Theodicy (Introduction)

by David Turell , Sunday, October 25, 2020, 18:47 (1488 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: I don't contradict myself. Note my bold of your usual trope about God's thinking. Using the same pattern of thought NEVER tells us His reasoning for his purposes. You can't disagree!!!

dhw: Nobody knows his patterns of thought, but since you agree that he probably has thought patterns similar to ours, it is absurd (a) to dismiss a theory on the grounds that it entails thought patterns similar to ours, and (b) to say you are sure that God is interested in his inventions, but he could not have invented them in order to give himself something to be interested in.

Answered below:

[…]
DAVID: God's being interested is not the issue. His personality is creation for the sake of achieving His purposes. Creating something for His own interest is very secondary. It is humanizing Him again. God does not need interests!!!

dhw: Yet again: What plural “purposes”? As above, you have named only one, which contradicts the whole history of evolution, because you agree that there is no connection between such organisms as the brontosaurus and humans, and “extinct life plays no role in current life”!

Again quoting out of context and inferring meanings that do not exist. I am discussing events that are only time separated but are fully connected through common descent and similar DNA genes.

dhw: How do you know that your God, who you are sure watches us with interest, does not WANT something he can watch with interest – a characteristic which could be exactly the same as ours, since we also like to create things we can watch with interest? And let’s not forget that this theory also solves the vexed problem of theodicy, which is the subject of this thread and for which you offered have no explanation.

I have offered many thoughts which have been left behind as you have produced distortions of my statements out of context. We have agreed God wanted to make life interesting, not a Garden of Eden, again for us, not Him. Just as we have discovered why certain body parts are necessary, as in the purposes of the appendix, we have yet to fully understand why nasty bugs exist. My view, previously expressed and still is God had reasons we still have not discovered. Cancer is generally due to genetic molecular mistakes, for which God has provided, recognizing the issue, very effective but not perfect editing.