Return to David's theory of evolution PART 2 (Evolution)

by dhw, Tuesday, June 21, 2022, 10:58 (668 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Your theory: making silly fun and games of a needed designer God.

You edited my reply, so I have restored it in order to include some of the “sillier” aspects of your theory.

dhw: Once again: you have stated repeatedly that there are two ways in which your God might have designed every species, econiche, lifestyle and natural wonder (e.g. the weaverbird’s nest) as an “absolute requirement” for humans and our food: preprogramming the first cells 3.8 billion years ago with every single one of these, or direct dabbling for every single one. I don’t know why you think your God’s possible design of intelligent entities that respond to changing conditions - by adapting and inventing - sounds sillier than that.

DAVID: God designs for future use, your cell committees work in the present. How do gaps appear? Oh, I forgot, no fossils.

Why do you think cells responding to present needs is sillier than a 3.8-billion-year-old book of instructions, or your God popping in to do a dabble before any change is required? What does this have to do with the fact that the fossil record is and will no doubt remain incomplete for the logical reasons given in Part One?

How did sex pop up?

DAVID: Thank you for clearly supporting my biochemcial theory of evolution. With that basis, new forms can appear. Chromatin came as new biochemistry.

dhw: Chromatin is “as old as eukaryotes themselves”. The point is that we have several examples of fundamental elements being present long before the fully developed organs appear.

DAVID: Exactly my point: necessary biochemicals appear before new forms.

dhw: So why did you say chromatin came as new biochemistry?

DAVID: Chromatin is made up from new biochemistry in a new physical form.

What do you mean by “made up from new biochemistry” if it already existed? It is an example of existing materials being used to create a new physical form – the very essence of common descent.

dhw: Then we are in agreement, and we can dismiss the idea that your God designed new species that had no precursors.

DAVID: Your dismissal. Gaps in form bother you just as they bothered hero Darwin as unexplained in light of Darwin's itty-bitty step theory.

So you continue to believe in common descent, except when you believe in speciation without precursors. Nobody can know for sure why there are gaps in the fossil record, though the explanations I’ve listed are perfectly reasonable. I also find it perfectly reasonable to suppose that intelligent cells (possibly designed by your God) would be able both to adapt and to exploit new conditions extremely rapidly, even from one generation to the next. In some cases, their very survival (adaptation) would depend on their doing so, whereas in others (exploitation leading to innovation) the process might be more gradual, as each generation improves on the work of its predecessor.

Mud

DAVID: what is key to understanding this evolved process on Earth, is that this is the way God works. Everything is evolved from a beginning: the universe from the Big Bang, the Earth from its beginining, and life from its beginning. dhw has never understood this pattern in God's works, and complains about how God evolved humans, instead of direct creation.

dhw: Your usual dodge. Dhw is a firm believer in evolution. Dhw does not complain about humans evolving in stages. Dhw complains about a collection of theories which when combined are so illogical that their inventor cannot explain them and tells us that they “make sense only to God”.

DAVID: If you learned how to believe in God, it would make sense to you like the rest of us believers.

I do not accept your extraordinary claim that every believer is convinced that God’s one and only purpose from the very beginning was to design us and our food, and therefore he designed every life form, econiche, lifestyle and natural wonder – including all those that had no connection with us – as preparation and “absolute requirement” for us and our food. And I very much doubt if you would be prepared to go to a synagogue, church or mosque or even ID conference, and inform everyone that your combined theories are correct, you can’t explain them, but you know they are the only possible truth, and – while you’re at it - you know how everybody should think about God.