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

by dhw, Friday, August 11, 2023, 11:17 (260 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: It’s you who used the word enjoyment, and you knew precisely what you meant by it. The word means to take pleasure in something. If you don’t mean what you say, then why say it?

DAVID: You don't understand the concept. We cannot know how God enjoys, if he does.

You said you were sure that he enjoys creating. Please tell us what YOU meant when you used the word “enjoy”?

DAVID: Theodicy articles I've reviewed all take my approach, which you abhor. God asks us not to sin, i.e., create evil. God knew necessary free-living bacteria cannot be controlled but are absolutely required for us to live properly.

dhw: Please stop hiding behind other people’s work. YOUR all-knowing God knew in advance that we WOULD sin, so what would be the point in asking us not to? And how can an all-powerful God be powerless to prevent the evil consequences of his own inventions? You say your God does what he wants to do. So he wanted to create the evil he knew would happen. I wonder which “theodicy articles” take your approach.

DAVID: All on Wikipedia. God created free acting organisms, which cannot be controlled. And yes, I believe God knew the consequences.

Thank you for confirming your belief that your all-powerful God was powerless to control his inventions, and that your all-good God knew in advance that he was creating evil. I wonder which theodicy articles take this approach.

dhw: […] if he wanted to designed species irrelevant to what you say was his purpose, maybe your interpretation of his purpose is wrong. If he wanted to create the forces of evil, then how can he be all-good? Now please tell us why you think he wanted to create us, and why he wanted to create life in the first place.

DAVID: Repeat: because He wanted to, and His reasoning is unknown. Your demand for exactitude is unreasonable.

But you are the one who proposes exactitude: over and over again, you have specified that your God’s one and only purpose was to design us and our food. (Repeated today under “ocean floor”: "My form of God is strictly purposeful with humans as a goal.") When I ask you why he would then have created 99 out of 100 irrelevant life forms, you can find no answer. It is your theory that is unreasonable. Just as your two responses to the theodicy problem are unreasonable: 1) evil is so minor that we shouldn’t even think about it; 2) your all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good God can’t control his inventions or, in the case of humans, gave them the freedom to commit evil, knowing in advance exactly what evil they would commit.

DAVID: He did not need to, because He has no needs.

dhw: I keep rejecting your deliberate insertion of “need”. I never used the term. I agree with you that your God, if he exists, would do what he wants to do.

DAVID: Your free-for-all is our term for the dog-eat-dog world where all life has to eat to survive. If God could have created a life without energy needs, He would have.

dhw: My free-for-all goes beyond dog-eat-dog (though energy can be acquired without the cruelty of dog-eat-dog) to speciation, as it would explain what you cannot explain: namely, the vast variety of life forms that have come and gone and have/had no relevance to your God’s sole purpose in creating life: us and our food.

DAVID: Evolution involves creating new forms from simple to complex and in the sorting process 99.9% don't survive. My God and your humanized form both used evolutions, so don't complain about mine.

Dodge, dodge, dodge. You have insisted that your humanized God deliberately designed 99 out of 100 forms, knowing that they were irrelevant to his purpose (us and food), and you can’t think of a single reason why he would have done so. That is what I complain about.

DAVID: On the other hand, your so-called God needs enjoyment from directionless free-for-alls, needs to experiment since he has no goals in mind, and is innocent of His mistakes because He is blissfully unaware of His unforeseen consequences of His blundering actions.

dhw: Again, he does not “need” anything. Enjoyment and interest do not denote need. Stop putting up such straw men. Experimentation is not goal-less. I offered you two forms: one the goal of creating a being like himself, and the other the enjoyment of discovery. I’m always surprised by your implicit condemnation of your perfect God’s “mistakes”, which fits in with your firm belief that despite his all-goodness he knew perfectly well that he was creating evil, just as with his perfect wisdom and omniscience he knew perfectly well that his method of achieving his sole purpose was cumbersome and inefficient. I wonder what your fellow theologians would make of your theories.

DAVID: Their articles mirror my theology.

So they ridicule his method of designing his one and only purpose as “messy, cumbersome and inefficient”, and they inform us that their all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good God knew perfectly well that he was creating future war, murder, rape, flood, famine, disease etc. etc. but went ahead all the same. I’m surprised that they all embrace such negative views of their God.