Return to David's theory of evolution (Evolution)

by David Turell , Monday, February 06, 2023, 20:41 (443 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: I now have an agnostic trying to rehabilitate God's reputation. It again reveals your underlying prejudices regarding theism. Your negative view has no basis in the facts. If we accept God as creating life's evolution, then He is logically responsible for all of its dead ends, failed experiments, etc. I, as a firm theist view God as a marvelous designer who successfully produced humans with their complex brains using the system He chose to use.

dhw: Your all-powerful God is apparently responsible for 99% of failed experiments and mistakes in his messy efforts to achieve what you think was his one and only purpose. This is supposed to make him a marvellous designer, whereas my proposal that he creates precisely what he wants to create without making any mistakes is apparently a negative view! I am not denying that humans are here, and if God exists, my three theistic theories all fit in with our existence, but none of them paint him as incompetent (mistake after mistake) or stupid (knowing he will make mistake after mistake, but still going ahead with his blunders).

If God is in charge, He is directly related to the history of evolution which has a failure rate of 99.9%. Your theories are simply inventions to disconnect God from a direct connection, and in so doing present a weakened form of God, not in total control but allowing secondhand design.

dhw: […] if you really want to believe that he invented the system but did NOT create 99% worth of mistakes, you need look no further than my third explanation: he wanted and therefore designed a free-for-all (with the option of dabbling if he felt like it). No mistakes, no failed experiments. […]

DAVID: Back you go to a humanized God who gives up full control so He can go blameless for the known failures. A real God is always in full control.

dhw: Thank you for acknowledging that you are now blaming God for all his mistakes. I can only suggest to you that a REAL and all-powerful God would not make mistakes […]. And I keep asking you why you regard a fallible, incompetent designer, whom you blame for his mistakes, as being less human and more godlike than a designer who produces exactly what he wants without making any mistakes. You never answer.

DAVID: My answer is still what you ignore. The dead ends and failures exist. You can't get rid of them.

Of course the dead ends exist! But I have explained to you why you needn't ridicule your God by calling them failures and mistakes. Now please answer the bolded question.

DAVID: I've described my powerful, purposeful, all controlling God, ad nauseum. Your wimp of a God comes from your artistic proclivities, I am sure.

dhw: It's you who blame your "wimpish" God for conducting failed experiments and making mistake after mistake in pursuit of his only goal! Furthermore, apparently he does not control the conditions which determine what species he can or cannot design – a major factor in his repeated failures to achieve that goal. Now please answer the bolded question.

Simple answer now repeated: My view of a real God is all-powerful, all-purposeful, all designer who does His designs with a full notice of where He is going without coming up suddenly with a new idea, which is the way humans work, a system you have implanted on your preferred view of a humanized God.

Permian mass extinction

dhw: We are looking at the SAME history […] Our dispute is over the interpretation of that history. […]“Preconceived prejudice” means fixed beliefs like yours, not a variety of possible explanations. As for free will, I have presented the case for and against without voting for either. You simply refuse to consider the case against. That is prejudice.

DAVID: Get off your fence. Make some intelligent decisions. They are possible to achieve.

dhw: I remain open-minded, which apparently means I am prejudiced. You stick to one rigid opinion, determined to ignore any view that is different from yours. That is not a bad definition of “prejudice”. But I don’t have a problem with many of your decisions when they are based on sound reasoning (e.g. the case for design, and the case for free will). I only object if you cannot provide a single reason for your illogical theories but still insist that they are correct, or if you dismiss arguments that are just as soundly based as your own, simply because you have already made up your mind (e.g. cellular intelligence, and the case against free will).

The bold is impossible to answer. God doesn't reveal his reasons for his actions. God fully controlled evolution with its dead ends. Therefore, He knew in advance dead ends appear, but it didn't matter, as with His designing powers He cold achieve humans. No added contrived form of God needed. God remains all-powerful, all-knowing, etc.