Miscellany (General)

by dhw, Saturday, September 04, 2021, 09:33 (966 days ago) @ David Turell

New amphibious whale
DAVID: A designer directly using His mental powers to design is much easier to accomplish than teaching cells how to design a required design to cover future needs for the next species.

dhw: Who said anything about teaching cells how to design a required design? That means giving them instructions!!! Intelligent cells would work out their own designs – not to cover future needs, but to respond to current needs! Why do you think your God is incapable of designing such cells?

DAVID: You are again asking for a second-hand design system, much more difficult and much more cumbersome than direct hands on.

Why is it more difficult and cumbersome for God to invent a single mechanism which will be capable of autonomously making each decision, performing each operation, coping with each new situation, than for him to keep popping in and doing it all himself "hands on"?

Introducing the brain
QUOTES: Both kinds of neurons receive incoming signals and, based on that information, decide whether to send their own signal to other neurons.
In most of the networks, that equated to about 1,000 artificial neurons for just one biological neuron.

DAVID: This study from AI shows how very complex a single neuron is in its potential activities. Not by chance.

dhw: I’d say that with all these potential activities, the neuron needs a fair degree of intelligence to decide what signals to send to the other members of the cell community. Wouldn’t you?

DAVID: Just lots of intelligent instructions for the neuron to act on.

So does every neuron receive instructions handed down from 3.8 billion years ago, or alternatively, does God pop in to tell every neuron what to do?

Back to New amphibious whale
dhw: But you dismiss the theory because my human proposal is somehow more human than your human proposal. Anyway, do please give us your other reasons for why we are here.[/i]

DAVID: Well, we extremely exceptional ones are here and He did lots of creating to get us here. Remember our battle is over why he wanted us as His goal.

I remember all too well that you believe we were his one and only goal (which apparently is why he created all those life forms that had no connection with us), and I remember all too well asking WHY he wanted us as his goal, so why don’t you answer?

LANGUAGE ACQUISITION
DAVID: If you are correct, it is counter to today's linguist theories. I can only read the opinions along with yours.

dhw: It is obvious from the article I quoted that there are different theories. I do wish you would tell us why you disagree with the above observations instead of suggesting that today’s linguists are all Chomsky fans. Have you done a survey?

DAVID: We've covered the arguments about the importance of recursion, and the one language without it.

dhw: No we haven’t, and what on earth has that got to do with your claim that today’s linguists agree with Chomsky that the brain is “hard-wired for syntax”? Some do and some don’t. Now please tell us why you disagree with the “copying” theory so vividly demonstrated by feral children.

DAVID: I didn't disagree. I thought it was an interesting point. And we did cover the argument about recursion.

As regards recursion, that must have been in an earlier discussion, and has no relevance here. You claimed that today’s linguists accepted Chomsky, whereas many do not, and I asked you for your objections to the “copying theory”. I’m pleased to hear that you don’t disagree with it, so we can shake hands on that and end the discussion.

Junk DNA
dhw: [..] every time you mention “junk”, I have to point out that if all of DNA is useful, it simply provides a demonstration of natural selection at work, since NS would remove anything that wasn’t useful.

DAVID: We still have about 20% junk, not removed.

dhw: So what does that prove?

DAVID: The atheist Darwinists use 80% junk as a direct argument for chance mutations being kept!!! They still rave about it and fight current research and majority opinion. You are unaware of the continuing battle. I've named names in the past, not worth it now.

I am aware of the battle, and am simply pointing out that if there is no junk, it supports Darwinian natural selection (which is neither atheistic nor theistic). You then said there was 20% junk. And so I asked what that proves – i.e. that there is a God? That there isn’t a God?