Evolution of Language (General)

by dhw, Saturday, November 02, 2019, 12:24 (1846 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Your obsessive hatred of Darwin has you lashing out in all directions. You began by telling us that moth ears were designed in advance of any need. I pointed out that the article showed the opposite. You then asked how cell communities knew in advance what they would need. I explained that they didn’t, and that they RESPONDED to current needs. And so now, for no reason whatsoever, and once again totally ignoring my response to your claims about clairvoyance, you have switched to gaps and itty bitty steps. You do not even bother to defend the “magic” you believe in. We have already agreed that Darwin was wrong when he claimed that natura non facit saltum, and even his faithful bulldog Huxley disagreed with him. Perhaps you will now respond to my post.

DAVID: I don't hate Darwin. He didn't know enough to reach the right conclusions about evolution's methods. I think his followers are totally wrong.

Just to clarify: we have agreed that common descent, the main thrust of his theory, is correct (so he and his followers are not “totally wrong”), but we do not accept his theory of random mutations and gradualism. There was absolutely no need for you to bring him into our discussion, which concerns your own theory that your God knows about every future change in environmental conditions and has either preprogrammed or dabbled every innovation in advance of those changes.

DAVID: You are skipping over my point that the needs of a new species have to be anticipated in planning for the design of the species. The designer had to know in advance ears were necessary for the moth's like style. If moths had arrived without ears and couldn't pick up evidence of predators, they would not have survived. Survival needs have to be planned in advance. Species appear abruptly after gaps, no time given for modifications, remember Gould's point.

I have repeatedly answered this point on this thread and elsewhere! If you accept common descent, then moths with ears did not appear out of the blue – moths with ears descended from pre-moths without ears, just as whales descended from pre-whales without flippers. We do not know why pre-moths took to nocturnal life, or why pre-whales took to marine life, but in both cases their adaptation to new conditions required the changes which ultimately led to speciation*** (see below for a perfect example). We are lucky enough to have evidence of transitional forms in the history of the whale. Survival does not have to be “planned in advance”. When conditions change, either existing species find new ways of coping with the changes, or they do NOT survive (= natural selection). No doubt many pre-eared moths did NOT survive either. That was why ears became necessary. Pure common sense, illustrated millions of times over by the history of life. No need for your “magic” - though highly selective (because most species have died out) - crystal ball process which you are so fixated on.

***DAVID (under “echolocation”): A very clever adaptation using land-based air breathing. Note the illustrated mechanism diagram. Another complex adaptation which makes me wonder, why bother to enter the water.

A perfect example of how organisms adapt to new conditions and thereby become new species. You don’t have to have a reverse crystal ball to guess that both pre-moths without ears and pre-whales without echolocation may have hunted by night/entered the water because by doing so they improved their chances of survival (e.g. by escaping from predators, or by gaining access to more plentiful food.)

DAVID (summarizing the article on “bacterial gut role”): ): Bacteria help us but they are not us.

dhw: No, they are not us, but they form part of the individual community which IS us, and they typify the way evolution works: cells and cell communities cooperate, and they all seem to know what they’re doing. So maybe they do know what they’re doing.

DAVID: Your interpretation is from the outside of any organism. Significance is that everything looks designed, so by your lights, 'maybe' it is designed. Dawkins says we must ignore that obvious point.

I keep agreeing that it IS designed! And my proposal is that the cells/bacteria do their own designing, and the theistic version of this theory is that your God designed the mechanisms that enable the cells/bacteria to do their own designing. We are not discussing Dawkins any more than we are discussing Darwin.