A possible God's possible purpose and nature (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by dhw, Wednesday, June 16, 2021, 11:45 (1254 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Another goal was food supply. The human goal was an endpoint of an evolutionary process which was created from one stage to the next, each stage supported by ecosystems of food supply.

dhw: I have always included food supply. Please explain why your God could not have specially designed humans and their food supply without first designing the brontosaurus and its food supply, plus the 99% of other organisms and their food supplies that had no connection with humans.

DAVID: I have to remind you, an evolutionary process builds new stages from the old and in our case this evolution adds complexity at each stage. Brontos are part of a stage.

Dodge, dodge, dodge. I have to remind you that if you believe in common descent, ALL life forms were once new “stages” built from the old, but 99% of the stages had no connection with humans. You have said yourself that brontos had no direct connection to humans. They were a “stage” on a different branch of the bush.

DAVID: I won't deny my vision of a very purposeful God who knows exactly what He is doing on the way to His goals.

dhw: So you agree that your version is a control freak. Meanwhile, what are the other goals apart from humans and their food supply? Why do you believe that a God whose goal is to create a free-for-all is not purposeful and does not know what he is doing on the way to fulfilling his goal of a free-for-all?

DAVID: Free-for-alls by definition have no specific goal in sight. You are not logical.

You’re fond of the phrase “slicing and dicing”, and that is precisely what you are doing. The subject is God’s goal. His goal would be the joy/excitement/pleasure of watching what the free-for-all will lead to. You accidentally hit on it when you drew the analogy with my own creative processes.

dhw: I know your beliefs are fixed. I am merely pointing out that if he was willing to give up control of our behaviour, it should not be inconceivable that he was also willing to give up control of evolution. At least that would offer you an explanation for all the different, higgledy-piggledy, non-human varieties of life forms that came and went, and it would relieve you of the problem of why your God with his good intentions deliberately designed all the murderous bacteria and viruses that cause so much suffering.

DAVID: It doesn't compare. Control over forms advancing to human beings is not the same as organisms controlling their everyday activity. Again, no logic.

That is not the comparison I am drawing! You chicken out of telling us what you think is your God’s purpose in creating us with our free will. So here’s one possibility: he’s done it because he’s interested in seeing what we do with our free will. Why would he give cell communities the freedom to create their own designs? One possibility: he’s done it because he’s interested in seeing what they do with their freedom to create their own designs. That is the comparison. Furthermore, since you have no doubt that your God is interested in his creations, there is no logical reason why you should reject the idea that he created them because he wanted something that would interest him. The theory at least offers solutions to the two bolded problems above, which you are so desperate to ignore.