Unapologetic Apologists: Why Would GOD Use Evolution?

Great conversation about the GAE, but also ID and why God might use evolution. One of the hosts told me afterwards that the conversation left him far more open to evolution than when we began.

I liked Otangelo’s “question” for just how incredibly… far out it is, and that you managed to characterize it as “not even true exactly”. :rofl:

How does one even come up with a “question” like this?

3.5 million times 365 days times 24 hours times 3500 mutations is 107 trillion 310 billion mutations.

Never mind the galactic absurdity of his numbers, one wonders how Otangelo even obtains a relationship between brain size and mutation count.

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Yeah that was a remarkable question. I hope my answer was clear the the listeners.

I understood it, I can’t speak for anyone else of course.

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rock star photo, keep it…

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I haven’t watched it, but hopefully the answer was ‘Because God is smart and evolution is awesome.’

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@swamidass

You got hit with a lot of good questions. Interesting discussion on image of God and abilities versus vocation.

We have very divergent views on death. There is joy in life in spite of suffering and death - but an atheist could make the same argument against nihilism.

I see death and evil as closely linked. Just as I see evil and hell closely linked

When we elevate our knowledge above what God says is good, God doesn’t just give a punishment that leads to death - I see it as automatic consequence. Built in. I don’t know how to state that in a philosophically correct way.

Proverbs 14:12: There is a way that seems right to a man,
But its end is the way of death.

Proverbs 14:27; The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life,
To turn one away from the snares of death.

I see these proverbs below also as closely linking spiritual death, physical death and sin.

Proverbs 14

The merciful man does good for his own soul,
But he who is cruel troubles his own flesh.
18 The wicked man does deceptive work,
But he who sows righteousness will have a sure reward.
19 As righteousness leads to life,
So he who pursues evil pursues it to his own death.
20 Those who are of a perverse heart are an abomination to the Lord,
But the blameless in their ways are His delight.
21 Though they join [g]forces, the wicked will not go unpunished;
But the posterity of the righteous will be delivered.

I’m not sure how I argue that God is good with the flood or with His commands if I believed differently. If “natural” death is seen as good, anytime God commands to end life “early,” an atheist says that is “bad” similar to what @John_Harshman has argued with me. I see it all as the result of sin that God punishes because he is a good, just God. If I don’t, then I think the atheist actually has a good point that God’s goodness is arbitrary.

Either way, if someone doesn’t want to believe, they will always find an excuse, but I don’t actually want to concede the atheist’s point about a loving God allowing suffering and death personally, because I just don’t think it’s true that it is possible without human sin.

I had other comments on animal death, but they’re probably better on the threads already started.