Natural Wonders & Evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Thursday, September 12, 2019, 10:03 (1897 days ago) @ David Turell

I’m combining this thread with “Unanswered Questions” as the two are now overlapping.

dhw: Innovation is something new, whereas alteration means changing something that already exists. But sometimes it is difficult to draw a borderline between the two. […]

DAVID: I don't understand your definitions. An alteration is an innovation of small degree. […] Design requires complex mental input, as in God did it.

Neat! So the borderline between adaptation and innovation is not clear if all forms of change are innovations of some kind. Thank you. And yes, design requires complex mental input, as in the theory that intelligent cells/cell communities did it (and God may have designed their intelligence).

DAVID: Again I'm with Adler and our specialness. You won't accept that point, which is major to me.

dhw: I keep accepting our specialness! But that does not mean your God set out with the one and only purpose of designing us, had decided not to do so for 3.X billion years, and therefore had to cover the time by specially designing the rest of the evolutionary bush…

DAVID: No you don't. The degree of specialness you agree to is not what Adler proposes in his book. He shows that we are so special God created us and has to exist.

Yes, yes, and you have devoted post after post after post to demonstrating that every life form, lifestyle and natural wonder is so special that God must have created them all and has to exist.

DAVID: Of course God wanted the bush. It was an absolute requirement to cover the time the whole process took. But I won't leave the concept that we are so special we were His goal. […]

dhw: […] and you have no idea why he chose this method of fulfilling his one and only purpose!

DAVID: Of course I have no idea. Why should I? I accept what God does what God does for His own reasons! You constantly want to analyze Him in as if you can in human terms.

You can’t know his reasons, but you insist that his reason for specially designing the evolutionary bush was to keep life going until he specially designed the only thing he wanted to design - you and me! This is your “analysis” written in “human terms” – God wanted/desired/knew/is purposeful/decided…How can you or anyone else attempt to describe God’s thought processes other than “in human terms”?

dhw: You wrote: “Haven’t you realized by now, I have no idea why God chose to evolve humans over time?” [..] If you can’t see any logic behind this fixed belief of yours, maybe it’s just possible that the whole bush, including humans, was designed (or was given the means to design itself) to satisfy his wants/desires, as you suggested earlier on this thread!

DAVID: I guessed because you asked me to and I politely did so. I have no idea because I don't question His motives, as you do in a humanizing way.

You don’t question your INTERPRETATION of his motives, because you have a fixed belief – in human terms – that the only thing he wanted to design (his final purpose) was us. That is no less human than the proposal that he wanted to design a vast variety of life forms or an autonomous mechanism that would design a vast variety of life forms.

DAVID: There were at least six mass extinctions according to my recent entry. God may well have used them to control the course of evolution. I view Him as totally in charge.

dhw: “Totally in charge” would have to mean he engineered every single environmental change that triggered every single new life form.

DAVID: Since He created the universe and the Earth and evolved them, He may well have controlled all the environmental changes.

If he didn’t control them, he was not “totally in charge”, in which case he was perfectly capable of giving up control, as he did – according to you – by allowing free will.

DAVID: Free will is not the same level as God running evolution.

dhw: I keep giving free will only as an example of your God giving up control.

DAVID: My dog runs to the barn using his free will. God is not in control at that level. My walking to the barn by free will means God is not involved, but God is still fully in control of evolution! What God gave up is very minor, not the major point you are trying to make about degree of control of the universe, the Earth, and evolution.

So God does not control our behaviour, but he has to control the behaviour of microorganisms like bacteria! He “may well have controlled all the environmental changes” leaves open the option that he may well not have done so, and that is major! On a universal level, does he preprogramme or dabble every single change in every single solar system, and every single asteroid that crashes into some star billions of miles away or even into our own planet? If not, he has chosen not to be “totally in charge”. And finally, how do you know he has chosen to be totally in charge of evolution, as opposed to his choosing to give evolution free rein? Why is choosing to be in charge less “humanizing” than choosing not to be in charge?