More "miscellany" PARTS ONE AND TWO (General)

by dhw, Thursday, September 29, 2022, 11:24 (546 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Same old confusion about God. God chose to evolve His purposes in His way. You can't out-think God.

dhw: If God exists, of course he chose to evolve his purposes in his way, but we don’t know his purposes, and according to you, he only had one. See “dead ends” for the illogicality of your attempt to fit your one purpose together with the history of life. None of us know how God thinks, but at least my various alternative theistic proposals have the merit of making sense to both of us, and your only objection is that they entail human thought patterns which you consider to be more human than those you attribute to him.

DAVID: Your form of God is primarily human in thought.

What do you mean by “primarily”? Why, for instance, is your belief that he wanted and maintained “full control” not “primarily human in thought”, whereas my alternative theory that he wanted and produced a “free-for-all” is “primarily” human? Why is your certainty that he enjoys creating and is interested in his creations not “primarily human”, whereas the idea that enjoyment and interest might be linked to his purpose in creating life is “primarily human”?

Human evolution: African climate and evolution

DAVID: this shows how climate affects evolution very clearly. But there is no relationship to speciation noted in any way.

dhw: The article is about human evolution, not speciation, but it offers clear support for the theory that local environmental conditions were instrumental in the evolution of the human brain and body, which RESPOND to them, i.e. the changes do not take place in anticipation of new conditions. And there is no reason to suppose that the same process does not apply to evolution generally: as you yourself agreed, “environmental changes set the way for speciation”.

DAVID: The ancient Homos/hominins had brains which equipped them to handle any future environmental change.

dhw: No they didn’t. History shows that the brains of ancient hominins and homos underwent gradual expansion, as new requirements exceeded the existing capacity for complexification.

DAVID: Just study our known brain for how brains work. Arrived 215,000 years ago ready to do all the work we found for it as its future use unfolded.

You said ancient brains were equipped to handle any future environmental change, and I pointed out that they weren’t, and so you now switch to our sapiens brain! We have discussed this ad nauseam. You believe your God inserted new cells which would only be used thousands of years later, and I propose that the new cells were needed at the time to meet a new requirement. We agree that from then on, no further cells were needed, because complexification took over from expansion.

Bacteria protect beetle larvae

QUOTE: "Lagria beetles have developed unusual physical traits to protect their progeny: Small invaginations on the backs of the larvae are inhabited by defensive bacteria."

DAVID: did the Lagria's work this out on their own, or did God help?

dhw: I always wonder what you mean by “help”. 3.8-billion-year-old instructions? Personal tuition? And would we humans be in trouble if there were no Lagrias?

DAVID: They fit their own ecosystem.

I still don’t know what sort of “help” God could give besides the two I’ve mentioned. Every life form fits its own ecosystem. That does not mean that every ecosystem has been designed specially for the benefit of H. sapiens.

Immunity system complexity: early evolution

DAVID: it is clear the process of evolution designed by God uses the same genes over and over. This is 'convergence' which Simon Conway-Morris cites as proof of God.

dhw: Alternatively, it is clear that cells/cell communities use the same genes over and over, and convergence makes it clear that intelligent entities will find similar solutions to similar problems. The complexity of cells is such that they provide a good case for the existence of a designer.

DAVID: The designer is always present.

If your God exists and is still watching us with interest, as you believe, then he is present.

Jawed fish

QUOTE: "Thanks to these close relatives, the researchers pieced together how paired fins in the jawless fish evolved in stages to become separate pectoral and pelvic fins in their jawed cousins. Such fins are the precursors of arms and legs in later tetrapods. "

DAVID: irritating gaps get filled, but the general big picture is clear.

Yes, the irritating gaps get filled, and each new discovery adds to the general big picture of common descent, as the different stages of evolution are revealed. We should therefore not assume that current gaps will never be filled and that God must have produced totally new species without precursors.


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