New Miscellany 1: evolution, eco,insects, atheism, future (General)

by dhw, Friday, May 23, 2025, 13:46 (46 days ago) @ David Turell

The smelly hoatzin Now Evolution

dhw: […] There are no evolutionary processes comparable to that of life’s history, and I challenge you to name a single evolutionary process in which designers knowingly design and then destroy things which are irrelevant to their purpose.

DAVID: Everything appliance we use in life has undergone evolution, from vehicles, to TV to computers as examples. It is an equivalence.

dhw: So you think the inventors of every appliance deliberately designed and discarded 99 out of 100 functional appliances (all God’s culled species were living creatures) that had no connection with the vehicle, TV or computer they wished to design. More nonsense. There is no equivalence!

DAVID: More nonsense. How many Model-T Fords can you find!

You have missed the point. Your version of God designed and culled 99.9% of species which were NOT the ancestors of his sole purpose: us plus our food. If Henry Ford is your equivalent, he would have invented and “culled” 99.9 non-motor-car machines in order to be able to invent his motor car, which is the ancestor of all modern Fords.

dhw: […] why would a God who according to you can create species “de novo” have to create and then cull all the species that were irrelevant to his one and only purpose?

DAVID: There is no answer, just that it was God's chose of method.

dhw: Why do you always present your theory as fact even though it ridicules your God? He could have created a free-for-all (through cellular intelligence) but could also have intervened if he had had new ideas, and even designed our ancestors “de novo”, as you wish. That is more logical and less insulting than the nonsensical method YOU choose for the purpose YOU choose.

DAVID: The bold shows your nonsense approach to God. God is not human and does not develop 'new' ideas. His goals are clear to Him.

There you go again. A God who gets new ideas is no more human than a God who starts out with a specific purpose. His goals will certainly be clear to him, but that does not mean he has only one goal, which is to produce us plus food, and therefore messily and inefficiently produces 99.9 out of 100 species that have no connection with his single goal.

Eco systems and Animal minds: Insect tool use

DAVID: You can poo poo ecosystems importance all you wish, but the Earth is covered with an interlocking mechanism of them.

dhw: I have never “poo-pooed” ecosystems’ importance for the life forms that live in them. I only poo-poo your insistence that every ecosystem extinct and extant has been specially designed and 99.9% “culled” by your God to enable him to design us and our food. Please stop distorting the argument.

DAVID: As for the resin, it may be an acquired instinct but we should test, not guess.

dhw: Many activities would have become an acquired instinct after their initial design by intelligent insects. But having agreed that they are intelligent, you now want to test whether what looks like intelligence was in fact divinely designed 3.8 billion years ago, or was the subject of courses your God gave to these insects on the use of resin to kill their prey, because this was essential for his design of us and our food.

DAVID: Still poo-pooing ecosystems into which the insect fits.

Answered above in bold, and this totally groundless comment does not explain why last week you accepted insect intelligence, but now believe a particular insect’s behaviour might have been divinely preprogrammed 3.8 billion years ago, or divinely dabbled through lessons in the use of resin.

New oxygen research now Atheism

DAVID: That God exists is a 50/50 statement for you, so at least 50% of your thinking is atheist.

dhw: Of course, but in our discussions concerning your ridicule of your God by means of an absurdly illogical theory of evolution, and when I offer you alternative theistic interpretations of life’s history, it is my theistic 50% that is talking.

DAVID: Unfortunately, I feel you come across as 90% atheist.

dhw: Don’t you think a 90% atheist would challenge the existence of God rather than criticize your ridicule of your God and propose alternative, less insulting interpretations of a possible God’s nature, purpose and method? Your comment is as illogical as your theory of evolution.

DAVID: Your 'act' of defending God is a shallow facade.

Please stop dodging the absurdity of your own theistic theory and the logic of my alternative theistic theories by pretending that my agnosticism somehow invalidates my arguments.

End of evolution?

DAVID: Do you see any speciation? Evolution is over.
And:
DAVID: What 'new conditions' do you imagine? I see none.

dhw: Possible changes to the sun, massive objects smashing into the Earth, human activities (uncontrolled climate change, nuclear warfare etc.) rendering the planet uninhabitable by humans, but habitable by other organisms that can cope. Do you really believe that in a million years’ time the Earth and its inhabitants will be the same as we have now?

DAVID: Possibilities.

You could not see any possible new conditions. Now you can see possible new conditions. Please answer my now bolded question.