Return to David's theory of evolution. Gelernter's view (Evolution)

by dhw, Wednesday, July 17, 2024, 12:35 (127 days ago) @ David Turell

GELERNTER: The odds against blind Darwinian chance having turned up even one mutation with the potential to push evolution forward are 10^40x(1/10^77)—1040 tries.

dhw: For the last 16 years, you and I have agreed with Gelernter that Darwin’s random mutations do not explain evolution.

GELERNTER: If Meyer were invoking a single intervention by an intelligent designer at the invention of life, or of consciousness, or rationality, or self-aware consciousness, the idea might seem more natural.

dhw: I take this as the equivalent of my argument that God may have set up the autonomous mechanisms at the beginning.

GELERNTER: But then we still haven’t explained the Cambrian explosion. An intelligent designer who interferes repeatedly, on the other hand, poses an even harder problem of explaining why he chose to act when he did. Such a cause would necessarily have some sense of the big picture of life on earth.What was his strategy? How did he manage to back himself into so many corners, wasting energy on so many doomed organisms? Granted, they might each have contributed genes to our common stockpile—but could hardly have done so in the most efficient way. What was his purpose? And why did he do such an awfully slipshod job? Why are we so disease prone, heartbreak prone, and so on? An intelligent designer makes perfect sense in the abstract. The real challenge is how to fit this designer into life as we know it. Intelligent design might well be the ultimate answer. But as a theory, it would seem to have a long way to go.(David’s bold)

dhw: This is a good summary of various objections I have raised to your concept of God. Gelernter doesn’t offer alternative theistic explanations of evolution, but every word pinpoints the absurdity of your own concept of God.

DAVID: Didn't you comprehend the bold? Sounds just like my criticisms of God's evolution!! "An awfully slipshod job".

Yes, it is. That’s why he is picking holes in the theory of design! It makes no sense to talk of a perfect, omnipotent, omniscient God who specially designs an imperfect, slipshod system!

dhw: Thank you for introducing me to a fellow agnostic who also accepts the logic of the case for design, but raises the same problems which in your case have led to your conclusion that your God is schizophrenic.

DAVID: My God is not schizophrenic. I am convinced He may or may not have the attributes we think might apply to Him. In this sense I am just as agnostic as you are. It all comes from a decision there must be a designer.

A delightful volte face from your earlier certainty that he is “not human in any way”, and now I trust you will stop rejecting my logical alternatives to your illogical theory of evolution on the grounds that they entail possible human attributes such as enjoyment. The decision that there must be a designer is not the issue here, since Gelernter and I agree with the logic of the design argument. The problems arise when you theorize about your God’s motive, method and nature. Thank you again for an article which directly supports my case against your illogical theories.