More Miscellany (General)
I posted this five hours ago, but it and all previous posts have disappeared! It's a complete mystery! We have to start again.
Origin of humans
dhw: […] you yourself can’t understand why [your God] didn’t create us directly. I’m suggesting he may have had good reasons for not doing so (e.g. experimentation, a new idea, a free-for-all), but you reject them all in favour of making your God a messy, cumbersome and inefficient designer.
DAVID: You ignore my now ancient answer: the various adaptations perfected us!
You have ignored my now ancient objection: why would an all-powerful, all-knowing God whose only purpose is to design H. sapiens, not do so directly? If he designed every adaptation individually, couldn’t that suggest experimentation, or new ideas, rather than the omniscience required for direct creation?
Darwin’s survival theory
dhw: I’m happy with your acknowledgement that [your God] would have expanded the brain originally in order to improve chances of survival. It is therefore wrong to claim that the human brain cannot be explained by Darwin’s survival theory.
DAVID: Still disagree. The 315,000-year-old brain was much too adequate for those times.
You agree that your God’s original purpose was to improve chances of survival, and your God did not control subsequent complexifications. These resulted from new ideas, many of which were and are extensions of basic survival improvements through inventions, discoveries and institutions. All perfectly in keeping with Darwin’s theory of survival.
Evolution, David and Adler
DAVID: God chose to evolve us, and you complain.
dhw: I complain about your wacky theories, and your constant effort to divert attention away from them by focusing on Adler’s evidence for God’s existence.
DAVID: Not a diversion but a strong point he made which counters your confused approach.
Proving God’s existence does not provide any support for your illogical theory of evolution, which you can’t explain. How does that make my approach “confused”?
Introducing the brain: Defining sex differences
dhw: Perhaps those who wish to change sex already have a mixture of proteins that creates the wish or feeling. That would be another area for the team to explore.
DAVID: We'll wait for a slew of trans brains to study.
It could make a big difference to negative social attitudes if scientists could explain these feelings as natural consequences of brain differences.
Mummies with parasites
DAVID: Thank goodness we know how to protect ourselves now. This was a major part of our civilized evolution. Big brains sure help.
dhw: There are still plenty of lethal bugs around. And in the context of [...] theodicy, we should not forget your statement that it is fair to “blame God for natural disasters” which include “bugs causing diseases”.
DAVID: It is the degree of blame that is important. Proportionality.
See “Theodicy”.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”
ID’s answer
QUOTE: The design of nature requires an explanation, an ultimate explanation. Rather than explain, invoking “teleonomy” just dodges the question. If we say that natural selection and random variation cannot explain something, evolutionary biologists can say, “Well, it’s not random variation, it’s goal-oriented.” If we ask where the goal-oriented-ness itself came from, they will say “natural selection.” The question returns to where it began; a final cause for the existence of design in nature has yet to be proposed.
DAVID: Good old Shapiro is back. Long ago we concluded natural selection is passive. Now suddenly with wishful thinking it is active again. As humans, who plan with purpose, we know a mind must be involved to plan the demonstrated intricacies of living biochemistry!
Yes, we have long since agreed that natural selection does not create anything, and nowhere is it mentioned in the description. It is the ID person who brings it in, and then erects a straw man entirely of his own making. The two quotes above could hardly be clearer: all the authors believe that organisms do their own designing, which is the exact opposite of random mutations. And of course they design with purpose! Every organism’s prime purpose is survival, and every evolutionary development either enables survival or improves the chances of survival.
The question your ID expert has every right to ask is how could this autonomous ability have originated? But that is evidently not the subject of the book, just as Darwin begins with Chapter 2 of life: the origin of species, not of life. There is no reason why any religious person or ID-er should think these findings exclude the possibility of God as the designer of the processes that enable organisms to pursue their own purpose in their own way, from “cognition and decision-making in plants to the niche-construction activities of many organisms to the self-making evolution of humankind.”
More Miscellany
by David Turell 
, Saturday, April 06, 2024, 16:16 (23 days ago) @ dhw
Origin of humans
You have ignored my now ancient objection: why would an all-powerful, all-knowing God whose only purpose is to design H. sapiens, not do so directly? If he designed every adaptation individually, couldn’t that suggest experimentation, or new ideas, rather than the omniscience required for direct creation?
God chose to evolve us as a purpose, stepwise, for His own unknown reasons. Experimentation not necessary as He is omniscient.
Darwin’s survival theorydhw: I’m happy with your acknowledgement that [your God] would have expanded the brain originally in order to improve chances of survival. It is therefore wrong to claim that the human brain cannot be explained by Darwin’s survival theory.
DAVID: Still disagree. The 315,000-year-old brain was much too adequate for those times.
dhw: You agree that your God’s original purpose was to improve chances of survival, and your God did not control subsequent complexifications. These resulted from new ideas, many of which were and are extensions of basic survival improvements through inventions, discoveries and institutions. All perfectly in keeping with Darwin’s theory of survival.
As a very limited view of it. Adler used the very opposite view.
Evolution, David and AdlerDAVID: God chose to evolve us, and you complain.
dhw: I complain about your wacky theories, and your constant effort to divert attention away from them by focusing on Adler’s evidence for God’s existence.
DAVID: Not a diversion but a strong point he made which counters your confused approach.
dhw: Proving God’s existence does not provide any support for your illogical theory of evolution, which you can’t explain. How does that make my approach “confused”?
You are confused about God's choice to evolve us for His own unknown reasons.
Introducing the brain: Defining sex differencesDAVID: We'll wait for a slew of trans brains to study.
dhw: It could make a big difference to negative social attitudes if scientists could explain these feelings as natural consequences of brain differences.
What is now true is obvious very male and quite feminine homosexuals, with exactly the same in lesbians: 'butch' and very feminine.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”
ID’s answer
QUOTE: The design of nature requires an explanation, an ultimate explanation. Rather than explain, invoking “teleonomy” just dodges the question. If we say that natural selection and random variation cannot explain something, evolutionary biologists can say, “Well, it’s not random variation, it’s goal-oriented.” If we ask where the goal-oriented-ness itself came from, they will say “natural selection.” The question returns to where it began; a final cause for the existence of design in nature has yet to be proposed.
DAVID: Good old Shapiro is back. Long ago we concluded natural selection is passive. Now suddenly with wishful thinking it is active again. As humans, who plan with purpose, we know a mind must be involved to plan the demonstrated intricacies of living biochemistry!
dhw: Yes, we have long since agreed that natural selection does not create anything, and nowhere is it mentioned in the description. It is the ID person who brings it in, and then erects a straw man entirely of his own making. The two quotes above could hardly be clearer: all the authors believe that organisms do their own designing, which is the exact opposite of random mutations. And of course they design with purpose! Every organism’s prime purpose is survival, and every evolutionary development either enables survival or improves the chances of survival.
The question your ID expert has every right to ask is how could this autonomous ability have originated? But that is evidently not the subject of the book, just as Darwin begins with Chapter 2 of life: the origin of species, not of life. There is no reason why any religious person or ID-er should think these findings exclude the possibility of God as the designer of the processes that enable organisms to pursue their own purpose in their own way, from “cognition and decision-making in plants to the niche-construction activities of many organisms to the self-making evolution of humankind.”
You've made a good review. ID accepts God. What you have avoided is the obvious purpose in evolution, the point of the book, which it tries to explain.
More Miscellany
Origin of humans
dhw: You have ignored my now ancient objection: why would an all-powerful, all-knowing God whose only purpose is to design H. sapiens, not do so directly? If he designed every adaptation individually, couldn’t that suggest experimentation, or new ideas, rather than the omniscience required for direct creation?
DAVID: God chose to evolve us as a purpose, stepwise, for His own unknown reasons. Experimentation not necessary as He is omniscient.
Omniscience is another attribute you wish for. Experimentation would not be necessary IF he was omniscient. Hence the question why an omniscient God with only one purpose (sapiens plus food) would not design us directly. “Unknown reasons!” you cry, as if that explained anything! God experimenting and learning would be a logical answer. Your response: “That goes against the God I wish for.”
Darwin’s survival theory
dhw: You agree that your God’s original purpose was to improve chances of survival, and your God did not control subsequent complexifications. These resulted from new ideas, many of which were and are extensions of basic survival improvements through inventions, discoveries and institutions. All perfectly in keeping with Darwin’s theory of survival.
DAVID: As a very limited view of it. Adler used the very opposite view.
Please stop hiding behind Adler. All of the above illustrates the obvious link between the human brain and its ever-present use from origin to present in the cause of survival. Your wish that your God gave it neurons that would not be used or only barely used for 290,000 years does not invalidate the theory that it originated as a continuation of the quest for improved chances of survival. Darwin’s theory is not wrong.
Introducing the brain: Defining sex differences
DAVID: We'll wait for a slew of trans brains to study.
dhw: It could make a big difference to negative social attitudes if scientists could explain these feelings as natural consequences of brain differences.
DAVID: What is now true is obvious very male and quite feminine homosexuals, with exactly the same in lesbians: 'butch' and very feminine.
Indeed. And horrifically they were once branded as criminals (and still are in some cultures). There are vast numbers of animal species that are also gay, and I’m sure their brain wiring would be different too, as would “trans brains”. But I must admit that the latter do create social problems that do not arise from homosexuality and lesbianism. No blame attached, but in the competitive world of sport, and in places like prisons and public lavatories, integration of “trans” people is a tricky matter which is causing a lot of controversy over here.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”
ID’s answer
I’ll summarize my response, which was that the author devised a straw man by pretending that the book sets up natural selection and random mutations as the answer to ID. It doesn’t. The above quotes propose that evolution develops through the autonomous ability of organisms to do their own designing. The ID reviewer then criticizes the book for not dealing with the origin of life (or in this case the origin of cellular autonomy), but that is not the subject the book is concerned with (unless the description is horribly selective).
DAVID: You've made a good review. ID accepts God. What you have avoided is the obvious purpose in evolution, the point of the book, which it tries to explain.
I didn’t avoid it. I wrote: “Of course they design with purpose! Every organisms‘s prime purpose is survival, and every evolutionary development either enables survival or improves the chances of survival.”
Handedness origin
QUOTES: "Monkeys that adopted an urban lifestyle in India are mostly left-handed – in contrast to humans and many other primates that live on the ground.”
"The findings clash with long-standing claims that primates that come down from the trees generally evolve a tendency to be right-handed, raising questions about what really drives this trait.”
I am applying for a grant to conduct a worldwide survey in order to establish the exact proportion of right and left handedness in monkeys and babies, and how this proportion is proportioned in proportion to the right and left handedness of parents and grandparents. All contributions will be most welcome.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Sunday, April 07, 2024, 15:08 (22 days ago) @ dhw
Origin of humans
DAVID: God chose to evolve us as a purpose, stepwise, for His own unknown reasons. Experimentation not necessary as He is omniscient.
dhw: Omniscience is another attribute you wish for. Experimentation would not be necessary IF he was omniscient. Hence the question why an omniscient God with only one purpose (sapiens plus food) would not design us directly. “Unknown reasons!” you cry, as if that explained anything! God experimenting and learning would be a logical answer. Your response: “That goes against the God I wish for.”
Your dive into God's brain is your refusal to understand theologian's views. Your logic is not God's logic!
Darwin’s survival theorydhw: You agree that your God’s original purpose was to improve chances of survival, and your God did not control subsequent complexifications. These resulted from new ideas, many of which were and are extensions of basic survival improvements through inventions, discoveries and institutions. All perfectly in keeping with Darwin’s theory of survival.
DAVID: As a very limited view of it. Adler used the very opposite view.
dhw: Please stop hiding behind Adler. All of the above illustrates the obvious link between the human brain and its ever-present use from origin to present in the cause of survival. Your wish that your God gave it neurons that would not be used or only barely used for 290,000 years does not invalidate the theory that it originated as a continuation of the quest for improved chances of survival. Darwin’s theory is not wrong.
Survival and common descent everyone agrees to. Only some see God the designer.
Introducing the brain: Defining sex differencesDAVID: We'll wait for a slew of trans brains to study.
dhw: It could make a big difference to negative social attitudes if scientists could explain these feelings as natural consequences of brain differences.
DAVID: What is now true is obvious very male and quite feminine homosexuals, with exactly the same in lesbians: 'butch' and very feminine.
dhw: Indeed. And horrifically they were once branded as criminals (and still are in some cultures). There are vast numbers of animal species that are also gay, and I’m sure their brain wiring would be different too, as would “trans brains”. But I must admit that the latter do create social problems that do not arise from homosexuality and lesbianism. No blame attached, but in the competitive world of sport, and in places like prisons and public lavatories, integration of “trans” people is a tricky matter which is causing a lot of controversy over here.
AND here.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”
ID’s answer
dhw: I’ll summarize my response, which was that the author devised a straw man by pretending that the book sets up natural selection and random mutations as the answer to ID. It doesn’t. The above quotes propose that evolution develops through the autonomous ability of organisms to do their own designing. The ID reviewer then criticizes the book for not dealing with the origin of life (or in this case the origin of cellular autonomy), but that is not the subject the book is concerned with (unless the description is horribly selective).
DAVID: You've made a good review. ID accepts God. What you have avoided is the obvious purpose in evolution, the point of the book, which it tries to explain.
dhw: I didn’t avoid it. I wrote: “Of course they design with purpose! Every organisms‘s prime purpose is survival, and every evolutionary development either enables survival or improves the chances of survival.”
The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
Handedness originQUOTES: "Monkeys that adopted an urban lifestyle in India are mostly left-handed – in contrast to humans and many other primates that live on the ground.”
"The findings clash with long-standing claims that primates that come down from the trees generally evolve a tendency to be right-handed, raising questions about what really drives this trait.”
dhw: I am applying for a grant to conduct a worldwide survey in order to establish the exact proportion of right and left handedness in monkeys and babies, and how this proportion is proportioned in proportion to the right and left handedness of parents and grandparents. All contributions will be most welcome.
From my lefty point of view I'll help.
More Miscellany
Origin of humans
DAVID: God chose to evolve us as a purpose, stepwise, for His own unknown reasons. Experimentation not necessary as He is omniscient.
dhw: Omniscience is another attribute you wish for. Experimentation would not be necessary IF he was omniscient. Hence the question why an omniscient God with only one purpose (sapiens plus food) would not design us directly. “Unknown reasons!” you cry, as if that explained anything! God experimenting and learning would be a logical answer. Your response: “That goes against the God I wish for.”
DAVID: Your dive into God's brain is your refusal to understand theologian's views. Your logic is not God's logic!
Nobody knows God’s logic or his purpose or his nature. Not even theologians agree amongst themselves, and I’m sorry, but when you present us with theories which defy logic and depend entirely on irrational faith that the God you wish for is the real God, I don’t “refuse” to understand them. I join you in not understanding them, but I don’t join you in accepting them.
Darwin’s survival theory
dhw: You agree that your God’s original purpose was to improve chances of survival, and your God did not control subsequent complexifications. These resulted from new ideas, many of which were and are extensions of basic survival improvements through inventions, discoveries and institutions. All perfectly in keeping with Darwin’s theory of survival. […]
DAVID: Survival and common descent everyone agrees to. Only some see God the designer.
Thank you for agreeing that Darwin’s survival theory is correct. Darwin himself had no objection to the theory that God was the designer of the processes that led to the evolution of the human brain and every other product of evolution.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”
I shan’t repeat ID’s answer which, by way of a straw man concerning natural selection, simply objected to the fact that the book appears not to have discussed the origin of life and of intelligent design.
DAVID: You've made a good review. ID accepts God. What you have avoided is the obvious purpose in evolution, the point of the book, which it tries to explain.
dhw: I didn’t avoid it. I wrote: “Of course they design with purpose! Every organism‘s prime purpose is survival, and every evolutionary development either enables survival or improves the chances of survival.”
DAVID: The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
And clearly the book – like Darwin’s Origin of Species – was dedicated to the theory I have bolded above, the point being that evolution is driven by the purposeful actions of the organisms themselves, as they adapt to or exploit new conditions in the great quest for survival. The origin of life and all its mechanisms is a different subject.
Handedness origin
dhw: I am applying for a grant to conduct a worldwide survey in order to establish the exact proportion of right and left handedness in monkeys and babies, and how this proportion is proportioned in proportion to the right and left handedness of parents and grandparents. All contributions will be most welcome.
DAVID: From my lefty point of view I'll help.
I’ll accept contributions from lefties and righties. You know how open-minded I am!
Evolution: transitional fish, Tiktaalik new findings
QUOTE: "'Tiktaalik is remarkable because it gives us glimpses into this major evolutionary transition," Stewart said. "Across its whole skeleton, we see a combination of traits that are typical of fish and life in water as well as traits that are seen in land-dwelling animals."
DAVID: the authors of this article see the purpose in evolution as they describe the advances related to walking.
It’s truly amazing how frequently we are presented with new findings. My thanks, as always, to David.
This one is very revealing. There is no “advance related to walking”. Different conditions demand different means of locomotion. Fins are better for water, and legs are better for land. In this clear filling of gaps, the authors point out the similarities and developments that confirm the theory of common descent, and they show that the purpose of all these structural changes is to improve the respective organisms’ chances of survival in different environments.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Wednesday, April 10, 2024, 19:16 (19 days ago) @ dhw
edited by David Turell, Wednesday, April 10, 2024, 19:23
Origin of humans
DAVID: Your dive into God's brain is your refusal to understand theologian's views. Your logic is not God's logic!
dhw: Nobody knows God’s logic or his purpose or his nature. Not even theologians agree amongst themselves, and I’m sorry, but when you present us with theories which defy logic and depend entirely on irrational faith that the God you wish for is the real God, I don’t “refuse” to understand them. I join you in not understanding them, but I don’t join you in accepting them.
I know that.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable.”
dhw: I shan’t repeat ID’s answer which, by way of a straw man concerning natural selection, simply objected to the fact that the book appears not to have discussed the origin of life and of intelligent design.
DAVID: You've made a good review. ID accepts God. What you have avoided is the obvious purpose in evolution, the point of the book, which it tries to explain.
dhw: I didn’t avoid it. I wrote: “Of course they design with purpose! Every organism‘s prime purpose is survival, and every evolutionary development either enables survival or improves the chances of survival.”
DAVID: The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
dhw: And clearly the book – like Darwin’s Origin of Species – was dedicated to the theory I have bolded above, the point being that evolution is driven by the purposeful actions of the organisms themselves, as they adapt to or exploit new conditions in the great quest for survival. The origin of life and all its mechanisms is a different subject.
And the book asks, what gave those organisms that purposeful drive? Trilobites lasted 250 million years. As Raup shows, only extinction forced a new change. One could ask, lasting that long, why bother to improve survival with a better form?
Handedness origindhw: I am applying for a grant to conduct a worldwide survey in order to establish the exact proportion of right and left handedness in monkeys and babies, and how this proportion is proportioned in proportion to the right and left handedness of parents and grandparents. All contributions will be most welcome.
DAVID: From my lefty point of view I'll help.
dhw: I’ll accept contributions from lefties and righties. You know how open-minded I am!
Evolution: transitional fish, Tiktaalik new findings
QUOTE: "'Tiktaalik is remarkable because it gives us glimpses into this major evolutionary transition," Stewart said. "Across its whole skeleton, we see a combination of traits that are typical of fish and life in water as well as traits that are seen in land-dwelling animals."
DAVID: the authors of this article see the purpose in evolution as they describe the advances related to walking.
dhw: It’s truly amazing how frequently we are presented with new findings. My thanks, as always, to David.
This one is very revealing. There is no “advance related to walking”. Different conditions demand different means of locomotion. Fins are better for water, and legs are better for land. In this clear filling of gaps, the authors point out the similarities and developments that confirm the theory of common descent, and they show that the purpose of all these structural changes is to improve the respective organisms’ chances of survival in different environments.
No question Tiktaalik fits the bill.
More Miscellany
Origin of humans
DAVID: Your dive into God's brain is your refusal to understand theologian's views. Your logic is not God's logic!
dhw: Nobody knows God’s logic or his purpose or his nature. Not even theologians agree amongst themselves, and I’m sorry, but when you present us with theories which defy logic and depend entirely on irrational faith that the God you wish for is the real God, I don’t “refuse” to understand them. I join you in not understanding them, but I don’t join you in accepting them.
DAVID: I know that.
So you know I don’t “refuse” to understand your wacky theological theories but, like yourself, can’t find any logical reason for supporting them. And I can’t join you in faithfully accepting your own wishful thinking.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable."
DAVID: The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
And he has no right to do so, since the book is manifestly not about God and some divine purpose but about the purposeful mechanisms that have driven evolution.
dhw: […] the point being that evolution is driven by the purposeful actions of the organisms themselves, as they adapt to or exploit new conditions in the great quest for survival. The origin of life and all its mechanisms is a different subject.
DAVID: And the book asks, what gave those organisms that purposeful drive? Trilobites lasted 250 million years. As Raup shows, only extinction forced a new change. One could ask, lasting that long, why bother to improve survival with a better form?
The book apparently shows us the different ways in which organisms design themselves. You and the reviewer seem to be criticizing it because you think the authors should have dealt with a different subject.
Evolution: transitional fish, Tiktaalik new findings
QUOTE: "'Tiktaalik is remarkable because it gives us glimpses into this major evolutionary transition," Stewart said. "Across its whole skeleton, we see a combination of traits that are typical of fish and life in water as well as traits that are seen in land-dwelling animals."
DAVID: the authors of this article see the purpose in evolution as they describe the advances related to walking.
dhw: There is no “advance related to walking”. Different conditions demand different means of locomotion. Fins are better for water, and legs are better for land. In this clear filling of gaps, the authors point out the similarities and developments that confirm the theory of common descent, and they show that the purpose of all these structural changes is to improve the respective organisms’ chances of survival in different environments.
DAVID: No question Tiktaalik fits the bill.
Nice to be in agreement! 
Giant viruses
DAVID: from my view of purpose acting in evolution, all forms of life that are here play a necessary role.
Necessary for what? All forms of life, extinct and extant, have played and play a role in the history of life. (Nothing to do with your theory of evolution, in which 99.9% of forms had no link with the present but for no conceivable reason were specially designed and culled by your God.) You’ve used the present tense, so please tell us, for example, what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Thursday, April 11, 2024, 21:27 (18 days ago) @ dhw
Origin of humans
DAVID: Your dive into God's brain is your refusal to understand theologian's views. Your logic is not God's logic!
dhw: Nobody knows God’s logic or his purpose or his nature. Not even theologians agree amongst themselves, and I’m sorry, but when you present us with theories which defy logic and depend entirely on irrational faith that the God you wish for is the real God, I don’t “refuse” to understand them. I join you in not understanding them, but I don’t join you in accepting them.
DAVID: I know that.
dhw: So you know I don’t “refuse” to understand your wacky theological theories but, like yourself, can’t find any logical reason for supporting them. And I can’t join you in faithfully accepting your own wishful thinking.
I'm sorry you can't jump in and see the logic.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable."
DAVID: The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
dhw: And he has no right to do so, since the book is manifestly not about God and some divine purpose but about the purposeful mechanisms that have driven evolution.
And he questions where did that purpose come from? And you object to that?
dhw: […] the point being that evolution is driven by the purposeful actions of the organisms themselves, as they adapt to or exploit new conditions in the great quest for survival. The origin of life and all its mechanisms is a different subject.DAVID: And the book asks, what gave those organisms that purposeful drive? Trilobites lasted 250 million years. As Raup shows, only extinction forced a new change. One could ask, lasting that long, why bother to improve survival with a better form?
dhw: The book apparently shows us the different ways in which organisms design themselves. You and the reviewer seem to be criticizing it because you think the authors should have dealt with a different subject.
Same subject, different questions with possible answers you seem to avoid.
Evolution: transitional fish, Tiktaalik new findingsQUOTE: "'Tiktaalik is remarkable because it gives us glimpses into this major evolutionary transition," Stewart said. "Across its whole skeleton, we see a combination of traits that are typical of fish and life in water as well as traits that are seen in land-dwelling animals."
DAVID: the authors of this article see the purpose in evolution as they describe the advances related to walking.
dhw: There is no “advance related to walking”. Different conditions demand different means of locomotion. Fins are better for water, and legs are better for land. In this clear filling of gaps, the authors point out the similarities and developments that confirm the theory of common descent, and they show that the purpose of all these structural changes is to improve the respective organisms’ chances of survival in different environments.
DAVID: No question Tiktaalik fits the bill.
dhw: Nice to be in agreement!
Giant viruses
DAVID: from my view of purpose acting in evolution, all forms of life that are here play a necessary role.
dhw: Necessary for what? All forms of life, extinct and extant, have played and play a role in the history of life. (Nothing to do with your theory of evolution, in which 99.9% of forms had no link with the present but for no conceivable reason were specially designed and culled by your God.)
Same weird total distortion of the evolutionary process. The 99.9% must be linked to the now living or the now living would not be here.
dhw: You’ve used the present tense, so please tell us, for example, what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
More Miscellany
Origin of humans
DAVID: Your dive into God's brain is your refusal to understand theologian's views. Your logic is not God's logic!
dhw: […] I don’t “refuse” to understand your wacky theological theories but, like yourself, can’t find any logical reason for supporting them. And I can’t join you in faithfully accepting your own wishful thinking.
DAVID: I'm sorry you can't jump in and see the logic.
The only logic you have offered us is the design theory. You admit that you can’t find any logic in your theory of evolution, and that your often self-contradictory views of your God’s nature are based on your wishes, not on “logic”.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
QUOTES:[the authors have explored] “in depth the different ways in which living systems have themselves shaped the course of evolution.”
As this collection compellingly shows, and as bacterial geneticist James Shapiro emphasizes, “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable."
DAVID: The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
dhw: And he has no right to do so, since the book is manifestly not about God and some divine purpose but about the purposeful mechanisms that have driven evolution.
DAVID: And he questions where did that purpose come from? And you object to that?
I do not think a reviewer should criticize a book for not dealing with the subject he/she would like it to deal with. Why should a scientific study of how evolution works have to discuss theology?
DAVID: Same subject, different questions with possible answers you seem to avoid.
How evolution works is not the same subject as how life might have originated. During your medical career, when you were studying how diseases developed, and what was needed to cure them, I hope you didn’t spend half the time explaining to your patients that God had a purpose in creating the bugs and had given you your great brain in the hope that you would find an antidote. The purpose of science is not always to wed itself to philosophy and theology.
Giant viruses
DAVID: from my view of purpose acting in evolution, all forms of life that are here play a necessary role.
dhw: Necessary for what? All forms of life, extinct and extant, have played and play a role in the history of life. (Nothing to do with your theory of evolution, in which 99.9% of forms had no link with the present but for no conceivable reason were specially designed and culled by your God.)
DAVID: Same weird total distortion of the evolutionary process. The 99.9% must be linked to the now living or the now living would not be here.
Off you go again. You have agreed that it is the 0.1% that are linked to the now living. How many more times?
(dhw: Do you believe that we and our food are directly descended from 99.9% of all creatures that ever lived?
DAVID: No. From the 0.1% surviving.)
dhw: […] please tell us, for example, what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
Cell complexity: formation of the centriole
DAVID: I cannot reproduce any portion of this study which is filled with picture illustrations of all the steps and parts. If possible open the website and skim through. The complexity of the design will be startling.
I have skimmed. It’s way beyond my comprehension, but that is a point in itself: I’m amazed by the fact that humans are able to analyse the different parts of such a tiny organism, and the amazement is massively multiplied when we think of the design itself. This is where faith in chance becomes as irrational as faith in an unknown, unknowable, immaterial, eternal, sourceless, omnipotent, omniscient, all-good form of consciousness.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Friday, April 12, 2024, 21:27 (17 days ago) @ dhw
Origin of humans
DAVID: I'm sorry you can't jump in and see the logic.
The only logic you have offered us is the design theory. You admit that you can’t find any logic in your theory of evolution, and that your often self-contradictory views of your God’s nature are based on your wishes, not on “logic”.
You won't see the purpose, so the logic never shows up.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
DAVID: The reviewer is looking for purpose as God evolved us.
dhw: And he has no right to do so, since the book is manifestly not about God and some divine purpose but about the purposeful mechanisms that have driven evolution.
DAVID: And he questions where did that purpose come from? And you object to that?
dhw: I do not think a reviewer should criticize a book for not dealing with the subject he/she would like it to deal with. Why should a scientific study of how evolution works have to discuss theology?
DAVID: Same subject, different questions with possible answers you seem to avoid.
dhw: How evolution works is not the same subject as how life might have originated. During your medical career, when you were studying how diseases developed, and what was needed to cure them, I hope you didn’t spend half the time explaining to your patients that God had a purpose in creating the bugs and had given you your great brain in the hope that you would find an antidote. The purpose of science is not always to wed itself to philosophy and theology.
Of course not. But a reviewer is free to review however he wishes. A book is not presented with any iron-bound rules that it must be seen from one rigid viewpoint. The reviewer used it to make his point. Why does that bother you?
Giant virusesDAVID: from my view of purpose acting in evolution, all forms of life that are here play a necessary role.
dhw: Necessary for what? All forms of life, extinct and extant, have played and play a role in the history of life. (Nothing to do with your theory of evolution, in which 99.9% of forms had no link with the present but for no conceivable reason were specially designed and culled by your God.)
DAVID: Same weird total distortion of the evolutionary process. The 99.9% must be linked to the now living or the now living would not be here.
dhw: Off you go again. You have agreed that it is the 0.1% that are linked to the now living. How many more times?
If you don't like my reasoning, try and understand it from the viewpoint of a purposeful designer.
(dhw: Do you believe that we and our food are directly descended from 99.9% of all creatures that ever lived?
DAVID: No. From the 0.1% surviving.)dhw: […] please tell us, for example, what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
dhw: Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
Millions died or are impaired. Where did you find such statistics to extrapolate?
Cell complexity: formation of the centrioleDAVID: I cannot reproduce any portion of this study which is filled with picture illustrations of all the steps and parts. If possible open the website and skim through. The complexity of the design will be startling.
dhw: I have skimmed. It’s way beyond my comprehension, but that is a point in itself: I’m amazed by the fact that humans are able to analyse the different parts of such a tiny organism, and the amazement is massively multiplied when we think of the design itself. This is where faith in chance becomes as irrational as faith in an unknown, unknowable, immaterial, eternal, sourceless, omnipotent, omniscient, all-good form of consciousness.
Quite an intricate design, isn't it? Yes, chance is an irrational conclusion. But we mustn't conclude a designing mind might exist. The big step is MUST exist.
More Miscellany
Origin of humans
DAVID: I'm sorry you can't jump in and see the logic.
dhw: The only logic you have offered us is the design theory. You admit that you can’t find any logic in your theory of evolution, and that your often self-contradictory views of your God’s nature are based on your wishes, not on “logic”.
DAVID: You won't see the purpose, so the logic never shows up.
I see your wishes and what you agree is your irrational faith that they are the reality. I note that you can’t find any logic to support your faith in your messy and inefficient theory of evolution, and you have no evidence to support your often contradictory faith that the God you wish for is the real God.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
dhw: I do not think a reviewer should criticize a book for not dealing with the subject he/she would like it to deal with. Why should a scientific study of how evolution works have to discuss theology? […]
DAVID: a reviewer is free to review however he wishes. A book is not presented with any iron-bound rules that it must be seen from one rigid viewpoint. The reviewer used it to make his point. Why does that bother you?
Of course anyone can write whatever they want to write. Go and see “King Lear” and write a review castigating Shakespeare for not making it a comedy. This review bothers me because I think critics should judge such a work by the degree to which it fulfils the purpose it sets out to fulfil. I can only comment on the article you presented to us, but the quotes suggest that it is a scientific study of the manner in which plants and animals design their own means of survival. As a potential reader, I want to know what the book is about, and whether the reviewer finds it convincing. If not, why not? I don’t expect the reviewer to ignore the actual subject and complain that the authors didn’t write about the subject he/she is interested in.
Giant viruses
DAVID: from my view of purpose acting in evolution, all forms of life that are here play a necessary role.
dhw: Necessary for what? All forms of life, extinct and extant, have played and play a role in the history of life. (Nothing to do with your theory of evolution, in which 99.9% of forms had no link with the present but for no conceivable reason were specially designed and culled by your God.)
DAVID: If you don't like my reasoning, try and understand it from the viewpoint of a purposeful designer.
That is exactly what I have done, and if I were a designer with a single purpose, I would not deliberately design and then get rid of 99.9 out of 100 items that had nothing to do with my one and only purpose.
dhw: […] please tell us, for example, what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
dhw: Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
DAVID: Millions died or are impaired. Where did you find such statistics to extrapolate?
One website gives the number of known Covid deaths as 7,010,631. The flu epidemic that hit the world in 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people. But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.
Cell complexity: formation of the centriole
dhw: I’m amazed by the fact that humans are able to analyse the different parts of such a tiny organism, and the amazement is massively multiplied when we think of the design itself. This is where faith in chance becomes as irrational as faith in an unknown, unknowable, immaterial, eternal, sourceless, omnipotent, omniscient, all-good form of consciousness.
DAVID: Quite an intricate design, isn't it? Yes, chance is an irrational conclusion. But we mustn't conclude a designing mind might exist. The big step is MUST exist.
I don’t understand your third sentence. I would use the complexity as evidence that a designing mind might exist. And yes, the big step would entail ignoring my last sentence.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Saturday, April 13, 2024, 20:26 (16 days ago) @ dhw
Origin of humans
dhw: I see your wishes and what you agree is your irrational faith that they are the reality. I note that you can’t find any logic to support your faith in your messy and inefficient theory of evolution, and you have no evidence to support your often contradictory faith that the God you wish for is the real God.
No one knows the 'real' Gpd. But I accept an all-knowing purposeful God who evolved us and provided the resources of the Earth for our use.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.dhw: I do not think a reviewer should criticize a book for not dealing with the subject he/she would like it to deal with. Why should a scientific study of how evolution works have to discuss theology? […]
DAVID: a reviewer is free to review however he wishes. A book is not presented with any iron-bound rules that it must be seen from one rigid viewpoint. The reviewer used it to make his point. Why does that bother you?
dhw: Of course anyone can write whatever they want to write. Go and see “King Lear” and write a review castigating Shakespeare for not making it a comedy. This review bothers me because I think critics should judge such a work by the degree to which it fulfils the purpose it sets out to fulfil. I can only comment on the article you presented to us, but the quotes suggest that it is a scientific study of the manner in which plants and animals design their own means of survival. As a potential reader, I want to know what the book is about, and whether the reviewer finds it convincing. If not, why not? I don’t expect the reviewer to ignore the actual subject and complain that the authors didn’t write about the subject he/she is interested in.
There is no rule that a writer cannot use a book as a discussion point from which he presents his view. A reviewer need not be neutral.
Giant virusesDAVID: from my view of purpose acting in evolution, all forms of life that are here play a necessary role.
dhw: Necessary for what? All forms of life, extinct and extant, have played and play a role in the history of life. (Nothing to do with your theory of evolution, in which 99.9% of forms had no link with the present but for no conceivable reason were specially designed and culled by your God.)
DAVID: If you don't like my reasoning, try and understand it from the viewpoint of a purposeful designer.
dhw: That is exactly what I have done, and if I were a designer with a single purpose, I would not deliberately design and then get rid of 99.9 out of 100 items that had nothing to do with my one and only purpose.
Same leap back to the same muddled distortion of the history of evolution which actually required that degree of extinctions.
dhw: […] please tell us, for example, what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
dhw: Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
DAVID: Millions died or are impaired. Where did you find such statistics to extrapolate?
dhw: One website gives the number of known Covid deaths as 7,010,631. The flu epidemic that hit the world in 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people. But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.
If you wish everyone sat peacefully around doing nothing just eating and sleeping, would you want a life like that? I'll take the challenges!
Cell complexity: formation of the centrioledhw: I’m amazed by the fact that humans are able to analyse the different parts of such a tiny organism, and the amazement is massively multiplied when we think of the design itself. This is where faith in chance becomes as irrational as faith in an unknown, unknowable, immaterial, eternal, sourceless, omnipotent, omniscient, all-good form of consciousness.
DAVID: Quite an intricate design, isn't it? Yes, chance is an irrational conclusion. But we mustn't conclude a designing mind might exist. The big step is MUST exist.
dhw: I don’t understand your third sentence. I would use the complexity as evidence that a designing mind might exist. And yes, the big step would entail ignoring my last sentence.
You understand the point. Design means a designer did it.
More Miscellany
Origin of humans
dhw: […] you have no evidence to support your often contradictory faith that the God you wish for is the real God.
DAVID: No one knows the 'real' God. But I accept an all-knowing purposeful God who evolved us and provided the resources of the Earth for our use.
For all-knowing, see the evolution thread. If God exists, I agree that he must have had a purpose, and that evolution produced us and all the other species and resources throughout our planet’s history. I do not accept your theory that 3.8 billion years of life’s ever changing history was “for our use”, since 99.9% of that history had no connection with us. Stop dodging.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
DAVID: There is no rule that a writer cannot use a book as a discussion point from which he presents his view. A reviewer need not be neutral.
No review will be neutral, as judgements are always subjective. There are no “rules”, but in my opinion a book which presents scientific evidence that organisms themselves shape the course of evolution should not be criticized for not delving into theology. If you explained the nature of and possible cure for your patient’s illness, would you expect the patient to disagree because you didn’t discuss the extent to which God was responsible for it? I think the context should determine the approach.
Giant viruses
DAVID: If you don't like my reasoning, try and understand it from the viewpoint of a purposeful designer.
dhw: That is exactly what I have done, and if I were a designer with a single purpose, I would not deliberately design and then get rid of 99.9 out of 100 items that had nothing to do with my one and only purpose.
DAVID: Same leap back to the same muddled distortion of the history of evolution which actually required that degree of extinctions.
I didn’t know history had requirements. How many evolutions have you experienced? I thought you thought it was your God who decided he must design and extinguish the 99.9% of species irrelevant to his purpose, though you can’t find any reason for his doing so.
dhw: […] please tell us […] what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
dhw: Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
DAVID: Millions died or are impaired. Where did you find such statistics to extrapolate?
dhw: One website gives the number of known Covid deaths as 7,010,631. The flu epidemic that hit the world in 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people.
No response.
dhw: But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.
DAVID: If you wish everyone sat peacefully around doing nothing just eating and sleeping, would you want a life like that? I'll take the challenges!
I have no idea why you think an interesting life would be impossible without rape, murder and millions of deaths from the diseases for which you blame your God. You keep telling us under “Theodicy” to ignore the evil and focus on all the good your God has created! Now we should forget all the good (the joys of love, family, friendship, art, sport, travel, etc.), and you thank God for creating or allowing evil to prevent you from getting bored.
Cell complexity: formation of the centriole
DAVID: Quite an intricate design, isn't it? Yes, chance is an irrational conclusion. But we mustn't conclude a designing mind might exist. The big step is MUST exist. […]
Later:
DAVID: Design means a designer did it.
Yes, That is a rational conclusion. But if a complex life requires a designing mind, the designing mind must be so complex that it too would require a designer: you need blind faith to believe that an unknown, immaterial, superpowerful form of consciousness can simply exist without a source. That is why I remain on my picket fence.
Homo luzonensis
QUOTES: "The implication is that some population of hominins, wandering vaguely eastwards, made their way to Luzon – accidentally or on purpose. Isolated on the island, they evolved bodies different to those of other hominins, ultimately becoming the distinct species we call H. luzonensis.”
“…evolution often throws up the same thing multiple times in different species: it’s called convergent evolution.”
DAVID: Environment causes adaptations.
Existing organisms respond to new conditions, and so there is clearly a mechanism that produces the changes – not just adaptations but also speciation. It ties in with the book on “teleonomy”: “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable”. This dispenses with Darwin’s random mutations, but confirms the heart of his theory, which is common descent. How such an autonomous mechanism came into being would be a different subject. Thank you, David, for your objective presentation.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Sunday, April 14, 2024, 19:50 (15 days ago) @ dhw
dhw: For all-knowing, see the evolution thread. If God exists, I agree that he must have had a purpose, and that evolution produced us and all the other species and resources throughout our planet’s history. I do not accept your theory that 3.8 billion years of life’s ever changing history was “for our use”, since 99.9% of that history had no connection with us. Stop dodging.
More confusion. What is here now if for our use.
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.DAVID: There is no rule that a writer cannot use a book as a discussion point from which he presents his view. A reviewer need not be neutral.
dhw: No review will be neutral, as judgements are always subjective. There are no “rules”, but in my opinion a book which presents scientific evidence that organisms themselves shape the course of evolution should not be criticized for not delving into theology. If you explained the nature of and possible cure for your patient’s illness, would you expect the patient to disagree because you didn’t discuss the extent to which God was responsible for it? I think the context should determine the approach.
A reviewer can take any viewpoint He wishes. It is your obligation to evaluate the review.
Giant virusesDAVID: Same leap back to the same muddled distortion of the history of evolution which actually required that degree of extinctions.
dhw: I didn’t know history had requirements. How many evolutions have you experienced? I thought you thought it was your God who decided he must design and extinguish the 99.9% of species irrelevant to his purpose, though you can’t find any reason for his doing so.
The history of evolution had extinction requirements. You continue to torture Raup's book. All of evolution required a 99.9% lost.
dhw: […] please tell us […] what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
dhw: Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
DAVID: Millions died or are impaired. Where did you find such statistics to extrapolate?
dhw: One website gives the number of known Covid deaths as 7,010,631. The flu epidemic that hit the world in 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people.
No response.
Thank you, Good statistics. Thank the Chinese for inventing the virus.
dhw: But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.DAVID: If you wish everyone sat peacefully around doing nothing just eating and sleeping, would you want a life like that? I'll take the challenges!
dhw: I have no idea why you think an interesting life would be impossible without rape, murder and millions of deaths from the diseases for which you blame your God. You keep telling us under “Theodicy” to ignore the evil and focus on all the good your God has created! Now we should forget all the good (the joys of love, family, friendship, art, sport, travel, etc.), and you thank God for creating or allowing evil to prevent you from getting bored.
I never ignored the 'good'. Your fallacy.
Cell complexity: formation of the centrioleDAVID: Quite an intricate design, isn't it? Yes, chance is an irrational conclusion. But we mustn't conclude a designing mind might exist. The big step is MUST exist. […]
Later:
DAVID: Design means a designer did it.dhw: Yes, That is a rational conclusion. But if a complex life requires a designing mind, the designing mind must be so complex that it too would require a designer: you need blind faith to believe that an unknown, immaterial, superpowerful form of consciousness can simply exist without a source. That is why I remain on my picket fence.
I'll stick with there must be a first cause.
Homo luzonensis
QUOTES: "The implication is that some population of hominins, wandering vaguely eastwards, made their way to Luzon – accidentally or on purpose. Isolated on the island, they evolved bodies different to those of other hominins, ultimately becoming the distinct species we call H. luzonensis.”“…evolution often throws up the same thing multiple times in different species: it’s called convergent evolution.”
DAVID: Environment causes adaptations.
dhw: Existing organisms respond to new conditions, and so there is clearly a mechanism that produces the changes – not just adaptations but also speciation. It ties in with the book on “teleonomy”: “The capacity of living organisms to alter their own heredity is undeniable”. This dispenses with Darwin’s random mutations, but confirms the heart of his theory, which is common descent. How such an autonomous mechanism came into being would be a different subject. Thank you, David, for your objective presentation.
You are welcome.
More Miscellany
Evolution and purpose: teleonomy.
dhw: […] in my opinion a book which presents scientific evidence that organisms themselves shape the course of evolution should not be criticized for not delving into theology.
DAVID: A reviewer can take any viewpoint He wishes. It is your obligation to evaluate the review.
Agreed. And I have done so.
Giant viruses
DAVID: Same leap back to the same muddled distortion of the history of evolution which actually required that degree of extinctions.
dhw: I didn’t know history had requirements. How many evolutions have you experienced? I thought you thought it was your God who decided he must design and extinguish the 99.9% of species irrelevant to his purpose, though you can’t find any reason for his doing so.
DAVID: The history of evolution had extinction requirements. You continue to torture Raup's book. All of evolution required a 99.9% lost.
I have no idea what Raup believes, and I wish you would tackle my arguments directly instead of hiding behind him. If God exists, he would have determined what evolution required – he would not have been bound by some requirement he hadn’t created for himself. Why would an all-powerful, all-knowing God require himself to design 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with his one and only purpose?
dhw: […] please tell us […] what you think is the necessary role of the influenza virus.
DAVID: Just like Covid. God-given brains are challenged and protect us.
dhw: Millions die or are impaired for life, and that is necessary because God gave us brains to protect ourselves with. I find your logic incomprehensible.
DAVID: Millions died or are impaired. Where did you find such statistics to extrapolate?
dhw: One website gives the number of known Covid deaths as 7,010,631. The flu epidemic that hit the world in 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people.
DAVID: Thank you, Good statistics. Thank the Chinese for inventing the virus.
Influenza was the virus we started with. Now that you know it killed 50 million in 1918, we can proceed to the next question.
dhw: But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.
DAVID: If you wish everyone sat peacefully around doing nothing just eating and sleeping, would you want a life like that? I'll take the challenges!
dhw: I have no idea why you think an interesting life would be impossible without rape, murder and millions of deaths from the diseases for which you blame your God. You keep telling us under “Theodicy” to ignore the evil and focus on all the good your God has created! Now we should forget all the good (the joys of love, family, friendship, art, sport, travel, etc.), and you thank God for creating or allowing evil to prevent you from getting bored.
DAVID: I never ignored the 'good'. Your fallacy.
You have just done so here and on the Plantinga thread. Without evil, you think “Eden” would be boring (“sitting around...just eating and sleeping”).
Cell complexity: formation of the centriole
DAVID: Design means a designer did it.
dhw: Yes, That is a rational conclusion. But if a complex life requires a designing mind, the designing mind must be so complex that it too would require a designer: you need blind faith to believe that an unknown, immaterial, superpowerful form of consciousness can simply exist without a source. That is why I remain on my picket fence.
DAVID: I'll stick with there must be a first cause.
I agree. The basic choice lies between an eternal, conscious, sourceless mind and an eternal, infinite mass of ever changing matter and energy forming endless combinations which eventually produce the first forms of life. One of these must be the truth, but I can’t choose between them.
The wild Milky Way center
QUOTES: “A huge black hole with high-speed stars in all sorts of wild orbits…”
“A few stars win the collision lottery…"
DAVID: by design the Earth is safely far away, two-thirds of the way out on the second spiral arm. It seems the larger the galaxy, the more turbulent is its center.
Bearing in mind that ours is only one of billions of galaxies in a universe that contains trillions of stars and quintillions of black holes, I can’t help feeling that the lottery image is more appropriate than that of design.
Mictobiomes and post-surgical infections
DAVID: the infections occur, not because the bacteria are 'bad', but they are freely built to survive on any food available. Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.
And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? Or do you mean that your omnipotent and omniscient God was powerless and too ignorant to prevent the evil caused by his inventions?
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Monday, April 15, 2024, 21:47 (14 days ago) @ dhw
edited by David Turell, Monday, April 15, 2024, 21:55
Giant viruses
DAVID: The history of evolution had extinction requirements. You continue to torture Raup's book. All of evolution required a 99.9% lost.
dhw: I have no idea what Raup believes, and I wish you would tackle my arguments directly instead of hiding behind him. If God exists, he would have determined what evolution required – he would not have been bound by some requirement he hadn’t created for himself. Why would an all-powerful, all-knowing God require himself to design 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with his one and only purpose?
Please find some definition of evolution to see that it requires loss of species. God chose to evolve us is obvious if one believes in God.
dhw: But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.DAVID: If you wish everyone sat peacefully around doing nothing just eating and sleeping, would you want a life like that? I'll take the challenges!
dhw: I have no idea why you think an interesting life would be impossible without rape, murder and millions of deaths from the diseases for which you blame your God. You keep telling us under “Theodicy” to ignore the evil and focus on all the good your God has created! Now we should forget all the good (the joys of love, family, friendship, art, sport, travel, etc.), and you thank God for creating or allowing evil to prevent you from getting bored.
DAVID: I never ignored the 'good'. Your fallacy.
dhw: You have just done so here and on the Plantinga thread. Without evil, you think “Eden” would be boring (“sitting around...just eating and sleeping”).
Is living just eating and sleeping? No mental activity? We should just be bugs.
Cell complexity: formation of the centrioleDAVID: Design means a designer did it.
dhw: Yes, That is a rational conclusion. But if a complex life requires a designing mind, the designing mind must be so complex that it too would require a designer: you need blind faith to believe that an unknown, immaterial, superpowerful form of consciousness can simply exist without a source. That is why I remain on my picket fence.
DAVID: I'll stick with there must be a first cause.
dhw: I agree. The basic choice lies between an eternal, conscious, sourceless mind and an eternal, infinite mass of ever changing matter and energy forming endless combinations which eventually produce the first forms of life. One of these must be the truth, but I can’t choose between them.
Hint: organic molecules just don't join up. It requires lots of energy or magical enzymes which appear with just the right fits!!
The wild Milky Way centerQUOTES: “A huge black hole with high-speed stars in all sorts of wild orbits…”
“A few stars win the collision lottery…"
DAVID: by design the Earth is safely far away, two-thirds of the way out on the second spiral arm. It seems the larger the galaxy, the more turbulent is its center.
dhw: Bearing in mind that ours is only one of billions of galaxies in a universe that contains trillions of stars and quintillions of black holes, I can’t help feeling that the lottery image is more appropriate than that of design.In fact, 86 percent of the bacteria causing infections after spine surgery were genetically matched to bacteria a patient carried before surgery. That number is remarkably close to estimates from earlier studies using older genetic techniques focused on Staphylococcus aureus.
Patterns like designed-for-life, our very unusual spiral galaxy, etc. refute that thought.
" Nearly 60 percent of infections were also resistant to the preventive antibiotic administered during surgery, the antiseptic used to clean the skin before incision or both.
It turns out the source of this antibiotic resistance was also not acquired in the hospital but from microbes the patient had already been living with unknowingly. They likely acquired these antibiotic-resistant microbes through prior antibiotic exposure, consumer products or routine community contact.
Mictobiomes and post-surgical infections
DAVID: the infections occur, not because the bacteria are 'bad', but they are freely built to survive on any food available. Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? Or do you mean that your omnipotent and omniscient God was powerless and too ignorant to prevent the evil caused by his inventions?
God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.
More Miscellany
Giant viruses
DAVID: The history of evolution had extinction requirements. You continue to torture
Raup's book. All of evolution required a 99.9% lost.
You have confessed YOUR distortion of Raup’s book on the “evolution” thread: “All Raup said was 0.1% are the living result.” Nothing to support your wacky theory.
DAVID: Please find some definition of evolution to see that it requires loss of species.
Please find one for me. Changing conditions have resulted in 99.9% extinction and in new species emerging. That is history. It doesn’t mean that an all-powerful God was forced to design species irrelevant to his purpose!
DAVID: God chose to evolve us is obvious if one believes in God.
Stop leaving out the fact that he would also obviously have chosen to evolve (but not necessarily to individually design) all the species that had no connection with us.
dhw: But you think such suffering is justified because your God wants to give us a challenge. Please tell us why you think he wants to challenge us.
DAVID: If you wish everyone sat peacefully around doing nothing just eating and sleeping, would you want a life like that? I'll take the challenges!
dhw: I have no idea why you think an interesting life would be impossible without rape, murder and millions of deaths from the diseases for which you blame your God. You keep telling us under “Theodicy” to ignore the evil and focus on all the good your God has created! Now we should forget all the good (the joys of love, family, friendship, art, sport, travel, etc.), and you thank God for creating or allowing evil to prevent you from getting bored.
DAVID: Is living just eating and sleeping? No mental activity? We should just be bugs.
No, it isn’t just eating and sleeping. So why have you pretended that it would be just that if there was no evil? I have given you a list of the “goodies” which we can enjoy without evil. You are tying yourself in knots.
Centriole (now first cause)
DAVID: I'll stick with there must be a first cause.
dhw: I agree. The basic choice lies between an eternal, conscious, sourceless mind and an eternal, infinite mass of ever changing matter and energy forming endless combinations which eventually produce the first forms of life. One of these must be the truth, but I can’t choose between them.
DAVID: Hint: organic molecules just don't join up. It requires lots of energy or magical enzymes which appear with just the right fits!!
No need to hint. I keep telling you I accept the logic of design! But even you admit that belief in the being described above requires irrational faith.
The wild Milky Way center
QUOTES: “A huge black hole with high-speed stars in all sorts of wild orbits…”
“A few stars win the collision lottery…"
dhw: Bearing in mind that ours is only one of billions of galaxies in a universe that contains trillions of stars and quintillions of black holes, I can’t help feeling that the lottery image is more appropriate than that of design.
That was the unanswered end of my post, but somehow a whole section of bacteria quotes was added to it.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections
DAVID: the infections occur, not because the bacteria are 'bad', but they are freely built to survive on any food available. Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? Or do you mean that your omnipotent and omniscient God was powerless and too ignorant to prevent the evil caused by his inventions?
DAVID: God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.
“Had to”…! “best he could…”? Today he’s lost his omnipotence and omniscience. A few days ago he was to blame. Yesterday all of these evils were necessary to provide a challenge and to prevent boredom. Which of your versions are you going to offer us tomorrow?
Storms are needed
DAVID: The pigmy human mind does not see God's reasons for dangerous storms, until research explains God's reasons. Thus, lots of thoedistic complaints await answers.
Like Dawkins, you wait for science to confirm what you wish to believe. Meanwhile, you have 50 million flu victims from 2018 and about 11 million holocaust victims haunting you as you announce that God allowed them to die in order to relieve the boredom, or their deaths don’t matter because God did so much good, or they shouldn’t object, because God must have had a good moral reason though you can’t think of one.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Saturday, April 20, 2024, 18:45 (9 days ago) @ dhw
Giant viruses
DAVID: Please find some definition of evolution to see that it requires loss of species.
dhw: Please find one for me. Changing conditions have resulted in 99.9% extinction and in new species emerging. That is history. It doesn’t mean that an all-powerful God was forced to design species irrelevant to his purpose!
Your usual fallacy. A purposeful God does not produce irrelevance.
DAVID: Is living just eating and sleeping? No mental activity? We should just be bugs.
dhw: No, it isn’t just eating and sleeping. So why have you pretended that it would be just that if there was no evil? I have given you a list of the “goodies” which we can enjoy without evil. You are tying yourself in knots.
Free-will will always produce evil, as a human trait.
Centriole (now first cause)
DAVID: Hint: organic molecules just don't join up. It requires lots of energy or magical enzymes which appear with just the right fits!!
dhw: No need to hint. I keep telling you I accept the logic of design! But even you admit that belief in the being described above requires irrational faith.
Faith is not irrational.
The wild Milky Way centerQUOTES: “A huge black hole with high-speed stars in all sorts of wild orbits…”
“A few stars win the collision lottery…"
dhw: Bearing in mind that ours is only one of billions of galaxies in a universe that contains trillions of stars and quintillions of black holes, I can’t help feeling that the lottery image is more appropriate than that of design.
That was the unanswered end of my post, but somehow a whole section of bacteria quotes was added to it.
I think it is all by reasoned design.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infectionsDAVID: the infections occur, not because the bacteria are 'bad', but they are freely built to survive on any food available. Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? Or do you mean that your omnipotent and omniscient God was powerless and too ignorant to prevent the evil caused by his inventions?
DAVID: God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.
dhw: “Had to”…! “best he could…”? Today he’s lost his omnipotence and omniscience. A few days ago he was to blame. Yesterday all of these evils were necessary to provide a challenge and to prevent boredom. Which of your versions are you going to offer us tomorrow?
Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.
Storms are neededDAVID: The pigmy human mind does not see God's reasons for dangerous storms, until research explains God's reasons. Thus, lots of thoedistic complaints await answers.
dhw: Like Dawkins, you wait for science to confirm what you wish to believe. Meanwhile, you have 50 million flu victims from 2018 and about 11 million holocaust victims haunting you as you announce that God allowed them to die in order to relieve the boredom, or their deaths don’t matter because God did so much good, or they shouldn’t object, because God must have had a good moral reason though you can’t think of one.
It is God's obligation to have morally sufficient reasons.
More Miscellany
Giant viruses
DAVID: Please find some definition of evolution to see that it requires loss of species.
dhw: Please find one for me. Changing conditions have resulted in 99.9% extinction and in new species emerging. That is history. It doesn’t mean that an all-powerful God was forced to design species irrelevant to his purpose!
DAVID: Your usual fallacy. A purposeful God does not produce irrelevance.
You have inadvertently cottoned on to the reason why your theory is so illogical. You have no idea why your omnipotent and omniscient God would have produced the irrelevant 99.9%, but instead of considering the possibility that he might have had a different purpose, or that he might not have designed every species individually, you insist that only your version of his “inefficient” design of irrelevant species is correct.
Centriole (now first cause)
dhw: I keep telling you I accept the logic of design! But even you admit that belief in the being described above requires irrational faith.
DAVID: Faith is not irrational.
Off we go again with your contradictions.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote: “It is YOUR reasoning I am criticizing, not your God’s. Nobody knows God’s reasoning…” You replied:
DAVID: Welcome to faith which does not need rationality.
If you can’t find a reason to justify your faith, and your faith does not need rationality, how can you claim that your “faith is not irrational”?
The wild Milky Way center
QUOTES: “A huge black hole with high-speed stars in all sorts of wild orbits…”
“A few stars win the collision lottery…"
dhw: Bearing in mind that ours is only one of billions of galaxies in a universe that contains trillions of stars and quintillions of black holes, I can’t help feeling that the lottery image is more appropriate than that of design.
DAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
But you can’t think of any reason for it. Your opinion is based on irrational faith.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections
DAVID: the infections occur, not because the bacteria are 'bad', but they are freely built to survive on any food available. Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? Or do you mean that your omnipotent and omniscient God was powerless and too ignorant to prevent the evil caused by his inventions?
DAVID: God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.
dhw: “Had to”…? “best he could…”? Today he’s lost his omnipotence and omniscience. A few days ago he was to blame. Yesterday all of these evils were necessary to provide a challenge and to prevent boredom. Which of your versions are you going to offer us tomorrow?
DAVID: Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.
“My” desired perfection? It’s YOU who claim he’s perfect, omniscient, omnipotent etc. but had to do this and that – thereby knowingly creating evil – and was powerless to prevent it, though he did his best!
Storms are needed
DAVID: The pigmy human mind does not see God's reasons for dangerous storms, until research explains God's reasons. Thus, lots of thoedistic complaints await answers.
dhw: Like Dawkins, you wait for science to confirm what you wish to believe. Meanwhile, you have 50 million flu victims from 2018 and about 11 million holocaust victims haunting you as you announce that God allowed them to die in order to relieve the boredom, or their deaths don’t matter because God did so much good, or they shouldn’t object, because God must have had a good moral reason though you can’t think of one.
DAVID: It is God's obligation to have morally sufficient reasons.
Since when was it God’s obligation to have the attributes you wish him to have? Do think that relief of boredom is a morally sufficient reason for allowing rape, murder and the Holocaust? Please don’t answer “dayenu”.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Sunday, April 21, 2024, 23:05 (8 days ago) @ dhw
Giant viruses
dhw: Please find one for me. Changing conditions have resulted in 99.9% extinction and in new species emerging. That is history. It doesn’t mean that an all-powerful God was forced to design species irrelevant to his purpose!
DAVID: Your usual fallacy. A purposeful God does not produce irrelevance.
dhw: You have inadvertently cottoned on to the reason why your theory is so illogical. You have no idea why your omnipotent and omniscient God would have produced the irrelevant 99.9%, but instead of considering the possibility that he might have had a different purpose, or that he might not have designed every species individually, you insist that only your version of his “inefficient” design of irrelevant species is correct.
It is your cockamamy view of evolution that is at fault. All species produced were relevant in their time.
Centriole (now first cause)
DAVID: Faith is not irrational.
dhw: Off we go again with your contradictions.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote: “It is YOUR reasoning I am criticizing, not your God’s. Nobody knows God’s reasoning…” You replied:DAVID: Welcome to faith which does not need rationality.
dhw: If you can’t find a reason to justify your faith, and your faith does not need rationality, how can you claim that your “faith is not irrational”?
From previous: 'Evidence beyond a reasonable doubt' gives it rationality.
The wild Milky Way centerQUOTES: “A huge black hole with high-speed stars in all sorts of wild orbits…”
“A few stars win the collision lottery…"
dhw: Bearing in mind that ours is only one of billions of galaxies in a universe that contains trillions of stars and quintillions of black holes, I can’t help feeling that the lottery image is more appropriate than that of design.
DAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
dhw: But you can’t think of any reason for it. Your opinion is based on irrational faith.
WE are the reason!!! But in your mind we are not that important.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infectionsDAVID: the infections occur, not because the bacteria are 'bad', but they are freely built to survive on any food available. Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? Or do you mean that your omnipotent and omniscient God was powerless and too ignorant to prevent the evil caused by his inventions?
God has not stopped humans or bacteria from use of free will. For life free will of molecules of bugs, of humans is required.
DAVID: God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.dhw: “Had to”…? “best he could…”? Today he’s lost his omnipotence and omniscience. A few days ago he was to blame. Yesterday all of these evils were necessary to provide a challenge and to prevent boredom. Which of your versions are you going to offer us tomorrow?
The same God who gives life.
DAVID: Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.dhw: “My” desired perfection? It’s YOU who claim he’s perfect, omniscient, omnipotent etc. but had to do this and that – thereby knowingly creating evil – and was powerless to prevent it, though he did his best!
All secondary and required effects.
Storms are neededDAVID: The pigmy human mind does not see God's reasons for dangerous storms, until research explains God's reasons. Thus, lots of thoedistic complaints await answers.
dhw: Like Dawkins, you wait for science to confirm what you wish to believe. Meanwhile, you have 50 million flu victims from 2018 and about 11 million holocaust victims haunting you as you announce that God allowed them to die in order to relieve the boredom, or their deaths don’t matter because God did so much good, or they shouldn’t object, because God must have had a good moral reason though you can’t think of one.
DAVID: It is God's obligation to have morally sufficient reasons.
dhw: Since when was it God’s obligation to have the attributes you wish him to have? Do think that relief of boredom is a morally sufficient reason for allowing rape, murder and the Holocaust? Please don’t answer “dayenu”.
Stop blaming God for humans who use free will to create evil.
More Miscellany
Giant viruses
DAVID: [...] A purposeful God does not produce irrelevance.
dhw: You have inadvertently cottoned on to the reason why your theory is so illogical. You have no idea why your omnipotent and omniscient God would have produced the irrelevant 99.9%, but instead of considering the possibility that he might have had a different purpose, or that he might not have designed every species individually, you insist that only your version of his “inefficient” design of irrelevant species is correct.
DAVID: It is your cockamamy view of evolution that is at fault. All species produced were relevant in their time.
Relevant to what? Certainly not to what you believe to have been your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food), since only 0.1% of them led to us and our food.
First cause)
DAVID: Faith is not irrational.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote: “It is YOUR reasoning I am criticizing, not your God’s. Nobody knows God’s reasoning…” You replied:[/i]
DAVID: Welcome to faith which does not need rationality.
dhw: If you can’t find a reason to justify your faith, and your faith does not need rationality, how can you claim that your “faith is not irrational”?
DAVID: From previous: 'Evidence beyond a reasonable doubt' gives it rationality.
As usual, you are referring to the theory of design and God’s existence, which I acknowledge as being rational, though “beyond a reasonable doubt” goes much too far. You know perfectly well that I am talking about your illogical theories of evolution and theodicy. Stop dodging.
The wild Milky Way center
DAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
dhw: But you can’t think of any reason for it. Your opinion is based on irrational faith.
DAVID: WE are the reason!!! But in your mind we are not that important.
You cannot find any reason why your God would design billions of galaxies and trillions of stars (not to mention millions of irrelevant species) when all he wanted to design was a single system to accommodate us and our food.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections
AVID: [..] Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.[/i]
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? [...]
DAVID: God has not stopped humans or bacteria from use of free will. For life free will of molecules of bugs, of humans is required.
According to you, your all-powerful, all-knowing God gave us and them free will, knowing precisely what we and they would use it for. Why did you “blame” him for the bugs? Why do you not blame him for knowingly allowing rape, murder, the Holocaust, although he must have known as you and I do that it is perfectly possible to lead a non-boring life without anyone committing evil?
DAVID: God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.
dhw: “Had to”…? “best he could…”? Today he’s lost his omnipotence and omniscience. A few days ago he was to blame. Yesterday all of these evils were necessary to provide a challenge and to prevent boredom. Which of your versions are you going to offer us tomorrow?
DAVID: The same God who gives life.
Which God do you wish for: the omnipotent one who is powerless to prevent evil, the all-good one who is to blame for natural disasters, or the selfless one who creates/allows evil in order to relieve his and our boredom?
DAVID: Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.
dhw: “My” desired perfection? It’s YOU who claim he’s perfect, omniscient, omnipotent etc. but had to do this and that – thereby knowingly creating evil – and was powerless to prevent it, though he did his best!
DAVID: All secondary and required effects.
The Holocaust and the 50 million deaths from ‘flu in 1918 were just secondary and required so that your selfless, omniscient and omnipotent God could relieve his and our boredom. (Please note: Under “Plantinga” you claim that your beliefs are mainstream!)
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Monday, April 22, 2024, 18:57 (7 days ago) @ dhw
Giant viruses
DAVID: It is your cockamamy view of evolution that is at fault. All species produced were relevant in their time.
dhw: Relevant to what? Certainly not to what you believe to have been your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food), since only 0.1% of them led to us and our food.
Relevant to current ecosystem of the time in evolution. More distortion of Raup. Cleared up in the other thread, remember.
First cause)DAVID: Faith is not irrational.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote: “It is YOUR reasoning I am criticizing, not your God’s. Nobody knows God’s reasoning…” You replied:[/i]
DAVID: Welcome to faith which does not need rationality.dhw: If you can’t find a reason to justify your faith, and your faith does not need rationality, how can you claim that your “faith is not irrational”?
DAVID: From previous: 'Evidence beyond a reasonable doubt' gives it rationality.
dhw: As usual, you are referring to the theory of design and God’s existence, which I acknowledge as being rational, though “beyond a reasonable doubt” goes much too far. You know perfectly well that I am talking about your illogical theories of evolution and theodicy. Stop dodging.
Stop complaining that I made logical choices in thought that lead to faith. Sorry you can't do it. And then you invent the weirdest definition I've ever seen about double standards, with no choices allowed. You have tied yourself into intellectual knots to defend your inability to consider choices!!!
The wild Milky Way centerDAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
dhw: But you can’t think of any reason for it. Your opinion is based on irrational faith.
DAVID: WE are the reason!!! But in your mind we are not that important.
dhw: You cannot find any reason why your God would design billions of galaxies and trillions of stars (not to mention millions of irrelevant species) when all he wanted to design was a single system to accommodate us and our food.
God has reasons I am not privy to.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infectionsAVID: [..] Not God's fault. Bacteria necessarily live as freely-acting organisms.[/i]
dhw: And yet a couple of weeks ago, you wrote: “What is fair is to blame God for natural disasters: earthquakes, terrible storms, and bugs causing diseases, non-human parts of his creation.” Why are you blaming him, if it’s not for the fact that he knowingly gave bacteria the freedom to infect us as well as help us? And why then would you not blame him if he knowingly gave us the freedom to do evil? [...]
DAVID: God has not stopped humans or bacteria from use of free will. For life free will of molecules of bugs, of humans is required.
dhw: According to you, your all-powerful, all-knowing God gave us and them free will, knowing precisely what we and they would use it for. Why did you “blame” him for the bugs? Why do you not blame him for knowingly allowing rape, murder, the Holocaust, although he must have known as you and I do that it is perfectly possible to lead a non-boring life without anyone committing evil?
The necessary bugs are free to get into trouble. It is the way life has to work.
DAVID: God had to accept tradeoffs to produce life. He created the best form of life He could. We need good skin microbiomes. A slicing scalpel makes no choices, just an instrument of delivery.dhw: “Had to”…? “best he could…”? Today he’s lost his omnipotence and omniscience. A few days ago he was to blame. Yesterday all of these evils were necessary to provide a challenge and to prevent boredom. Which of your versions are you going to offer us tomorrow?
DAVID: The same God who gives life.
dhw: Which God do you wish for: the omnipotent one who is powerless to prevent evil, the all-good one who is to blame for natural disasters, or the selfless one who creates/allows evil in order to relieve his and our boredom?
Same usual limp distortion. TE subject is human boredom! Stay on point!!
DAVID: Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.dhw: “My” desired perfection? It’s YOU who claim he’s perfect, omniscient, omnipotent etc. but had to do this and that – thereby knowingly creating evil – and was powerless to prevent it, though he did his best!
DAVID: All secondary and required effects.
dhw: The Holocaust and the 50 million deaths from ‘flu in 1918 were just secondary and required so that your selfless, omniscient and omnipotent God could relieve his and our boredom. (Please note: Under “Plantinga” you claim that your beliefs are mainstream!)
In theodicy discussions, yes.
More Miscellany
First cause
DAVID: Faith is not irrational.
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote: “It is YOUR reasoning I am criticizing, not your God’s. Nobody knows God’s reasoning…” You replied:
DAVID: Welcome to faith which does not need rationality.
dhw: If you can’t find a reason to justify your faith, and your faith does not need rationality, how can you claim that your “faith is not irrational”?
DAVID: From previous: 'Evidence beyond a reasonable doubt' gives it rationality.
dhw: As usual, you are referring to the theory of design and God’s existence, which I acknowledge as being rational, though “beyond a reasonable doubt” goes much too far. You know perfectly well that I am talking about your illogical theories of evolution and theodicy. Stop dodging.
The wild Milky Way center
DAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
dhw: You cannot find any reason why your God would design billions of galaxies and trillions of stars (not to mention millions of irrelevant species) when all he wanted to design was a single system to accommodate us and our food.
DAVID: God has reasons I am not privy to.
Your inability to think of any reason once more illustrates the fact that most of your beliefs (apart from your argument for a designer God) are based on totally irrational faith, so please stop pretending that they are logical.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections
dhw: Why did you “blame” [God] for the bugs? Why do you not blame him for knowingly allowing rape, murder, the Holocaust, although he must have known as you and I do that it is perfectly possible to lead a non-boring life without anyone committing evil?
DAVID: The necessary bugs are free to get into trouble. It is the way life has to work.
Yes, we know they were free to kill 50 million people in 1918, just as Hitler was free to kill 6 million Jews. And your omniscient God must have known what would happen when he gave them their freedom. Now will you please answer the bolded questions.
dhw: Which God do you wish for: the omnipotent one who is powerless to prevent evil, the all-good one who is to blame for natural disasters, or the selfless one who creates/allows evil in order to relieve his and our boredom?
DAVID: Same usual limp distortion. THE subject is human boredom! Stay on point!!
You keep forgetting the following:
dhw: I’m sure you’ll agree that your God, who you believe is interested in his creations, would find puppets pretty boring.
DAVID: Exactly!
And so he gave us free will because he would have found puppets boring. A very reasonable theory, which you have confirmed. What’s the problem?
DAVID: Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.
dhw: “My” desired perfection? It’s YOU who claim he’s perfect, omniscient, omnipotent etc. but had to do this and that – thereby knowingly creating evil – and was powerless to prevent it, though he did his best!
DAVID: All secondary and required effects.
Please tell us if you regard the Holocaust and the 50 million flu victims as secondary and morally justified by the fact that such evil relieves us from being bored.
A new consciousness declaration
QUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles, amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.) (dhw's bold)
DAVID: there is no question animals are aware, perform purposeful activities and also can play. What they lack, as my bold notes, is self-awareness.
I don’t think anyone would argue that our fellow creatures have the same degree of awareness/self awareness that we humans have. The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? I would also draw attention to “including, at minimum….” You have now published articles which completely support Shapiro’s belief that even individual cells have a degree of consciousness. Many thanks as always for your integrity in presenting all these articles.
New study on DNA repair
QUOTE: Luckily, cells have developed a complex set of repair mechanisms to protect vulnerable DNA and fix damage so that the cell’s genomic instruction manual remains intact.
DAVID: Did this defense develop because breaks happened early on, or was it designed from the beginning to avoid early loss of genes from brakes? Darwin-type unguided chance evolution could not have achieved this degree of controls.
I agree with your dismissal of unguided chance. It seems perfectly logical to me that, as with the whole of evolution, cells respond to new requirements. See above. The origin of all degrees of consciousness remains open to question, but the evidence of its existence in all forms of life is becoming stronger and stronger, extending to plants and to all cells and cell communities.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Tuesday, April 23, 2024, 22:35 (6 days ago) @ dhw
The wild Milky Way center
DAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
dhw: You cannot find any reason why your God would design billions of galaxies and trillions of stars (not to mention millions of irrelevant species) when all he wanted to design was a single system to accommodate us and our food.
DAVID: God has reasons I am not privy to.>
dhw: Your inability to think of any reason once more illustrates the fact that most of your beliefs (apart from your argument for a designer God) are based on totally irrational faith, so please stop pretending that they are logical.
What do you want? That I can think like God.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections
dhw: Why did you “blame” [God] for the bugs? Why do you not blame him for knowingly allowing rape, murder, the Holocaust, although he must have known as you and I do that it is perfectly possible to lead a non-boring life without anyone committing evil?DAVID: The necessary bugs are free to get into trouble. It is the way life has to work.
dhw: Yes, we know they were free to kill 50 million people in 1918, just as Hitler was free to kill 6 million Jews. And your omniscient God must have known what would happen when he gave them their freedom. Now will you please answer the bolded questions.
Answered, For life to work, free bugs have to exist!!! You are alive, accept it and stop complaining.
dhw: Which God do you wish for: the omnipotent one who is powerless to prevent evil, the all-good one who is to blame for natural disasters, or the selfless one who creates/allows evil in order to relieve his and our boredom?DAVID: Same usual limp distortion. THE subject is human boredom! Stay on point!!
You keep forgetting the following:
dhw: I’m sure you’ll agree that your God, who you believe is interested in his creations, would find puppets pretty boring.DAVID: Exactly!
dhw: And so he gave us free will because he would have found puppets boring. A very reasonable theory, which you have confirmed. What’s the problem?
Answered, For life to work, free bugs have to exist!!! You are alive, accept it and stop complaining.
DAVID: Apparently your desired perfection cannot exist.dhw: “My” desired perfection? It’s YOU who claim he’s perfect, omniscient, omnipotent etc. but had to do this and that – thereby knowingly creating evil – and was powerless to prevent it, though he did his best!
DAVID: All secondary and required effects.
dhw: Please tell us if you regard the Holocaust and the 50 million flu victims as secondary and morally justified by the fact that such evil relieves us from being bored.
Not the direct effect you tout. Humans are free to cause evil.
A new consciousness declarationQUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles, amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.) (dhw's bold)
DAVID: there is no question animals are aware, perform purposeful activities and also can play. What they lack, as my bold notes, is self-awareness.
dhw: I don’t think anyone would argue that our fellow creatures have the same degree of awareness/self awareness that we humans have. The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? I would also draw attention to “including, at minimum….” You have now published articles which completely support Shapiro’s belief that even individual cells have a degree of consciousness. Many thanks as always for your integrity in presenting all these articles.
You are welcome. But consciousness does not create speciation.
New study on DNA repairQUOTE: Luckily, cells have developed a complex set of repair mechanisms to protect vulnerable DNA and fix damage so that the cell’s genomic instruction manual remains intact.
DAVID: Did this defense develop because breaks happened early on, or was it designed from the beginning to avoid early loss of genes from brakes? Darwin-type unguided chance evolution could not have achieved this degree of controls.
dhw: I agree with your dismissal of unguided chance. It seems perfectly logical to me that, as with the whole of evolution, cells respond to new requirements. See above. The origin of all degrees of consciousness remains open to question, but the evidence of its existence in all forms of life is becoming stronger and stronger, extending to plants and to all cells and cell communities.
Consciousness is more common than peviously realized.
More Miscellany
The wild Milky Way center
DAVID: I think it is all by reasoned design.
dhw: You cannot find any reason why your God would design billions of galaxies and trillions of stars (not to mention millions of irrelevant species) when all he wanted to design was a single system to accommodate us and our food.
DAVID: God has reasons I am not privy to.
dhw: Your inability to think of any reason once more illustrates the fact that most of your beliefs (apart from your argument for a designer God) are based on irrational faith, so please stop pretending that they are logical.
DAVID: What do you want? That I can think like God.
No, I want you to stop pretending that your God must think like you, as in your belief that the billions of galaxies are by “reasoned design” in order to produce us, although you can’t think why. However, you have agreed that your beliefs (other than in the existence of God) are based on irrational faith and on what you wish your God to be, so we can leave it at that.
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections (now theodicy and boredom)
dhw: Why did you “blame” [God] for the bugs? Why do you not blame him for knowingly allowing rape, murder, the Holocaust, although he must have known as you and I do that it is perfectly possible to lead a non-boring life without anyone committing evil? [See below re moral justification.]
DAVID: The necessary bugs are free to get into trouble. It is the way life has to work.
dhw: Yes, we know they were free to kill 50 million people in 1918, just as Hitler was free to kill 6 million Jews. And your omniscient God must have known what would happen when he gave them their freedom. Now will you please answer the bolded questions.
DAVID: Answered, For life to work, free bugs have to exist!!! You are alive, accept it and stop complaining.
I am not complaining. Now would you please answer the two bolded questions: 1) why “blame” for the bugs, and 2) why not “blame” for allowing evil in order to alleviate his and our boredom?
dhw: I’m sure you’ll agree that your God, who you believe is interested in his creations, would find puppets pretty boring.
DAVID: Exactly!
dhw: And so he gave us free will because he would have found puppets boring. A very reasonable theory, which you have confirmed. What’s the problem?
DAVID: Answered, For life to work, free bugs have to exist!!! You are alive, accept it and stop complaining.
Once more: I am not complaining. You believe that your God created or allowed evil in order to relieve himself and us of boredom. It fits in with life’s history. But it raises a moral problem, as below, which you keep refusing to answer:
dhw: Please tell us if you regard the Holocaust and the 50 million flu victims as secondary and morally justified by the fact that such evil relieves us from being bored.
DAVID: Not the direct effect you tout. Humans are free to cause evil.
You believe your omniscient God gave us that freedom, knowing that it would lead to rape, murder and holocausts, in order to relieve his and our boredom. Do you think he was morally justified in doing so?
A new consciousness declaration
QUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles, amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.) (dhw's bold)
DAVID: there is no question animals are aware, perform purposeful activities and also can play. What they lack, as my bold notes, is self-awareness.
dhw: I don’t think anyone would argue that our fellow creatures have the same degree of awareness/self awareness that we humans have. The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? I would also draw attention to “including, at minimum….” You have now published articles which completely support Shapiro’s belief that even individual cells have a degree of consciousness. Many thanks as always for your integrity in presenting all these articles.
DAVID: You are welcome. But consciousness does not create speciation.
I thought we'd agreed that it does, unless you believe in blind chance. But you think that only your God’s consciousness can do it, and it is unthinkable that even though he gave consciousness to our fellow animals, birds and insects, he might have done the same for single cells and their communities.
DAVID: Consciousness is more common than previously realized.
I’m glad the message is gradually getting through to you.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Wednesday, April 24, 2024, 16:18 (5 days ago) @ dhw
Microbiomes and post-surgical infections (now theodicy and boredom)
dhw: Why did you “blame” [God] for the bugs? Why do you not blame him for knowingly allowing rape, murder, the Holocaust, although he must have known as you and I do that it is perfectly possible to lead a non-boring life without anyone committing evil? [See below re moral justification.]
DAVID: The necessary bugs are free to get into trouble. It is the way life has to work.
dhw: Yes, we know they were free to kill 50 million people in 1918, just as Hitler was free to kill 6 million Jews. And your omniscient God must have known what would happen when he gave them their freedom. Now will you please answer the bolded questions.
DAVID: Answered, For life to work, free bugs have to exist!!! You are alive, accept it and stop complaining.
dhw: I am not complaining. Now would you please answer the two bolded questions: 1) why “blame” for the bugs, and 2) why not “blame” for allowing evil in order to alleviate his and our boredom?
The bugs are required as previously explained. God did not allow evil!!! He gave us free will. Humans with free will create evil!!! l
dhw: I’m sure you’ll agree that your God, who you believe is interested in his creations, would find puppets pretty boring.DAVID: Exactly!
dhw: And so he gave us free will because he would have found puppets boring. A very reasonable theory, which you have confirmed. What’s the problem?
DAVID: Answered, For life to work, free bugs have to exist!!! You are alive, accept it and stop complaining.
dhw: Once more: I am not complaining. You believe that your God created or allowed evil in order to relieve himself and us of boredom. It fits in with life’s history. But it raises a moral problem, as below, which you keep refusing to answer:
dhw: Please tell us if you regard the Holocaust and the 50 million flu victims as secondary and morally justified by the fact that such evil relieves us from being bored.
The theodicy answer is always proportionality.
DAVID: Not the direct effect you tout. Humans are free to cause evil.
dhw: You believe your omniscient God gave us that freedom, knowing that it would lead to rape, murder and holocausts, in order to relieve his and our boredom. Do you think he was morally justified in doing so?
Yes, as a morally sufficient reason to give us free will.
A new consciousness declarationQUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles, amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.) (dhw's bold)
DAVID: there is no question animals are aware, perform purposeful activities and also can play. What they lack, as my bold notes, is self-awareness.
dhw: I don’t think anyone would argue that our fellow creatures have the same degree of awareness/self awareness that we humans have. The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? I would also draw attention to “including, at minimum….” You have now published articles which completely support Shapiro’s belief that even individual cells have a degree of consciousness. Many thanks as always for your integrity in presenting all these articles.
DAVID: You are welcome. But consciousness does not create speciation.
I thought we'd agreed that it does, unless you believe in blind chance. But you think that only your God’s consciousness can do it, and it is unthinkable that even though he gave consciousness to our fellow animals, birds and insects, he might have done the same for single cells and their communities.
DAVID: Consciousness is more common than previously realized.
dhw: I’m glad the message is gradually getting through to you.
But not at your cell committee theoretical level.
More Miscellany
DAVID: I will agree faith is not rational.
dhw: Thank you. I will make a note of this for the next time you claim that your theories about evolution and God’s purpose, method and nature are based on reason.
DAVID Stop complaining that I made logical choices in thought that lead to faith.
dhw: You have just agreed that your faith in your choices (apart from the design theory) is irrational (i.e. not logical).
DAVID: The thoughts are logical. The final leap is not.
That depends on which of your choices we’re talking about. The thought that an omniscient, omnipotent God would deliberately choose to design and cull 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with his one and only goal is illogical/irrational, as is your fixed faith in that theory.
A new consciousness declaration
QUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles,amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.)(dhw's bold)
DAVID: there is no question animals are aware, perform purposeful activities and also can play. What they lack, as my bold notes, is self-awareness.
dhw: The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? I would also draw attention to “including, at minimum….”
DAVID: But consciousness does not create speciation. […]
dhw: I thought we'd agreed that it does, unless you believe in blind chance. But you think that only your God’s consciousness can do it, and it is unthinkable that even though he gave consciousness to our fellow animals, birds and insects, he might have done the same for
single cells and their communities.
DAVID: Consciousness is more common than previously realized.
dhw: I’m glad the message is gradually getting through to you.
DAVID: But not at your cell committee theoretical level.
“Community” not “committee”. Thank you for publishing all the articles that disagree with you.
Bioluminescence
DAVID: light is always helpful, but these organisms don't have eyes. It is a mystery but developments in evolution always have reasons.
I agree, and one very logical reason is that in one way or another they improve chances of survival. It seems to me highly unlikely that the reason for bioluminescence is that your God (if he exists) considered it to be essential for the evolution of humans and their food, although you tell us that we and our food were his one and only purpose right from the beginning of life.
Importance of Microbiomes: skin wound effects
DAVID: These relationships are hard to explain as to purpose. But evolution produces these results for valid reasons. We need to understand the underlying purpose.
Not so hard to understand if we assume that bacteria, like every other organism, find their own ways to survive. This can clearly involve conflict between different types of bacteria in the great free-for-all – a theory which you accept when it concerns good and bad bugs, but reject when it comes to the countless different species that had no connection with your version of your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food).
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Friday, April 26, 2024, 00:01 (4 days ago) @ dhw
dhw: You have just agreed that your faith in your choices (apart from the design theory) is irrational (i.e. not logical).
DAVID: The thoughts are logical. The final leap is not.
dhw: That depends on which of your choices we’re talking about. The thought that an omniscient, omnipotent God would deliberately choose to design and cull 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with his one and only goal is illogical/irrational, as is your fixed faith in that theory.
Your weird distortion of my theology is not worth discussing, as totally preposterous.
A new consciousness declarationQUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles,amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.)(dhw's bold)
DAVID: there is no question animals are aware, perform purposeful activities and also can play. What they lack, as my bold notes, is self-awareness.
dhw: The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? I would also draw attention to “including, at minimum….”
DAVID: But consciousness does not create speciation. […]
dhw: I thought we'd agreed that it does, unless you believe in blind chance. But you think that only your God’s consciousness can do it, and it is unthinkable that even though he gave consciousness to our fellow animals, birds and insects, he might have done the same for
single cells and their communities.DAVID: Consciousness is more common than previously realized.
dhw: I’m glad the message is gradually getting through to you.
DAVID: But not at your cell committee theoretical level.
dhw: “Community” not “committee”. Thank you for publishing all the articles that disagree with you.
All views are to be seen.
BioluminescenceDAVID: light is always helpful, but these organisms don't have eyes. It is a mystery but developments in evolution always have reasons.
dhw: I agree, and one very logical reason is that in one way or another they improve chances of survival. It seems to me highly unlikely that the reason for bioluminescence is that your God (if he exists) considered it to be essential for the evolution of humans and their food, although you tell us that we and our food were his one and only purpose right from the beginning of life.
My point exactly.
Importance of Microbiomes: skin wound effectsDAVID: These relationships are hard to explain as to purpose. But evolution produces these results for valid reasons. We need to understand the underlying purpose.
dhw: Not so hard to understand if we assume that bacteria, like every other organism, find their own ways to survive. This can clearly involve conflict between different types of bacteria in the great free-for-all – a theory which you accept when it concerns good and bad bugs, but reject when it comes to the countless different species that had no connection with your version of your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food).
I'm glad God had that purpose, aren't you?
More Miscellany
dhw: You have just agreed that your faith in your choices (apart from the design theory) is irrational (i.e. not logical).
DAVID: The thoughts are logical. The final leap is not.
dhw: That depends on which of your choices we’re talking about. The thought that an omniscient, omnipotent God would deliberately choose to design and cull 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with his one and only goal is illogical/irrational, as is your fixed faith in that theory.
DAVID: Your weird distortion of my theology is not worth discussing, as totally preposterous.
Please tell us which part of the above theory is a distortion. To be precise: do you now reject your beliefs that (1) we and our food were your God’s sole purpose, 2) that he chose to design and cull 99.9% of past species, 3) that we and our food are descended from only 0.1% of past species, which means the remaining 99.9% were irrelevant to his purpose?
A new consciousness declaration
QUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles,amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.)(dhw's bold)
dhw: The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? […]
DAVID: But consciousness does not create speciation. […]
dhw: I thought we'd agreed that it does, unless you believe in blind chance. But you think that only your God’s consciousness can do it, and it is unthinkable that even though he gave consciousness to our fellow animals, birds and insects, he might have done the same for
single cells and their communities.
DAVID: But not at your cell committee theoretical level.
dhw: “Community” not “committee”. Thank you for publishing all the articles that disagree with you.
DAVID: All views are to be seen.
We have come a long way since you claimed that Shapiro’s theory was dead and buried.
Bioluminescence
DAVID: light is always helpful, but these organisms don't have eyes. It is a mystery but developments in evolution always have reasons.
dhw: I agree, and one very logical reason is that in one way or another they improve chances of survival. It seems to me highly unlikely that the reason for bioluminescence is that your God (if he exists) considered it to be essential for the evolution of humans and their food, although you tell us that we and our food were his one and only purpose right from the beginning of life.
DAVID: My point exactly.
Just to clarify: is it now your point that these developments serve the purpose to improve chances of survival? Or do you still think your God couldn’t have designed us and our food without designing bioluminescence for eyeless organisms?
Importance of Microbiomes: skin wound effects
DAVID: These relationships are hard to explain as to purpose. But evolution produces these results for valid reasons. We need to understand the underlying purpose.
dhw: Not so hard to understand if we assume that bacteria, like every other organism, find their own ways to survive. This can clearly involve conflict between different types of bacteria in the great free-for-all – a theory which you accept when it concerns good and bad bugs, but reject when it comes to the countless different species that had no connection with your version of your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food).
DAVID: I'm glad God had that purpose, aren't you?
The discussion is not about how glad we are to be alive. Which purpose are you talking about now? You seem to be accepting the theory that your God created a free-for-all battle for survival as a means of avoiding boredom, so I don’t know why you reject it as an explanation for the 99.9% of species that were not connected with us and our food.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Friday, April 26, 2024, 20:07 (3 days ago) @ dhw
DAVID: The thoughts are logical. The final leap is not.
dhw: That depends on which of your choices we’re talking about. The thought that an omniscient, omnipotent God would deliberately choose to design and cull 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with his one and only goal is illogical/irrational, as is your fixed faith in that theory.
DAVID: Your weird distortion of my theology is not worth discussing, as totally preposterous.
dhw: Please tell us which part of the above theory is a distortion. To be precise: do you now reject your beliefs that (1) we and our food were your God’s sole purpose, 2) that he chose to design and cull 99.9% of past species, 3) that we and our food are descended from only 0.1% of past species, which means the remaining 99.9% were irrelevant to his purpose?
Your invented discussion of the statistics of survival in evolution is wildly illogical. The 99.9% that went extinct led to the 0.1% survivors. That is what Raup told us in his book. All extinction led to current new living forms.
A new consciousness declarationQUOTE:“The empirical evidence indicates at least a realistic possibility of conscious experience in all vertebrates (including all reptiles,amphibians and fishes) and many invertebrates (including, at minimum, cephalopod mollusks, decapod crustaceans and insects.)(dhw's bold)
dhw: The whole point is that they can think for themselves, which suggests that they can design their own lifestyles, strategies and modes of survival. What else would they use their consciousness for? […]
DAVID: But consciousness does not create speciation. […]
dhw: I thought we'd agreed that it does, unless you believe in blind chance. But you think that only your God’s consciousness can do it, and it is unthinkable that even though he gave consciousness to our fellow animals, birds and insects, he might have done the same for
single cells and their communities.DAVID: But not at your cell committee theoretical level.
dhw: “Community” not “committee”. Thank you for publishing all the articles that disagree with you.
DAVID: All views are to be seen.
dhw: We have come a long way since you claimed that Shapiro’s theory was dead and buried.
Shapiro retired but he is still active touting his evolution theory.
BioluminescenceDAVID: light is always helpful, but these organisms don't have eyes. It is a mystery but developments in evolution always have reasons.
dhw: I agree, and one very logical reason is that in one way or another they improve chances of survival. It seems to me highly unlikely that the reason for bioluminescence is that your God (if he exists) considered it to be essential for the evolution of humans and their food, although you tell us that we and our food were his one and only purpose right from the beginning of life.
DAVID: My point exactly.
dhw: Just to clarify: is it now your point that these developments serve the purpose to improve chances of survival? Or do you still think your God couldn’t have designed us and our food without designing bioluminescence for eyeless organisms?
All part of required diversity of forms.
Importance of Microbiomes: skin wound effectsDAVID: These relationships are hard to explain as to purpose. But evolution produces these results for valid reasons. We need to understand the underlying purpose.
dhw: Not so hard to understand if we assume that bacteria, like every other organism, find their own ways to survive. This can clearly involve conflict between different types of bacteria in the great free-for-all – a theory which you accept when it concerns good and bad bugs, but reject when it comes to the countless different species that had no connection with your version of your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food).
DAVID: I'm glad God had that purpose, aren't you?
dhw:The discussion is not about how glad we are to be alive. Which purpose are you talking about now? You seem to be accepting the theory that your God created a free-for-all battle for survival as a means of avoiding boredom, so I don’t know why you reject it as an explanation for the 99.9% of species that were not connected with us and our food.
Back we do to your irrational analysis of evolution. God does not get bored, but your overly humanized form does. When will you learn how to think about a possibly real God?
More Miscellany
A new consciousness declaration
dhw: Thank you for publishing all the articles that disagree with you.
DAVID: All views are to be seen.
dhw: We have come a long way since you claimed that Shapiro’s theory was dead and buried.
DAVID: Shapiro retired but he is still active touting his evolution theory.
And as you have kindly demonstrated, it is getting more and more support. As in the next item:
QUOTES...new research at Moffitt led by Dipesh Niraula, Ph.D., and Robert Gatenby, M.D., discovered a nongenomic information system that operates alongside DNA, enabling cells to gather information from the environment and respond quickly to changes.
The researchers suggested that this system, which allows for rapid and local responses to specific signals, can also generate coordinated regional or global responses to larger environmental changes.
This intricate network enables cells to make swift and informed decisions, critical for their survival and function.
Thank you for providing yet more evidence for Shapiro’s theory that cells gather information, respond to changes in conditions, and make decisions based on what is best for their survival.
Bioluminescence
DAVID: light is always helpful, but these organisms don't have eyes. It is a mystery but developments in evolution always have reasons.
dhw: I agree, and one very logical reason is that in one way or another they improve chances of survival. It seems to me highly unlikely that the reason for bioluminescence is that your God (if he exists) considered it to be essential for the evolution of humans and their food, although you tell us that we and our food were his one and only purpose right from the beginning of life.
DAVID: My point exactly.
dhw: Just to clarify: is it now your point that these developments serve the purpose to improve chances of survival? Or do you still think your God couldn’t have designed us and our food without designing bioluminescence for eyeless organisms?
DAVID: All part of required diversity of forms.
Why do you think bioluminescence for eyeless organisms was essential to the fulfilment of your God’s sole purpose of producing us and our food?
Importance of Microbiomes: skin wound effects
DAVID: These relationships are hard to explain as to purpose. But evolution produces these results for valid reasons. We need to understand the underlying purpose.
dhw: Not so hard to understand if we assume that bacteria, like every other organism, find their own ways to survive. This can clearly involve conflict between different types of bacteria in the great free-for-all – a theory which you accept when it concerns good and bad bugs, but reject when it comes to the countless different species that had no connection with your version of your God’s one and only purpose (us and our food).
DAVID: I'm glad God had that purpose, aren't you?
dhw:The discussion is not about how glad we are to be alive. Which purpose are you talking about now? You seem to be accepting the theory that your God created a free-for-all battle for survival as a means of avoiding boredom, so I don’t know why you reject it as an explanation for the 99.9% of species that were not connected with us and our food.
DAVID: Back we do to your irrational analysis of evolution. God does not get bored, but your overly humanized form does. When will you learn how to think about a possibly real God?
Your theory was that your God allowed human evil and created murderous bugs (for which he is to be blamed) in order to avoid boredom – his and ours. Now, with your astonishing first-hand knowledge of how God thinks and feels, you dismiss your own theory. When will you learn that nobody can learn how to think about a possibly real God, but if you propose certain ideas one week and then propose the opposite the following week, it becomes more and more difficult to take any of your ideas seriously. I still vividly remember your certainty that your God enjoys creating, is interested in his creations, and has thought patterns and emotions like our own. When you proposed your boredom theory, it was nicely consistent with your earlier beliefs. But suddenly out they all go again.
The role of the interstitium
QUOTE: "Understanding how the interstitium works will define more of the rules about how the trillions of cells in the human body communicate across vast distances to create the exquisitely complex system that is the body. How these things all add up are vast scientific questions that will require a meticulously reductive approach as well as cultivation of a beginner’s mind.”
The new articles were too technical for me to grasp, but this paragraph leapt out at me. These vast communities perform different functions, but communicate with one another to create a single community of communities. Awesome. And I love the emphasis on the need for a reductive approach and a beginner’s mind. The logical outcome of a reductive approach would seem to be just how each individual cell plays its part, and perhaps the beginner’s mind will find that each cell actually knows what it’s doing. But I acknowledge that you would expect the approach to lead to the conclusion that all cells are robots obeying your God’s instructions.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Saturday, April 27, 2024, 17:01 (2 days ago) @ dhw
A new consciousness declaration
QUOTES...new research at Moffitt led by Dipesh Niraula, Ph.D., and Robert Gatenby, M.D., discovered a nongenomic information system that operates alongside DNA, enabling cells to gather information from the environment and respond quickly to changes.
The researchers suggested that this system, which allows for rapid and local responses to specific signals, can also generate coordinated regional or global responses to larger environmental changes.
This intricate network enables cells to make swift and informed decisions, critical for their survival and function.
dhw: Thank you for providing yet more evidence for Shapiro’s theory that cells gather information, respond to changes in conditions, and make decisions based on what is best for their survival.
No question, cells adapt but only at a local level, not speciation.
BioluminescenceDAVID: light is always helpful, but these organisms don't have eyes. It is a mystery but developments in evolution always have reasons.
dhw: I agree, and one very logical reason is that in one way or another they improve chances of survival. It seems to me highly unlikely that the reason for bioluminescence is that your God (if he exists) considered it to be essential for the evolution of humans and their food, although you tell us that we and our food were his one and only purpose right from the beginning of life.
DAVID: My point exactly.
dhw: Just to clarify: is it now your point that these developments serve the purpose to improve chances of survival? Or do you still think your God couldn’t have designed us and our food without designing bioluminescence for eyeless organisms?
DAVID: All part of required diversity of forms.
dhw: Why do you think bioluminescence for eyeless organisms was essential to the fulfilment of your God’s sole purpose of producing us and our food?
My God wished to produce an Earth filled with diverse life forms for our use.
Importance of Microbiomes: skin wound effectsdhw:The discussion is not about how glad we are to be alive. Which purpose are you talking about now? You seem to be accepting the theory that your God created a free-for-all battle for survival as a means of avoiding boredom, so I don’t know why you reject it as an explanation for the 99.9% of species that were not connected with us and our food.
DAVID: Back we do to your irrational analysis of evolution. God does not get bored, but your overly humanized form does. When will you learn how to think about a possibly real God?
dhw: Your theory was that your God allowed human evil and created murderous bugs (for which he is to be blamed) in order to avoid boredom – his and ours. Now, with your astonishing first-hand knowledge of how God thinks and feels, you dismiss your own theory. When will you learn that nobody can learn how to think about a possibly real God, but if you propose certain ideas one week and then propose the opposite the following week, it becomes more and more difficult to take any of your ideas seriously. I still vividly remember your certainty that your God enjoys creating, is interested in his creations, and has thought patterns and emotions like our own. When you proposed your boredom theory, it was nicely consistent with your earlier beliefs. But suddenly out they all go again.
God is not human. Does He have emotions like ours is questionable. Religions claim He loves us, but is that human wishful thinking? I have never been 'certain' about God's personal attributes you listed. Perhaps it is my human wishes that He be that way.
The role of the interstitiumQUOTE: "Understanding how the interstitium works will define more of the rules about how the trillions of cells in the human body communicate across vast distances to create the exquisitely complex system that is the body. How these things all add up are vast scientific questions that will require a meticulously reductive approach as well as cultivation of a beginner’s mind.”
dhw: The new articles were too technical for me to grasp, but this paragraph leapt out at me. These vast communities perform different functions, but communicate with one another to create a single community of communities. Awesome. And I love the emphasis on the need for a reductive approach and a beginner’s mind. The logical outcome of a reductive approach would seem to be just how each individual cell plays its part, and perhaps the beginner’s mind will find that each cell actually knows what it’s doing. But I acknowledge that you would expect the approach to lead to the conclusion that all cells are robots obeying your God’s instructions.
IN DNA there are instructions, but as these articles show there are other levels of communication constantly in action.
More Miscellany
A new consciousness declaration
dhw: Thank you for providing yet more evidence for Shapiro’s theory that cells gather information, respond to changes in conditions, and make decisions based on what is best for their survival.
DAVID: No question, cells adapt but only at a local level, not speciation.
Another authoritative statement of opinion.
Bioluminescence
dhw: Why do you think bioluminescence for eyeless organisms was essential to the fulfilment of your God’s sole purpose of producing us and our food?
DAVID: My God wished to produce an Earth filled with diverse life forms for our use.
I’m not sure what use we make of these organisms, but of course we are still left with the conundrum of why he would have produced and culled 99.9 out of 100 species that were manifestly not for our use, since today’s bush of life is descended from only 0.1% of past species.
Importance of Microbiome (now back to boredom and theodicy)
DAVID: God does not get bored, but your overly humanized form does. When will you learn how to think about a possibly real God?
dhw: Your theory was that your God allowed human evil and created murderous bugs (for which he is to be blamed) in order to avoid boredom – his and ours. Now, with your astonishing first-hand knowledge of how God thinks and feels, you dismiss your own theory. When will you learn that nobody can learn how to think about a possibly real God, but if you propose certain ideas one week and then propose the opposite the following week, it becomes more and more difficult to take any of your ideas seriously. I still vividly remember your certainty that your God enjoys creating, is interested in his creations, and has thought patterns and emotions like our own. When you proposed your boredom theory, it was nicely consistent with your earlier beliefs. But suddenly out they all go again.
DAVID: God is not human.
I never said he was.
DAVID: Does He have emotions like ours is questionable. Religions claim He loves us, but is that human wishful thinking? I have never been 'certain' about God's personal attributes you listed. Perhaps it is my human wishes that He be that way.
You were once certain he enjoyed creating and was interested in his creations, but apparently you have never been certain. You are certain that he is omnipotent, omniscient, all-good, can’t get bored, is selfless and acts without self-interest etc. In fact, you are certain about anything that supports your wishes, and you are certain in your rejection of anything that contradicts them.
The role of the interstitium
QUOTE: "Understanding how the interstitium works will define more of the rules about how the trillions of cells in the human body communicate across vast distances to create the exquisitely complex system that is the body. How these things all add up are vast scientific questions that will require a meticulously reductive approach as well as cultivation of a beginner’s mind.”
dhw: The new articles were too technical for me to grasp, but this paragraph leapt out at me. These vast communities perform different functions, but communicate with one another to create a single community of communities. Awesome. And I love the emphasis on the need for a reductive approach and a beginner’s mind. The logical outcome of a reductive approach would seem to be just how each individual cell plays its part, and perhaps the beginner’s mind will find that each cell actually knows what it’s doing. But I acknowledge that you would expect the approach to lead to the conclusion that all cells are robots obeying your God’s instructions.
DAVID: In DNA there are instructions, but as these articles show there are other levels of communication constantly in action.
All of which reinforce the image of a vast community of communities cooperating to perform existing functions and to respond to new requirements. It is certainly not unreasonable to suggest that they know what they’re doing.
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Sunday, April 28, 2024, 15:53 (1 day, 4 hours, 43 min. ago) @ dhw
A new consciousness declaration
dhw: Thank you for providing yet more evidence for Shapiro’s theory that cells gather information, respond to changes in conditions, and make decisions based on what is best for their survival.
DAVID: No question, cells adapt but only at a local level, not speciation.
dhw: Another authoritative statement of opinion.
Why are you afraid of opinions? You know my view, and I know yours.
Bioluminescencedhw: Why do you think bioluminescence for eyeless organisms was essential to the fulfilment of your God’s sole purpose of producing us and our food?
DAVID: My God wished to produce an Earth filled with diverse life forms for our use.
dhw: I’m not sure what use we make of these organisms, but of course we are still left with the conundrum of why he would have produced and culled 99.9 out of 100 species that were manifestly not for our use, since today’s bush of life is descended from only 0.1% of past species.
Same confused math, not worth further discussion. Stop splitting evolution into two unrelated parts!!!
Importance of Microbiome (now back to boredom and theodicy)DAVID: God does not get bored, but your overly humanized form does. When will you learn how to think about a possibly real God?
dhw: Your theory was that your God allowed human evil and created murderous bugs (for which he is to be blamed) in order to avoid boredom – his and ours. Now, with your astonishing first-hand knowledge of how God thinks and feels, you dismiss your own theory. When will you learn that nobody can learn how to think about a possibly real God, but if you propose certain ideas one week and then propose the opposite the following week, it becomes more and more difficult to take any of your ideas seriously. I still vividly remember your certainty that your God enjoys creating, is interested in his creations, and has thought patterns and emotions like our own. When you proposed your boredom theory, it was nicely consistent with your earlier beliefs. But suddenly out they all go again.
DAVID: God is not human. Addendum: All those human qualities I and you listed above are covered just below.
dhw: I never said he was.
DAVID: Does He have emotions like ours is questionable. Religions claim He loves us, but is that human wishful thinking? I have never been 'certain' about God's personal attributes you listed. Perhaps it is my human wishes that He be that way.
dhw; You were once certain he enjoyed creating and was interested in his creations, but apparently you have never been certain. You are certain that he is omnipotent, omniscient, all-good, can’t get bored, is selfless and acts without self-interest etc. In fact, you are certain about anything that supports your wishes, and you are certain in your rejection of anything that contradicts them.
That is my right as an individual thinker.
The role of the interstitiumQUOTE: "Understanding how the interstitium works will define more of the rules about how the trillions of cells in the human body communicate across vast distances to create the exquisitely complex system that is the body. How these things all add up are vast scientific questions that will require a meticulously reductive approach as well as cultivation of a beginner’s mind.”
dhw: The new articles were too technical for me to grasp, but this paragraph leapt out at me. These vast communities perform different functions, but communicate with one another to create a single community of communities. Awesome. And I love the emphasis on the need for a reductive approach and a beginner’s mind. The logical outcome of a reductive approach would seem to be just how each individual cell plays its part, and perhaps the beginner’s mind will find that each cell actually knows what it’s doing. But I acknowledge that you would expect the approach to lead to the conclusion that all cells are robots obeying your God’s instructions.
DAVID: In DNA there are instructions, but as these articles show there are other levels of communication constantly in action.
dhw; All of which reinforce the image of a vast community of communities cooperating to perform existing functions and to respond to new requirements. It is certainly not unreasonable to suggest that they know what they’re doing.
"Know" in a mental sense? Please define.
More Miscellany
A new consciousness declaration
dhw: Thank you for providing yet more evidence for Shapiro’s theory that cells gather information, respond to changes in conditions, and make decisions based on what is best for their survival.
DAVID: No question, cells adapt but only at a local level, not speciation.
dhw: Another authoritative statement of opinion.
DAVID: Why are you afraid of opinions? You know my view, and I know yours.
I am not afraid of opinions. But I’m not happy when people express opinions as if they were facts, as in “No question…” Of course there is a question.
Bioluminescence
Dealt with above.
Importance of Microbiome (now back to boredom and theodicy)
DAVID: Does He have emotions like ours is questionable. Religions claim He loves us, but is that human wishful thinking? I have never been 'certain' about God's personal attributes you listed. Perhaps it is my human wishes that He be that way.
dhw: You were once certain he enjoyed creating and was interested in his creations, but apparently you have never been certain. You are certain that he is omnipotent, omniscient, all-good, can’t get bored, is selfless and acts without self-interest etc. In fact, you are certain about anything that supports your wishes, and you are certain in your rejection of anything that contradicts them.
DAVID: That is my right as an individual thinker.
You have “never been certain about God’s attributes” which I listed, but you are certain about some of them, as is your right.Maybe you should also say you never contradict yourself.
The role of the interstitium
dhw: logical outcome of a reductive approach would seem to be just how each individual cell plays its part, and perhaps the beginner’s mind will find that each cell actually knows what it’s doing. But I acknowledge that you would expect the approach to lead to the conclusion that all cells are robots obeying your God’s instructions.
DAVID: In DNA there are instructions, but as these articles show there are other levels of communication constantly in action.
dhw: All of which reinforce the image of a vast community of communities cooperating to perform existing functions and to respond to new requirements. It is certainly not unreasonable to suggest that they know what they’re doing.
DAVID: "Know" in a mental sense? Please define.
To be aware of the available information, to deliberately process it, communicate with other cells, and make decisions as to the best way to deal with it. This is what all organisms do in order to survive, and I don’t think even you believe that all living organisms are robots whose decisions always depend on instructions provide by your God.
Aquatic spiders
DAVID: Why did the spiders go back to water? As with whales many physiological changes had to occur. God must have stepped in as a designer.
The article answers your question: “Presumably, the spiders that later returned to a life aquatic were strongly drawn by something to eat there, or driven by unsafe conditions on land.” This would also be a very reasonable explanation for pre-whales leaving the land. In their case, you had your God making the changes before the pre-whales entered the water, so do you think he did the same for all the different varieties of aquatic spiders listed in the article: a twiddle here and a fiddle there, and hey ho, off you go to the water? But of course, you will not even consider the possibility that this wide variety of adaptations might be the result of intelligent cells responding to new conditions in their own different ways. And I’d better not ask why you think your God specially designed all these variations. Do we humans really need them or use them?
More Miscellany
by David Turell , Monday, April 29, 2024, 18:30 (2 hours, 7 minutes ago) @ dhw
A new consciousness declaration
DAVID: Why are you afraid of opinions? You know my view, and I know yours.
dhw: I am not afraid of opinions. But I’m not happy when people express opinions as if they were facts, as in “No question…” Of course there is a question.
I express my thoughts about God as fact for my faith. Please remember that as you question me.
Importance of Microbiome (now back to boredom and theodicy)DAVID: Does He have emotions like ours is questionable. Religions claim He loves us, but is that human wishful thinking? I have never been 'certain' about God's personal attributes you listed. Perhaps it is my human wishes that He be that way.
dhw: You were once certain he enjoyed creating and was interested in his creations, but apparently you have never been certain. You are certain that he is omnipotent, omniscient, all-good, can’t get bored, is selfless and acts without self-interest etc. In fact, you are certain about anything that supports your wishes, and you are certain in your rejection of anything that contradicts them.
DAVID: That is my right as an individual thinker.
dhw: You have “never been certain about God’s attributes” which I listed, but you are certain about some of them, as is your right. Maybe you should also say you never contradict yourself.
Contradictions are your inventions. No, no one can be certain about God's attributes. My thoughts about God are within a faith structure. When I offer an opinion it will come across as if fact.
The role of the interstitiumdhw: logical outcome of a reductive approach would seem to be just how each individual cell plays its part, and perhaps the beginner’s mind will find that each cell actually knows what it’s doing. But I acknowledge that you would expect the approach to lead to the conclusion that all cells are robots obeying your God’s instructions.
DAVID: In DNA there are instructions, but as these articles show there are other levels of communication constantly in action.
dhw: All of which reinforce the image of a vast community of communities cooperating to perform existing functions and to respond to new requirements. It is certainly not unreasonable to suggest that they know what they’re doing.
DAVID: "Know" in a mental sense? Please define.
dhw:To be aware of the available information, to deliberately process it, communicate with other cells, and make decisions as to the best way to deal with it. This is what all organisms do in order to survive, and I don’t think even you believe that all living organisms are robots whose decisions always depend on instructions provide by your God.
No, in adaptability there are some minor processes that do not need instructions.
Aquatic spidersDAVID: Why did the spiders go back to water? As with whales many physiological changes had to occur. God must have stepped in as a designer.
dhw: The article answers your question: “Presumably, the spiders that later returned to a life aquatic were strongly drawn by something to eat there, or driven by unsafe conditions on land.” This would also be a very reasonable explanation for pre-whales leaving the land. In their case, you had your God making the changes before the pre-whales entered the water, so do you think he did the same for all the different varieties of aquatic spiders listed in the article: a twiddle here and a fiddle there, and hey ho, off you go to the water? But of course, you will not even consider the possibility that this wide variety of adaptations might be the result of intelligent cells responding to new conditions in their own different ways. And I’d better not ask why you think your God specially designed all these variations. Do we humans really need them or use them?
They play a role in seaside ecosystems, of course. The authors spouted the usual reasons we all think of to explain such an unusual action.