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

by dhw, Wednesday, February 28, 2024, 12:31 (267 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: There are colossal “variations” between different species of dinosaurs. Bearing in mind your belief that the vast majority of dinosaur species did NOT lead to us or our contemporary species, do you believe your God designed every single species of dinosaur?

DAVID: Yes.

Thank you for your straight answer. You therefore believe that your God individually designed and culled the vast majority of dinosaurs although they had no connection with his one and only purpose, which was to design us and our food. And you have no idea why he would use such a messy, cumbersome and inefficient way of achieving his goal.

dhw: You also wrote: “How much the twigs came from some degree of automatic experimentation I see as a possibility.” […] again I’d like to know what you meant by “automatic”? A misprint for “autonomous” perhaps? […]

DAVID: 'Autonomous experimentation' is what Behe has described, some small biochemical steps appearing naturally, not designed.

dhw: So “automatic” was a misprint. Regardless of Behe, do you believe that the “irrelevant” dinosaur “twigs” appeared as a result of autonomous experimentation (= by dinosaurs) or by divine experimentation (= God experimenting)?

DAVID: As above, I would think minor variations could possibly appear without God.

dhw: As above, please be a little more precise, using the dinosaur example. Would you say the smallest herbivorous dinosaur (Albertadromeus) was a minor variation on the largest carnivorous dinosaur (Spinosaurus)?

DAVID: God speciates.

The “twigs” include the vast majority of dinosaur species which had no connection with your God’s sole purpose, and you say they may have "come from" a degree of "autonomous experimentation". This suggests that the twigs (= species of dinosaur) may be the result of experimentation by the dinosaurs themselves. What else could it mean?

Purpose

dhw: Wanting to be worshipped, to have his work recognized, to have a relationship with us, enjoyment of creating and interest in his creations – these were all YOUR “guesses”, which I find perfectly understandable and reasonable. But they are not selfless. Yet another example of Turellian self-contradiction, for which you are trying to blame me! […]

DAVID: I accept all of those possible descriptions with the allegorical proviso.

dhw: A couple of weeks ago, we established exactly what you mean by “allegorical”. As follows:

DAVID: It is, can they describe God in any meaningful way?

dhw: […] Yes, of course they do. He wants us to recognize him and worship him is perfectly meaningful. The question is whether the description is true or false.

DAVID: Right, therefore allegorical.

dhw: Quite uniquely, disregarding any definition you will find in any dictionary, by “allegorical” you mean: is the description right or wrong?

DAVID: The issue is we know how the words apply to us but not to God.

The issue is we don’t know whether God wants us to worship him or not. It has nothing whatsoever to do with what the words themselves mean. “Allegorical” does not mean “is the proposal right or wrong?”

dhw: And so when you tell us you think your God wants recognition and worship, you accept your own description on condition that it is right and not wrong! Please stop all these absurd language games, and stop blaming me for your own humanizing and your self-contradictions. And please stop pretending that my alternatives can’t be true because they endow him with certain thought patterns like ours, although you agree that he has certain thought patterns like ours.

DAVID: Your vision of your God is a very humanized one. You can't understand it as I do because I have been taught ta very specific way to think about Him.

I have no objection to YOUR humanized vision of a God who wants to be recognized and worshipped, and who enjoys creating and is interested in his creations, or to your belief that he probably has thought patterns and emotions like ours. Perfectly feasible. But if you were taught that he wants us to worship him etc., which means he is selfless, and that “allegorical” means either right or wrong, and that he is a messy, cumbersome and inefficient designer, because you can't understand why he would adopt the method and purpose you impose on him, I would suggest that perhaps it’s time you stopped relying on your teachers.