David's theory of evolution Part Two (Evolution)

by David Turell , Sunday, April 05, 2020, 21:40 (1691 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: Of course I think God ran/runs evolution. My two earlier thoughts are still the same: preplanning and preprogramming and dabbling along the way are probably ways God did it. But if He wanted a course change He dabbled. Of course dabbling (the bold above) is direct creation; what else can it be?

dhw: You wrote: “His patterns tell me He prefers to evolve each creation, rather than direct creation.” Now you are telling us that if he wants a course change, he uses direct creation. So we now have either a 3.8-billion-year-old programme for evolution or we have direct creation. Humans were apparently a direct creation, but for some unknown reason, he only directly created H. sapiens – his one purpose – by directly creating bits and pieces in other forms of human before directly putting them all together, although of course he is all powerful and can achieve his purpose any way he chooses. No wonder you tell us not to look for his reasons.

My summary today (Sunday, April 05, 2020, 21:10) summarizes that I now think God directly dabbles most advances/ new speciation and preprogramming may have a minor role.

DAVID: As for the Cambrian/ human explosion comparison, in a definite sense our brain does not have a real ancestor, Adler's point. Your constant implied demand for direct creation of humans is what raised my objection to it.

dhw: How anyone can claim that our brain does not have an ancestor is beyond me, when all our ancestors have brains, with many features in common with ours. Whatever happened to the common descent you used to believe in? I don’t demand direct creation of humans! It is you who have told us that humans are a direct creation, and so I ask you why he directly created lots of different humans when, in his all-powerfulness, he could have directly created the only one he wanted. Ah, apparently it’s because that’s what he wanted to do, but we mustn’t ask why.

The usual distortion of my thinking. No question God uses common descent, but as I said clearly above, the giant gap in brain function from Erectus to sapiens has a special significance. Sure our brain is based on that primitive form but the 200 cc enlargement is all prefrontal cortex with undoubtedly highly complex new neuronal networks for the soul to use, not to mention alterations on the cerebellum that help with language development.

DAVID: Again, your view of God is that He did not use human reasoning to decide how to evolve. Do you read what I write? God evolved the Earth to prepare for a survivable evolution of life with the proper-sized bush.

dhw: What is the “proper-sized bush” for the fulfilment of his one and only purpose, to create H. sapiens? 3.X billion years’ worth of non-human life forms and natural wonders etc., 99% of which must go extinct!? What is your criterion for "proper"?

Why do you ask that question when you fully should know the answer from my previous comments? The current human population requires a bush of that size and in fact we have created food farms with chicken ranches, huge beef herds, manufactured vegetables in a meat substitute form.

DAVID: I accept what God did as shown by the historical events. It is you who want to dig in and ascertain, somehow, God's exact reasoning for all he did and why He did it.

dhw: It is you who insist that you know the reason for all he did and why he did it: the “why” was to specially design H. sapiens, and the reason for the bush was to keep life going until he did what he wanted to do, although he could have done it any other way he chose. What made you “dig” into evolution and come up with such an illogical conclusion?

Not illogical if you would only read Adler.

DAVID: Note religions will give you all the answers you want, all from human reasoning. I carefully avoid that approach. why don't you? I am not a fideist. My faith comes after I studied the science and other opinions. Never a rote regurgitation from religious teaching. I am convinced there must be a designer. And you recognize design, and then full stop.

dhw: Why bring religion into it? I have accepted your argument for design, but I challenge your illogical interpretation of the designer’s combined purpose and motive. I also offer logical alternatives, but then you grumble that we mustn't humanize a God who could very well think like us and probably has similar thought patterns to ours.

I don't grumble. God's purpose in creating us is obvious. Of course we must not humanize him as you constantly prefer to do.