Evolution v Creationism (Part II Responses) (Evolution)

by dhw, Wednesday, September 17, 2014, 21:34 (3718 days ago) @ Balance_Maintained

TONY: Yes, God can manipulate the environment, and there are numerous examples of him doing so. The question is not whether he COULD, but rather whether or not it was the correct thing to do. Something is strange here, though. Why should god NOT use living creatures to do the work? Perhaps a better question is, why should he create creatures that serve no purpose? This is what you seem to be suggesting. Just that he should let things go, will-he nil-he, for no purpose whatsoever, randomly living and dying for no other reason than his amusement. That he should 'scientifically' twiddle his nose and !*Poof*! things into perfect existence with no regard to what came before or what comes after. If this is the way people see God then it is no wonder they have a hard time believing. That is about as unrealistic as Hollywood romance.-In the section I've marked in bold, your use of "should" changes meanings as it goes along, from a possible "would" (why should he create creatures that serve no purpose?) to "ought to"! I didn't suggest that he “should” let things go, and I didn't suggest he “should” use magic instead of science. So let's start again. Correct me if I'm wrong: you advocate separate creation, and argue that life's history is geared to the purpose of creating humans to be “stewards” of the earth. The millions of species that he created separately and then killed off were necessary for him to achieve this purpose. As an example, I have asked why you personally believe that God could not have created humans without first creating and killing off trilobites (as one example among millions). What's unrealistic or unscientific about such a question? If I am to follow your logic, I need an answer to it.
 
My current thinking is that it makes no sense for your God to have had to specially create and kill off vast numbers of species in order to make humans, especially if he made humans separately and so they have no antecedents. (No problem with useful live creatures such as bacteria, which clearly played and play a vital role and have of course survived.) Since I can't see any logical reason for the separate creation and subsequent extinction of, say, the trilobites, I look for other explanations as to why things are as they are (not for how I think God “should” have done it.) Since the entertainment hypothesis offends you, let's forget it, because it's irrelevant to the evolution debate. Let's just say God created the universe and life, and millions of species have come and gone. We don't know why. If God created them separately (e.g. trilobites), he must have had a reason for doing so, but we can't think of one. And there is actually no evidence that he did create them separately. So maybe he didn't. Maybe he devised a mechanism or a system or a programme to set life moving in lots of different directions. And maybe he also devised a mechanism or a system or a programme to vary the environment in which organisms exist, so that they could evolve into lots of different forms according to the needs and possibilities created by the changing environment. We don't know why, but that would explain the vast variety and the extinctions, which are not explained by separate creation geared to the production of humans. -This does not ask God to say "Poof!". And even now we see evolution at work on a micro-level, as organisms interact with their environment. You can certainly argue that there is no direct evidence for macro-evolution, just as there is no direct evidence for separate creation. But many theists do find it more convincing, and at least what I've outlined above doesn't force us to impose any particular interpretation onto the unknowable mind of your God. The theory of evolution itself is just a possible explanation of how things came to be the way they are. It does not attempt to explain why God did it that way (if he did).-********************-I'll return to the interesting religious thread tomorrow.