Theodicy (Introduction)

by David Turell , Tuesday, December 08, 2020, 22:16 (1444 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: My God is too purposeful to become your humanizing form. God controls call.

dhw: So he’s a non-human control freak. And you still haven’t offered a solution to the problem of “theodicy”, and you still haven’t offered a single objection to the logic of my proposal, and you still can’t understand that a God who creates things in order to give himself something interesting to watch is a purposeful God.

Once again you describe a humanized God with a self-interest desire for entertainment

dhw: So how do you know he is wholly purposeful, and how do you know he is without self-interest? Of course you don’t, so you object to the logic of my proposals because we can’t know if they’re true or not. We might as well give up proposing and discussing all our subjects if your only answer to any theory is that “we know nothing for sure”. So why do you bother to propose theories of your own?

We can continue to disagree about our personal images of who God is. It is obvious we will never agree because you and I imagine Him totally differently. It is true we know nothing for sure. You and I both have a perfect right to propose our person theories and continue to disagree. I haven't seen a neutral ground on this subject as yet. And I doubt one can be found.

DAVID: He is solely in the business of creation.

dhw: That makes no sense. If he is highly purposeful, he must have a purpose for creating whatever he creates.

DAVID: What wrong with creation for the sake of creation? I am sure we were the major purpose.

dhw: And you are sure he watches us with interest, and you are sure "He likes what He creates, and that He is satisfied in His results as the inventor”. So as I suggested yesterday, maybe he created it because he wanted to create something he could be interested in, which he would like and would give him satisfaction.

There we are together. I'm sure He is satisfied with his creations, but not to create self-satisfaction. He doesn't need that. And I am not sure He did it for interesting spectacles, your proposal. He doesn't create for His own personal needs.

dhw: ...you’ve made a very logical and convincing case, which comes astonishingly close to my own proposal. I don’t know why you are so coy about it.

DAVID: I'm not coy. I've told you constantly why you are wrong about Him.

dhw: Yes you have: I am apparently wrong because you say I am wrong, because your own theory (no self-interest) is right although “we know nothing for sure”, apart from what you ARE sure about, which actually supports my theory!

I've described our obvious continuous differences above. There is no right or wrong. Our views of god are gulfs apart, and won't change.