Watching asteroids; possible damage (Introduction)

by David Turell , Friday, March 03, 2017, 00:39 (2824 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: You extrapolate my suppositions beyond all recognition, which is fun in a debate but does not truly explore the intent of my thinking which is expressed above. I've never changed as you imply. I have always recognized the God might have limits, but He always uses an evolutionary process and keeps as tight control as He can. I don't know that He chose to be incapable; your phrase came from what thought? He may simply could not do it any other way and is not as all powerful as the Bible proposes.

dhw: So why did you say he “chose” the method, if it was forced on him by the laws he himself had created? Either he chose it or he didn’t choose it.

However, since you and I believe that evolution happened, i.e. life began with comparatively simple forms and evolved into forms that are more complex, it is fair enough to assume from a theistic viewpoint that God did choose that method. It is not fair enough to assume that right from the start he was forced by the laws he himself created to design millions of non-human organisms, a system of indiscriminate natural disasters and diseases, and a continual succession of comings and goings before he was finally able to get what he wanted with a dabble, which he couldn’t have done earlier. All of these convolutions spring from your one basic premise that he started out with the purpose of producing humans.

Getting to humans looks like His purpose because the odds are so enormously large against a chance appearance of humans. The only method He chose was evolution as the source of universe, Earth and humans. I don't know if He was limited to that method by what He created. You are supposing that and creating convolutions.

dhw:If you now think that your God, who created the universe and life from scratch, can be that limited, why can’t you accept that there is an alternative possibility: namely, that he actually got precisely what he wanted in the way he wanted it, i.e. the ever changing and unpredictable spectacle of life’s history as we know it, maybe with dabbled humans as the most recent and most interesting part of the show?

Your supposed limitations again. We don't know if He has any limits at all. He could be all-powerful per the Bible. The asteroids might have been required as I observed. And you are humanizing Him again. I don't know He needed an entertaining show.