Return to David's theory of evolution, purpose & theodicy (Evolution)

by dhw, Friday, March 08, 2024, 11:31 (50 days ago) @ David Turell

dhw: Do you believe that we and our food (= contemporary species) are directly descended from 99.9% of all creatures that ever lived?

DAVID (a few days ago): No. From the 0.1% surviving.
And yesterday:
DAVID: Yes. All existing lines contributed to the 99.9% total loss.

dhw: You are incorrigible! That is not an answer to the question.

DAVID: Incorrigibility is yours. The 0.1% survivors came from the 99.9% ancestors, which magically makes 100% of all that ever lived.

There is no such magic. 99.9% of the ancestors of current species are extinct, but our ancestors only comprise 0.1% of all the creatures that ever lived, as you agreed in your first answer. Example: one small group of dinosaurs evolved into current species (birds), and the rest were dead ends. i.e. had no descendants. And you have no idea why your God would messily and inefficiently have designed the dead ends. STOP DODGING!

Experimentation

DAVID: An all-knowing omniscient God has no need to experiment!!!

dhw: Obviously. So in order to understand why he would design and cull 99.9 irrelevant species, we should consider the possibility that we plus our food were NOT his one and only purpose, or that he is not omniscient but is a God who likes to try out new ideas, make discoveries, or even give his creations the freedom to do their own inventing (as indeed you believe he has done with humans).

DAVID: See new theodicy article which shows how you don't understand how to basically consider God.

See below.

dhw: [...] please explain at last what sort of “autonomous experimentation” you meant!

DAVID: I said automatic, look above. The ability to make adaptions as all species do.

I asked if that was a misprint, and you replied: ‘Autonomous experimentation’ is what Behe has described. And you thought it was possible that the twigs (dinosaurs) came from some degree of autonomous experimentation. You obviously agreed with Behe, and you must know what you agreed with. Does Behe believe dinosaurs might have speciated by means of autonomous adaptation, and that adaptation is synonymous with experimentation?

Purpose

dhw: I accept your perfectly feasible proposal that your God may have thought patterns and emotions like ours. But a God who wants to be worshipped can hardly be called selfless or not self-serving. The words worship, recognize, relationship, enjoy and interest are not metaphors or allegories. They do not symbolize anything, and you have agreed that the question is whether your God does or doesn’t – not whether he disagrees with the dictionary definitions.

DAVID: See theodicy article today.

See below

Adler

dhw: And apparently his instructions have led you to a raft of illogical conclusions and self-contradictions.

DAVID: But! He tells how we have to properly think about God!

The article below, which you support, makes it clear that nobody knows how to “properly” think about God.

Theodicy: skeptical theist view of God

QUOTE: "Given that God has exhaustive knowledge and is much wiser than we are, it would not at all be surprising if God has knowledge that we lack access to — knowledge that is relevant to one or more of his decisions. (David’s bold).This has applicability to the problem of evil, since it is difficult for us to evaluate, from our limited vantagepoint, whether God plausibly might have morally sufficient justification for allowing natural and personal evil to exist in the world. This is not to say that the problem of evil has no evidential force against theism (dhw’s bold), but, rather, that we should be cautious about overstating what we can assert with confidence about what God would or would not do or allow to happen.

He is anything but a skeptical theist! Your bold alone shows he has total faith, and his skepticism applies purely to human pronouncements about the nature of God. My bold shows how confused he is. The problem of evil (theodicy) only arises if there is a God! It has nothing to do with theism (belief in God). “Overstating with confidence” applies just as much to his proposal that God might plausibly have knowledge which justifies evil as to the proposal that God’s powers might plausibly be limited, or that God plausibly couldn’t care less about the damage his invention has caused. It also applies to every theory that you have not only proposed but actually believe in.

DAVID: Note my bold. With God's vast knowledge how can we humans outguess His motives? Or worse, give Him obviously human motives?

The only safe approach will therefore be to stop theorizing altogether. For instance, don’t tell us his only motive for creating life was to design humans and our food, that his messy, inefficient method of doing so was to design 99.9% of species that were irrelevant to his purpose, that he is all-powerful, all-knowing and all-good, that he might want us to recognize us and worship him, have a relationship with him, enjoy creating and be interested in his creations. Just say God exists and we cannot “assert with confidence” what he would or wouldn’t do, or what he wants, or what he is like. And we should get rid of most religions, because they are based on confident but overstated assertions – e.g. his omnipotence, omniscience, all- goodness and wish to be worshipped.