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

by dhw, Saturday, June 08, 2024, 07:49 (132 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: […] human unusualness is very necessary. Our brain is like nothing else in the universe.

dhw: Very necessary for what? The universe managed to exist before we did, and so did countless life forms. I keep agreeing that as far as we know, we are unique. How does that answer the points I have made above about “allegory” and “all everything”. Please stop dodging.

DAVID: Very necessary for Adler's argument. […] As for allegory, Adler insists upon its use. His God is all-everything as religions describe.

You seem to think that if you repeat Adler’s beliefs, you are answering the points I raised yesterday, so I will raise them again:

dhw: [...] I have long since agreed that the design theory provides a good case for the existence of God. You don’t need human “unusualness” for that […] We have dealt with “allegory” before, and you agreed that the question is not the meaning of the words we use, but whether they apply to God. “All everything” tells us absolutely nothing: God would then be all-good and all-evil, all-loving and all-hating, omnipotent and powerless, omniscient and totally ignorant.

It is no answer merely to repeat that Adler insists on allegory, and God is “all-everything”!

DAVID: God wanted all of evolution as it happened, because it produced all of the organisms humans can use. […]

dhw: You agreed long ago that “all of evolution” did not produce humans or our food. 99.9% of evolution had no connection with us and our food. […] as follows:

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

DAVID: No. From the 0.1% surviving.

DAVID: More nonsense. The 0.1% required the 99.9% to go extinct!!! Pure Raup.
And:
DAVID: No, descended from the 0.1% survivors who arrived because of 99.9% who went extinct. Stop truncating Raup!

dhw: They did not arrive because 99.9% went extinct. They arrived because there were new conditions which caused the extinctions but allowed for new forms. Extinct species do not produce new species, as you have agreed above (bolded).

DAVID: Again, you are with pure chance to have evolution. Extinct forms are the ancestors of the living. I interpret the bold as you saying dead forms do nothing. Stop the foolishness.

The foolishness is yours, since you agree that we and our food are descended from the 0.1% of survivors, not from the other 99.9%, i.e. our extinct ancestors came from the 0.1% of earlier survivors, as you have confirmed above (bolded).

DAVID: The big difference. I apply God to Raup's discussion, while you are pure chance evolution.

dhw: I am not pure chance. I am an agnostic. You are distorting Raup by applying God to his theory of pure chance.

DAVID: Not distorted as a belief!

Your belief that your God had to design and cull 99.9 out of 100 species irrelevant to his sole purpose is a distortion of Raup’s theory, which does not even mention your God.

Evolution

DAVID: Listen to Adler!! "Divine inscrutability precludes us from ever asking the reason why God does anything".

dhw: So please stop telling us that your God’s one and only reason for creating life was to design us and our food, and his reason for designing 99.9 out of 100 species irrelevant to this purpose was that he was obeying some law which he “inherited” […] And please stop telling us that your God is selfless and certainly not human in any way, since Adler tells you he is all everything, which must include his being 50/50 self-interested and 50/50 endowed with other human attributes […]

DAVID: None of the now bolded is Adler: "God is no way necessitated to create the universe and must be considered as acting freely." from yesterday means He is selfless in creating. You cannot learn about Adler through me, since his teachings upset your preconceived notions about God.

dhw: Your logic is incomprehensible. A God who acts freely is free to indulge in whatever interests him! I don’t wish to argue about what Adler says or means to say. I wish to discuss the various arguments about God’s purpose, methods and nature. I have no preconceived notions about your God, but I offer various theistic alternatives to your own theories. It is you who confess that you “first choose a form of God I wish to believe in. The rest follows.” And the rest is a mass of contradictions which you keep avoiding, even to the extent of quoting Adler and ignoring the implications of what you quote. See above.

DAVID: I fully understand Adler. You don't or don't want to since it upsets your convictions about what a God may be.

I have no “convictions”. You are describing yourself, as bolded above. The question is not whether you understand Adler but whether you can defend the arguments you say he offers. You have agreed there is no “allegory” but the simple question of whether your God does or doesn’t want to be worshipped etc. If he is “all-everything”, he must be good and bad, selfish and selfless etc. Since you fully understand Adler, please tell us what else the word might mean.