Return to David's theory of evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Thursday, August 11, 2022, 11:57 (833 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: You have agreed that the majority of extinct branches if life forms and ecosystems did NOT lead to us or our food.

DAVID: I don't know how you can claim I agreed. I have constantly said evolution is a continuum, and the past must lead to the future. All ecosystems have a role in feeding us.

dhw: You wrote: “The current bush of food is NOW for humans NOW. There were smaller bushes in the PAST for PAST forms.” (The block capitals were your own.) And “Extinct life has no role in current time.” Yes, evolution is a continuum which produced countless branches of diversified life forms and ecosystems long before humans came on the scene.

DAVID: You seem to follow my logic in those statements.

Of course I do. And it makes nonsense of your claim that “all ecosystems have a role in feeding us”, and every extinct life form and ecosystem was an “absolute requirement” for the production of us and our food.

dhw: (Why have you used the present tense in your last sentence?)

DAVID: I don't understand your question.

“Have a role” only relates to the present. It leaves out all the PAST systems which had NO role, although you claim they were all essential.

dhw: I must confess I find it hard to believe that you yourself now reject your above statements and believe your God designed every single PAST and extinct life form and food bush throughout 3.X billion pre-human years as an “absolute requirement” for himself to design the current us and our current food bush.

DAVID: I don't reject the statements, and don't know why you think that.

You agree in the above statements that the majority of extinct forms had no role to play in the production of us and our food, but you deny that you agree (“I don’t know how you can claim I agreed.”)

DAVID: Why can't you see a God in charge of creation creates exactly what He wishes for His own reasons.

dhw: I have always agreed. We simply disagree on what he created and why he created it.

DAVID: We can only try to interpret His reasons from that viewpoint. Therefore, it 'makes sense only to God' is a logical starting point.

dhw: The key word is “only”. Why do you assume that his reasons will not make sense to us?

DAVID: We cannot know His personal reasons but can analyze probable ones.

Agreed. But your analysis has produced reasons which do not make sense even to you, and I suggest that this rather reduces their probability.

DAVID: 'Thought and emotions' must be expressed allegorically which means not in any way equivalent to ours.

dhw: […] A couple of days ago, I asked how your God could have created love if he had no idea what love was. You replied:“For once you are thinking about God in a reasonable way. Of course, he knows love and every other emotion.” Please explain how his love is an “allegory”.

DAVID: Because He is a personage like no other human person.

How does that come to mean he has created love which does not actually mean love?

dhw: why do you think a fully purposeful God who enjoys creating, is interested in his creations, knows love and every other emotion, wants our recognition and wants to have a relationship with us (all your terms) is less human than a fully purposeful God who enjoys creating, is interested in his creations, knows love and every other emotion, and experiments and/or tries out new ideas?

DAVID: Back to experimentation or changing course with new ideas. A purposeful God creates to determined endpoints He has identified. He is not a humanized God as you keep insisting.

dhw: I have included various thought patterns and emotions we have both listed, plus your God's very human desire for recognition and a relationship..... Unfortunately, your version has him incomprehensibly NOT pursuing his single purpose, because he spends 3.X billion years specially designing lots of different things that are not connected with his purpose, but in any case, why do you think your single-minded God is less human than my more open-minded God?

DAVID: They are connected as food supply, as you know. […]

The majority are NOT connected as food supply, as you have agreed above, and you have not answered my question: why do you think your single-minded God is less human than my more open-minded God?

DAVID: Thinking about God requires some guidelines if religious teachings are ignored. Adler, as a philosopher of religion does just that and I follow those guidelines he provides.

dhw: I know you do, but I’m afraid that doesn’t help you to explain theories which you yourself regard as inexplicable and which make no sense to you – since they ”make sense only to God”.

DAVID: Of course, they make sense to God and I accept that. He can create in any say He wishes.

Whatever may have been your God’s purpose and method would make sense to him, and of course he can create any way he wishes. However, the wishes and ways you impose on him make no sense to you or to me, and your love of Adler does not make your theories any more intelligible.