Natures wonders: ants and other insects farm (Introduction)

by David Turell , Thursday, May 21, 2020, 15:15 (1645 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: And please don’t tell us that “Any evolved process God set in motion is under his control, since he can let it continue or stop it as he wishes”, cannot possibly mean the process of evolution.

DAVID: All powerful or not is a human conception of Him. To each his own. As for the bold, why not?

dhw: So your conception of him is just as “human” as my various alternatives. As for the bold, it doesn’t make sense to say that your God might have set any evolved process in motion and allowed it to continue etc., and then claim that “any process” does not include the actual process of evolution! In any case, how do you know?

Your answer still does not explain its meaning to me. I view God as letting some evolving processes proceed as they do, until He doesn't like the endpoint, such as giant animals which are simply variations within species

DAVID: Our glaring difference is you never accept the degree of specialness I do, or its theological import. […]

dhw: Your usual escape route. I accept our specialness,

But not to the degree I do, from which I conclude God's major purpose as Adler does. It is not an escape route, but the most major difference between us.

dhw: I am an agnostic, not an atheist. You reject both explanations of the non-human bush of life on grounds of “humanizing” God because you believe that your God is all-knowing and all-powerful – though you admit above that this concept is just as human as any other.

We are bth human with human-based concepts.

DAVID: My God always speciate new advanced species, and the type of evolution He allows on its own is species variation, no more. What I constantly object to in the discussions is the way you always manage to stretch interpretations of my ideas to somehow fit your weird theories, and when I object, you claim I have retracted a position that you have invented.

dhw: I know what you believe your God does, and why he does it, and constantly remind you of the fact that you have “no idea” why he directly designed 3.X billion years’ worth of non-human life forms and econiches (let alone lifestyles and natural wonders) although his only purpose was to design H. sapiens and his food supply.

This is a perfect example of distortion. My 'no idea' refers only to the fact that I don't question His choice of evolving humans from bacteria. I cannot know His reasons. I accept the history.

DAVID: The bold is your constantly repeated mantra that will not admit God has a right to choose His method of creation, and when called on it you will agree He has the right to choose. And turn right around and ask me 'why' for the ten thousandth time.

dhw: This is not my “mantra”! It would be unbelievably stupid for anyone who accepts the possibility of God’s existence to claim that he did not have the right to choose. I don’t ask you why he has or doesn’t have the right to choose. I ask you why he would have chosen the version of evolution that you impose on him, as bolded above. And you have no idea why.

Why should I know His reasons, or guess at them? The bold is weird. Is there another version of evolution than the one history gives us? It is the one I use.

DAVID: Will you every recognize we envision two very different Gods? Your so-called theism is God-lite. And of course, I am trapped in using some humanizing terms because we don't have any others to employ. You complain about it, but you know that full well.

dhw: There is no such thing as “God-lite”. If God exists, he has just as much right, for instance, to create a mechanism that allows evolution to take its own course (but “stop it if he wishes”) as to hands-on dabble every species. I don’t complain about you using “humanizing” terms. I complain that you dismiss theories as “humanizing” although your own is no more and no less “humanizing” than those I offer, and your theory defies human logic whereas you admit that my alternatives don’t.

Your God likes to watch humans as spectacles, remember? One memorable example of God-lite.