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

by dhw, Wednesday, May 04, 2022, 08:45 (695 days ago) @ David Turell

Chixculub

DAVID: Your problem is you want exact info about God's reasoning. NOT AVAILABLE! Dinosaurs were complex new forms when they arrived. The next step to mammals was waiting in the wings. They were the next giant step. I see progression, not your constant confusion about God. Why can't you simply accept God does as what God wants to do, and often the explanation at our level of thought is not clear.

The usual dodge. I do not want information about God’s reasoning, but about yours. I agree that dinosaurs were complex, that mammals took over, and our intellectual ability represents vast progress compared to dinosaurs. I have no idea why you consider progression to be an alternative to “confusion about God”, and I have no doubt that if he exists, God would have done what he wanted to do. And if all he wanted to do was design us and our food, and if he was perfectly capable of designing species directly, I don’t understand why he would not have done so. Your uncertainty over whether the extinction of dinosaurs was deliberate or an accident, and the fact that their extinction led to evolution going off in a “totally new direction” (hardly indicative of a God “in total control”, who knows from the start exactly what he wants and how to get it) both suggest that it is your theory which involves “confusion about God”. And your inability to make sense of it (“God makes sense only to Himself”) seems to me to confirm that the confusion is entirely yours.

DAVID (under “gaps by design”): What human can know what another human thinks. Solipsism. You try to enter my brain and tell me I don't make sense to myself. Ridiculous thinking! If you could let yourself think about God and His personage as I do, you would understand. But your brain is frozen in doubt and confusion. Any ID'er thinks as I do. So did Adler.

You have said over and over again that ID and Adler do not promulgate the theory that your God’s only purpose was to create humans plus food and therefore he designed countless species and econiches that did not lead to humans plus food. As for solipsism, when you make direct statements about your beliefs, I take them to be representative of your true thoughts. You wrote: “What I cannot explain is why God chose evolution over direct creation. Why can’t you accept that explanation?” And “God makes sense only to Himself”. If you can’t explain a theory, and you think that only God can, I take it to mean that it doesn’t make sense to you.

dhw: […] you agree that your God makes adjustments as he goes along, even to the extent of going in “totally new directions”. This could hardly be a clearer endorsement of the theory that he was experimenting, or that he kept getting new ideas as he went along.
DAVID: Back to your treasured human form of God who is wandering along. Any God wo can create our universe, knows exactly what He is doing.

dhw: You have not explained his adjustments and his total change of direction.

DAVID: I am not an authority on God's thinking/reasoning, much as you wish me to be.

No, you are not. And that is why you should not kid yourself that your illogical, anthropocentric interpretation of God’s purpose and method is a fact, and any other interpretation is to be dismissed, no matter how logical it might be.

dhw: On the other hand, if he knows what he is doing, the higgledy-piggledy bush of life forms and econiches unrelated to humans can be explained by his deliberately creating a free-for-all, along with the option to dabble if he felt like it. You have agreed that all my theories provide logical theistic explanations for the history of life as we know it. The only theory you cannot make sense of is your own.

DAVID: See above. Your brain is a brick wall of confusion. Read 'How to Think About God'. I can mail you my copy, as they are out of print and mine is used one.

Thank you for the generous offer, but with a working day that generally runs from 6am till 11pm (with plenty of gaps!) I have very limited time for reading books other than those I translate! And I’m afraid the very title of the book (who can possibly have such authority?) and its influence on your own illogical and often self-contradictory theories concerning your God’s possible purpose, methods and nature, would put it low on my list of priorities. But I accept what you have told me about Adler’s case for design and about the special nature of humans.


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