@brianjakub,
brianjakub wrote:I disagree. The ingredients are there. The potential for biological complexity exists in the mind that can organize the ingredients.
But the human mind is just part of a broader evolving system.
Quote:I don't say the potential for a loaf of bread lies in my kitchen because I have a bag of flour and an oven.
No, but the potential for wheat lay in the grasses that evolved into wheat in tandem with human stewardship. The yeasts that makes it rise evolved naturally before they were cultivated by humans. Biomass was cooked and roasted in various ways naturally before humans developed the ability to control fire and heat.
Quote:The potential for bread exists because SOMEONE built an oven and SOMEONE raised a crop of wheat and SOMEONE built a flour mill. and I made the bread in my kitchen.
No, someone was able to build an oven because they had a brain and hands that allowed them control fire and understand that they can contain convection currents within an enclosed box. They learned to grind flour by hold rocks in their hands and smashing grains against other rocks and collecting them in woven baskets, clay pots, etc.
Quote:The same pattern is ALWAYS FOLLOWED when a complex system is being observed with complex results.
The human brain evolved together with human hands, legs, feet, etc. That is how God created and continues to create the creation. We are part of that, which can be described using the phrase, "made in His image."
Quote:Some systems are just so old and have operated so effectively for a long period of time that it is assumed that they always existed.
Well, in one sense they have always existed and in another they are the latest version of something older that ended when they began.
Quote:I believe that is what you are assuming here. Am I wrong and if so why?
Why is it not better to assume that the pattern we observe today (things that are created always have a creator) followed through consistently into the ancient past?
They do, but their is no fundamental distinction between conscious/intentional creation and natural evolution. Our brains perceive their own thoughts and actions they willfully cause as being fundamentally different than other natural processes, which they perceive as unconscious/unintentional/subconscious; but in reality the brain itself is a collection of ion-solutions seeping through semi-permeable cell membranes causing action-potential nerve signal patterns. We experience those as conscious/intentional thoughts and wilful actions, but ultimately they are just a byproduct of the mechanical functioning of that organic machine/system that is the brain.