Human evolution; savannah theory fading (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, August 26, 2022, 11:33 (607 days ago) @ David Turell

Brain expansion

DAVID: Thank you for admitting the new 315,000-old neurons still have future use.

dhw: You initially claimed that they had no use but just sat around for thousands of years doing nothing. You then conceded that they may have had minor uses. [...]

DAVID: We agree there was minor use before major uses. They would not survive if unused, this is obvious. You unreasonably assumed I assumed no use at all until later.

Initially you argued that the brain was oversized and the new neurons were “excess” (which = not needed). Anyway, we needn’t argue about that now, since you have agreed that the new cells were used from the start.

DAVID: What prepared them for them for an unknown future? Not Darwin theory, which handles only the present. Logical to assume God, the designer set up teh brain for the future.

dhw: The future is unknown for ALL life forms! According to you, every evolutionary change was engineered by God as preparation for the unknown future. You even have him transforming pre-whale legs into flippers before the animals enter the water. My proposal (why must you bring Darwin into it?) is that every evolutionary change, including the additional brain cells, has resulted from a new current requirement or opportunity presented by changing conditions. NOT from your God’s gazing into his crystal ball and forecasting all future requirements. But of course the additional cells will continue to be used and to complexify in response to new future requirements!

DAVID: Well, I'm still with God the future designer and you're not. No surprise.

Are you still with God as a designer who operates on brains to provide them with excess additional cells before they are needed, and on whales to provide them with flippers before they enter the water?

DAVID: God's direct action at the end was to produce humans, so unusual Adler uses us as proof of God.

dhw: It was not direct. You yourself cannot understand why “at the end” he would have designed various “species” of hominin and homo before finally designing sapiens. That is one of the theories that “make sense only to God”. Yes, you keep telling us that Adler uses us as proof of God. But we are not arguing about proof of God. We are arguing about your theories of evolution which do not make sense to you.

DAVID: And proof of God is part of it. Adler helps my arguments.

You don’t need to “prove” God if you wish to argue that God’s one and only aim was to design us and our food, but you don’t know why he designed countless species and foods that had no connection with us, or why he designed us in itsy-bitsy stages instead of directly. All you need to do is admit that your theory “makes sense only to God” and therefore it does not make sense to you.

DAVID: From the beginning of time God knew we were coming!!! That answers your muddle about evolution which God used as His mechanism to create us.

dhw: I have covered the hypothesis that from the beginning he “knew we were coming” (or we were his purpose) by explaining all the disconnected life forms and food bushes which you cannot explain as experiments in his quest to create beings that might recognize him and have a relationship with him (your own concept). But you don’t like the theory because it entails “human” attributes which are not among those you want your God to have.

DAVID: You are again trying to humanize my God to protect your form of god.

“Protect”? The experimenting alternative offers you a logical explanation for YOUR theory which otherwise doesn’t make sense to you!

dhw: I suggest that he designed what he wanted to design, and that he actually wished for all those countless forms and foods and stages, as life unfolded its ever-changing variety. What better way than to give the original life forms their own means of designing?

DAVID: Answered above.

dhw: Again with your “secondhand” objection. See “More miscellany”.

DAVID: Secondhand design is a cumbersome mess, that you don't seem to understand. You've never tried it and I have with firsthand experience.

Please stop comparing yourself to God. I have given you an answer on the “More miscellany” thread.