Return to David's theory of evolution PART ONE (Evolution)

by dhw, Monday, December 20, 2021, 07:04 (1067 days ago) @ David Turell

PART ONE

DAVID:In regard to the whole brain the percentage enlargement is minuscule. You are once again making a mountain out of a molehill. We only know our brain's capacities but can infer only that previous brains could also enlarge tiny areas with heavier use.

dhw: You persist in ignoring my suggestion that the human brain reached its maximum capacity, as further expansion would have required major anatomical changes, and therefore expansion generally gave way to complexification (which proved so efficient that the brain actually shrank).

DAVID: Really silly expansion-stop theory. There is no evidence that 200cc more would have caused anatomic problems for our neck and shoulders.

I have no idea what the tipping point would be. It is, however, a fact that the brain stopped expanding and complexity took over. What is your explanation?

dhw: Since we KNOW that earlier brains expanded, and we KNOW that brains change in response to new requirements, I don’t understand why you have a problem acknowledging the logic of my proposal.

DAVID: You are skipping over major jumps in size from Lucy to now. And Neanderthal brains were bigger!!! Doesn't fit your theory.

I am suggesting that every expansion (major jump) since Lucy was caused by new requirements which exceeded the capacity of the existing brain. Hence the expansion of the capacity. Neanderthals were a different build from sapiens, more thickset and with a more prominent brow and nose. Please explain why you think your God gave Neanderthals a bigger brain than ours.

DAVID: God chose to evolve us and obviously WANTED all of the other forms on the way to us. You constantly distort my theory, which is a poor way to debate honestly.

dhw: There is no distortion. If he did indeed WANT all the other forms that had no connection with humans, it makes no sense to argue that the only species he WANTED were humans plus their food!

DAVID: You forget/ignore all the material presented here as to how interbreeding gave us advantages.

I have asked why your all-powerful God needed to design all these different homos and hominins when according to you he is perfectly capable of designing species “de novo” (see Cambrian), but in any case your theory does not stop with homos and hominins. According to you EVERY extinct life form, econiche, lifestyle, natural wonder etc, was “part of the goal to evolve [= design] human” and their food. According to you, he only WANTED us plus food, yet you say he also WANTED all those life forms and foods that had no connection with us.

dhw: I have no doubt that Stephen C. Meyer believes in intelligent design, and in God the designer. Please save me some more time and just tell me whether he also believes that your God specially designed every life form and lifestyle and natural wonder, including all the extinct ones that had no connection with humans, for the sole purpose of designing humans and their food.

DAVID: All ID'ers think God designed evolution.

But apparently you can’t find even one who supports the theory I have bolded!

dhw: Frankly, I doubt if any scientist would propose a theory that is so manifestly illogical. Design, yes. Existence of God, yes. Humans vastly more intelligent than other species, yes. But a God who only wants one species plus food, but spends 3.x billion years specially designing countless species that have no connection with humans plus food? No. That doesn’t even make sense to you, which is why you either dodge it or you tell me go and ask God.

DAVID: Same inadequate distortion. Makes perfect sense to me. Move on.

dhw: What have I distorted?

DAVID: You have ignored Adler constantly. His thoughts and proofs of God are mine also. A leading philosopher of religion in the 20th century. I easily follow him and reject your approach. And both he and I accept the history of evolution as what God did. He created humans and their food by that method.

I have agreed ad nauseam that Adler’s theory, as you have explained it, provides a logical reason for believing in the existence of God. But you have always maintained that he does not cover your theory of evolution. Please make up your mind. And please tell me what I have distorted in the paragraph you criticised.