Back to David's theory of evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Friday, July 03, 2020, 13:44 (1602 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Why do you regard a “perfect” God, who deliberately designs the imperfect system we know, as being more “human” and less purposeful than a “perfect” God who is unable to design a system without imperfections?

DAVID: You refuse to accept the point that a high-speed living biological system cannot be perfect. Are you campaigning for a 'perfect' God that can create it? Your definition of a perfect God doesn't exist.

dhw: I have proposed that if he exists, your God deliberately designed a system with errors, because endings are as integral to life as beginnings. Can you imagine a planet full of organisms that never die but go on producing more and more and more….? The idea is absurd. Now please answer my bolded question.

DAVID: I've told you, it doesn't bother me that no God can make a perfect biological living system. The 'errors' are accidents not planned. But we both know death is built into life. Death has nothing to do with this argument. Death is planned, not an accident, and you understand that I would think. Why did you drag it in?

I’d have thought that as a doctor you might have realized that most deaths are the result of a malfunctioning biological system. So the errors that cause death are planned, but the errors that make us ill or prevent us from being cured are accidental? Once you’ve explained that, perhaps you would tell us why you think a God who deliberately designs the imperfect system we know is more “human” and less purposeful than a God who is unable to design a system without imperfections.

DAVID: The self-correcting and safeguard systems in living organisms shows God knew it wouldn't work perfectly. I've produced a multitude of articles about safeguards showing required design, stating the safeguards must have been present when the advanced state appeared. Remember?

dhw: And I remember proposing that the “safeguards” could just as well be the responses of autonomous organisms finding their own ways of solving the problems you believe God set them, whether deliberately or otherwise. I’m surprised you don’t regard God “trying to stop errors” as degradingly humanizing him. At least in my alternative proposal he does exactly what he wants to do.

DAVID: That is your view of your humanized God, not mine.

Why is a God who does exactly what he wants to do more “humanized” than a God who tries to make up for errors in the system he invented?

DAVID (under “immune complexity”): Our immune system should not attack us, but it does under some circumstances which are mistakes by the control systems. The mistakes are that the protections put in place do not work.

So not only did your God design a system with mistakes, but some of the safeguards he put in place don’t work either. But this doesn’t “humanize” him!

dhw: Of course we can’t know his reasons, but how do you know his logic is the same as
ours if you can’t understand why he did what he did?

DAVID: I've explained what I think His reasoning is about complexification, as a prime example of how I attempt to understand why and what He has done. It implies His logical thought, similar to ours.

dhw: The context is your theory of evolution, which is that your all-powerful God (except when he’s not all-powerful) had only one purpose – to design H. sapiens – but chose to design millions of now extinct non-human life forms before designing our ancestors before designing us, and you don’t know why. Once again, please stop dodging.

DAVID: I don't dodge while you complain about a God you do not fully understand in the way I do. I'll still follow Adler's logic as you follow Talbott.

Adler’s logic, so you have told us, does not extend so far as to cover your theory bolded above. I am amazed at your claim that you fully understand God, and if you do not dodge, then please at last explain the logic behind the bolded theory above.