The Mind of God (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, February 10, 2015, 10:00 (3574 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: As for the complex genome controls, there is no reason to suppose that these are not also part of an autonomous mechanism. After all, you remain convinced that the astonishing complexities of the human brain (thank you for the latest post on the subject) serve to make us autonomous and not automatic.
DAVID: Once again, those genomic and brain complexities cannot have been developed by chance. IMHO we are autonomous.-And if the amazing complexities of our brain can make us autonomous, perhaps the amazing complexities of other organisms can do the same.-dhw: You say God planned things to fulfil a particular purpose (humans). It seems to me just as reasonable to speculate that the operator actually aimed for higgledy-piggledy, or didn't know what he was doing, or was experimenting, as it is to speculate that his goal was humans.
DAVID: I understand your speculation. I look for a reasonable explanation as to why humans are here. I still maintain we are different in kind, not degree. As for 'didn't know what he was doing', hard to accept that in view of what did appear from the point of the Big Bang.-And I also look for a reasonable explanation as to why the duck-billed platypus is here, and I don't find one in the suggestion that God needed it for the balance of life and the production of humans. Deliberate free-for-all, experimentation, or even - who knows? - “Oops, what have I done here?” Looking closely at the d-b-p, my money would be on a free-for-all. -DAVID: I really do not know why God did what He did. I don't know how bonded He is to us, if bonded at all. We are here. There must be a cause, and perhaps a reason. There may be no reason and no emotion involved. 
dhw: Thank you for an excellent summary of our situation - but the discussions between you and me have not been about whether God is bored, playful, callous, but about whether evolution fits the pattern you have imposed on it.-DAVID: All I have really imposed is purpose. Humans are here. We really don't know the 'why' or the 'how', except both of us see evolution as the underlying process. You are unwilling to accept purpose. That is your right, but it hard to avoid the appearance of purpose.-You have imposed a very specific purpose, and on analysis it seems very hard to fit that purpose to the higgledy-piggledy course of evolution as we know it. Of course you can escape by saying nobody knows the mind of God, but I see nothing wrong in our looking for other possible purposes that fit in more snugly than the one you advocate.