Return to David's theory of evolution and theodicy (Evolution)

by David Turell , Friday, June 23, 2023, 18:16 (517 days ago) @ dhw

dhw: Perhaps understandably, you have now dropped the subject, but it casts its shadow again over the new purpose you attribute to your God at the end of this post. The dog-eat-dog metaphor applies to most forms of evil - in nature as in human affairs - which result from self-interest.

Evil is a tiny part of the dog-eat-dog world God gave us. You prefer to think of it as a battle for survivability which is a correct view, but not as Darwin viewed it, a driver of evolution. Everyone must eat, just like your 'humans plus food' pejorative, which shows us the emptiness of your approach. Eating constantly is imperative.

DAVID: Your God produced the same 99.9% loss in evolution, didn't He.

dhw: [...] You say they were mistakes, and I say they were successful experiments by himself or by his inventions!

DAVID: Your God's experiments were 99.9% failures!!! That can't be ignored. We see only one evolutionary process.

They were not God's failures (if he exists)! This is made abundantly clear by the next exchange:

DAVID: The amazing battles continue. It is still a dog-eat-dog world with each side capable of adapting.

dhw: This sums up the world of good and evil. Your God does not intervene. So maybe this free-for-all battle for survival, with its vast range of variations, adaptations, innovations, comings and goings, goods and bads, was his purpose right from the start.[…]

DAVID: […] I've always thought God created a dog-eat-dog world. One purpose, another was humans.

dhw: You have always acknowledged the dog-eat-dog element of life’s history. But you have always claimed that the creation of humans plus food was his only purpose. That is why you consider the 99% of past species to have been failures – because they did not lead to humans plus food.

A totally an incorrect interpretation. The 99.9% loss is simply a part of the culling nature of evolution. What survived led to humans plus food as a necessary endpoint.

dhw: But if his purpose was to create a dog-eat-dog world, the 99% of losses were the direct consequence of the free-for-all he intended to create from the beginning. Whether he designed the 99% directly, or gave them the ability to design themselves, makes no difference. Dog-eat-dog, producing an ever changing variety of “dogs”, was the purpose, and so every dog was relevant to that purpose. Now ask yourself what was the purpose of dog-eat-dog, if it was not to provide enjoyment of creation and interest in the ever changing products of creation.

Totally misses the point. Whether animal or vegetable, all must have constant nutrition, which creates constant competition.