Mutations, bad not good (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, July 15, 2011, 15:02 (4880 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

I am trying to fathom out Tony's ideas in relation to evolution, and asked a series of questions.-Many thanks for your detailed response, which I greatly appreciate. When I put on my theist hat ... which is easy to do, especially in the light of David's continuous flow of information about life's biological complexity ... I inevitably begin to speculate on how a creative intelligence might have produced its designs. I'm hampered by the fact that I depend on other people for all my information, but when there's a general consensus among the experts, I accept the likelihood (not, of course, the certainty) of their being right. This is the case with man's late arrival on the scene. I am not bothered about the timeline.-The next phase is the link between earlier forms of animal and ourselves, and I asked if you thought it more likely that a creator would create us from scratch or use existing creatures as a basis. You wrote that you made "no assumptions regarding the mechanic that was used", and you felt that Evolution did make assumptions that it couldn't back up. We are treading a very fine linguistic line here. I am not interested in assumptions either, but at the same time I do not expect incontrovertible proof of ANYTHING. The most we can ever hope for is a pattern that will seem likely, and comparative likelihood was all I asked you for. -Our experience and observation tell us that all creatures descend from parents. That small adaptations take place has also been established by experience and observation, and so clearly species are subject to change. That we share many features with earlier mammals is undeniable. We need not go into the problems of defining mutations or distinguishing between adaptation and mutation, because all we are concerned with here is finding a pattern which, as you say, will "provide sufficient explanatory power to cover all the observed phenomena." One such pattern (I am still wearing my theist hat) is that God created life, and then organized it in such a way that different forms succeeded one another, either through a mechanism of change which he created, or through deliberate experimentation on his part. This pattern of earlier forms undergoing many changes fits in with the theory of evolution ("theory" in what Matt calls the "public" as opposed to the scientific sense ... a point which I shall take up with him again when he returns). -There are no assumptions here, and I am only concerned with the overall pattern, not with the details. I now have two questions for you: 1) Can you find fault with this pattern? 2) Can you suggest another that fits in equally well with the three sets of experiences and observations I have listed above?