More Denton: My review of my reading so far (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, March 01, 2016, 13:39 (2979 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: First of all, I'd like to express my admiration at your dedication in reading such books, and my gratitude for sharing what you learn. I don't know how you find the time and the patience!
DAVID: Thank you. This study has been an avocation for over 30 years. Believe me I live a very full life outside of it, as you probably realize.-I do indeed, and that gives added cause for admiration!-dhw: Anyone who has followed our discussions over the last eight years will know that as far as you and I are concerned, gradualism has long since been a dead duck, and natural selection creates nothing, but simply ensures that useful changes will survive.
DAVID: Your comment is somewhat tautological: survival and the concept of 'fit' to survive are one and the same. Natural selection is a name given to the result, nothing more.-I did not say ‘fit to survive'. There is no disagreement between us here, except that natural selection is a process, not a result. The result of natural selection is extinction or survival.-dhw: However, we must distinguish between “functional adaptation” and innovation, which is why the response to environmental challenges may come in two forms: adaptation leaves the organism basically the same (surviving the challenge), whereas innovation changes the organism (possibly as a result of exploiting opportunities offered by the environment). Evolution depends on innovation, not adaptation.-DAVID: Exactly. this is why epigenetic adaptations may very well not lead to speciation.-So there must be an inventive mechanism that goes beyond epigenetic adaptation.-dhw: Frankly, if he accepts common descent and wants to discount a preprogramming or dabbling God AND Darwin's random mutations plus gradualism, I see no other possible solution than an autonomous inventive mechanism within organisms themselves.

DAVID: And I ask, where did that come from? You will admit it is just as nebulous. At least in his 'structuralism' he thinks the 'drive to complexity' follows built in laws or guidelines.-I have always said that the origin is unknown and might be your God. And I have always said that it is an alternative explanation of how evolution works. What is this “at least”? Built in laws or guidelines also require an origin, as does your universal mind, though you prefer to gloss that over	 with “first cause”. I do not see the “drive to complexity” as some sort of abstract principle floating around in the ether. It can only exist within organisms themselves, and that requires individual ‘thinking' mechanisms, not a law.