huckelberry wrote:
Themis , I think there is sufficient objective uncertainty about Gods existence that I have at least a bit of understanding of what you are saying here. On the other hand I am perhaps not agreeing in part because I am not much taken with the idea of YEC making sense. I think it leads to problematic interpretations of the Bible as well as going against evidence.
Certainly YEC doesn't make sense because it goes against the available evidence. Ignoring the evidence we have today though and it does make sense. Original YEC the universe was created in six days with the earth as center of the universe. Creating humans was the prime reason. YEC today makes less sense because they accept some things like the earth not being the center of the universe, and of course so much evidence against a young earth.
I suspect yec inclines some people to see people as needing to return to the perfection of Eden. I do not see that as a productive active or loving goal. It short cuts the possibility of this life being an important creative business which we all participate in. YEC may fit well with such ideas as that this life is a test to winnow out the inferior folks. Instead I think life should be a discovery of our interdependence, a format to enhance that through creative shared exploration. I think the fact that our universe is bigger in space and time than we expect is an invitation from God to grow.
Sure.
In the thread Philo Sofee reply to mikwut on discussion of God, Physics Guy is exploring some portions of the question to my mind quite clearly.
I to have been following this thread.
a relevant quote from him,replying to,
"The universe] is vastly larger and much more wasteful than a God ever needed to make it in order to give life on a planet."
...
Physics Guy replied,
Yes. Blaise Pascal thought about this, and wrote that the eternal silence of those infinite spaces terrified him. He had a definite point. And all those spaces are not even silent. All kinds of stuff is going on out there, on far vaster scales than ours. Why is it there? What's it for? No-one knows.
The immensity of the universe does seem to me like a knock-down argument against the little old man in the sky. We can forget about that guy. But to me that guy never was God in the first place.
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Lots of space, but the problem is not all the space, but why take billions of years to create humans, and why so much wasted dead ends. There is no good explanation that involves God did it, but there is a fantastic one where God was not involved. Evolution of life looks just quite natural based on what we know of it. It's something that doesn't lend itself to fast changes or intelligent design. Intelligent design would only need a fraction of the time to create life, and probably would not go down multiple dead ends or the many imperfections. There is another problem we don't see discussed much, and that is that evolution is not done. Humans are not some end product. Evolution has not end product, and with another million years humans could be different enough to be classified as a different species.
