dhw: big brain evolution:comparing chimp and brain organoids (Evolution)

by David Turell , Friday, March 22, 2019, 21:30 (2071 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: Once again you have donned the mantle of religion's pundit: God is all-powerful so why decide to wait through 3.8 billion years. […] God may not be totally all-everything […] perhaps He had limits, […] In your fence sitting pose as an agnostic, why do you stick to accepting God's all-powerful persona? Only because you think it allows you to argue with me. […] I don't know if God is really all-powerful, as I've considered the issue, and fully understand He might have limits as He directs evolution.

dhw: I’m sorry, but one of the major problems in our discussions is that your beliefs seem to change from week to week. It is you who keep on insisting that your God is in full control, and I keep saying that IF he is in full control, it is illogical that he should spend 3.5+ billion years designing anything but the one thing he wants to design. I hate to do this to you, but here is one of your explicit statements on this thread, Wed, 6 March at 18:38:

DAVID: I believe He is in full control. You are the one who is not sure of that because you don't accept God's powers, and I know that.

dhw: Since then you have gone on insisting that he is in full control. Two days ago, I repeated my various alternatives. Note the bold.
dhw: You force me to repeat alternative theistic interpretations of life’s “real history”: maybe your God had other goals, maybe he’s not all-powerful, maybe he was experimenting, maybe he did not specially design every life form, econiche etc., maybe he didn’t want to be “fully in charge”, maybe he wanted an evolutionary free-for-all. […]

My belief He is full control covers both sides of your problem in discussion with me. Full control means He has the total right to choose His method of creation. My standard persistent position. Your view of His 'full control' means you see no reason for Him to have waited to create humans. You have the problem. I don't

DAVID: Adler gives no explanation for evolution, but as far as vastly different humans arrived, that vast difference proves God exists.

dhw: Our issue here is not the existence of God but your insistence that your God spent 3.5+ billion years designing anything but the one thing he wanted to design. You complained that I was “skipping the importance of Adler’s analysis”. Clearly Adler is irrelevant to this particular discussion.

Adler is not off point. His view of the especial nature (consciousness) of humans is we are God's special creation and purpose.

dhw: Why do you think your own inexplicable reading of his mind is the only true one, when you have acknowledged that all the other interpretations of purpose and method I have offered fit in logically with the “real history” of life?

DAVID: It is your interpretation that is wrong: Above, I've fully explained our difference in thought. You create your own problem of interpretation. I am trying to show you why you should stop struggling. I'm at peace.

dhw: I have several interpretations, all of which by your own admission fit in with the “real history”. You have now explicitly acknowledged that one of your hypotheses (“fully in control”) may be wrong. That opens the way to the hypothesis of experimentation. Perhaps you will open your mind to other possibilities, e.g. perhaps humans were not the sole purpose and only arrived late on in his thinking: that would also explain all the earlier designs which have no conceivable link to humans. But I have no wish to disturb your peace. My purpose in starting this forum was to have an open discussion on all the possibilities – a purpose which I would like to feel is being served by all our posts, and to the fulfilment of which you in particular have contributed more than anybody in our 11 years of debate!

I cannot disagree in general as to the value of the website. As usual you are confused about evolution in that if God is running it, it will start simple, as in all evolved things, and have a complex, purposeful, desired point to reach. And to this point we have. Very special humans, per Adler's analysis.