Return to David's theory of evolution PARTS 1 & 2 (Evolution)

by dhw, Saturday, March 26, 2022, 12:17 (971 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: […] Don’t you think a theory that makes sense to you might have a better chance of being true than a theory that doesn’t make sense to you?

DAVID: It makes total sense to me. The explanation is God chose to evolve us. How evolution was conducted, as seen in history, makes perfect sense with my views of God's personality.

dhw: That is not an explanation of your theory, which is that God’s only purpose was to design us and our foods, and so he designed countless life forms and foods that had no connection with us. You tell me that only God can explain it, so why do you keep leaving out the bits you can’t explain?

DAVID: I have explained 'countless life forms and foods'. Ecosystems are piled upon ecosystems and relate to each other. It all comes down to life requires constant energy intake. You admit this and then constantly ignore it with your constant illogical complaint.

There is no dispute over the obvious fact that all life forms require energy. You know perfectly well that the dispute is over the theory bolded above which makes no sense even to you: “God makes sense only to Himself. We may not understand His reasons.”

DAVID: Can't we please allow me to make perfect sense to me? […]

dhw: How can I possibly accept that your theory makes perfect sense to you when you tell me that only God can make sense of it?

DAVID: Accepting the history of reality as God's work explains it all. Why are we here? How do you explain it?

As an agnostic, I accept the possibility that there is a God who is responsible for the history of reality. It is your inexplicable version of the history of reality that I question, as above. As for the very different question of why are we here, you have suggested it’s because God wants us to admire his work and have a relationship with him, and you have volunteered the fact that you think God enjoys creating and is interested in his creations. All perfectly feasible and very human, but offering no logical explanation for the theory bolded above.

DAVID: An article on God's warring animals:
https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/deer-have-antlers-walruses-have-tusks-her...

DAVID: in evolution competition is built in. So there has to be evolutionary 'war'.

dhw: You keep telling me about what exists – evolutionary war. And I keep asking you why you think your God chose to create a system of warlike competition when we know that peaceful cooperation is perfectly possible, as exemplified by all forms of symbiosis. […]

DAVID: Symbiosis involves an intimate bonded relationship. How could that possibly work for all of life?

It is an example of peaceful cooperation. Why shouldn’t it work for all of life?

DAVID: […] I frankly think it was the only choice available. Why do I have to explain to you every aspect of God's reasoning behind God's works? We take off into wooly guesses.

You insist on imposing limits on your all-powerful God’s abilities. You have him deliberately designing a system of “dog eat dog” (see below), including every ingenious method of killing (e.g. your boa-constrictor – thank you for this example of your kind God’s ingenuity). I do not ask you to explain every aspect of God’s reasoning behind his works. I ask you to explain YOUR reasoning behind YOUR INTERPRETATION of God’s works, and you can’t.

BLOOD BRAIN BARRIER CONTROLS

DAVID: […]. I never shut out your weird view of God, as I work to show you how wrong you are.

dhw: I know pandemics are part of the war, and I keep asking you why your God chose war over peace. Why does this question denote a weird view of God?

DAVID: It's what we have.

I know. And I keep asking you why you think your kind God would DELIBERATELY have designed such a system. And I have suggested that instead of him deliberately designing deadly viruses and the boa-constrictor's rib cage and carnivorous plants, he created a free-for-all in which all life forms did their own designing, thereby creating their own wars. Why is this weird?

DAVID: God's 'war' began at the beginning of life:
https://phys.org/news/2022-03-bacteria-self-vaccinate-viral-invaders.html

DAVID: I assume viruses and bacteria were both at the start of life, and God designed bacteria with the described defenses. The issue of dog eat dog is the only way our form of life can survive. I believe God gave us the best system He could devise and most likely the only workable system. God would know that. dhw's god probably would not.

I am not disputing that the war began at the start of life. I don’t know why dog eat dog should be the only workable system your all-powerful God could devise. My view of an all-powerful God is that if he had wanted to create a Garden of Eden, he could have done, and as I agree completely with your view that he enjoys creating and is interested in what he creates, I suggest that he wanted something a bit more interesting than a Garden of Eden, and this would have been provided by giving his creations (intelligent cells) the ability to do their own designing – with humans the most interesting of all the results.