Darwinism unproven theory. I view God as the designer and prime driver of Evolution. Therefore survival is an important part of how He designs the next stage in evolution, but it is always of secondary consideration compared to the design of the next more complex stage with must include provisions for necessary survival.

dhw: Then please explain why your God preprogrammed or dabbled all the different reproductive systems for dragonflies if his sole purpose was to produce the brain of H. sapiens. And please don’t tell us you don’t “try” to explain it. If it is comprehensible to you, then you must have an explanation.

You are forcing me to repeat my series of logical thoughts.God chose to design/evolve every form of life until the process produced H. sapiens. That comes from a preliminary analysis that life is much too complex to have arrived by chance, therefore had a first cause, and it had to be a mind/designer. Since I feel a chance-driven evolution cannot arrive at H. sapiens it must be the goal of the designer. I view the Cambrian 'gap' no larger than the ape/human 'gap'.

dhw: The problem also disappears if your God endowed the dragonflies’ cell communities with the intelligence to manipulate their reproductive systems – and then we don’t need to cudgel our H. sapiens brain as to why he would bother if his sole purpose was to produce that brain.

DAVID: I firmly believe God designed most of everything which obviously needs to be designed.

dhw: And according to your many posts on the subject, this includes every innovation, lifestyle and natural wonder in the history of life. I am aware of your fixed beliefs and also of the fact that you reject any hypothesis that offers a logical explanation of those aspects of your beliefs that defy logic. (See above.) The term for such beliefs is “dogma” (= a set of firm beliefs held by people who expect other people to accept these beliefs without thinking about them). You are an expert in using logic to question the dogma of atheists such as Dawkins, and also to support your belief in God, but you seem strangely reluctant to use it when discussing your fixed beliefs about your God’s possible purposes and methods.

And just why can't I be fixed for myself? I've agreed your views are logical, but only if God is not the designer.