Watching asteroids: a close one is coming (Introduction)

by dhw, Sunday, April 16, 2017, 14:35 (2779 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: What a coincidence! I thought your own response was the weird one! I really don’t think we need to be reminded about the dangers of the universe we live in, which range from asteroids careering round the universe – uncontrolled by your God, which leaves wide open the question of how much control he really has over the environment – to fatal diseases borne by divinely programmed or guided bacteria. Your God has apparently created all these and is now watching to see if we can solve the problems (but we mustn’t ask why because our answer might “humanize” him).
DAVID: You can always ask why. Just don't put 'God is human in His thinking' in your propositions.

Firstly, it is impossible to offer any answer to the question of God’s purposes in creating life and humans without attributing some recognizable human attribute to him; secondly you have agreed that God may well have certain human attributes; and thirdly you have admitted that you yourself believe he does have certain human attributes. Now please tell me why we should not argue that if God created the universe, life and humans, he had a reason for doing so and the reason may well be in terms perfectly comprehensible to ourselves, including those you yourself have suggested, e.g. loneliness, boredom, wanting a relationship, delighting in the pleasures of own work, enjoying watching us solve the problems he has set us. We can’t KNOW, of course, but then we can’t even KNOW if God exists. That is why we discuss these matters.