Far out cosmology: our galaxy is huge (Introduction)

by dhw, Tuesday, November 17, 2020, 12:09 (1256 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: "Once again, as with the evolution of life, my mind boggles at the thought that your God had to produce these vast numbers of stars/species in order to produce one planet/species. And how many millions of these stars and life forms disappeared before your God was able to directly design the only life form (plus food supply) he wanted to design?

DAVID: Are you assuming there were living species before humans?

I have no idea. I am merely questioning your assumption that your God’s purpose in designing all these billions of stars and all these millions of life forms was to design H. sapiens.

dhw: I can’t help wondering why this was the “only way” an all-powerful God could possibly create a single species. What is described here is, of course, history. But I can well understand why, given the fact that our galaxy is thought to be just one of between 100 and 200 thousand million galaxies, some folk reckon that chance is just as likely an explanation of life as a single, designing, sourceless mind that can fiddle with billions of stars as well as provide single cells with programmes for the whole of life's evolution. Can’t you?

DAVID: No, logic tells me the extraordinary basis of reality in the complexity of quantum mechanics, and the exquisite engineering of cellular biology requires just such a mind as the one you doubt.

Quantum mechanics remains a mystery, and I accept the logic of the design argument. How does that explain the need for your God to create between 100 and 200 thousand million galaxies, and millions of life forms with no connection to humans, in order to produce a single species and its food supply?

dhw: […] your only answer is that it must have been the only way your God could do it.

DAVID: Again you have reverted to faulting God's methods. Analysis through research of what He created will offer explanations and we are given the brains by Him to find them.

There are two levels here: 1) I regard the sheer enormity and impersonality of the ever changing universe as a major hindrance to belief in a sourceless mind that created and “controls” it. This is a counter to the logic of the design theory. Hence my agnosticism. 2) If God exists, I do not fault his methods. I question the accuracy of your interpretation of his purpose and his methods. You know this because I have repeated it a hundred times.

DAVID (under “far out cosmology”: We know our galaxy seems very unique. These new findings add to the mystery of its formation. but the result is obvious, the Earth is very protected.

Microcosm/macrocosm. You don’t know why your God designed bad bugs, and you don’t know why he designed the forces that threaten our planet. But you believe that “analysis…will offer explanations.” This puts you very much on a par with Dawkins: “If there is something that appears to lie beyond the natural world…..we hope eventually to understand it and embrace it within the natural.” Instead of predicting/hoping that your totally opposite beliefs will one day be confirmed, perhaps both of you should face the fact that neither of you has one jot of scientific support for them.