Does evolution have a purpose? (Evolution)

by David Turell , Tuesday, October 21, 2014, 21:12 (3467 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: Hardly out of all proportion, since you now acknowledge that sentient cell communities, with their built-in “brain” (the genome), are capable of inventing an organ as complex as the elephant's trunk.-Extending my patterns argument, that the basic required organs must be planned in advance, and their coordinated function planned out also, I suggested that ancillary issues like the shape of noses might be able to be formed by an inventive mechanism with guidelines from God. I have never accepted sentient cell communities as capable of much except immediate minor adaptations, unless they contained a semi-automatic IM in the genome with guidelines from God.-> dhw: But your argument is still puzzling: God is clever enough to devise a mechanism that can autonomously invent kidneys etc., but you won't back down from your contention that he did not do so. Instead, then, you have to revert to the preprogramming/dabbling that caused your dilemma in the first place. However, we have come this far, so perhaps we can delve a little deeper. -Not puzzling at all. God is in control of evolution. All outcomes are within his guidelines. Major issues to make advanced life possible are planned by Him.
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> dhw: So the organs you identify with “patterns” (heart, lungs, kidneys, brains etc.) are too complex for God's inventive mechanism to have invented autonomously. Therefore he preprogrammed them all into the first cells 3.7 billion years ago. Is that correct? -Either pre-programmed or by later direct intervention (dabbling).
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> DAVID: ...And it is true that elementary circulatory systems had no hearts, then beating areas, then had two chambers and then developed to three and finally four chambers. However, each of those jumps is enormous and requires much planning from information to jump the gaps.
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> dhw: So do you think each consecutive stage from beating areas to four chambers was preprogrammed into the first cells 3.7 billion years ago, or did God dabble, or could the inventive mechanism have progressively developed that elementary system?-The heart is so complex at several levels that an IM could not have tried to deal with it. -> dhw: You obviously don't think the IM worked on existing brains, so do you think the human brain was preprogrammed separately from other brains 3.7 billion years ago, or did God dabble?-I think it was direct intervention by God, either pre-pro or dabble, it dones't matter which. The development of the human brain with all of its magificent plasticity, changing itself based on what its human is trying to think or learn, is a marvel of inventiveness. An IM is no match for this. Nor will any computer ever be.