philosophy of science: meaning and functions (Introduction)

by David Turell , Tuesday, October 09, 2018, 17:54 (2236 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: Did you ever consider God as selfless? You can only think of Him as similar to you.

dhw: Did you ever consider that your God might have thoughts and feelings similar to ours, which is why he was able to create creatures with thoughts and feelings similar to his? Why do you tell us he wants a relationship with us, wants to prove himself to us, enjoys creation, watches us (and all the other humans in all the other universes you think he has created) with interest if you don’t think of him having these thoughts and feelings? What sort of God are you now trying to conjure up? A vast blob of conscious energy that has no feelings, no identity, no self? All this because although you constantly insist on how purposeful he is, you cannot stand the thought that his purpose might have been to keep himself occupied.

As an eternal being God is not tied to a passage of time, which to humans creates a requirement to fill that time with productive efforts or pass-timing. I'm sure God contains all of the human attributes of thought in His thoughts we have but He is much more than that as He proceeds to create. We can only guess at his motives, so why bother?

DAVID: Pure humanizing of God. The concept of pass-timing in psychology is useless filling of time, and we all do it!

dhw: It is you who have introduced the term “pass-timing”, you have not told us your criteria for usefulness, you have ignored the whole argument above (that your God was not born into a world already filled with purposes and occupations), and you refuse to acknowledge that all your own interpretations of your God’s purposes are pure humanizations. And you still haven’t explained why the hypothesis I have offered is illogical. Your only objection seems to be that it doesn’t fit your personal image of your God.

Pass-timing is a concept from my training in psychology. It should be easy for you to recognize, as I'm sure you've done it, if you think about it. Is every moment of your life purposeful? As for guessing God's purposes, that is all they can be. I've produced some possibilities when goaded by you, but why bother? Just accept what He has provided.

DAVID: You still haven't taken your human concept of God to understanding that while He fully understands our lesser way of thinking his purposeful thoughts are on creation of universes. Our similarity is only a tiny portion of His mentality.

dhw: And yet again you use the word “purposeful”. So yet again, tell us what you think was/is his purpose in creating universes?

I can only guess, which is all you can do while trying to make Him a person like us. He isn't