Divine purposes and methods (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, January 12, 2019, 12:54 (2140 days ago) @ David Turell

I’m condensing this post, as it is becoming very repetitive. The salient points are contained in the exchanges below:

DAVID: My reasoning is from facts.
And
DAVID: I read God’s mind logically.

dhw: The only facts are that life’s history has produced the diverse bush of species, and H. sapiens is the latest. You don’t question your personal assumptions that your God exists, and if he does, that he is in total control, that his goal from the beginning was to specially design you and me, and that his method was to spend 3.5+ billion years specially designing millions of other life forms so that they could eat one another. You don’t understand the methodology you have imposed on him, since it seems to contradict the total control and single goal you have also imposed on him, and yet it is not illogical to you. Your human reasoning leads you to reject my logical alternatives because we mustn’t “humanize” God by trying to read his mind – although it’s OK for you to do so – and God’s logic is different from ours (as if you knew). Maybe it isn’t!

DAVID: You are sitting on the outside of faith looking in. Why should I question my belief God exists? That is your problem, not mine.

I’m not asking you to question it. I’m simply pointing out that the existence of God – let alone your personal reading of his mind - is not a fact.

DAVID: I didn't impose a method on Him. He chose to evolve humans over time. That is the history. I accept it.

You “accept” your own non-factual assumption that his goal from the beginning was us, that he was in total control, that his chosen method of specially designing humans was to take 3.5+ billion years specially designing all those other life forms so that they could eat one another, and you also “accept” that you cannot understand why he would choose the method you have read into his mind. And yet you regard this as a logical reading!

DAVID: 'Total control' means He has the right to chose His preferred method. I don't have to know the background of His logic. He has the right to choose His method. His logic might be like ours or different. No one knows.

So once more: if no one knows, why do you insist that YOUR illogical account is correct, in which YOUR idea of his purpose by your own admission makes YOUR idea of his method incomprehensible even to you?