Miscellany (General)

by dhw, Friday, February 12, 2021, 11:22 (1163 days ago) @ David Turell

Spiders lasso

dhw: […] why shouldn’t your God experiment, and why shouldn’t he learn from each new step he takes, and since he is supposed to be a unique being, why should he not create things in order to have something outside himself that he can be interested in?

DAVID: Same human comparisons. God knows His goals all along with purpose. Again He has to find interests just like us humans in your humanizing view of Him.

dhw: Same silly objection to his having human characteristics although according to you he probably/possibly has human characteristics. Of course if he exists he has a purpose. But all you can think of is that every life form is/was “part of the goal of evolving humans”. Hence your illogical theory of evolution dealt with on the other thread. Creating something of interest is a purpose.

DAVID: Notice you've invented a very minor purpose at that.

So once more, please tell us why you think your interested God created all the life forms, including humans, and their food supplies.

Fin to limb genes

DAVID: Easier to take first hand control then drawing up second hand instructions.

dhw: I am asking why it would be easier for your God to directly design millions and millions of programmes, and directly perform millions and millions of operations, than to sit back and watch the different life forms design their own programmes and perform their own operations.

DAVID: A pure directionless view of evolution.

dhw: That does not explain why it is easier to perform a million operations than to give the task to the life forms themselves. And what direction do you see in the 99% of individually designed, extinct life forms that had no connection with humans although humans were your God's one and only purpose, or in the directly designed bad bacteria and viruses that cause so much suffering?

DAVID: Answered in my new entry on DNA pre-planning.

Totally irrelevant to the questions I am asking. But I’ll rephrase them for you: what direction do you see in the 99% of preplanned, extinct life forms that had no connection with humans although humans were your God's one and only purpose, or in the preplanned bad bacteria and viruses that cause so much suffering?

EGNOR ON FREE WILL

dhw: As usual, Egnor only tells half the story. His approach is all about dualism versus materialism.

DAVID: Sorry. I thought the mirror approach interesting.

dhw: There are lots of things that are interesting, but you raised the subject of Egnor on free will, and then ignored my response. I thought you wanted to discuss or even defend his viewpoint.

DAVID: I like Egnor's reasoning. You have a different approach I do not accept as a proper form of dualism as I view it.

His subject was free will, and he totally ignored the cause-and-effect argument against free will.

Highest speed claw snapping

dhw: What I would like to know is why your God would specially design all this claw-snapping if his only purpose was to design H. sapiens. Do you think high-speed claw snapping is an essential part of our food supply?

DAVID: Part of all ecosystems in its own system.

dhw: Yes, every life form that ever lived is/was part of its ecosystem. No connection whatsoever to the theory that every life form is/was “part of the goal of evolving humans”.

DAVID: Ignoring the need for food for all provided by the huge straggly bush.

dhw: Every life form has to have food. But according to you every life form is/was “part of the goal of evolving humans”. So please tell us whether you think claw-snapping is part of the goal of evolving humans or of supplying food to humans.

DAVID: Part of the always necessary food supply as I've stated. Each tiny econiche system supports other larger systems thus providing food for all. Without an energy supply chain life disappears.

Yes, we know that, and that has always been the case with every life form that ever existed. So do you think that 3.8 billion years ago your God pre-planned claw-snapping, or popped in to construct a special claw-snapability in order to provide humans with their food supply? My question is serious, because the only alternatives to your theory are random mutations and cellular intelligence.