Innovation (Introduction)

by David Turell , Sunday, May 12, 2013, 22:52 (4012 days ago) @ dhw

dhw:The invention itself is NOT random. The key issue between us is HOW innovations are created.-Agreed. Livers appeared when predation appeared and the eaten had to be assimilated through digestion. You accept punc inc but don't appear incredulous at the sudden appearance of the hunter and the hunted in the Cambrian. Digestive tracts had to come all made at once. Just have the stomach and intestine is not enough. Livers and pancreas must be added at the same time, and they are all made from very different cells, organized in very different ways. There is specified complexity at this stage of species development. One part does not work without the others.-What I don't know, and you keep asking, does God step in and adjust things or it is all in the plan from the beginning?
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> dhw: The genome responded by creating a new combination of different cells. The "key issue" between us is how the genome came up with the design.-To repeat:
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> DAVID: It cannot work by itty-bitty advances. No matter how bright your imagined cells are, they could not conjure up a liver by cooperation. They had to have a whole outlined architectural plan in their DNA from the beginning. -or some help along the way.
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> dhw: 1) From the beginning of what? Are you saying that God preprogrammed the liver into the very first forms of life, to pass on through billions of years and generations until the Cambrian? In that case, God must have preprogrammed EVERY innovation into the first forms of life. Is that what you believe? 2) Nowhere have I argued for itty-bitty advances. I accept punctuated equilibrium and organs de novo. So once again, let me ask you: if your God did NOT preprogramme the liver from the beginning of life but had to intervene: "Does his infinite intelligence hone in telekinetically on the chosen few, or does he take them to his great lab in the sky, or merely say "Let there be livers..."? (My question is serious.)-I've answered with my admitted ignorance on display above. I don't know how much God preplanned in the genome and how much tweaking He had to do. I just know He was the production manager. Nothing else makes sense.
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> dhw: As regards your various Darwin quotes, here's another for your armoury: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down." -I know the famous quote.-> dhw: So please can we finally drop the subject of gradualism. That particular theory is not an issue between us.-Agreed. Punc inc it is.
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> dhw: Evolution therefore progresses in accordance with how these intelligences respond to environmental conditions, either adapting or innovating through cooperation. Hence the bush, which grows as and when these intelligences come up with their innovations. Neither by chance nor by central organization.-It is God's intelligent genome plus God, and only He knows the proportions.
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> You have explained that the invention of new organs is not linked to random changes in the environment (disagree), that such organs have to be specifically designed (agree), that they cannot come into being gradually (agree), that the genome is the mechanism with the plan (agree), and that only God could provide the necessary organization (judgement suspended).-Fair enough, and new organs do arise to need, when the need appears. Since the evolution of the Earth as we now know it followed a well-designed path, both the evolution of complex life and of the Earth may well have been coordinated by God. We could not have life as we know it without the oxygen level provided by plant photosynthesis, as an example of this coordination.