Human evolution; our complex speech mechanism (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, May 15, 2019, 18:07 (2017 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: I rely on you to inform me about McCrone’s findings and arguments. If all the changes were present in habilis and erectus, does he think they communicated without using their voices to make sounds, and how does he know that they were not able to make some of the sounds that are now used in modern speech? Is there a tape recording?

I notice you have skipped over this point. Please tell us how McCrone knows that pre-sapiens did not use his larynx and epiglottis to make sounds now made by H. sapiens.

I said Mc Crone did describe them talking at five, six words per minute, remember?

DAVID: And I've written such a mechanism must contain God's guidelines, and you have refused to accept that limitation which means your mechanism allows that God is not entirely in control.

dhw: The only “guidelines” you can offer are a 3.8-billion-year-old computer programme for epiglottises and larynxes and every other evolutionary change in life’s history, or your God performing ad hoc operations on individual organisms. Yes, in my theistic hypothesis, my autonomous mechanism means God deliberately creates a free-for-all while still having the option to dabble if he feels like it. How do you know your God does not want some unpredictability to add to the interest?

As usual I think your concept humanizes God. I view Him as knowing exactly what He wants

DAVID: Same old mantra. I accept that God chose the method He did. You can't refute that point, so you keep repeating I have 'no idea', but I do.

dhw: In your own words, you have “no idea why God chose to evolve humans over time”. We agree that if God exists, he chose evolution to fulfil his purposes. That is a million miles away from saying that he chose your interpretation of evolution (every life form etc. specially preprogrammed or dabbled) to fulfil your interpretation of his purpose (to specially design humans). See "Unanswered questions" for your concept of evolution which so blatantly contradicts your concept of your God's purpose.

What is evolution but the development of all the forms that evolution has produced? If God is in change, the history of what He did is clear. And humans are certainly specially designed, compared to everything else