Genome complexity: seemingly not in obvious DNA (Introduction)

by David Turell , Wednesday, July 08, 2020, 17:54 (1387 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: And I do not believe cell committees can create new species, which is your claim.

dhw: I gave you a full response to your claim that in the context of brain/skull/pelvis, my theory required clairvoyance. It doesn’t. Skull responds to requirements of brain, pelvis responds to requirements of foetus. No simultaneity, no clairvoyance.

This response is an exact description of simultaneity. One change cannot follow another!

DAVID: Nothing 'put paid'. The new pelvis for upright posture and birthing large baby brain was a complicated redesign of the pelvis. Please remember Lucy had a tiny brain but her pelvis had adapted for mainly upright locomotion. Real brain expansion followed this in newer species. But the resultant very new pelvic shape still requires our difficult births. It is a trade off: we have full use of arms and hands and apes do not.

dhw: I am not disputing any of this! Your theory is that your God kept on simultaneously enlarging brains, skulls and pelvises overnight. I suggest that the enlargements would have been sequent and would have required time.

Same mess. All changes must occur at the same time for survival of baby and/or mother.

DAVID: As for why God took time, please remember my observation that God likes to evolve: the universe, the giant Milky Way which gobbled/es up satellite galaxies, the Earth, and then life. You never deny this, just ignore it.

dhw: There is no point in denying the blindingly obvious fact that evolution took time! But according to you, each enlargement was abrupt – it did not take time, because your God dabbled each one. And to make matters worse, you say he could easily solve what is still a problem that causes difficulty. So why didn’t he?

Never said it. Human pelvis has required shape for upright posture, results in hard births.

DAVID: Again glossing over 'cell intelligence'. It had a definite cause, but dhw's wishy-washy discussion leaves the source hanging. Chance or God the designer?

dhw: I am delighted that your comment offers no opposition to the theory of cellular intelligence. I don’t “gloss over” the cause – I openly admit that I don’t know whether it’s chance, God, or some form of panpsychism.

DAVID: The 'glossing over' refers to a source of the appearance of 'cellular intelligence', which you have just enumerated, adding panpsychism, a nebulous invention that simply pushed further away the issue of where did panpsychism come from, if it even exists? I remind cells follow intelligent instructions implanted by God so they will function properly.

dhw: “Just enumerated, adding panpsychism…”? I have ALWAYS allowed for God as the inventor of cellular intelligence, and for years I have included a form of panpsychism in my list of possible “first causes”. The issue of where panpsychism came from, if it even exists, applies equally to your God. I don’t know why you are “reminding” me of your theory that 3.8 billion years ago your God programmed the first cells to pass on instructions for every single undabbled development in evolution, including life forms, econiches, strategies, lifestyles, natural wonders, responses to diseases etc. I remain stubbornly convinced that this is just a little far-fetched, and perhaps one might just consider the possibility that your God provided cells with the intelligence to design all of these themselves.

To repeat from above, cells follow intelligent instructions given to them by God. Of course, you have forgotten Behe's very strong exposition which shows DNA devolves to advance evolution, strongly suggesting the instructions were there from the beginning.