David's theory of evolution (Evolution)

by David Turell , Wednesday, October 30, 2019, 14:26 (1849 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID (under “early mammals”): Your theories about God are all reasonable if you assume God didn't really know what He was doing or what purposes He had in mind when He created the universe.

dhw: I gave you alternatives. The first was that he knew exactly what he was doing, and enjoyed experimenting with different life forms, i.e. if he exists, he created the universe and life for his own enjoyment, much as a painter enjoys his own paintings (your very own image). What is wrong with that as a purpose? “Didn’t know what he was doing” is a negative view of my suggestion that if his purpose really was to create a creature that could think like himself, he had to experiment in order to get it. Why is this such anathema to you?

DAVID: How do you definitely know God thinks like we do?

dhw: I don’t even “definitely know” that God exists, let alone how he thinks – and nor do you! That is why I offer alternative explanations, whereas you stick rigidly to the only one that requires the abandonment of human logic.

dhw: You did not explain why the above alternatives were anathema to you.

They are humanized versions of how God might think or express purposes, as I implied.

DAVID: History shows God's work, not His reasons, but I recognize you love to guess.

dhw: So do you. Just a reminder: Your guess is that your God’s only purpose was to design H.sapiens, but he decided not to do so for 3.X billion years and therefore had to design every earlier, non-human life form, lifestyle and natural wonder in order to cover the time he had decided to take, but this is logical so long as we do not apply human logic to the history.

DAVID: Your usual reply. You recognize our specialness by giving it lip service, and then forget how different we really are. Evolution as a natural event does not explain our arrival. We were designed.

dhw: Of course I don’t forget it. Nor do I forget the billions of other life forms, lifestyles and natural wonders, every one of which you tell us had to be specially designed by your God. And I don’t forget that the reason why you think he had to specially design them all was that he decided not to fulfil his one and only purpose for 3.X billion years etc., and you have no idea why, but it’s logical so long as we do not apply human logic to the history. I seem to have pointed that out before.

DAVID: You have distorted my thinking as usual.

dhw: If you think the above is a distortion of your thinking, then please tell us precisely which points you disown, and I will produce the relevant quote in your very own words.

You know full well the bush of life is required to maintain all of life's energy sources, and if God decided to evolve man from bacteria, we know the exact time it took. You continually debate God's choice of method, which implies you wonder why He waited and didn't just do direct creation as in Genesis. I don't do that. i just look at the history of his works. Fully logical, while you conjure up woolly possibilities, while you cannot possibly know how He thinks