More miscellany Parts One & Two (Evolution)

by dhw, Thursday, October 10, 2024, 11:22 (8 days ago) @ David Turell

Free-for-all
Biochemical controls: chaperones control proteins

DAVID: With one protein as primary and another as secondary there is much room for mistakes from freely acting proteins. These are mistakes by proteins, not their designer.

dhw: If your house falls down, do you blame the house or the builder? Only if your God designed the system as a free-for-all can you blame the cells and not their designer. […] I’m pleased to see you gradually edging closer to accepting Shapiro’s theory....

DAVID: Stop dragging Shapiro into the discussions. We've fully covered Shapiro in the past. His theory remains pure theory and we know of minor cell- editing DNA I've reported.

All our discussions have you dragging your inefficient God theory into everything. As a counter, I offer Shapiro’s theory that cells are autonomous, intelligent entities, in which case they are indeed to blame for the mistakes. But you prefer your theory that your God is an inefficient designer.

Cancer

DAVID: Cancer is cancer! Very rebellious.

dhw: Even rebellion denotes some form of free will. […] It would appear, then, that your God – if he exists – gave cells the ability to design their own means of survival, just as he gave humans their free will to commit evil.

DAVID: This is one of the warts that had to exist.

So cells make their own decisions. Now you know why I drag Shapiro into the discussion.

Early galaxies (now back to God’s purposes for creating life)

dhw: There are no obvious purposes. You love the word “entertainment”, but the terms you used […] are “enjoyment” and “interest”.*** […] Why do you now think this is unreasonable and “humanizing”?

DAVID: Your God's desires are human desires. Can't you see that?

And you have accepted their feasibility: “all my ‘earlier proposals’ still apply.” And the possibility that the Creator has endowed his creations with attributes of his own does not mean he is a human being.

*** Another relevant quote for you:

dhw: I’m sure you’ll agree that your God, who you believe is interested in his creations, would find puppets pretty boring.

DAVID: Exactly!

dhw: You clearly had no doubt then that your God wanted to create something that would interest him, as opposed to boring him.

DAVID: IF He is that interested. We don't know His theoretical level of interest.

Either he is or he isn’t interested, enjoys or doesn’t enjoy. You say he is and he does.

Macrophages repair lungs

QUOTE: The team hypothesized that the Ly6G+ macrophages were orchestrating damage repair by giving instructions to the progenitor cells.

DAVID: an amazing group of cells like teams from FEMA in the USA doing emergency management in storm-battered areas. The cells act with purpose and this is more evidence for design.

I like your comparison. Cells and cell communities act just like humans and human communities in their various modes of survival. More evidence for intelligence, possibly designed by your God.

Biochemical controls

dhw: I don’t like this focus on proteins, since these are just one component of the cell and have to cooperate with other parts.

DAVID: A cell is all proteins in one form or another. The problem is folding in correctly. Proteins are free to do that.

dhw: I was a bit surprised to see this, so I googled and found “All cells are made from the same major classes of BBorganic molecules: nucleic acids, proteins, carbohydrates, and lipids.” It doesn’t matter. Let’s just stick to cells. […]

DAVID: […] So much for dhw's distain of the discussion about protein folding.

A disgraceful distortion. There is no disdain! Your statement was wrong: a cell is not ALL proteins, but I said it didn’t matter. In the context of cellular intelligence (leading to a free-for-all), I see no reason why we should confine the subject of cellular intelligence to protein folding. That’s all.

Kinesins

QUOTE: Are these differences in function a result of random haphazardness — stochastic tweaking of gene sequences to give infinitesimally small perturbations of amino acids within the motor to eventually (over billions and billions of years) produce a smorgasbord of elegant machines like the kinesin family? Many in the scientific community have faith in this hopeless Darwinian theory. Thankfully, there are a number of scientists who view the nanoscale world with wonder and are open to the idea that molecular machines reflect purpose and design.

DAVID: All constructed from amino acids in various folding patterns. dhw to the contrary, this is the proper level for discussion of cellular activity.

Your attempts to distort my approach are becoming quite outrageous. I have explicitly opposed the theory of “random haphazardness”, view the nanoscale world with as much wonder as you do, and agree that the molecular machines reflect purpose and design. The intricacy of such mechanisms is part of the case for a designing God. This does not, however, disprove the case for intelligent design by the cells themselves, which allows for your God as the designer of that intelligence.