Return to David's theory of evolution (Evolution)

by dhw, Wednesday, September 21, 2022, 08:34 (792 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Allegorical: “A representation of an abstract or a spiritual meaning through concrete or material forms; figurative treatment of one subject under the guise of another.”
“A symbolic narrative”.
“Full control” is not a concrete or material form or a figurative treatment or a symbol. Control means making something happen the way you want it to happen.

DAVID: You miss the point. God's view of control may not be ours.

You miss the point. “Control” is not allegorical or figurative. I have defined “control” for you. The dispute is over what your God wanted to do and did do. Now please tell us why your belief that your God wanted to and did have “full control” over evolution is not human, whereas my theory that he did not want “full control” but gave autonomous control to his creations is human. (And please note your self-contradiction in “More Miscellany” PART ONE, which I will highlight.)

DAVID: So you have no authority but yourself? Adler is an authority to teach "how to think about God", his book!

dhw: I have no authority. Nor do you, Adler, Dawkins or Dennett. If God exists, the only “authority” on how to think about him is God himself.

DAVID: Exactly!!! We can only be figurative. Please stick to that proper reasoning.

There is nothing “figurative” in our guesses. Control, free-for-all, enjoyment, interest, kindness are not symbols for something else! And your comment has nothing to do with your extraordinary belief that a human being can be an authority on how to think about God.

DAVID: (under ecosystem importance: If they [eco systems with no connection to ours] existed, they were created by God purposefully.

dhw: Maybe, but if he purposefully created life forms and bushes that had no connection with H. sapiens plus bushes, then his one and only purpose cannot have been to create H. sapiens plus bushes. You agree. Your theory “makes sense only to God”, i.e. not to you. Stop dodging!

DAVID: Maybe!! God, as creator, had a purpose for everything He made appear!!

Of course he did, but that does not mean that he purposefully designed every single life form and ecosystem! He may have wanted a free-for-all, and so by giving cells autonomous intelligence he would have got what he wanted. He may have wanted to create a being who would recognize him and admire his work (your terms) and may have experimented in order to get what he wanted – that is also purposeful. Or he may have set out as some humans do, to see where different experiments might lead him, and eventually have come up with a great idea: humans. Again, this is purposeful. But it doesn’t fit in with your idea of a God who knows everything and is always in full control (which is not an allegory).

DAVID: […] Why can't you accept the logical answer: God chose to evolve us for His own reasons.

dhw: And you cannot think of any reasons!!! So I offer you logical alternatives, but you reject them all because they do not fit in with your preconceived ideas about your God! […]

DAVID: You can't know God's reasoning any more than I can. WE can only analyze what HE produced.

Correct. And your analysis has produced theories that make no sense to you.[…]

DAVID: God makes perfect sense to me. As for your God, His humanized attributes are foreign to my thinking about God.

It is not “God” but your theories about God that “make sense only to God”, i.e. not to you. Some of my theoretical human attributes are the same as yours (enjoyment of creation, interest in his creations), I would not go so far as you with others (his kindness, his desire for total control, for recognition, and for a relationship with us), and I don’t see why your theoretical attributes are any less human than mine (e.g. experimenting in order to get what he wants, or to give himself new ideas).