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

by David Turell , Sunday, November 10, 2024, 19:18 (11 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: You still don't follow my thoughts. You have used reason and purpose synonymously correctly. I am asking for an underlying conceptual reason that creates God's overt action to produce a purpose. Here reason and purpose differ. (dhw’s bold)

dhw: What is the difference between a reason and a conceptual reason, and since when did an action produce a purpose? What are you referring to? You have said that your God’s purpose/reason for creating life was to create us and our food. Next, you want to know the purpose of/reason for this purpose. Schizophrenically you then ask “Why must he have a reason?” and tell us: “There must be an underlying reason for his wish to create us.” The purpose is the reason why you do something. I have repeated the possible reasons/purposes YOU have offered us for his wish to create us and our food. But since you disagree with yourself, please tell us what you think might have been the underlying reason for your God’s wish to create us. And then perhaps you will be able to explain the difference between the reason for which he wished to create us and the purpose for which he wished to create us. If there is no difference (as you have now agreed twice over), then please stop this silly word game.

DAVID: The bold is your word game. Above I've explained we conceptualize a reason for action (purpose) and then act on it. For example, God thought I would like organisms that can recognize me and communicate with me. [dhw: I presume “I” refers to God himself, and not to David Turell!]. He then purposely evolves humans. A two step process, not your one-step.

dhw: Thank you for confirming everything I have been telling you, including two of your own reasons/purposes (recognition and a relationship/communication, which you nullify with your insistence that God is selfless.) The purpose/reason precedes and gives rise to the action. There is no difference between “purpose” and “reason”. So what was all this nonsense about “Why must He have a reason?”, “action to produce a purpose”, and “reason” not being synonymous with “purpose” in this context? And what is this nonsense about “one step”? First you have a purpose or reason, and then you have the action that is meant to fulfil or achieve (not “produce”) the purpose. All agreed and all perfectly straightforward use of language. That should be the end of this silly game.

Still your problem of gluing reason and purpose as one. There are two brain steps in any action. Conceive of the reason for an action and then achieve it purposely. We still look for reasons God produced humans

99.9% v 0.1%

dhw: So you really do believe that 99.9 different species were the mummies and daddies of the 0.1 survivors. I guess they do certain things differently in Texas.

DAVID: My analysis of statistical evolution and yours differ.

dhw: They don’t differ when you agree that we and our food are descended from the 0.1% of survivors, but they differ when you say that we are descended from the 99.9% that produced no survivors although they were the mummies and daddies of the survivors. Please stop this nonsense.

DAVID: I am only following Raup's presentation.

dhw: Once more: please quote the passage in which Raup tells us that the 99.9% of extinct organisms were the mummies and daddies of the 0.1% survivors.

DAVID: Raup opens his book by telling us in evolution 99.9% extinct left the 0.1% alive today. Nothing about your mummies and daddies. Your approach is to slice evolution into yesterday and today as if they were not continuous.

dhw: It’s YOU who told us (October 12 2024): “The 0.1% are the progeny of the 99.9%.” Of course if 99.9% became extinct and only 0.1% survived, the extinct “left” and the survivors remained. And whenever a species goes extinct you have discontinuity, and whenever a species survives you have continuity. Do you or do you not now agree with yourself that we and our food are descended from the 0.1% of survivors, and not from the 99.9% that did not survive?

The bold is correct. Evolution is not discontinuous but a continuous process of producing new species. The discontinuity is part of the continuing process.