Back to theodicy and David's theories (The nature of a \'Creator\')

by dhw, Friday, April 02, 2021, 14:19 (1121 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: A free-for-all God lacks purpose and is not the image of God I have. The use of totalitarian is bastardizing this discussion as it is not an applicable term in the context you are using. You do not understand how you humanize God in your imagination of Him.

dhw: The lack of purpose argument is a non-starter, as I have shown above. I know you have a different theory. I have no idea what you mean by “bastardizing”, since you insist your God wants to be and is in total control (except when he isn’t, but that’s not his fault) – and I understand perfectly how YOU humanize God (i.e. endow him with thought patterns, emotions and other attributes similar to ours) in a different way from me.

DAVID: I only assume He might have those attributes, while you act as if they are real!

I offer you different theories, which entail him having different attributes from those which you attribute to him, but it is you who insist that yours are real. Hence your continued avoidance of the argument bolded below.

DAVID: My God, from the point of starting this universe fine-tuned-for-life, knew what the endpoint would be.

dhw: Most human designers start out with a purpose and know what the endpoint will be. So how does this come to mean that God the know-all designer is not “human”, whereas a power that designs a mechanism that will produce an endless and unpredictable variety of life forms, developments, events etc. is “very human”?

DAVID: Unpredictable mean uncertain. My purposeful God won't do that. An unpredictable purpose is only that with no foreseen end point or goal. Why can't God have goals?

Your purposeful God, like any human designer, knows exactly what he wants for his endpoint, but according to you, that is NOT human. A purposeful God who creates because he enjoys creating is not acceptable to you, because that is "very human". Of course your God can have goals. So do tell us what you think was his goal when – after designing millions of life forms etc., 99% of which had no connection with humans – he finally got down to designing humans? And while you’re at it, what was his goal in designing bad bugs and viruses? And in making survival depend on organisms eating one another in a constant war? (See “Nasty butterflies”.)

DAVID: Now we know subduction started very early to make this planet just perfect for life. God doesn't always waste time. Sometimes He seems to but that is a humanizing complaint about Him. His timing is obviously what He prefers since He is always in total control. And that easily explains Why God gave us a big brain much earlier than its full use finally happened. Why deny that God knows what He is doing.

dhw: You just did. On the same day: “he is always in total control “, and “It is possible God did not recognize exactly how we would learn to use our brain. We are beyond His control so here is your example of free-rein in action!” But even if he was fully in control, that does not explain why he would have given us extra cells which would prove to be redundant!

DAVID: Minor quibble. God knew exactly what He was doing in granting total free will.

Our subject here is not free will, but since you keep hammering on about purpose. and then grumbling when I try to identify possible purposes, what exactly do you think he was doing in granting free will, i.e. what do you think was his purpose?

DAVID: The extra cells allowed a more exact complexification process is a reasonable view, considering God is a thorough designer as proven by the complexities of living biochemistry.

Your explanation of the “extra cells” is unreasonable, because the extra cells proved to be unnecessary.

QUOTE: Carpediemonas is the first eukaryote known to have lost this large suite of conserved complexes, suggesting that it has a highly unusual cell cycle and that unlike any other known eukaryote, it must rely on a novel set of mechanisms to carry out these fundamental processes.

DAVID: Nothing to add except it will require research to find out how the organism does it. Common descent doesn't always result in sameness. We study mice because there is much that is the same with us.

Yes indeed, if common descent always resulted in sameness, there wouldn’t have been much evolution, would there? Good to hear you talk of “how the organism does it” in the context of its novel set of mechanisms.