More miscellany (Evolution)

by David Turell , Friday, July 05, 2024, 20:08 (64 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: The basic answer is proportionality. […] That is how theologians handle it. The Dayenu approach.

dhw: Please stop pretending that all theologians think the same as you. I’ve given you two examples of different theologies (God gave us free will, God wants to punish us for our sins), and you offered a third: God wants to challenge us. It’s no answer to tell us that your all-good God created evil because there’s not enough of it for us to bother discussing it.

DAVID: Allow me to quote to you the standard response to theodicy in the theological literature.

dhw: Who decides what is “standard”, since nobody knows the truth? Why have you ignored my comment above? Have you read every book ever written by every theologian that ever existed? Didn’t you know about the alternatives? Why have you yourself offered an alternative (God wants to challenge us)? Please stop pretending that the answer is not to answer.

I went to several 'standard' theological websites on theodicy. They are all the same. I have no need to do the whole theological universe.

Offshoot from Giraffes

DAVID: Evolution works by culling 99.9%. The resulting 0.1% are a superb result of the process. Why are you complaining? God handled His purpose beautifully.

dhw: According to you, it is not evolution that culls 99.9% but your God, who deliberately designed them, knowing that they were irrelevant and he would have to cull them. You say he handled his purpose imperfectly, messily, cumbersomely and inefficiently, all of which means "beautifully".

You proceeded to ignore this ridiculous contradiction delivered by your Jekyll and Hyde self, and revert to the same silly argument we have dealt with over and over again:

DAVID: Try this interpretation, God handled a messy system of His own choice and produced us, the most complex item in the universe.

dhw: He also deliberately produced 99.9 out of 100 species that had no connection with us, which is why you ridicule his system as being imperfect, messy, cumbersome and inefficient. But you want him and it to be perfect and efficient, so your inner Jekyll and Hyde make you present me and any fellow readers with a theory that is sheer nonsense.

DAVID: Your analysis of evolutionary statistics is sheer nonsense. God deliberately used evolution.

dhw: Still desperately dodging your ridiculous contradictions. Yes, if God exists, he deliberately used evolution. That does not mean we were his sole purpose, or that he deliberately designed and had to cull the 99.9% of irrelevant species – a statistic which leads you to conclude that your perfect and beautifully efficient God is an imperfect, and messily inefficient designer. Jekyll and Hyde.

I repeat: Adler used Darwinian theory to show God's sole purpose were humans. It is simply the logical reverse of Adler's proof of God in his book.

Plants control water in the desert
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/07/240703131733.htm

Crassula muscosa, native to Namibia and South Africa, can transport liquid in selected directions.

DAVID: the plant does not have a brain with which to produce this mechanism. I can't imagine the plant developing this by chance in the desert[…] Design is the answer.

dhw; Two comments from me: firstly, neither plants nor cells have brains, but in March you kindly drew our attention to a book which explicitly champions the theory of both plant and cellular intelligence, harking back to Lynn Margulis’s article entitled “The conscious cell”. You only have to google the question “Are plants intelligent?” and you’ll be surprised at the number of experts who answer yes.
Secondly, if your God’s one and only purpose was to design us and our food, why the heck would he specially design the crassula muscosa and the millions of other plants with their own special methods of survival?
Put your comment together with my own, and you have a an extremely feasible theory: yes, design by intelligent plants is the answer. And maybe plant intelligence was designed by your God.

And maybe God designed the DNA directions to help this desert plant in its ecosystem helping the insects there with water supply.