Miscellany (General)

by dhw, Saturday, October 02, 2021, 10:57 (1146 days ago) @ David Turell

Survival
dhw: So your God designs all the changes that lead to speciation in order to ensure the survival of the respective life forms, but evolution does not come about because of your God’s efforts to ensure that the respective life forms will survive.

DAVID: My point is God designs evolution stage by stage. He is the driver.

And my point is that even if this were true, you yourself keep telling us that “new species are designed by God to ensure future survival following their appearance”. If that is his purpose, I suggest that the changes that lead to speciation and hence to evolution are driven by his desire to ensure their survival. It is therefore absurd to claim that “survival has nothing to do with the appearance of new species”.

Reductionism
DAVID: There has to be a first cause. The biological design we see requires a designer who is necessarily the first cause.

dhw: I asked you to note my comment on “first cause”, but of course you ignored it: “Back to the non-explanation of “first cause”, which might just as well be unconscious materials evolving into consciousness”. And of course you continue to ignore my request for the rationale behind your firm belief that consciousness requires a designer but supreme consciousness does not require a designer.

DAVID: I didn't ignore your first cause. You know my belief is in an eternal God designer. I know your disbelief, which to me defies logic.

dhw: Not “disbelief”, which means rejection. I am an agnostic. Now please explain to me the logic behind your belief that consciousness requires a designer, but supreme consciousness does not require a designer.

DAVID: Since biological design is so intricate it requires a designer. Since there was a start to reality in our BB from nothing it requires a cause, and therefore an eternal mind.

But that is not the problem, as you well know. An even greater mystery than biological design is that of an “eternal mind” that is simply “there”, had no origin, and yet is capable of creating a universe and life and conscious beings like ourselves. Unimaginable.

Newborn brains
DAVID: But luckily the advanced homo rain came with the proper wiring built in […]

dhw: How do you know that the evolution of spoken language did not itself change the wiring of the homo brain?

DAVID: The pre-homo brain had existing areas that eventually acquired specific uses.

dhw: The pre-sapiens brain was smaller than the sapiens brain, and required more and more cells once there were new skills to be mastered. Eventually, when the brain reached optimum size, complexification took over from expansion, and so such advances as spoken language entailed additional complexification (rewiring). Yes, the areas were there by then, but the rewiring was not “built in”, as bolded above.

DAVID: Agreed areas used more were interconnected by more rewiring.

I’ll take that as your agreement with my comment. Thank you.

Your gut has a big brain
DAVID: We eat, we defecate, all without having to think about it. The proper nutrients are absorbed. This developed in evolution without interspecies or intraspecies conflict, which Darwinism favors as causing evolution. Why is it there? By design.

I have no idea why you have brought Darwin into this, but since you have, let me remind you that Lynn Margulis proposed that cooperation was at least as important to evolution as conflict, and she believed in cellular intelligence. The brainy gut is a prime example of how intelligent cells cooperate in order to design functioning communities. (It is possible that your God gave them their intelligence.)

Guth and David on “time”
DAVID: I am unchanged. Your bolded comment makes the point. We do not know of any prior BB's. Our BB may be the only one ever!!!

dhw: And it may not be, as you have acknowledged: “I hadn’t considered the possibility of prior BB’s seventeen years ago. With that point made, it is obvious there was prior time within prior possible BB’s.”

DAVID: Yes, possible time in possible previous BB's doesn't change past statements or make them untrue at the time they are made.

dhw: It certainly doesn’t change your July statement that: “there is no before before the BB. Time didn’t exist. This was proven by Guth, Borde and Valenkin by mathematics years ago, presented by my books and here.” However, I can’t follow your logic in maintaining that in July your statement was NOT untrue, whereas in August/September/October it WAS/IS untrue. May I humbly suggest that you have now changed your mind, realize that your July statement was untrue, and therefore – perish the thought – back in July you made a mistake and your statement was wrong. I suggest you drop the subject.

DAVID: The context at each time was correct so the statements in the context of their times were correct. An example is Darwin. At his time he was fully correct for the knowledge available. Research now shows his deficiencies.

Firstly, the statements were not correct, but many people thought they were. Secondly, in July you thought your bolded statement was correct and I didn’t. You now agree with me. So please don’t tell me now that your bolded statement was correct in July! And please drop this subject as your arguments are getting sillier and sillier.