> DAVID: We are back to 50/50 here in a sense as in bacterial reactions. Pre-planning is seen in the genes, no question. From the outside it well can look like an IM working.
> dhw: Alternative version: an autonomous intelligence is seen in the genes, no question. From the outside it well can look like pre-planning.
> 
> DAVID: When an autonomous intelligence made the genes what do you expect!
> 
> dhw: I don't understand your answer. You say that cells are pre-programmed by God to act automatically, and I suggest that they may have an autonomous intelligence which may have been designed by your God.-Just make it 'autonomous intelligent information' and it works just fine. Codes=information always.


> dhw: We can't know the purpose of humans because of what you call "the silliness of trying to read God's mind", but we do know the purpose of every other form of life, extant and extinct, from bacteria to trilobites, dinosaurs, mosquitoes, the duck-billed platypus, the weaverbird, and the parasitic wasp: to produce or feed humans. May I ask how we know THEIR purpose without reading God's mind?-I can't read His mind but I can see His obvious purpose: US
> 
> DAVID: We are back to 50/50 here in a sense as in bacterial reactions. Pre-planning is seen in the genes, no question. From the outside it well can look like an IM working.
> 
> dhw: Alternative version: an autonomous intelligence is seen in the genes, no question. From the outside it well can look like pre-planning.-When an autonomous intelligence made the genes what do you expect!


> dhw: You admit that you don't know “why” the bush came out that way, but you say the “why” doesn't matter. Then you complain that I don't look at “why” we are here, i.e. why the bush produced us! -The bush provided food to allow evolution to produce us through God's guidance. The bush did not produce us, but was a necessary part of the process. The bush is a side event to the drive to complexity built-in to the evolutionary process-> dhw: And even when I followed the theistic “why humans?” line and suggested it might be to entertain a bored God, you offered the alternative that he wanted someone to converse with, and when I pointed out that it was difficult to converse with someone who kept himself hidden, you remarked that it was silly to try and read God's mind!-My offer of 'wanting to converse' was purposefully silly to make the point that you were obviously off on a silly tangent looking for God's superficial reasons. Frankly, as stated in the past, I have no idea why God did it, and like Adler I believe that the probability of God answering prayers is 50/50. We don't know.- > 
> DAVID: There is plenty of evidence for pre-planning, which may be the IM we have been discussing. :
> "From The Evolution Revolution by physicist Lee Spetner: [...]
> 
> dhw: Just like the video you recommended, this is an attack on the theory of random mutations, which you and I have long since rejected, and which has been under fire since I don't know when. Pre-planning and the IM as I understand them are not the same thing at all. The IM is what enables each organism to work out in its own way how to adapt or, in my hypothesis, improve in accordance with the demands or opportunities offered by a changing environment.-We are back to 50/50 here in a sense as in bacterial reactions. Pre-planning is seen in the genes, no question. From the outside it well can look like an IM working.

DAVID: Evolution advanced to humans because everyone along the way could eat. Not confusing. food supply is food supply.
> 
> dhw: The balance of nature provides food for them until it changes, and then food supply is no longer food supply and they disappear. 3.8 thousand million years of nature changing its balance - you can't tell us if God controlled that - and of millions of weird and wonderful creatures and lifestyles “guided” by God, appearing and disappearing, just to produce humans (not possible without dead trilobites and triceratops) and provide food for us (we can't eat without the weaverbird's nest or wasp eggs on a spider's back). My belief is beggared!-Stop equating the bush of life as an unreasonable relationship for 'survival by eating' so evolution could proceed. So it is a strange bush. I don't know why it came out that way, but it doesn't matter. We humans are here for no good reason except to produce us, so we could think about all of this. I still look at 'why' we are here and you keep looking at 'how'. Try both as I do. 
>> 
> DAVID: Your two thoughts don't follow logically. A semi-automatic IM has created all sorts of wonders of nature while guiding evolution to humans.
> 
> dhw: Alternative hypothesis: An autonomous IM (possibly designed by your God) has created all sorts of wonders of nature while guiding evolution to create parasitic wasps, nest-building weaverbirds,the duck-billed platypus and humans plus xyz times millions, leaving behind trilobites and triceratops plus xyz times millions. (And if we can't read God's mind, it's still "silly" to claim you know his intention for designing the IM.)-There is plenty of evidence for pre-planning, which may be the IM we have been discussing. :-"From The Evolution Revolution by physicist Lee Spetner:-"The proximate biochemical signal evoking the change in beak shape [of Galapagos finches] has been discovered to be a protein growth factor Bmp4. The more Bmp4 that is made, the broader and deeper is the bird's beak. This protein acts as a signal to the development of the craniofacial bones which determines the beak's shape. If my suggestion is correct that the hormones triggered by environmental inputs affect embryonic development, then those hormones induce these growth factors to form the finch beak….The built-in mechanism of the NREH [Non Random Evolutionary Hypothesis] enables the bird population to adapt to a new environment quickly and efficiently without having to call upon the slow and wasteful neo-Darwinian process of random mutation and natural selection. p. 76-"Note from reader:-"Spetner's Non Random Evolutionary Hypothesis proposes that certain genetic traits lie dormant within the genomes of various living things until environmental cues turn them on and they appear in the next generation. In other words, living things are front loaded with a host of options which allow for rapid and specified adaptations for various enviroments. There is neither chance nor selection in this process. Moreover, it also accounts for the rapid return of smaller finch beaks when the drought ceases. It points towards exquisite design and accounts for the variability of Darwin's finches without invoking the confusions of natural selection. If mutations are random, why is it that thicker, larger beaks appear reliably with every drought on the Galapagos Islands? Why don't longer tail feathers or unusual colors appear? If natural selection works slowly and imperfectly, why are the changes in beak size so rapid? If the mutations are embedded in the genomes of the birds, why do they disappear so quickly when conditions change?"-http://www.uncommondescent.com/evolution/lee-spetner-on-darwins-iconic-finches/


> dhw: The balance of nature was needed so that they could eat, but when the balance of nature changed, they couldn't eat and so they died, which shows that they were all necessary for the balance of nature which was necessary for the production and feeding of humans, who arrived millions of years later. I'm afraid I still find it very confusing.-Evolution advanced to humans because everyone along the way could eat. Not confusing. food supply is food supply. 
> 
> DAVID: Make it a semi-autonomous IM and it makes sense to me.
> 
> 
> dhw: We'd need to define semi-autonomous in relation to the nature and degree of your God's participation, which you like to gloss over as “guidance”. But no matter how you define it, I'm glad you now appear to agree that we cannot know why God created an IM in the first place, and so it is “silly” to say his purpose was to produce humans.-Your two thoughts don't follow logically. A semi-automatic IM has created all sorts of wonders of nature while guiding evolution to humans.-And pre-planning takes a role in this if you have noted my latest article about algae.

dhw: Let me get this straight. You “can't see any other purpose than humans. Nothing else makes sense.” So God designed every innovation, lifestyle and natural wonder from bacteria onwards to ensure that the balance of nature would enable humans to be produced and to eat. However, prior to the arrival of humans he continually changed the balance of nature (extinctions) so that millions of these innovations, lifestyles and wonders would be eliminated, even though he only designed them to enable humans to be produced and to eat.-No, everyone who evolved on the way to humans had to eat. That is obvious. Balance of nature was required all along.-> 
> dhw: I'm glad the above makes sense to you. Try this for a theistic hypothesis: God created an autonomous inventive mechanism which would allow cells to produce a vast variety of life forms in their quest for survival and/or improvement. Changes in the environment allowed for a continual stream of extinctions and innovations. Different forms of life dominated at different times. Currently the dominant form - if one discounts bacteria, which have survived from the earliest days - is humans, whose intelligence far exceeds that of all other known species. We have no idea what might happen during the next few billion years. It is “silly” to try and read God's mind, so we cannot know why he created the autonomous mechanism in the first place. Does that make sense or not?-Make it a semi-autonomous IM and it makes sense to me.


> dhw: ALL innovations, lifestyles, natural wonders etc., including the weaverbird's nest, from bacteria onwards were therefore not required by the challenges of nature.-Then why did it happen? Chance or underlying drive for complexity. 'Drive' appears most likely. Where did that come from? Again chance seems very unlikely. tniks is why I see purpose.
> 
> dhw: Balance in nature is critical for what? -Survival. Everyone has to eat.-> dhw: However, if you truly believe God deliberately designed the nest and the millions of past and present wonders in order to balance nature so that he could produce/feed humans, then I can only explain to you why such anthropocentrism stretches my own credulity way beyond its limits.-But if we accept that humans appeared without demands of nature, as you now say you do, I have to ask why they appeared. All I can see is purpose, not accident, because it took too many purposeful modifications to leave 'monkeydom' over a 20 million year period when he first lumbar modifications began.-> dhw: As a theist, how can you possibly conduct a search for purpose without trying to read God's mind? ..... Please tell me what other purpose you want me to look for without trying to read God's mind.-I can't see any other purpose than humans. Nothing else makes sense.
 
> dhw: I have included the “lowest levels of life”, which you insist have no freedom but have been programmed by your God to follow the same patterns - all apparently because they are necessary to fulfil God's purpose of producing/feeding humans (though it is silly to try to read God's mind).-I repeat, nothing else makes sense. It is the only purpose I see. Why are we here? It is like 'why is here anything?'


> dhw: The challenges of nature do not require the weaverbird's nest either,-And how do you know this?-> dhw: If the nest is not relevant to the production of humans, might it not mean that your God did indeed give organisms the wherewithal to do their own designing?-Again you avoid my contention that balance in nature is critical. Everyone has to eat. Ask Australians about their imbalance! I think the nest may well be relevant on that basis. And look at this article about invasive species messing things up:-http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151003135017.htm-"Goldenrod, Himalayan balsam, Chinese windmill palm: three plants, one problem. All are native to continents other than Europe, but were introduced to Switzerland as garden or ornamental plants. At some point they "escaped" into the wild, where they now threaten the native flora.-"This phenomenon isn't limited to Switzerland: biological invasions happen on every continent every day. A major driver of this is global trade, which is increasingly shifting to the internet and being conducted on auction platforms like eBay. As a result, one click is all it takes to spread potentially invasive plants from continent to continent -- and unintentionally encouraging biological invasions."-> dhw: If so, and you add that to your view that God did not control the environment, evolution will begin to look more and more like a free-for-all than the planned or “guided” process you have made it out to be.-I've only said that I don't know if God controls the environment or asteroids. I have no way of knowing. -> 
> dhw: Loneliness, then? Need for love? I'm not sure how the conversation (though we can hardly converse with him as equals) is meant to work when according to you he deliberately keeps himself hidden, but it is true that many people think they are in contact with him.-Like your boredom approach, my invented suggestion only points out the silliness of trying to read God's mind, which silliness you are now portraying! See your statement below.-> dhw: The consequences of this assumed contact vary from comfort and good deeds to mass murder, but that may be attributed to our autonomous intelligence. The dichotomy is strangely reflected in Nature, where at even the lowest levels of life we find a mixture of cooperation and competition, construction and destruction, survival and extinction...But you would have us believe that humans are different: only humans have the autonomous intelligence to pursue these choices as they wish, whereas God “guides” other organisms to go one way or the other.-I've never said the more sentient organisms don't have freedom of action.

DAVID: I really have no way of knowing what sort of guidance, nor do I care. Since there are huge gaps in the fossil record and I believe in theistic evolution, God may well have produced each jump in speciation.
> 
> dhw: God producing each jump in speciation = creationism, as opposed to evolution. That's a big jump in the evolution of Turellian thinking, though it is neatly balanced by your response on 1 October to my scepticism: “...perhaps the drive did not need the direct intervention of God's dabbling to produce the oddities. The thought gives me a different answer about the dabbling issue. Thank you for the stimulation.” -It is not a big jump in Turellian thinking. I've always thought of the process as theistic evolution, and yes, as I've noted before, I am a form of creationist.-> dhw:I find that the explanations offered by atheistic Darwinism as epitomised by Richard Dawkins, and theistic evolutionary anthropocentrism as epitomised by David Turell, are full of huge gaps which I try to point out. I'm afraid your “So?” does not fill the gaps.-These are gaps you create by your analysis. Why do I have to explain how God did it? We see common descent and we see the pinnacle of evolution as complex humans. We also see the challenges of nature do not require humans. For me it is an easy jump to presume that God guided evolution to create humans, and not worry why the weaver bird nest is so complex.
> 
> DAVID: I see purpose. You see confusion. And when you approach God and ignore purpose, your 'theistic brain' gets all muddled, in my view. That is your problem when you try to be theistic. We do not know if God's logic is 'our' logic. Try looking for purpose.
> 
> dhw: The only purpose you have offered me so far is the production of humans...... Perhaps it might help if you told us what you think was God's purpose in producing humans.-Simple. God is sentient. He wanted sentient beings to converse with, to relate to Him. As you do, I can imagine God's wishes. I really doubt He did his out of boredom.


> dhw: Your first point is the same as mine: speciation advances by innovation, not by adaptation. We do not know how or why this happened, since there was no need for ANY innovation. If you are now dropping your oft repeated argument that “no need” bolsters your case for humans as God's purpose, I shall be delighted. If you think “no need” bolsters the case for guidance, we are back to the question of what sort of guidance.-I really have no way of knowing what sort of guidance, nor do I care. Since there are huge gaps in the fossil record and I believe in theistic evolution, God may well have produced each jump in speciation.-> DAVID: I don't have to decide, and guidance will do, because I don't see how species arrive for no good reason of need.
> 
> dhw: Quite right, you don't have to. Badly phrased. You can remain agnostic on the question. However, once we accept that there is a drive to complexity or “improvement”, we look at the Turellian theory that humans are God's purpose for this drive, and we ask why God would need to personally design the weaverbird's nest or - if we want to focus on species - the long extinct Jabberwockus Carrolliensis in order to produce or feed humans. And, with my theist hat on, I can't help feeling it doesn't add up. -Your analytical brain won't let loose. We humans are here against all odds. Life is a wildly convoluted bush of lifestyles. So? We ARE HERE. That fact is not all explained by Darwin. I see purpose. You see confusion. And when you approach God and ignore purpose, your 'theistic brain' gets all muddled, in my view. That is your problem when you try to be theistic. We do not know if God's logic is 'our' logic. Try looking for purpose.