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

by dhw, Wednesday, May 18, 2022, 11:03 (918 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: I cannot explain God's works for you. I can only analyze them in view of the picture I have of a very purposeful God who knows His goals, and exactly how to reach them in vast contrast to your God-vision of a humanized bumbler. Of course, God makes sense to himself.

dhw: Correction: you cannot explain your interpretation of God’s works, and the quote is that your interpretation “makes sense only to God”, which means it does not make sense to you.

DAVID: Wow!! What a scrambled-up interpretation. Finally, I can understand your problem. It makes perfect sense to me. I accept what God did for His own reasons, while not needing to understand His reasoning, which is obviously impossible. I've written this before, and don't understand your obtuse interpretation, exc opeet to point out you do not think about God as I do.

If God exists, we both accept that he would have produced life and evolution. You then go on to theorize that his one and only purpose was to produce us and our food, but first of all he produced countless life forms and foods that did not lead to us and our food, and although he was perfectly capable of designing species with no precursors, he designed us in stages. You cannot find any sense in this theory (it “makes sense only to God”), but you reject any logical alternatives. Please stop assuming that your illogical theory is an objective truth, and claiming that it makes sense to you because only your God can understand it!

DAVID: A designer who is evolving organisms over time from single cells to us is running a continuous process under his control. There can be gaps in phenotype, but never in biochemistry of life, under his controls. That is an obvious explanation, while you torture quotes into meaninglessness. God's evolution is not Darwinian.

dhw: As I pointed out in bold in the same post, “the fact that all life is biochemical does not explain the gaps”. H.sapiens is a species, and while I am happy to follow Darwin’s argument that all species descend from earlier species (common descent), you emphasize the gaps which you believe denote speciation without precursors. This clearly breaks the continuity of speciation, and since you claim that we humans are descended from species that had no precursors, you contradict your own belief in continuity from bacteria to us, and hence your belief that we were your God’s one and only purpose from the very start.

DAVID: Obtuse thinking again. Why was Darwin so concerned about the Cambrian gap? Because it didn't fit his theory or continuing your acceptance of his theory. A designer creating the phenotypical gaps does! I accept a designer and you don't.

Dodging again. Like Darwin, I am an agnostic. All theories must include the possibility of God as designer. The gaps are real. There are two possible THEISTIC explanations. 1) God created species with no precursors (from which we are descended), in which case you cannot claim that there is a continuous line from bacteria to humans, who you say were his one and only purpose from the beginning. 2) God created a continuous line from bacteria to humans, and so the gaps are the result of an incomplete fossil record, which is hardly surprising given the enormous stretches of time involved and the special circumstances required for dead bodies to survive the ravages of time. Of course neither explanation of the gaps explains your illogical theory that although we plus food were God’s only purpose from the beginning, he individually designed countless organisms and foods that had no connection with us or our food.

Schroeder

dhw (concerning “humanization”): ...have you never heard of believers who think God watches over them, loves them, judges them, wants them to worship him etc.? You have frequently expressed your negative view of the way religions “humanize” God, but perhaps you don’t count religious people as “believers” and only you know how to think about God.

DAVID: Thank you for recognizing those religious folks are the ones I ignore in my thinking!!!

dhw: So please stop pretending that “we believers” accept your illogical theory of evolution and your blinkered way of thinking about God.

DAVID: In conferences with ID folks, I know we think alike, much to your surprise. Accepting that design requires a thinking designer would solve all your confusion.

Of course you and ID folks and religious believers think alike when it comes to the existence of God! The confusion arises when you promote a theory of evolution that makes no sense even to you (it “makes sense only to God”), and when you claim that although it is possible that God has thought patterns and emotions similar to ours, and although many religious believers firmly believe he does, you know he doesn’t and only you know how to think about God.