Balance of nature: human and theological implications (Introduction)

by David Turell , Monday, January 20, 2025, 19:43 (1 day, 14 hours, 9 min. ago) @ dhw

DAVID: Poisoning air and soil is more alarmist propaganda.

dhw: Does this mean you think we should go on indefinitely cutting down the forests etc.? (We needn’t go into the details of how modern fertilizers, pesticides and other chemical aids are poisoning air, soil and water. Just answer the question, please.)

dhw: The fact that the changes will be difficult does not prove that it is OK to continue present practices. Please answer my question above.

DAVID: I think I did.

dhw: Your answer was that agricultural methods are not poisoning air and soil. You have not told us if you think we should continue to cut down the forests etc.

Yes, with good conservation methods, replanting as we cut. Follow the principal of fallowing fields. Gradually finding reasonable substitutes for fresh lumber, etc.

Transferred from “erectus", which I think we can leave now:

DAVID: You spew alarmist propaganda and my answer is we can go very slow in any possible mitigation.

dhw: Neither of us is an expert in the field, but if you really believe that the current pollution of our waters, deforestation, the burning of fossil fuels and the noxious gases from current forms of transport (and agricultural methods) are harmless, then so be it. If you recognize the damage they are causing even now, would that not be sufficient reason to replace “very slow” with “as fast as possible”?

What is wrong with slowly changing?? The apocalypse is not here, while you think it is alarmistically

Theology

Symbiosis

DAVID: I know the difference as I see it. Agnosticism grudgingly suggests a God might exist.

dhw: You have just agreed that “no one knows!” Agnostics accept that no one knows, and we can see the logic and the non-logic behind the choices made by theists and atheists. In our discussions, I offer various alternative theories, which include God as the designer – the intelligent cell being one of them. There is no “grudgingly”. But you stick to your own illogical theories (e.g. anthropocentric evolution, an all-powerful but inefficient designer, an all-good creator of evil (theodicy), selfless but might want to be worshipped), and you pretend that my alternatives, such as an experimenting God or a God who enjoys creating, or learns as he goes along, are atheistic!

DAVID: You always create a humanized God, never a real God-like figure.

dhw: How the heck do you know the “real” God? You agree that your God probably has human thought patterns and emotions, but in any case, a “humanized” God is still a God, so how can you claim that my theories demonstrate a “grudging” acceptance that God might exist? They simply offer a different version from your illogically all-powerful, all-knowing, messy, cumbersome and inefficient blunderer.

A very humanized version.

God and evolution: weaverbirds

dhw: You insist that your God designed the weaverbird’s nest. Do you believe that other birds had the intelligence to design their own nests?

DAVID: Yes, simple dish style.

dhw: Excellent news. You accept that your God must have given most avian cell communities the autonomous intelligence to design their own nests. Any idea why he might have chosen weaverbirds for special tuition during his single-minded quest to design us and our food?

Their complex knot styles require deep mechanical understanding of knot designs.