philosophy of science: meaning and functions (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, September 27, 2018, 18:42 (2035 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: I wasn’t asking you to blame God. I was pointing out that it requires faith to believe in a loving, caring God.

TONY: Yes it requires faith and He does not have to be loving or caring. […] Further unless God's personality and thought pattern are not viewed in the realm of pure purpose, the interpretation will not be accurate.

dhw: Nobody knows which interpretation is accurate, or what the purpose might have been.

DAVID: Evolution is a guide to purpose. Look at what has appeared against all odds, humans! The complexity of evolution and life require as designer.

dhw: All life appeared against the odds, and of course if God exists he will have had a purpose. And I have conceded that the complexities suggest design, but not necessarily one designer (atheistic panpsychist hypothesis), and your designer is no less of a mystery than the origin and complexities of life.

dhw (to David): Why are you so sure your God created humans without ever having experienced any of the thoughts that humans have?

DAVID: Since we are in His image our thoughts are similar but His are not at a human level of understanding. Always remember the difference. The image is only mental.

dhw: What is this “level of understanding”? Either he has experienced certain thoughts or he hasn’t.

DAVID: Quibbling: God is not human. Of course He has our thoughts, but with His degree of creation powers He is thinking at a level we cannot reach. Again, you can't seem to leave your humanizing view of Him, probably ground in your inability to accept His existence at His level of power.

dhw: I agree that God is not human, thank you for agreeing that he has our thoughts, but no thanks for not explaining what you mean by those thoughts being “at a level we cannot reach”. Tony agreed that he may have experienced boredom. So since he is God, his boredom would be at a level of boredom that we cannot reach. So what? Boredom is boredom.

You and Tony can believe He was bored. I don't. I envision God as eternal and with the purpose of creating thinking humans, which I suspect He has done many times in he past. I'm happy Tony supported you but as a committee of three our discussions don't prove any truths, just opinions. Since I am not God. His level of thought is something I imagine as beyond any thinking we can do. As God is imagined, we humans can only guess what He is exactly like.