Back to David's theory of evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Friday, September 04, 2020, 09:10 (1539 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Please notice I use Him to strongly but suggestively prove God's purpose.

dhw: I have noticed that you use Adler to support your theory concerning God’s purpose, but you cannot use him to support your theory concerning God’s method of achieving that purpose, which is the theory which forces you to abandon human logic.

DAVID: It only ignores your illogical conclusions.

You cannot explain why your all-powerful God, whose only aim was to directly design H. sapiens plus food supply, first directly designed millions of now extinct non-human life forms and food supplies before starting to design the only thing he wanted to design. I have not drawn any conclusions, but have offered alternative theistic explanations of life’s history, all of which you have deemed to be logical.

dhw: Calling my objections “illogical” does not make them illogical. We both accept common descent. If you believe he designed every species etc., that belief can indeed be made to fit in with common descent if he deliberately transformed one species into another. What is illogical is that he would have directly designed/transformed every species etc. in life's history if the only species he wanted to design was H. sapiens. You simply refuse to understand that it is the COMBINATION of your premises that is illogical.

DAVID: You've repeated your same illogical objections, implying God should have used direct creation of humans. History tells us we evolved. Since I have God in charge of creating reality and its history, my belief is logical.

I am not saying what God should have done! History tells us we evolved, as did millions of other life forms, ecosystems etc. History does not tell us that your God directly designed every life form plus food supply, that he only wanted to directly design one particular life form plus food supply, and so he directly designed all the other life forms plus food supply as “part of the goal of evolving humans”! Once more: this discussion continues simply because you focus on one of your premises at a time, whereas it is the COMBINATION of your premises that is illogical.

dhw: …why do you think the slingshot spider is “part of the goal of evolving humans”? Do you think our species and our food supply would die out if this one particular variety of spider went extinct? Why do you think that every extinct species and every current species and variation within species had to be specially designed in order that God could specially design H. sapiens?

DAVID: Explained over and over: every ecosystem is important to the functioning of the entire bush of life.

That is no answer! How can 3.X thousand million years’ worth of long gone life forms and food supplies be important to the functioning of our current life forms and food supplies? And please tell me if you think our species and food supply depend on the existence of the specially designed slingshot spider.

dhw: All our theories are human guesswork, and if we shouldn’t bother to ask why God wanted to produce H. sapiens, why did you bother to propose a theory that his only purpose was to produce H. sapiens?

DAVID: I felt strong enough to write a book about my developed faith and actually convince some folks. You started this website! We are equals.

dhw: You have written two (excellent) books to explain your belief in God’s existence. That does not explain your insistence on guessing that your purposeful God’s only purpose for creating the universe and life was H. sapiens, while also insisting that we should not bother to guess his purpose in creating H. sapiens.

DAVID: We have bothered multiple times. Since it is all guesswork it doesn't produce anything substantive.

Hence my agnosticism. But as you say, we are both equals, because we are both so fascinated by the mysteries that in company with millions of other humans down through the ages, we try to make sense of life and the universe. That is why I started this website, you wrote your books, and both of us have engaged in these discussions for over twelve years. It’s a bit late in the day to say we shouldn’t bother!