David's theory of evolution: God always evolves goals (Evolution)

by David Turell , Wednesday, September 29, 2021, 20:13 (1149 days ago) @ David Turell

A portion of Earth's evolution adding photosynthesis:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/09/210928193834.htm

"Some time in Earth's early history, the planet took a turn toward habitability when a group of enterprising microbes known as cyanobacteria evolved oxygenic photosynthesis -- the ability to turn light and water into energy, releasing oxygen in the process.

"This evolutionary moment made it possible for oxygen to eventually accumulate in the atmosphere and oceans, setting off a domino effect of diversification and shaping the uniquely habitable planet we know today.

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"Interestingly, this estimate places the appearance of oxygenic photosynthesis at least 400 million years before the Great Oxidation Event, a period in which the Earth's atmosphere and oceans first experienced a rise in oxygen. This suggests that cyanobacteria may have evolved the ability to produce oxygen early on, but that it took a while for this oxygen to really take hold in the environment.

"'In evolution, things always start small," says lead author Greg Fournier, associate professor of geobiology in MIT's Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences. "Even though there's evidence for early oxygenic photosynthesis -- which is the single most important and really amazing evolutionary innovation on Earth -- it still took hundreds of millions of years for it to take off."

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"The analysis also revealed that, shortly before the GOE, around 2.4 billion years ago, cyanobacteria experienced a burst of diversification. This implies that a rapid expansion of cyanobacteria may have tipped the Earth into the GOE and launched oxygen into the atmosphere."

Comment: Note God didn't simply put oxygen on Earth. He had organisms develop it. Just like he didn't make all the elements at once, but gave the stars a process to make them internally and release them in explosions. We cannot know if God is limited in His creationist abilities or simply prefers evolving what He wishes. I still think in inventing living biochemistry He developed the only possible working system.