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

by dhw, Sunday, October 29, 2023, 11:01 (389 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: Our problem is I do not see your illogicalities. I find them as inventions of your mind. So I am really happy with my theory of God and His goals. I think He has achieved them.

dhw: This is a very severe case of amnesia. Year after year you have acknowledged that you have no idea why your all-powerful God, whose only goal (no plural) you believe to have been us and our food, would have designed and had to cull 99.9 species out of 100 that had no connection with his purpose. […] By all means remain happy, but please stop pretending you can’t see the illogicality of the combination of theories which you admit you can’t explain.

DAVID: What you wish explained cannot be explained! The reasons in God's mind are hidden to us. We can only analyze what God produced. He produced us!

And according to you, we and our food were his one and only purpose, but he also deliberately produced and had to cull 99.9 out of 100 species which had no connection with us and our food, and you cannot explain why!

DAVID: We conjecture why. We see only two ways to create us, evolve or direct creation. Obviously, God chose evolution which by analysis resulted in a required 99.9% loss rate. You turn all of this on its head and complain about the necessarily lost forms. And then state I am illogical!!! We are here. God succeeded in His intentions!

What analysis tells you that your God’s only purpose was us and therefore he had to design 99.9 species out of 100 that had nothing to do with us? If God exists, he designed evolution. According to you “he directly creates what he wishes directly”. He did not create us directly, but for reasons you can’t explain, he also directly created 99.9 species that had no connection with us. In your own words: ““We do not know why God chose to evolve us. dhw is correct. Why not direct creation?” Well,there is an alternative to his creating some weird law that “if thou wishest to create humans, thou must first create and cull 99.9 out of 100 unnecessary species.“ The alternative is that he wished to create them. Why might he have wished to create them? Surprisingly perhaps, you yourself have provided one perfectly logical motive, because you are certain that he enjoys creating and is interested in his creations.

DAVID: ...any form of enjoyments or interests are secondary events, not primary purposes.

dhw: What is that supposed to mean? Enjoyment and interest are not “events”, and if you do something because you enjoy doing it and you want to create something interesting to watch, then enjoyment and interest are a purpose. Please tell us his “primary purpose” in designing the unnecessary 99.9 species, and his “primary purpose” for designing us and our food.

DAVID: I've answered above about your irrational analysis of evolution as invented by God.

Dealt with above. Now please tell us the two primary purposes I’ve asked for.

Theodicy

DAVID: I accept God's works warts and all. […]

Your acceptance is irrelevant to the problem of theodicy.

dhw: I don’t understand why an all-powerful God, who according to you “directly creates whatever he wishes directly”, has to accept the evil which he hates, and which as first cause he and he alone has produced, whether directly (as a challenge to us humans) or indirectly (because he was powerless to prevent it). Warts are blemishes or imperfections. How can a designer deliberately or accidentally produce evil imperfections but still be regarded as all-powerful, all-good and perfect?

DAVID: I've answered before; the good greatly outweighs the secondary evil which results. Translated: you can't have one without the other.

Proportionality does not explain the existence of evil. If you can’t have one without the other, then quite clearly your God can’t be all good. Let us not forget that as first cause he is supposed to have created all of our reality out of himself. There was no such thing as evil until he produced it.

You and I are highly sceptical about claims that the Bible is the word of God, but there are many who believe it is. I wonder what they make of an all-good God’s instructions concerning those who do not believe in him. If it’s an individual: “But thou shalt surely kill him; thine hand shall be the first upon him to put him to death.” (Deuteronomy 13,9) And if it’s a whole community: “Thou shalt surely smite the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, destroying it utterly, and all that is therein.” (Deuteronomy 13,15) I suggest that for some believers, the problem of theodicy is not solved by proportionality.