New Miscellany 1: evol theories and future; humanization (General)

by dhw, Monday, June 02, 2025, 11:25 (2 days ago) @ David Turell

Evolution and “culling”

DAVID: we certainly might reflect God's aspects. My God knows exactly what He is doing with all- out purpose.

dhw: Thank you for agreeing with what you agreed many moons ago, that your God may have thought patterns and emotions like our own. […]

DAVID: God might create from a set plan that does not include His need for enjoyment, experimentation or even interest, all specifically human attributes.

Of course, you are quite right that when you speculate that your God might enjoy creating (or he wouldn’t do it), might be interested in his creations, might want us to recognize him and worship him, and might love us, and when I speculate that he might prefer a free-for-all to a puppet show, like to make new discoveries, get new ideas, or experiment in order to fulfil a particular purpose (e.g. us and our food), we are endowing him with human attributes and we may be wrong with some or all of them. After all, we don’t even know if he exists. But if you dismiss my speculations because they entail human attributes, you will have to dismiss your own as well. In any case, what is wrong with the concept that creations might reflect certain aspects of their creator? And you have the added problem that your speculations concerning his motive and methods make absolutely no sense to you, whereas mine do. See below.

Transferred from Part 2:

DAVID: I agree it is a poor method of creation, but successive species are improvements over preceding forms despite your confused view of evolution. Evolution results in newer, better forms doesn't it? Yes or no.

dhw: It certainly results in new forms, yes, and homo sapiens represents a massive leap forward when it comes to levels of consciousness and intelligence. Prior to humans, however, I don’t know what are your criteria for “better”. In what way are elephants “better” than dinosaurs, or aquatic whales “better” than their land-based ancestors? When it comes to survival – which is the prime goal of all species – one could argue that bacteria are “better” than the 99.9% of species that came to a dead end. Evolution has clearly produced more complex forms, yes – and if your God is responsible, then your argument clearly favours the theory of experimentation coupled with new ideas as he goes along. It is no defence of your theory that he kept on blundering with “improvements” that had no connection with us and our food.

DAVID: Back to a God who needs to experiment. It is all connected to us humans.

See above for experiments. How can it all be connected to us humans if we are only descended from the 0.1% of survivors, as you have agreed. Stop backtracking.

DAVID: Certainly elephants are safer than dinosaurs and whales are fascinating to study.

I have no idea what you mean by “safer”, and the fact that life forms are fascinating to study applies just as much to dinosaurs as to whales. But the article on human feet might clarify the element of “improvement” , if only you would take off your blinkers. See Part 2.

End of evolution?

DAVID: Our sun has a standard life expectancy. Life will certainly end with its end.

dhw: Indeed, but during the 5 billion or so years before that happens, there could be many new “episodes” of evolution, and therefore it is absurd to announce that “evolution is over”.

DAVID: It is difficult to imagine a different Earth requiring new evolution unless the Earth is struck by a large asteroid, exactly the possibility we are working to avoid. Avoid it and no need for new evolution.

To start with, you couldn’t imagine any new conditions at all. I gave you a list of possibilities: changes to the sun, massive objects smashing into the Earth, human activities (e.g. climate change, nuclear warfare). How can you possibly know that in the next 5 thousand million years, life will remain the same as it is now – same conditions, same species (apart from those we kill off)? Why are you prolonging this discussion when you have already agreed that new “episodes” are possible. If they are possible, then you cannot go on telling us that “evolution is over”!