Return to David's theory of evolution, theodicy and purposes (Evolution)

by dhw, Wednesday, October 23, 2024, 11:15 (29 days ago) @ David Turell

God and possible purposes
Starting point:

DAVID: Why must [God] have a reason? It is part of your humanizing God.

First you argued nonsensically that “a reason” for an action was not its “purpose”. Secondly, you have always maintained that your God is purposeful. Now you inform us that although your God might not have had a purpose, his purpose was to design humans, which means he did have a purpose.*** When asked what your God’s purpose might have been for creating life and humans, having agreed that your God probably/possibly has thought patterns and emotions like ours, at various times you have listed enjoyment, interest (and avoidance of boredom), a relationship, recognition and worship as possible purposes. Assuming that your God exists, I regard all these “humanizing” proposals of yours as plausible. And I have added the possibility that a free-for-all would have been more interesting for him than a puppet show, or he might have been experimenting in order to make new discoveries or to achieve a particular goal. How do your proposals and mine come to mean that God may be a zombie who has designed all of life with no purpose at all, though his purpose was to create us, and a purposeful God is part of my “humanizing” him?

***DAVID: It is a likely proposition to say humans were His goal/purpose assuming as Adler did, that natural evolution could not have reasonably produced us.

So you and Adler think “natural” evolution could reasonably have produced trilobites, dinosaurs, the early Ediacaran blob etc., do you? You may be right, of course, in which case welcome to atheism. Otherwise, why were all the extinct species not his goal, since "natural" evolution could not have produced them either? I accept the argument that life’s complexities can be seen as evidence for a designer. But you are left with no explanation for the 99.9% of “designs” that had no connection with what you believe was your God’s one and only purpose although he may have had no purpose at all.

DAVID: Your God expresses humanizing wishes constantly. My God is not human in any way.

Your God probably/possibly has human-like thought patterns etc. but he is not human in any way. And you never contradict yourself! You have also said of these possible purposes: “all we can say is all or none of them are possible.” All of them are therefore possible, but you reject them all. Why? Because you have come up with the theory that your God is “selfless”. A selfless God would not want to be worshipped etc., and so although all your proposals and mine are possible, they are not possible. But you never contradict yourself.

DAVID: I don't view them as contradictions.
All our theories are possible, but those you don’t like at any particular time are not possible. Your beliefs are “schizophrenic” (your word) but you never contradict yourself.

99.9% v 0.1%

dhw: Did you really not know that every creature that ever lived included those that lived in the past?

DAVID: All of the 99.9%c extinct created the current 0.1% surviving. A 100% total.

dhw: 99.9% extinct plus 0.1% surviving = 100%. It does not = 99.9% extinct were the mummies and daddies of the 0.1% surviving. Please stop this nonsense.

DAVID: The 0.1% surviving would not be here unless the 99.9% produced them.

The 0.1% surviving would not be here unless their parents had produced them and they and their descendants had produced the next 0.1% of survivors that provide the continuity of evolution, leading to us and our food. No creature on earth will have had 99 sets of different species as its parents. Not even in Texas. We and our food are not descended from 99.9% of all the creatures that ever lived. You have agreed. So please stop this nonsense.