David's theory of evolution Part Two (Evolution)

by dhw, Thursday, November 07, 2019, 11:44 (1841 days ago) @ dhw

Part two

DAVID: As far as your Shapiro comment is concerned, why do humans have the brain they have with consciousness? You always look to demands from new conditions. Early humans lived just like apes on ground and also in trees (Lucy evidence). Apes are still the same and we are here as sapiens. Explain the evolutionary drive! There is no natural explanation.
And:
DAVID: God in charge produced what He wanted to appear.

dhw: Of course he did. The illogicality which you yourself acknowledge is your interpretation of his wishes and how he runs the show! According to you, His wish was to produce H. sapiens, and he ran the show by deciding (you have "no idea why") not to produce H. sapiens for 3.X billion years, which meant he “had to” produce the rest of the non-human bush in order to cover the time he’d decide to take before fulfilling his wish.

DAVID: Logically evolution is everything you have described. Of course humans were the main goal per Adler. See my new entry about an early ape whose body foretells the future use.

QUOTE (from “New fossil foretells the human future”): “'Given that all living apes use bipedalism to some degree – often in the trees, but also on the ground – it is not unreasonable to suggest that bipedalism evolved much earlier in hominoid evolution than we previously thought."

DAVID: Tell me this is not an advance change well before bipedalism was really needed. Gone is the theory that savanna appearance forced the change.

Sometimes you complain that there are no transitional forms, but the moment you are confronted with transitional forms, you flounder for an explanation. Does it not occur to you that in some areas some of our ancestors would have made a good living staying up in the trees, whereas in different areas others would have found it advantageous to be up in the trees AND to be down on the ground? And eventually some of those ancestors found that ground dwelling was vastly more advantageous, and so just like pre-whales that decided to live entirely in the water, these particular pre-humans decided to live entirely on the ground, and bipedalism took over – while elsewhere, apes stayed the same. You seem to think that all apes were huddled up in one place all under the same unchanging environmental conditions. And do please tell us why your God – who you insist wanted nothing but H. sapiens - would have popped in to fiddle here, fiddle there, half and half, itty-bitty changes, before at long last coming up with the only species he ever really wanted – bipedalling H. sapiens?

DAVID: I found an article which said earless moths did exist, but our discussion started with an article that said eared moths predated bats by many years, as if planned:

dhw: It does not say “as if planned”, by which you mean your God gave some moths ears in preparation for when they would become nocturnal and then have to cope with bats. What makes you think that a sense of hearing would not have been useful for diurnal moths?

DAVID: Earless moths survived, according to the article by not being nocturnal.

So some diurnal moths survived without ears, some diurnal moths survived with ears, and nocturnal moths were jolly glad to have ears.

DAVID: That is no answer as to why moths have ears well before bats appeared…

dhw: Because maybe a sense of hearing was useful even in daytime, for instance to hear approaching predators. Why do you think your God would have given them ears well before he produced bats? “Wow,” said God, gazing into his crystal ball, “I’ve got them damn bats comin’ in a million years’ time. I’d better give them there moths ears now before...um...before I forget.(?)”

DAVID: This is only one of many findings of pre-planning I have presented. see the new one. And note George does not like your cellular intelligence theory.

Thank you for withdrawing the eared moths as an example of your God’s pre-planning. All your many “findings of pre-planning” have been dealt with in the same way, and I have dealt with the new one above. George doesn’t know anything about the (not just “my”) cellular intelligence theory. He still believes in chance and unknown physical laws. Note to George: the interaction between cellular intelligence and changing environmental conditions as the driving force behind evolution is an alternative to random mutations. Natural selection only determines which anatomical changes survive and which do not. The concept itself is neither theistic nor atheistic, as it does not deal with the origin of cellular intelligence.

dhw: I have suggested that the expanded brain was caused by the pre-sapiens brain cells responding to new concepts and/or conditions that exceeded the capacity of the existing brain.

DAVID: So the existing brain grew by 200 cc by no planned design for the connected parts? You think the existing neurons knew what to design. Pipe dream is all I can consider this. Design required.

The parts are always connected, and yes, the neurons are key players in coordinating the brain’s response to new demands, either by expansion or by complexification. (Note the John Lieff quote about neurons.) Yes, design required – as in cellular communities responding intelligently to new conditions – but no to divine dabbling in anticipation of any need for change.