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

by dhw, Monday, May 13, 2024, 08:06 (158 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: I have very specific beliefs, and you are correct we don't know, but I see God as selfless despite the guesses I made for you.

dhw: It is your very specific beliefs that make you want to shut out alternatives – that is the danger of first choosing what you wish to believe in, and then trying to make the rest follow. You wish to believe in a selfless God, but you have realized that it is perfectly possible for him to want to be recognized and worshipped; you wish to believe that your God is all-knowing and all-powerful, and that we and our food were his only purpose, but you realize that this makes a mockery of your belief that he also designed vast numbers of species that had no connection with his purpose (you even label him as “inefficient”); and your wish that he should be all-good leaves you with the unanswerable question of why he had to allow/create the forces of evil.

DAVID: Your logic is impeccable, but I accept my God, warts and all, for all the good He has done. I differ here: Humans were His primary purpose, not His 'only' purpose.

I’m surprised that you think of your omniscient, omnipotent, all-good God as having warts. I’m afraid I can only see you accepting the warts that are only too obvious in your attempted justification of your illogical, self-contradictory theories. You have frequently tried to change your “only” purpose to “primary”, but you have NEVER offered us a different purpose. It has ALWAYS been one and only, so please don’t make me produce a list of quotes. What has varied is his purpose for creating us, but you have thrown out all your own suggestions (enjoyment and interest, avoidance of boredom, desire to be recognized and worshipped) as they conflict with your wish that he should be selfless.

DAVID: I make my own considered theism.

dhw: So you follow the all-everything God of the monotheistic religions, warts and all, but you don’t, because you pride yourself on making your own theism.

DAVID: On the contrary, I start with the God I described, and my critical thoughts about God logically follow. Evolution is not a direct way to create all living organisms.

dhw: What is “on the contrary”? You don’t follow the monotheistic religions although you say you do, or you pride yourself on inventing your own theology although you say you follow the monotheistic religions? Of course evolution is not direct: what has that got to do with all the contradictions listed above?

DAVID: The evolution comment is to answer your gross distortion of evolution by God. 99.9% of extinctions were required, per Raup.

According to your description of Raup’s argument, he just told us that for evolution to continue, there had to be changing conditions which would result in new species that would live under those conditions, and in the extinction of those that could not live under those conditions. You have agreed that Raup never said that there is a God who controls evolution and who is forced to design and cull 99.9 out of 100 species that are irrelevant to his one and only goal. It is you who have grossly distorted Raup to fit in with what you wish to believe.

dhw: There is no reason whatsoever to assume that your God does not have thought patterns and emotions like ours. Indeed you wrote that he probably does.

DAVID: I won't moan about your humanized God you have aptly described. We do not know what God, having produced us, wants or needs from us. Briefly, does God have motives of any sort? We humans can invent all sorts of possibilities like you invent for your humanized guy. God may have none like my selfless guy.

dhw: I’m glad you’ve stopped moaning about my “humanizations”, which of course are no more human than your own – the God who certainly enjoyed and was interested, who wanted to be recognized and worshipped, who messed up his method of achieving the purpose you gave him, and who probably has thought patterns and emotions like ours. And I like this new approach, in which you acknowledge that all your inventions, which you call your “very specific beliefs”, could be totally wrong, and one or other of my alternative inventions could be right. We are making progress, though sadly it only lasts until the “More miscellany” thread.

DAVID: Of course it doesn't last. Your constant distortions of God, because you do not know how to think about Him following theological rules, leads to my rebuttals.

What rebuttals? You keep “rebutting” your own thoughts about God, but you have agreed that my logic is “impeccable”, and I’m still waiting to hear what “theological rules” force you to start with what you wish to believe and to contradict yourself over and over again, and yet forbid me to propose logically impeccable alternatives. See “More miscellany” for your efforts to make fools of your fellow theologians.