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

by dhw, Sunday, April 03, 2022, 11:39 (963 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: God creates. We can know nothing more about Him. I see Him as directly purposeful with no emotional overlays concerning Himself.

dhw: We’re off again. We can’t even “know” if he exists. Your guess that his purpose has “no emotional overlays concerning Himself” has no more authority or evidence than the guess that his purpose does have such overlays. The fact of the matter is that you have guessed to the point of being certain that he enjoys creating (or he wouldn’t do it) and is interested in his creations. You therefore cannot claim that he definitely doesn’t feel enjoyment or interest, and so it would be perfectly logical for you to accept the possibility that satisfying these feelings may constitute his purpose.

DAVID: Of course I can accept that and have in the past, when I have told you: if I accept your human form of God. Anything about God is possible, when possible personalities are considered.

This is a major breakthrough. You have previously rejected it BECAUSE you claim that it “humanizes” God, though this contradicts your belief that God probably has thought patterns and emotions similar to ours. I do not ask you to believe any of my alternative theories. There are two things I ask you to accept: 1) that your own theory is illogical – you have repeatedly agreed that you can’t explain it, and then in the next breath have claimed that it is logical; 2) that my logical alternatives (enjoyment and interest, free-for-all, experimentation, ongoing learning) are all possible. This you have now done. Thank you.

God's choice of war over peace

dhw: If your all-powerful God exists, then it was his choice to create a world in which survival depends on war. […] You keep telling us that despite his omnipotence he had to do it that way, because you can’t imagine him creating a Garden of Eden. I can, and I’d like to know why he didn’t. […]

DAVID: You are attacking God's choice of method as usual.

I am NOT attacking it! Assuming God exists, it is painfully clear that his choice was war over peace, and so I am asking why he might have made that choice. Why do think it is an attack if I suggest that freedom is more interesting than automaticity, and interest is more enjoyable than boredom?

DAVID: Free moving and free will organisms can do as they wish, and you wish God programmed them to be passive. Is that your personal preference? That is obviously what God did not do. We are back to your unanswerable questions.

You have completely missed the point. I don’t have a wish or a personal preference, and it is obvious that your God did NOT choose peace. If, as I suppose, you are interested in discussing the nature, purpose and method of your God – assuming he exists – then we can hardly avoid discussing his choices and reasons, even if we can never know the objective truth (unless he tells us).

Ecosystem importance

DAVID: The reason I presented this article is dhw's attitude about the need for food energy when he does not see to recognize how vital each system is for life to exist.

dhw: EVERY ORGANISM NEEDS FOOD! Each ecosystem is vital for the particular life forms that depend on it. That does not mean that every extinct ecosystem was “part of the goal of evolving [= designing] humans” and their food! Please stop dodging the illogicality of your theory of evolution by pretending I don’t know that life needs energy.

DAVID: What you never accept is the delicacy of the design of those vital systems, or their interrelation, as related to the current massive human population needs for food. The same needs were present in the past and the now and explains in large part the need for evolutionary bushiness all along. All anticipated in God's plans

I am not questioning the delicacy of those vital systems both past and present! But the current massive human population has only been around for about a minute in geological terms. And so what I question is your assumption that every past ecosystem for every past form of life was designed in “preparation”, as “part of the goal of evolving [= designing] humans” and our food, although the vast majority of those past life forms and econiches did NOT lead to humans and our food.

DAVID: What did Shapiro work with for his theory? Bacteria!!!

dhw: […] His theory concerns all cells, not just bacteria, and I have not inflated or misused it. Your attempt to belittle it by sniping at his own particular field of expertise does not alter the theory itself, which is precisely what I presented [...]

DAVID: And I believe it fully, but I recognize its limits. You jump in hook line and sinker to try and salvage your hope that cells think for themselves, when all they are doing is following intelligent onboard instructions.

It is not a “hope”, and I recognize that it is a theory not a fact. You do not “recognize” its limits (Shapiro claims that intelligent cells design evolutionary novelties) – you simply disagree, because you believe cells are not intelligent and only follow your God’s instructions. Finally, will you please not tell me that I have inflated and misused his theory when I have reproduced it word for word.