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

by dhw, Friday, September 29, 2023, 08:36 (211 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: I repeat. My views are mine alone, totally consistent with ID. […]

dhw: […] I strongly suspect that many ID-ers would be surprised to hear that they believe their God deliberately designed 99.9% of life forms that were irrelevant to his one and only purpose. However, it makes no difference whether they do or don’t – the fact remains that you yourself can make no sense of it.

DAVID: The bold would make no sense to ID'ers.

dhw: Thank you for your honesty. Since it would make no sense to them and makes no sense to you either, maybe it’s time for you to admit that it might just possibly be wrong?

DAVID: My 'no sense' was meant to be derogatory. As your snowman complaint makes no sense to me!

If the bolded theory would make no sense to ID-ers, what is meant to be “derogatory”? What snowman complaint are you talking about? You have agreed over and over again that you cannot find a single reason why your God would deliberately design 99.9 out of 100 species which have no connection with what you believe to have been his one and only purpose. Hence your derogatory description of your senseless theory as messy, cumbersome and inefficient, and your statement that it makes sense only to God (i.e. not to you).

Early pre-humans

DAVID: God, as Creator, can create as He wishes. Perfectly understood!

dhw: Of course. And that’s why your bolded theory makes no sense. Maybe, just maybe he did NOT design every species individually, or maybe, just maybe he did NOT invent life for the sole purpose of designing us plus food.

DAVID: And maybe He did!

But if you put your two theories together, you have him senselessly creating 99.9% of life forms that had no relevance to his one and only purpose. Such messy inefficiency can hardly be said to fit in with other concepts of yours, such as his all-powerfulness and all-knowingness.

dhw: […] So stop telling us that your God is all-powerful and all-knowing and selfless and all-good!

DAVID: Silly. We are discussing terms that apply to God's personality, not his works.

dhw: Of course when you say he enjoys creating and is interested in his creations, and is all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good and selfless, you are describing his personality, but since you insist that the words may mean something different to your God, there is no point in your using such terms!

DAVID: Silly!! We have to use our terms to discuss Him at all.

Of course we do, and we know exactly what we mean by these terms.

dhw: (taken from the “Feser” thread): The fact is, we both know exactly what you mean by all these terms. What we don’t know is whether they are applicable to your God or not.

DAVID: Thank you for the bold, finally.

It’s you have finally understood that it is not a matter of the terms having a different meaning for God, but of whether the terms – whose meaning is perfectly clear – can be applied to him. When you say you are certain he enjoys creating, you don’t think your God may have a different concept of enjoyment; the question is whether or not creating gives him pleasure. Similarly such terms as all-powerful or selfless are not open to different interpretations – we all know what they mean. So is he or is he not all-powerful and selfless? (See the Feser thread.)

Evolution and theodicy

DAVID: I'm simply repeating scholarly conclusions about theodicy.

dhw: If the scholarly answer to the problem of evil is that evil is not worth discussing, I suggest you ignore it and start thinking for yourself.

DAVID: Thinking for myself first involves self-education in the subject.

You don’t seem to have got beyond the thought that the problem of theodicy is solved by pretending it isn’t a problem. […]

DAVID: No, I like recognizing proportionality of the problems you over magnify.

There is no magnification. Evils such as war, murder, rape, famine, flood, disease all exist, and the ratio of good to bad does not explain how such evil can result from the deliberate work of an all-good God.