Mass/Energy and Information 4

            Newly introduced organisms fit-in right away

            One theme put forward in these blogs is that the ever-increasing complexity that has produced the vast diversity of life-forms we see today, is always introducing living organisms that are at the perfected edge of specified refinement.  

            What is staring us in the face, when we look at biology, is the reality that human designed and manufactured products are always complete and functional at the forward edge of specified, refined completion for their intended use.

            Human agency universally produces functionally complete objects, from fully cooked, baked lasagna at our favorite Italian restaurant, to a bicycle that has two wheels, to a new automobile that has brakes, to computer software programs that are debugged and operational, and to completed murder mystery books that are spell-checked and edited for good grammar.

            We do not see in the vast diversity of life today any organisms that are in major transitional development part-way towards some future outcome going from barely functional to more functional to completely functional. 

            We presently do not see works-in-progress other than the things that have dynamic change as part of their defining nature, such as the formation of deltas where rivers meet the sea, the erosion of geography due to wind, rain, snow, and ice, the eventual shrinkage and cooling of our sun, and the continued expansion of the universe.

            We do not see dynamic change as the universally prolific paradigm of development in the natural living and non-living world.

            Applying Charles Lyell’s dictum of using the present to interpret the past in the historical sciences like geology, this present-day evidence then tells us that living organisms enter into existence with specified, refined maturity at the forward edge of their conceptual essence. 

            Living organisms enter into the world functionally complete enough to fit into their biodiverse and ecologically balanced niches, to be able to survive and to reproduce “right-out-of-the-box, no assembly tools required.”

            Modern science tells us that the proverbial watch we find on the beach that points towards the existence of a watchmaker, is not a quarter or half completed watch, but a fully completed watch at the end-point of its functionally defined essence.

            If the scientific fact-based evidence of embryonic development exhibits directional aim towards sustainable, fully mature function in living organisms at the molecular level, then this line of thinking is in direct contrast to the simple-to-complex ideology of random and undirected processes applied to biology.

            This is a key departure from the “nature makes no sudden leaps” concept proposed by Charles Darwin in 1859.

            The concept of blocks of different new cell-types introduced in grouped clusters enables immediate function in new architectural body-plans capable of integrating into the complexity of the current biodiversity and ecology of a particular era.

            This then harmonizes with the leaps of development from bi-pedal, upright walking pre-human ancestors 4 to 7-million years ago, to the near vertical spike upward of the human capacity from the first appearance of a letter alphabet in Egypt around 3,200 B.C. to humans walking on the moon in 1969.

            If the Darwinian concept that “nature makes no sudden leaps” is false, if the true reality is that development occurs at the mature end-points of function as the result of massive inputs of information at the molecular level inside living cells, then the current controversy over the clear absence of a gradual linear progression from pre-humans to modern humans is resolved.

            The differences between Australopithecus (4-7 million years ago), Homo habilis (2-million years ago), Homo erectus (1.8-million years ago), Cro-Magnon man (being early Homo sapiens 200,000 years ago), and modern humans can more plausibly be explained by the additions of new blocks of cell-types in clusters, to produce improved development and function.

            This then resolves the ideological rift between naturalistic materialism and intelligent design currently being debated within the realms of philosophy, theology, and science.

            This is discussed more fully in the chapter Human Development and Evolution. 

            I see the transitional leaps of early life at 3.8-billion years ago from the single-cell bacteria to multi-cellular algae floating on top of the oceans, to the Precambrian jellyfish having 10 to 12 new and different cell-types, to the radiation of new creatures with architectural body-plans having 30 to 40 different cell-types during the Cambrian Explosion at 535-million years ago…as increasing complexity throughout geologic history to our present day.

            This is always occurring at the guided and directed level of putting-out functionally mature organisms able to adapt and survive at the first moments of their introduction, factoring-in the genetic mutations that also over time put-out beneficial variant traits to be chosen by natural selection to enhance adaptation to changing environments.

            This non-Darwinian thinking encompasses large jumps of development tied to the introduction of a coordinated ensemble of new cell-types to achieve immediate function. 

            These large jumps of development arise from the abstract informational concepts of living organisms into their actualized material expression, altogether bypassing transitional, trial-and-error intermediates. 

            This is empirically the fact-based evidence in the fossil record and what we observe today in the natural world.[1]

            This non-Darwinian approach requires the intentionalrelease of well-timed, physical expressions of information that consistently produce fully functional living organisms. 

            These strategically released inputs of information come from within living cells that could not plausibly be explained through an accidental, trial-and-error, small-step progression over long stretches of time that would be easily detectable as on-going today to molecular biochemists.

            We see in this present “miracle” of information in living cells the use of material molecular mechanisms to build and accurately position the different cell types in architectural body-plans to create such diverse organisms as hawks, spiders, sea crabs, whales, wolves, and humans. 

            We see the same quality of actualized information that produces the distinctive architectural body-plan of the African bull elephant and the instinctual lifestyle habit of its intimidating full-speed charge. 

            If all of the artistic, creative information resides in the living cell, if all of the work takes place molecularly to produce functional living organisms before they make their grand entrance onto the stage of the living world, this then reduces the Darwinian model of mutation/selection to the more limited minor role of pre-engineered, microevolutionary variability adaptable to changing environments.

            It is inconceivable that Agatha Christie would sit in front of her typewriter or laptop computer and randomly hit the keys with her eyes closed and her mind on other things, hoping through a trial-and-error, accidental process that she could produce complex and highly specified information arranged in the form of a classic murder mystery who-done-it story.   

            It is inconceivable that the complex and highly specified information we find being coordinated and integrated inside living cells towards functional end-point outcomes could be the product of mindless and undirected processes.

            Darwin’s initial extrapolation in 1859 from microevolution to macroevolution in his book The Origin of Species as an explanation for the vast diversity of life on earth, is no longer plausible in this new Age of Information because incremental, trial-and-error gradualism as the means to produce complex and specified systems of information does not work.[2]

            The physical universe requires a timeless creator.

            Darwin’s fundamental condition that nature makes no sudden leaps locks his theory into the materialistic dynamic of change over time, which no longer works when applied to the complexity we find in the living world.

            But a timeless, Spirit-Being God can input the new information or turn-on a gene regulatory network switch to release 5, 10, or 20 new and different cell-types together to produce new architectural body-plans in time t=0.

            This can be represented by a “width-less”[3] vertical line on the two-dimensional x/y-graph of change (vertical axis) over time (horizontal axis) over the course of geological history.

            We do not have a PBS documentary, video recording of Agatha Christie composing her murder mystery book And Then There Was None.

            I never personally met Agatha Christie.  For all I know, she could be a divinely timeless God who produces her books in a split-second, or she could be a normal human being taking 6-months to write each book.  The physical, end-result product today would look the same either way.

            Common descent in biology can be true without utilizing Darwin’s model of small, incrementally progressive steps fueled by random and accidental serendipity.

            Common descent can simply have another and better explanation, being a divinely timeless God inputting massive infusions of information at various points in time, represented by “width-less” vertical lines on the two-dimensional x/y-graph, these lines having zero-time durations.

            For a brilliant and up-to-date, 35-minute refutation of Darwinian evolution see Gunter Bechly Explains What The Fossil Evidence Really Says, hosted by Discovery Science, published November 23, 2021 on You Tube.

            This is how true science operates.  New, more correct information surfaces to clarify or replace earlier theoretical hypotheses with better explanatory hypotheses.

            Science can be roughly defined as the elimination of possibilities.  Scientific investigation has dispelled “old-wives” tales, magic, superstition, and wild speculation regarding the causes of phenomena in the natural world.

            These are some of the key questions in our current modern age, as Christian faith and the investigative field of science begin to coalesce from different angles to reach some final answers.

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[1] Fossil Discontinuities: Refutation of Darwinism & Confirmation of Intelligent Design—Gunter Bechly, published Oct. 11, 2018 on You Tube by FOCLOnline.

[2] Michael Denton, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis (Chevy Chase: Adler & Adler, 1985), 308-325. 

[3] See on the Internet Moravec’s Paradox – Why are machines so smart, yet so dumb? On Up and Atom published July 8, 2019, and The Essence of Calculus, sections one and two, describing change over time and the concept of limits, in 3Blue 1 Brown.