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

by David Turell , Friday, April 02, 2021, 17:13 (1121 days ago) @ dhw

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”?

Your 'God' is a weak form of mine, allowing a free-for-all which has no predictable ending.

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?

dhw: 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”.)

God certainly allowed a war between organisms, since all have to eat. As for God's possible human attributes, of course, there are obvious comparisons at a superficial level, since we deal with God's personality in allegorical terms. As for His goal, we are it.

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

dhw: 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?

He didn't make us automatons, because in that way we would never have shown progress in our development. Freedom of thought allows us to advance by ourselves. In that way we would come to recognize Him, not for adulation which He doesn't need or want, but understanding what He has created. I believe that is enough for Him.

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.

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

Extra cells allowed for a more exact form of complexification, by allowing a larger variety of axonal connections from a larger variety if neurons.

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.

Well, it has some sort of God-given mechanism yet to be discovered.