Concepts of God: how I think about God (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by David Turell @, Friday, April 08, 2016, 02:31 (2911 days ago) @ dhw

DAVID: I look at the available evidence from God's works to arrive at my conclusions, and I see purpose everywhere, because I look for it. Circular I admit, but productive.
> 
> dhw: An admirably honest assessment of your own thought processes, but that does not give you the right to dismiss other ideas as “out and out wrong”.-I am too forceful in my statements. 'Out and out wrong' is my view of the approach. you certainly have the right to propose what you will.-> dhw: And although it was you who used the term “voyeur”, I still don't know why it can't be applied to someone who according to you is intensely interested but keeps himself concealed.-I am using the word voyeur in its derogatory sense of spying on someone without their permission or knowledge.-> dhw; My objection is to your “out and out wrong”, because I don't like to see you using the same intolerantly irrational level of argument as the fundamentalists of all creeds. -Explained above. -> David: Doesn't change my approach. You don't think in teleological terms at all.
> 
> 
> dhw: Not so. I try to consider all possibilities, and if God exists, I would very much like to know his purpose in creating life. The hypothesis that he did so in order to relieve his eternal boredom is teleological. It is a hypothesis, not a belief, but in all honesty I must say I find it more rational than the hypothesis that he wants a relationship with us and yet conceals himself from us.-The gap in your reasoning is because you do not accept the fact that the arrival of humans is an very extraordinary and unnecessary event from an evolutionary endpoint. We should not be here, unless God intervened. Relationship with Him requires faith.
> 
> DAVID: "Concept of God" is for me a strange way of approaching God. Very analytic but is it a search for evidence? I don't think so.
> 
> dhw: It is perfectly possible to consider the evidence for and against the existence of God and at the same time to hypothesize about his nature (if he exists) by studying what he has created. You have drawn one conclusion from such studies; others may draw different conclusions.-Just so! He created humans. I don't see how they can be a glorious accident, per Gould. He was convinced and I'm quoting him, that if the tape of evolution was run over again, we would not appear! You do not want to accept that we are that degree of special, thus our degree/ kind battle.


Complete thread:

 RSS Feed of thread

powered by my little forum