dhw: I know you prefer to stick to your dogma, and I accept that human consciousness makes us a very special species, but the idea that the WHOLE of evolution – every innovation, lifestyle and natural wonder extant and extinct – was preprogrammed 3.8 billion years ago, apart from the odd dabble, and this was done for the sole purpose of producing humans, is what I find unreasonable.

You find God unreasonable. The supreme achievement of life's evolution is humans. Why not the main purpose?