David's theory of evolution Part Two (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, April 25, 2020, 13:59 (1671 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Previously you were “sure” he was watching with interest, in which case you can hardly discount the possibility that he started life and evolution because he wanted something he could watch with interest.

DAVID: Once again you are introducing human motives for God's actions. We cannot presume that in any manner. God does what He wants to do, and never announces His reasoning. We can only guess. (dhw’s bold)

And you have guessed the same as me, so the logical conclusion is that he wanted to create something that he could watch with interest! You also guess that he and we have similar thought patterns, emotions etc. so you have no reason for rejecting this possibility. All you need do is ignore your human teachers’ instructions.
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DAVID: […] I still think God ran the process of common descent.

dhw: But you believe in separate creation by direct design of the species! How can separate creation mean common descent?

DAVID: Come on. If God creates, then He created common descent! Or if you want to stick to your very strict definition, He created the appearance of common descent. Is there a difference?

Common descent means that every life form apart from the very first is descended from previous life forms, but you keep telling us your God designed the species directly and separately – the exact opposite of common descent! I don’t have a problem with your Creationism (though I don’t share it). My problem is with all the confusion, more of which follows.

DAVID: Dabbling comes from a doubt that God is absolutely prescient in seeing the future without error, as religions claim. And that admits I am conceding some weakness in God, which is a form of humanizing Him. It is certainly possible that an all-powerful, all- knowing God never has to dabble. […]

dhw: On 5th April you virtually turned your back on preprogramming and opted for dabbling:
DAVID: My summary today (Sunday, April 05, 2020, 21:10) summarizes that I now think God directly dabbles most advances/ new speciation and preprogramming may have a minor role.

dhw: Now apparently it is possible that he never has to dabble! In that case, the only alternative you can envisage is the preprogramming you regarded as minor just three weeks ago.

DAVID: My dabbling discussion above shows how unsettled I am about how God directs evolution. It is all guesswork. The possibilities are total programming, constant hands on, or occasional dabble if not constant hands on. One or all may be true. We cannot know for sure.

You are indeed unsettled and muddled, as exemplified by your theory of evolution, summarized below. You also reject the autonomous cellular intelligence theory, because that makes him “weak” or too “human”. See next.

dhw: […] I do not regard any of my alternatives as signs of “weakness”! A God who learns, or has new ideas as he goes along, or experiments, or designs things for his own enjoyment (as a painter enjoys his paintings was your image) is not “weak” in my eyes. […]

DAVID: Again total humanization.

It is not “total”. Nobody in his right mind would assume that a God who can create a universe is “totally” human. But the above list would come under the thought patterns, emotions etc. you believe he possibly/probably shares with us. And this belief is perfectly logical. Do you really think we humans created all these patterns and emotions before your God knew anything about them?

dhw: And so to the third option: instead of preprogramming (now back in favour) and dabbling (now out of favour), surprise, surprise, the theistic option you can’t imagine is a God who creates a mechanism whereby the cell communities of which all multicellular life forms consist are able to work out their own means of adapting to or exploiting ever changing environmental conditions etc. etc.

DAVID: Its your old loosey-goosey God. Your God is not my God. He has definite purposes and uses tight control. We only know of minor epigenetic adaptations.

Back to your old mantra: tight control (except for H. sapiens and viruses), definite purposes means one purpose (H. sapiens – mustn’t ask for purpose of designing H. sapiens), 3.X billion years of extinct bush to supply food for 3.X billion years of extinct non-human life forms (no idea why, but God watches with interest while waiting to directly design/dabble sapiens, or to switch on his sapiens programme?), muddle over whether it’s all preprogrammed or dabbled, and we mustn’t humanize because although God possibly/probably has human attributes, your teachers told you not to think about them.