Back to theodicy and David's theories (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by dhw, Tuesday, March 16, 2021, 12:01 (1346 days ago) @ David Turell

David’s Theory of evolution and alternatives

dhw: And still you go on editing out what I have bolded! It is not evolution that I am challenging but your insistence that every single life form in the history of life was part of your God’s one and only goal to design humans, although 99% of them had no connection with humans.

DAVID: Same old illogical complaint. My position: God chose to evolve humans from bacteria. Pure history, and must involve 99% of all extinct species as evolution is a continuous process.

Now your God wanted only to design humans and their food supply, but he had to design every other extinct life form, 99% of which had no connection with humans, because he designed every one of the other 99% of non-human branches in a continuous process from bacteria. I’m sorry, but the logic of this theory (which you later call your “totally logical position”) is getting more and more twisted.

dhw: But supposing your God wanted a free-for-all? Then he would invent a mechanism that would enable organisms to do their own designing. And wouldn’t that explain the vast diversity of life forms that have come and gone? (See below.)

DAVID: My God prefers tight control of all advances. Yours is namby-pamby. Design require controls.

You are of course free to tell us what you think your God prefers, but you have no more insight into his mind than anyone else. Calling my theoretical God namby-pamby just because I propose that he WANTED a free-for-all is not the most illuminating of reasons for rejecting a theory which logically explains the vast variety of life, not to mention the existence of bad viruses and bacteria, deadly diseases, and “evil”, which all constitute the great problem of theodicy.

DAVID: God designs in anticipation of needs.

dhw: And you dismiss the theory that organisms change IN RESPONSE to existing conditions, as opposed to anticipation of them. And yet we see examples every day of organisms RESPONDING and adapting to new needs, so why should the process have been reversed for speciation?

DAVID: The adaptations we see are small changes within species. My view: only God speciates.

Nobody knows what caused speciation, but if organisms have the autonomous ability to make small changes, it is not illogical to propose that in earlier times (and possibly later - Planet Earth is still young) the same ability enabled them to make large changes.

The rest of this part of the post leads to you repeating the non sequitur of what you call the “totally logical position” you offered at the start: that in order to specially design H. sapiens, your God had to specially design the brontosaurus plus the rest of the 99% per cent of extinct, non-human life forms, because all life forms are descended from bacteria.

God’s purpose for creating life

DAVID: That God choses to create is all we know. WE can assume He 'likes' doing it, because if He hated it, creation would stop. He doesn't need to do it for self-satisfaction.

dhw: You said it was obvious that he likes creating, and you agree that he possibly (probably) has thought patterns similar to ours. You don’t need to change the vocabulary. If he likes doing it, why is it not even feasible that he would do it because he likes doing it?

DAVID: More humanizing. God is the creator and is not doing it for self-enjoyment or aggrandizement.

Why do you keep changing the vocabulary? You are sure that he “likes” creating. So why are you so sure that he does not create because he “likes” creating?

Theodicy

dhw: Bearing in mind the terrible diseases that are caused by some of the errors, I’m asking why you think he wanted to correct them.

DAVID: He didn't want the diseases to happen, so He added corrections where He could.

dhw: You’re coming closer to giving me an answer, so I’ll just try to push you one step further. Why do you think he did not want the diseases to happen?

DAVID: Why invent forms that get sick? Not on purpose.

And yet he invented bad bugs and viruses that cause sickness. But I suspect that you prefer not to answer my question because it might mean that he has some thought patterns and emotions similar to ours – e.g. he doesn’t like seeing people and animals suffering through the errors in his system. Just a thought, but it might explain why you are hoping so desperately that one day someone might discover a “good” reason why he directly designed “bad” bacteria and viruses.

QUOTES (from “Bacterial intelligence”): "Some of the best-known human pathogens -- from the plague bacterium Yersinia pestis to the diarrhea pathogen Salmonella -- use a tiny hypodermic needle to inject disease-causing proteins into their host's cells, thereby manipulating them.
“The new results from Marburg show how protein exchange allows to respond flexibly to external circumstances -- an immense advantage, not only for bacteria."

DAVID: Shapiro's research validated again. I still approach this as a God-given design.

Have I understood this correctly? Are you saying you believe that the plague and the diarrhea bacteria were specially designed by the same God who tried to correct the disease-causing errors in his design system? Don’t you find this a bit odd?