More Miscellany: Bechly reappears (General)

by dhw, Thursday, June 13, 2024, 11:35 (13 days ago) @ David Turell

Examples of Darwinist thinking: Insect adaptations

DAVID: The article is at the level of species adaptation, not speciation which is the real evolution. You always defend Darwinists.

dhw: The article deals with an aspect of evolution which clearly opposes Darwin’s theory of randomness. Do you disagree that the process of evolution includes repetitions? There is nothing pro or anti Darwin in the title, so why do you claim that the headline is phony and “totally overblown Darwin-speak propaganda”.

DAVID: Species adaptation is not evolution!!! And yes, adaptations are repetitious. True use of the word evolution requires speciation. My point, to which you are blinded as usual, the word 'evolution' is over sold.

You have convinced yourself that “evolution repeats itself” is phony, “totally overblown Darwin-speak propaganda”, even though it introduces an article which attacks Darwin’s theory of randomness. If I said that God's use of "evolution requires extinctions", or "has resulted in countless varieties of organisms, lifestyles, strategies etc.", would that be overblown Darwin-speak propaganda" just because I haven't said evolution requires speciation?

Cyanobacteria

DAVID: Purpose is the result of mental activity. Thank you.

dhw: Obviously. How does that prove your God’s one and only purpose was to create us plus food???

DAVID: Obviously. No other proof indicated.

dhw: The fact that purpose indicates mental activity proves nothing except that if you believe all living things pursue the purpose of survival, you will have to agree that this indicates mental activity on their part. Enter James A. Shapiro.

DAVID: Purpose is built into all of life's activities by design.

dhw: And I have no objection to the theory that the means (autonomous cellular intelligence) of fulfilling their purpose (survival) may have been built into all life forms by design. Shapiro is still with us.

DAVID: Ah, yes, DNA editing bacteria.

You seem to have forgotten that Shapiro’s theory of cellular intelligence – supported by many scientists from different disciplines – extends to all organisms.

Oxygen and the Cambrian

QUOTE: "It seems these bursts of oxygen, assisted by the worms' excavations, helped life's spectacular diversity boom on Earth."

DAVID: You humanized version of God's actions are not worth any preference.

dhw: An eternal, immaterial, sourceless mind which enjoys creating, learning, discovering, experimenting, and always does precisely what it wants to do, seems to me to be at least as feasible as an omniscient, omnipotent mind which has to use an imperfect, messy, cumbersome and inefficient method of achieving its one and only purpose. But as you have so wisely observed, there are as many forms of God as people that invent them.

DAVID: A purposeful God created humans. The many forms come from a major problem. Whoever God is, is up for grabs. We are faced with a totally unknown personage.

dhw: A purposeful God must have had a purpose for all life forms, including the 99.9% that had no connection with humans. Your acknowledgement of “up for grabs” and “totally unknown” completely demolishes your prejudiced insistence that your God is certainly not human in any way. Dealt with on the other thread, but worth repeating here, as I shall keep note of it for whenever you present your own preconceived ideas and object to any alternatives.

DAVID: I have simply admitted the form of the deity has as many forms are there are religions, Eastern and Western.

You have admitted that “everyone chooses the God he wishes to believe in”, “there are as many forms of God as people invent him”, whoever he is, is “up for grabs”, and he is “totally unknown”. If someone chooses to invent a God who creates a free-for-all, enjoys what he does, wants to be worshipped, hates boredom, then it is totally absurd for you to claim that their invention must be wrong, just because it conflicts with your own invention.

Oxidation

QUOTES: "Poulton, Bekker and colleagues discovered that the rare sulfur isotope signatures disappear but then reappear, suggesting multiple O2 rises and falls in the atmosphere during the GOE. This was no single "event."
"'Earth wasn't ready to be oxygenated when oxygen starts to be produced. Earth needed time to evolve biologically, geologically and chemically to be conducive to oxygenation," Ostrander said. "It's like a teeter totter. You have oxygen production, but you have so much oxygen destruction, nothing's happening. We're still trying to figure out when we've completely tipped the scales and Earth could not go backwards to an anoxic atmosphere."

If there is a God, I can’t help feeling that all this teeter tottering is far more redolent of experimentation than of a precise knowledge of what is required for the fulfilment of a single purpose. Wouldn’t you agree?