philosophy of science: meaning and functions (Introduction)

by dhw, Saturday, September 15, 2018, 11:56 (2049 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: My objection to your spectacle hypothesis is you have draped God in human clothing. You don't think like God does. None of us do.

DHW: How do you know how God thinks? According to you, we have a soul that is part of your God’s own consciousness. Some folk believe he made us “in his image”. And according to you he created us because he wants a relationship with us (how human is that!). You believe in God and you keep insisting that the universe is full of purpose, but how can you possibly consider what that “purpose” is and yet not consider what is in his mind? So please tell us, what do you think is the purpose of the universe and life?

DAVID: I've said I don't know how He thinks, but you have given Him a spectator purpose! Watching fun and games? My God is much more serious than your imagined God. We've discussed God's purpose before. It was to create fully conscious humans in my opinion.

Correction: Your IMAGINED God is much more serious than my imagined God. Why do you trivialize the spectacle as “fun and games”? Tony thinks God wanted to grow and develop (I ask why, and suggest that he may have been bored with his isolated existence). By creating life he will have learned what it is to love, to hate, to enjoy, to suffer, to win, to lose...none of which he would have experienced all on his own as an eternal blob of pure energy. Is this "fun and games"? Whether he started out with the sole intention of creating conscious humans is another subject, but your observation does not answer Tony’s question – it is part of the question. Why did God create EVERYTHING, which includes the universe, life and humans?

TONY: Life and growth ARE part of the purpose. Is that not a worth purpose in and of itself, to live and grow? Still, I have said that I believe there to be many layers of purpose, and I don't claim to know them all.

DAVID: I'm with Tony. Giving life's experience is a purposeful gift. Anonymous charity is the most worthy.

I join you both in regarding life as a wonderful gift and as a purpose in itself, and I am fully aware of and grateful for all the beautiful experiences I have been privileged to enjoy, just as I am fully aware of the painful experiences I have had and of the painful experiences I have been fortunate enough not to have had. This has nothing whatsoever to do with the existence of God, whether there is a purpose for “everything”, and if there is - which depends on there being a God - what his purpose might be.