More "miscellany" PARTS ONE & TWO (General)

by David Turell @, Saturday, September 17, 2022, 17:27 (559 days ago) @ dhw

Biochemical controls

DAVID: Of course, we agree God can do whatever He wishes. But we do not know God's wishes. We must guess from His works.

dhw: Thank you. All we can do is make our guesses, and then analyse them to see if they make sense. You have agreed that all my alternative theistic guesses make sense, and there is no reason at all why your God should not have endowed cells with the autonomous ability to change the genetic code, except that a proposed “human” wish for a free-for-all conflicts with your proposed “human” wish for total control.

Full answer is in the other thread today.


Brain evolution

DAVID: The plasticity of the brain is a built-in ability given 210,000 years ago in anticipation of future use. Undeniable.

dhw: I would suggest that the plasticity of the brain goes back long, long before then. You have agreed that pre-sapiens brains would have complexified before they expanded.

DAVID: Your comment is a non-response to my point the sapiens brain arrived prepared for future use.

dhw: Two days ago I responded to your point that plasticity was “given” 210,000 years ago, when clearly it was there long before that. I then devoted a whole paragraph to your “anticipation” theory. You totally ignored the following: “We have discussed your “anticipation” theory ad nauseam. I propose that not only the brain but every change in every organ and organism through evolution has been a RESPONSE to new conditions, concepts, requirements etc.

You talk around and around about a giant brain with little to do 210,000 years ago. Your theory of evolution should produce 'a response to' immediate needs. not something that can be used timelessly like our brain.

dhw: Chimps, related to humans, never changed. They, like hippos, survived perfectly well without changing. How does this prove that your God changed prewhales’ legs into flippers before they entered the water, or operated on some sleeping apes to change their arms, legs and pelvises before they descended from the trees?

DAVID: Turn it around. Humans left trees because they had a new pelvis.

dhw: Yes, that is your theory: that all new species wake up one morning to find God has changed them. Then they hang around until the environment changes so they can use their new bits and pieces. (Until yesterday, you even believed that God did not control the local conditions which probably led pre-whales to water, and pre-homos to leave the trees. He just knew they would happen sometime in the future.)

In today's world climate systems represent God's work, but local weather events are uncontrolled results.


ANT WOUND TREATMENT

DAVID: Pure instinct.

dhw:So when various species first built their cities, began to farm, devised military strategies, administered medical treatment, they hadn’t a clue what they were doing. God preprogrammed them 3.8 billion years ago, or kept popping in to tell them what to do, because otherwise he couldn’t have designed H. sapiens and our food. Don’t you find all this a little far-fetched?

No, if you believe in God. For you God is far-fetched.


GAPS IN EVOLUTION CAUSE DISCONTINUITY

dhw: These fish appeared about 150 million years after the Cambrian, and the article stresses continuity from 380 million years ago till today. If you say these organs must already have been present in the Cambrian fish, then what was the “leap” mentioned in the article? In any case, why is 150 million years regarded as a leap? The article doesn't compare Cambrian to Ediacaran, so I can’t see what you think appeared “so quickly”, or which “gaps indicate discontinuity” here. Perhaps you can explain.

DAVID: Any complex animal in the Cambrian must have some rudimentary circulatory system, a digestive system, etc. Brains have been found so nerves must be present. The leap is the jaw appearance.

dhw I find it hard to imagine your Cambrian fish without any jaws, but I find it hard to discern any “discontinuity” in the article and to regard 150 million years as a leap.

But those first jaws were a leap.


Mitochondria and chloroplasts

DAVID: They have found pure convergence in this comparison. I'm not surprised at it. Convergence is evidence of design. And this common pattern in two very divergent forms is very strong evidence for design.

dhw: I agree. In Chapter Two of life’s history (evolution), we see that plants and animals are all composed of cells. Convergence may be seen as intelligent cells finding similar solutions to similar problems. Design, not chance. Chapter One concerns the origin of life and the mechanisms of evolution. These too might well be the products of design, with your God being the designer.

Agree ;-)


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