Theodicy: solution lies in definition of God (Introduction)

by David Turell , Tuesday, September 14, 2021, 16:39 (1164 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: So please stop hiding behind Adler. For the sake of all these discussions about theodicy, and about the possible nature and purposes of a possible God, we have to assume that God exists! And yes indeed, among your guesses was your certainty that God enjoys creating and that he watches us with interest. Why do you think this excludes the possibility that his purpose for creating life was to give himself the joy of creating, and to provide himself with something interesting to watch?

DAVID: Your God wants to pleasure Himself. Lets assume He is self-centered. He may just do His work is the alternate view and that is my view. It all depends upon the God one envisions.

dhw: “He may just do his work” removes any purpose from his work, and you are the one who keeps hammering home that your God is purposeful! Creating humans – which you say is his one and only goal – is not a purpose in itself. He has to have a purpose for creating us – and the same applies to every other life form that ever existed, whether he designed them directly or created a mechanism to give them the freedom to design themselves. Of course one’s view of God depends on one’s view of God! And you have yourself told us he enjoys creating and he watches his creations with interest. So there’s one possible purpose. What’s wrong with it? You think a possible purpose is that your God wants us to admire his work, and maybe even to have a relationship with us. What’s wrong with that? Why must you use a negative term like “self-centred”, which denotes selfishness, lack of concern for others? When you helped your patients, and they expressed their gratitude and admiration for your brilliant work, did that turn you into a selfish brute? Why must you turn enjoyment of creation into “pleasure himself”, which sounds almost like masturbation? Anyway, let’s hear some more purposes that you imagine might have motivated your purposeful God.

What you have mentioned about my quotes concerning God's thoughts behind his actions are all my guesswork, which you always forget to mention. My view of God is that He is obviously extremely clear as what He wants and produces it. We are His final result as He evolved the universe, the Earth, started and evolved life to final produce us. His image in my mind is nothing like your proposed thoughts He has as you present His personality. I don't need to list all the humanizing ways about God you imagine for Him. We cannot know if God does what He does for any sense of pleasing Himself in what He creates. We are then at a level of how humans think about themselves, and that cannot translate to God who is not human in any way. This is why I stay at a level of guesswork when thinking of His motives. We are the endpoint of all God has done. We are/were His purpose. We are the only creation that can recognize His existence and what He did. What He wanted to do or needed to do is our broad difference in thinking about Him.