The Simplicity Of God
It's been quite some time since I've seen an argument regarding Divine Simplicity. Although what I'm about to say will turn on the word "simplicity", I must clarify that the simplicity I'm going to discuss is god's intelligence. I'm going to try and prove that god is a simpleton, a simpleton herein meaning a being that far from being a genius is actually possessed of only child-like intelligence, even apish I might add.
Life, in many ways, is the crowning glory of the being, if such a being exists, that created this universe. It remains unexplained despite the breadth and depth of current scientific knowledge which, for some, begs the interpretation that it (life) is the work of a genius, a mind possessed of vast, unimaginable intelligence. Such a view jibes with the standard notion of god as an omniscient being.
The scientific theory of evolution states that the fundamental principle all life obeys is trial and error i.e. genetic mutations are randomly initiated and those that confer a survival advantage are selected for in what is but a dance of chance.
Trial and error is a bona fide problem solving technique as attested here but it's a method that according to the article is "Nevertheless, this method is often used by people who have little knowledge in the problem area" i.e. it doesn't display understanding as much as other more advanced problem solving techniques do.
So, if god exists and he's the one behind all creation in general, evolution in particular, and if his preferred method is trial and error, it must be that good is not a genius who understands the ins and outs of creation and life but is actually a simpleton as herein defined.
Comments...
Life, in many ways, is the crowning glory of the being, if such a being exists, that created this universe. It remains unexplained despite the breadth and depth of current scientific knowledge which, for some, begs the interpretation that it (life) is the work of a genius, a mind possessed of vast, unimaginable intelligence. Such a view jibes with the standard notion of god as an omniscient being.
The scientific theory of evolution states that the fundamental principle all life obeys is trial and error i.e. genetic mutations are randomly initiated and those that confer a survival advantage are selected for in what is but a dance of chance.
Trial and error is a bona fide problem solving technique as attested here but it's a method that according to the article is "Nevertheless, this method is often used by people who have little knowledge in the problem area" i.e. it doesn't display understanding as much as other more advanced problem solving techniques do.
So, if god exists and he's the one behind all creation in general, evolution in particular, and if his preferred method is trial and error, it must be that good is not a genius who understands the ins and outs of creation and life but is actually a simpleton as herein defined.
Comments...
Comments (53)
... and I thank you. I simply don't have the time or skills to be a god. ;)
(sorry the joke, but it was simply set up too well, please go back to the real conversation. I like to read.)
A few thoughts in reply, hopefully relevant...
1) I like a theory that space is God, that everything arises from nothing, for reasons unknown. In one way of looking at it, nothing is about as simple as it gets.
2) I'm quite skeptical of discussing God's intelligence.
First, that presumes that God is a "thing" which would thus have properties, a phenomena divided from other phenomena. I prefer a "God as Everything" theory, which suggests God is not a thing, but a container of all things. In this theory, God would not have a particular set of properties, but would contain all properties. We can see this in the Jehovah character for example, who seems quite contradictory as a result.
Next, our understanding of intelligence is derived from an extremely small sample of reality, life on a single planet in one of billions of galaxies. I think we're making the usual human mistake of trying to map this very local phenomena on to the most fundamental nature of everything everywhere, probably a spectacular logic failure.
To me, the most promising method of investigating God theories is to shift the focus to that which is generating the theories, thought. We are observing all of reality through the medium of thought, so whatever the properties of thought may be will have a profound influence upon the observation. As example...
Thought operates by dividing the real world in to conceptual objects. So for example, we see the noun as the building block of language. Because we are not only using thought, but are ourselves made of thought, we assume reality is made up of things (ie. divisions), and thus assume God is one of those things. And then from there we attempt to define the God thing, assigning it particular properties as we would any thing.
My guess is that the divisions we perceive everywhere we look are a property of the tool being used to make the observation, not a property of what is being observed. Almost all of theology may be built upon such an error.
Also, it took Him millions of years to figure it out... He can't be that bright.
Quoting Mayor of Simpleton Read above
Quoting Hippyhead
:ok: I wonder though, if nothing is simple, why do people have difficulty discussing it?
Quoting Hippyhead
:ok:
Quoting Hippyhead
:ok:
Quoting Hippyhead
:ok:
Your issue is with what can be broadly termed as anthropomorphism. Indeed, once we begin to look beyond our planet and our solar system, we must think twice before we bring our earth-centric perspective to bear on matters that are galactic in nature.
Nevertheless, we can't hold our anthropomorphism or more accurately earth-centrism against us if only for the reason that that's all we have to go on. Plus we need a very good reason to believe things could be radically different in other parts of the universe, a reason that seems hard to come up with. All the evidence seems to suggest that physics, chemistry, ergo, biology, should be the same everywhere in the universe. I say this because I heard that the most common elements in the universe are carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, and hydrogen - the fundamental constituents of life on earth. Ergo, isn't it likely that life elsewhere in the universe will evolve in a manner similar to that on earth?
Coming to the matter of god's intelligence, notwithstanding the fact that it counts as anthropomorphism at some level, I only ask that you embrace the inherent anthroporphism, be human, be an earthling, be who you are instead of trying to view the issue from a galactic perspective, a perspective of which you haven't the slightest idea.
Quoting Coben
You made a good point. What of the so-called laws of nature? Don't they evidence a prodigious intellect? Yet, taking into account the fact that life is the pièce de résistance of god's creation, it's reliance on a method (trial and error) that's so simple that even animals and toddlers use it doesn't jibe with a conception of god as a supreme genius capable of creating universes.
As mortals, we cannot understand the God force. If anything, seeing it as a source, is one way of seeing the divine. I find Fritjof Capra's book God and the New Physics very helpful.
As far as the 'simpleton' part, the problem may really be about how we expect God to behave, especially if we perceive God as wholly God. What about the shadow side of God? This matter is dealt with in depth in Jung's book Answer to Job.
According to some theists it is the pièce de résistance of god's creation, mainly the Abrahamists, others not so much. But why does the magnificance of what we look at - the vast array of life on the planet - become less if a simple set of heuristics (and some rather incredibly complicated molecules) are what led to it. IOW one could argue that only a genius could find a simple process that would lead to such diversity. Whereas some lesser deity would have to have many more processes and complicated interventions and so on.
IOW if two extremely talented inventors (engineers) came to a company, each with a device that could do something very useful and complicated and one inventor had a very elegant simple set of programming, say, and the other had extremely complicated programming in this device, we would like think the one who managed to create a device with the same functions off a simpler set of processes is the better inventor, the greater genius.
If creation is wondrous, I don't see how having a simpler set of processes that led to it, takes anything away from the wonder of it, nor from the genius of the maker.
And just to repeat: to get something to 'learn' via trial and error what nature has learned is incredible - note I am not making a case for God, just noticing what an incredible result we have. And DNA is an incredible molecule and not a simple one. And trial and error led to the creation of minds that use more than trial and error, so if this was made by a deity, that deity chose a simple elegant solution to create something incredible. That to me is a sign of skill and it would be seen as a skill in science, business, art, whereever. The most skilled workers come up with elegant simple solutions if they can. If the process itself then leads to whatever the goal is, the simplicity is not leading to any loss, and it is likely easier and cheaper, but at root it shows mastery.
If I invent a robot that I have to constantly tell what to do, it is less effective than one that I can just set in motion once and it learns and does what I want it to. The former robot/supervisor heuristic is more complicated, but less elegant and a sing of a poorer product.
I've been trying to explain that. 1) It's because evolution has trained our minds to focus on things, the predator, the potato. 2) It's because thought operates by dividing reality in to conceptual parts. Nothing is not a part, nothing has no parts, it can't be subdivided, categorized and labeled etc. So our mind doesn't know what to do with it.
Quoting TheMadFool
Ok, but the God question is beyond galactic. It's a collection of theories about the most fundamental nature of everything everywhere. So it's kind of absurd to try to take a very local concept like intelligence, which is useful for comparing humans to donkeys, and map it on to phenomena the scale of gods.
However, the very absurdity of such an operation is useful in that it reveals how hopelessly flawed the God debate is. And, how hopelessly inept are those considered expert on the subject. When this is seen and faced, the entire structure of the God conversation including all arguments for and against etc collapses in to a pile of pointless dung. And then we have nothing. Which as it turns out, is perhaps the best representation of reality we can get.
Quoting TheMadFool
I'll pass on the anthropomorphism, and have already agreed I haven't the slightest idea. Not having the slightest idea, and knowing that to be true, is not a defeat. Once all the fantasy knowings are off the table that creates an opportunity to approach such issues with an open quiet mind, a psychological state which is more like reality than any philosophy. This should be appealing to those, like many atheists for example, who want their perspectives to be grounded in observation of reality. If one is trying to understand reality, and reality is overwhelmingly nothing....
Quoting TheMadFool
I have no idea. And anyway, the God concept typically has nothing to do with species on other planets.
There are two parts to this:
1. Human-level understanding, something I've tried to do in my OP
2. God-level understanding, which is, in likelihood, as you seem to be suggesting, something we won't be able to achieve
Quoting Coben
:ok: It's something that hasn't escaped my notice but be mindful that you used the word "simple" and substituted "diversity" for the word most often used viz. "complexity" when people describe the universe. Are you trying to avoid a contradiction here?
I guess it depends on whether the complexity evident in the universe is part of god's plan. If it is then he truly is a being of incommensurable intelligence but if it isn't then so much for god's intelligence. A clue to decide which of these possibilities is true can be found in the many design flaws our bodies have.
Quoting Coben
So, you agree then that there are better ways to create universes.
By the way, a trial and error method as a survival process for life only makes sense if the environment that imposes selection pressure is not something that god has control over. God, perforce, has to make life adapt to changing milieu that can come in the form of slow climate change or sudden asteroid impacts. Either god is playing a macabre game with us, something the faithful will vehemently deny, or there are certain variables in creation that are out of his divine hands. If one runs with the latter possibility, we have a being that hasn't quite figured the nuts and bolts of creating universes capable of harboring life.
:up: :ok:
The idea of nothing seems germane to my thesis; after all, trial and error as a method seems closer to an absence of a creator than a presence of one.
If if not
Everything I got
But that is not
Ergo, I if a lot
:grin: Sorry, bad at punctuation and worse at grammar. Thanks for your comment though.
:rofl:
It depends on the values of that deity. It depends on whether the deity is omnipotent or not. I don't think what we consider flaws means that God is not incredibly intelligent, since we don't know God's goals, at least those of us who don't nor God's value.Quoting TheMadFoolIf God set the whole thing rolling then he set both nature and nurture in motion.Quoting TheMadFool
Or the deity has values that are the same as ours or value that are similar but the deity can see more deeply into the consequences. Or there is a demiurge situation. Or the deity is not completely infallible. The Abrahamics have trouble with the idea of a fallible deity or a deity that is also learning, but other religions do not.
But now we seem to be rolling into a variety of arguments, more or less under the Problem of Evil baliwick. I hadn't encountered the simplicity problem before and was mainly interested in that.
God, creator, supreme being, supernatural entity. These are nouns. Like all nouns they presume the existence (or non-existence) of some separate phenomena, a thing, with properties which define that thing, and thereby divide it from other phenomena.
Centuries of debate arise regarding what the properties of such a thing called God might be. Such discussions are almost always built upon an unexamined assumption that a God should be considered a thing with properties, even if the only property is non-existence.
What if God is not a thing?
Quoting Hippyhead
The question doesn't make sense. God has to be something, right? The alternative to something is nothing and if god is nothing, it's just a fancy way of saying god doesn't exist.
As @Coben pointed out for our benefit God, if he exists, didn't employ only the trial and error method in the creation of the universe; after all, there are the laws of nature - fixed patterns in matter-energy interactions - that stand testament to that fact. Perhaps given the laws of nature, the trial and error method is best for life.
Furthermore, from a scientific and mathematical perspective, simplicity, especially one that packs a powerful punch like in our universe, is a mark of genius. Has anyone done any research on whether there are any redundancies in the universe in terms of unnecessary laws, processes, etc. insofar as life is concerned? Basically, could the universe have begun simpler without affecting its existing, or precluding even more, complexity ? If that were not possible then it bespeaks prodigious brainpower. If, on the other hand, the birth of universes can be simplified further it means 1. simplicity wasn't achieved and/or 2. simplicity didn't figure among the priorities and both indicate a dull mind if nothing else.
Right, it doesn't make sense to because 1) our minds have been trained by evolution to focus on things, and 2) thought works by dividing reality in to conceptual objects (ie. things).
The fact that a theory that God is perhaps not a thing doesn't make sense to us is not a very important piece of evidence given our built-in bias for things, and how incredibly small we are in relation to reality as a whole. The Internet doesn't make sense to your dog. So what??
Quoting TheMadFool
If the overwhelming vast majority of reality can be a nothing (or perhaps relative nothing) why would God be required to be a something?
Quoting TheMadFool
Does space exist? Space is very clearly real, but to our knowledge it has none of the properties we use to define existence such as mass, weight, shape, form, color etc. Math is also clearly real, and also clearly does not exist. According to science all of reality arose from nothing, or something very close to nothing. So, sorry, no. A theory that God is nothing does not automatically equal atheism.
I would ask the following of readers:
1) The Nature Of Thought: Shift much of your focus from the content of thought (this idea vs. that idea) to the nature of thought, how it works. When you see that thought operates by dividing reality in to conceptual objects, it will become clear that this is an important form of built-in bias which affects all observations.
In this case it may be that thought insists on turning God in to a conceptual object, a thing, because that's how thought interacts with all phenomena, divide and label. The division we presume to be between "God" and "non-God" may be a property of the tool being used to make the observation, and not a property of what is being observed. As example, if we look at the world while wearing tinted sunglasses, everything we observe will appear to be tint colored.
2) Space: The overwhelming vast majority of reality at every scale is space. If our goal is to develop understandings grounded in observation of reality, then space should be our primary focus. It's not our primary focus because of the built-in bias for division and "things" referenced above in item #1.
It seems reasonable to consider whether God may not be a thing in reality, but instead reality itself. If true, then God would be real, while being overwhelmingly what we typically refer to as nothing.
For the 99th time, I would like to respectfully suggest we try dropping the "does God exist or not" paradigm. The vast majority of reality does not tidily fit in to the "exists or not" paradigm, clear evidence suggesting that a God would not necessarily be limited to "exists or not".
My own guess is that the simplistic dualistic "exists or not" framework is our mind's way of trying to map it's own limitations on to all of reality.
That aside, I would like to draw your attention to the difference between nothing and space with an illustration. Take the life of your average person on the street. Let's call this person Smith. Say Smith is born in 1930 and dies in 2020 living a full life of 90 years. You can graph Smith's worldline - it'll begin 1900 and end 1990. The question is "where was Smith before 1930 and where will Smith be after 2020?". My personal take on Smith's whereabouts is 1) he doesn't exist, is nothing, before 1930 and after 2020, and 2) he wasn't in space-time pre-1930 and isn't in space-time post-2020. Basically nonexistence, nothingness, is something completey beyond space and time. So, even if it's true that we can't speak of space as existing, it doesn't mean nothing can be equated to space.
Coming to the matter of how our mind operates,
[quote=Abraham Maslow]I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.[/quote]
My rejoinder to Maslow would be,
[quote=TheMadFool]If everything is a nail, might as well have a hammer[/quote]
Offer me a third option then.
Space. The vast majority of reality. Does not neatly fit in to either the "exists" or "not exists" category.
Explained this now about 100 times in a number of threads across the forum.
Generally agreed, and this is why I often include the alternate descriptor of "relative nothing" to describe space.
Anyway, the point is that space doesn't have the properties we usually use to define existence. And yet it is real. Thus, any conversation which assumes that the only options for God are exist vs. not-exist would seem to be blatantly ignoring evidence from the vast majority of reality. It seems useful to observe a few things here.
1) First, blatantly ignoring observations of reality would seem to be a serious heresy for atheists.
2) Second, we might observe how almost all of the leading "experts" on all sides of the God question have long assumed without questioning that a God can only exist or not exist. And we might observe how we blindly follow them in to what seems an obvious error.
Sorry, I don't follow. I've been trying to wrap my head around the idea of existence for as long as I can remember with nothing to show for it.
That you mentioned about how god could be nothing is pertinent to the problem I'm grappling with because god, majority opinion says, is immaterial and the sticking point here is that existence is defined in material terms.
We say that something exists if and only if it's detectable through our senses and their extensions, instruments but this is also the definition of the material.
In other words, existence = material for all intents and purposes. This is a serious setback for someone who wants to claim that god is both immaterial and that god exists for it's a contradictio in terminis. The same difficulty arises when we say god is nothing.
Perhaps we need to create subcategories for the notion of detectability like so:
1. Detectable by the senses and instruments = material existence
2. Detectable by means other than the senses and instruments = immaterial existence type 1
3. Undetectable by any means whatsoever = immaterial existence type 2
I don't know. What's your take on this?
Furthermore, your view on space is also relevant to my problem. Space, as every schoolboy knows, isn't material in that it has no mass, can't be perceived with our senses and so on but it's something we're very familiar with - from the emptiness of our favorite cup to the vacuum of outer space, we encounter space almost constantly in our lives.
Contrast the above [over]familiarity with space to our complete ignorance of or difficulty understanding what nothing is or means. If you ask me, it points to a difference, real or not I'm not sure, between space and nothing. What do you think?
Existence = made of atoms.
Quoting TheMadFool
"Existence" is a human concept which is useful in our everyday lives at human scale. A pencil exists on my desk. Even though the pencil overwhelmingly consists of non-existence, at human scale we need not concern ourselves with such details.
The problem would seem to arise when we attempt to map these local scale human concepts on to vastly different scales. And so we argue for centuries whether God exists or not, as if God is or isn't a thing, equivalent to a pencil.
Observation of reality seems to offer a way out of this very tired box. Space illustrates that a phenomena can be real without meeting our definition of existence. At the least this might teach us that we can stop clinging stubbornly to the widely shared assumption that a God is required to exist, or not exist, one or the other.
Quoting TheMadFool
Who cares about contradictions in terms? These are rules created by infinitely small half insane creatures, so it's not likely they are binding upon all of reality including any gods that may be contained within.
What do I think? If there is something such as God, human thought would be unlikely to be able to grasp such a unifying phenomena, given that human thought operates by a process of division. As example, the word God is a noun, and like all nouns it presumes some phenomena which is separate from other phenomena. So every time we type the word God we are reinforcing our built-in bias towards thinking of God as a thing. And so we argue for centuries regarding whether that thing exists or not.
:ok:
Quoting Hippyhead
:ok:
Quoting Hippyhead
A pencil doesn't have atoms?
Quoting Hippyhead
Space doesn't have atoms.
Quoting Hippyhead
So, god isn't made of atoms or is he? If you're going to compare god to space then, it must be that god isn't atom-based and so, as per your definition, god doesn't exist and he's real because you believe space is real. In short, you believe god doesn't exist but god is real. :chin:
Of course it has atoms, but the pencil overwhelmingly consists of space, like everything else. You know, an atom is mostly space.
Quoting TheMadFool
Right. And so space doesn't meet our definition of existence, as it has no mass or weight etc. But as we seem to all agree, space is nonetheless real.
Quoting TheMadFool
I don't believe anything about god one way or the other.
I'm examining the God debate.
1) We can observe how there is near universal agreement between theists and atheists that a God either exists, or not, one or the other.
2) We can observe that this either/or, exists or not, one or the other assumption at the heart of the God debate is false. "Exists" and "doesn't exist" are not the only options. Space illustrates that a phenomena can both: 1) not meet our definition of existence, and 2) be real.
What I see happening is that we've attempted to map a simplistic dualistic "exists or not" paradigm which is useful in our everyday human scale lives, on to an entirely different scale such as we enter when discussing the most fundamental nature of everything everywhere, ie. God theories.
95%+ of God theories and debate by both amateurs and professionals are built upon the "exists or not" assumption. Most commentators focus all their attention on achieving a rhetorical victory on that battlefield. If we 1) disengage from the either/or battlefield, and 2) instead look at the either/or assumption those battles are built upon, and 3) discover that assumption is wrong, then....
We have liberated ourselves from the God debate in it's usual form.
And, we have liberated ourselves from authority, given that most authority figures on all sides take the either/or, exists or not, one or the other assumption at the heart of the God debate to be an obvious given not meriting our attention. In other words, the emperor has no clothes, the authority figures on all sides don't really know what they're talking about. They are probably authorities because they have the knack for projecting that image.
Given that the God debate has failed to produce anything but more of the same for at least 500 years, liberating ourselves from this proven failure, and those leading it, seems a step in the right direction.
If we want to be totally exhaustive, there is also the possibility that there exist several gods.
1. Evolution operates under a principle of trial and error, a primitive form of problem-solving.
2. God is the creator of the universe and fashioned it to his liking.
3. If God is the creator of the universe and fashioned it to his liking and evolution operates under a principle of trial and error, which is a primitive form of problem-solving, then it follows that God is not intelligent.
4. Therefore, God is not intelligent.
Assuming the above is an accurate recreation of your argument, premise three is very contentious. There are two objections that come to my mind. First, one could argue that creation may not necessarily wholly reflect what God is or what God is capable of. Reflecting on metaphysics is illuminating on this point. The ontology of this world is limited and does not contain all possible objects, states of affairs, etc. Even a quick survey of logical space reveals that this universe is lacking in so much or could have been quite different. If one tried to determine God’s capabilities through just this universe, then it would appear that God is limited. However, when one considers all that is possible, then it begins to look as if God’s capabilities are much greater than one would suspect from just looking at the actual world. Second, even if one assumes that this world is the only actual world, it could still reflect a God who is intelligent. See, if God is the creator of the universe, then everything in the universe, whether known or unknown, would have to have its origins in God. The sciences, logic, technological and everything else would be created by God. Given how complex the above items are, I doubt that one would object that such items are demonstrations are mindlessness or simplicity.
Trial and error is a technique used by simpletons.
Trial and error is involved in evolution.
If God created human beings, then God created evolution.
If God created human beings, then God used trial and error.
So, If God created human beings, then God is a simpleton.
Regarding premises 3 and 4, I don’t see how God could have created evolution, but not the process by which evolution exists. What I mean when I say this is that is it not possible for God to have created trial and error when he created human beings? If that’s the case, then couldn’t God have just created evolutionary human beings just for kicks and giggles? Could He not have just created us as some sort of entertainment to watch how we develop if he gives us the tools to develop on our own like trial and error? I don’t see how the existence of evolution entails that God is a simpleton because there is no evidence provided in this argument that God had no other option or couldn’t create us as fully developed human beings had He wanted to. Furthermore, even if God had to use trial and error through evolution to create us, could that really classify Him as a simpleton? There is an entire universe of unknown things and we have only scratched the surface of one small planet in the universe. It seems that if God were a simpleton, then we would be even lower than simpletons, and if that were the case I don’t think any of us would even be alive at this point. I think the best conclusion you could draw from this sort of reasoning is that God might not be omniscient.
In your recent post you made the following claim:
Such a view jibes with the standard notion of god as an omniscient being. The scientific theory of evolution states that the fundamental principle all life obeys is trial and error i.e. genetic mutations are randomly initiated and those that confer a survival advantage are selected for in what is but a dance of chance. Trial and error is a bona fide problem solving technique as attested here but it's a method that according to the article is "Nevertheless, this method is often used by people who have little knowledge in the problem area" i.e. it doesn't display understanding as much as other more advanced problem solving techniques do. So, if god exists and he's the one behind all creation in general, evolution in particular, and if his preferred method is trial and error, it must be that good is not a genius who understands the ins and outs of creation and life but is actually a simpleton as herein defined.
I think your argument has this form:
1) If God created the world, then God used trial and error to create all living beings.
2) If God used trial and error, then he used a simple solution that is often used by people who do not know a lot about what they are doing.
3) If he used a simple solution that is often used by people who do not know a lot about what they are doing, then God does not know a lot about creation.
4) If God does not know a lot about creation, then God is a simpleton without the quality of omniscience.
5) Therefore, if God created the world, then God is a simpleton without the quality of omniscience (from 1, 2, 3, 4 via a hypothetical syllogism)
If this argument works, it presents a challenge to the omniscience of God, which could cause problems for commonly held theistic beliefs. I have a few objections to this argument: First, most theistic accounts of creation do not depict God as having used trial and error to create the world. Living organisms do evolve according to natural selection, but they were designed to do that. God himself did not utilize trial and error to create livings organisms even if he did program those organisms to do so. This makes premise one questionable. Second, premise three is objectionable too. Even if God used trial and error to create living beings, and even if trial and error is often used by people with little knowledge about something, it does not then follow that God does not know a lot about creation. This would be like saying that if I use spell-check, and there are people that use spell-check that do not know a lot about grammar or writing, then I do not know a lot about grammar or writing. Just because God uses the same method as simpletons would not make him therefore a simpleton. Because premise 1 and 3 are objectionable, the argument does not succeed.
Sincerely,
Joel
A couple of things to consider:
1. I'm not entirely sure why I did what I did - treat evolution as god's handiwork. The usual thing to do is to treat evolution as a counterpoint against god. I suppose most people are under the impression that if god created the universe, every object, including living organisms, must've come into existence fully formed i.e. there shouldn't be simpler forms preceding the current incarnations of organisms like Darwinian evolutionary stages. In other words the mainstream view seems to be that evolution disproves god and to incorporate evolution as part of god's creative act is a contradictio in terminis.
However, this - divine evolution (god was behind evolution) - is a contradictio in terminis only if evolution is, in fact, a simple process. I did try and make the case that it is by pointing out that the underlying mechanism in Darwin's theory of life is trial and error, an extremely simple problem solving technique which bespeaks a novice tinkering around in faers garage rather than an expert creating faers magnum opus in a state-of-the-art workshop.
Is evolution really a simple process based on trial and error? I recall making a point of mentioning that a trial and error technique maybe the best if there's an element of randomness in the environment as is the case to my reckoning. In other words, trial and error may actually be a sign of superior intelligence rather than an inferior one.
2. In continuation, therefore, the alleged simplicity of Darwnian evolution - it being trial and error - is questionable to say the least. This is probably why I, unwittingly but not erroneously, treated evolution as god's handiwork - there is no contradiction in doing so.
This, nonetheless, doesn't help me in my attempt to prove god's simplicity. In fact, by proving the complexity in evolution and then ascribing it to god, I've essentially shot myself in the foot [or so it seems].
It's time to revisit the element of randomness I talked about for it's the only thing that makes trial and error a mark of intelligence rather than idiocy. Why does randomness exist and what is its relationship with god's omniscience? Or, most intriguing of all, is randomness an illusion?
If randomness is an illusion or is god-created in the sense god has control over it, why have a trial and error method [for life]?
It seems we're forced to conclude that the randomness in the universe is not under god's control and thus the intelligent solution for life - trial and error.
But, why is randomness something beyond god's control? I'll leave you with one question: could it be that god is not playing with a full deck?
I haven't quite worked out how something the size and weight of the planet earth is able to suspend itself
in space the way it does. I have tried to suspend a tennis ball in mid air but to no avail. I also cannot create a being with intelligence that has hundreds of miles of blood vessels, nerves etc. So many things that I discovered when I asked God to show me a miracle to prove he exists when I was young and foolish .In the same way I made the mistake of being blind are you not also guilty of the same? Everything that can be known is out there but we are the simpletons, not God, for believing we know anything.
By the way, if the process of 'trial and error' doesn't belong to a very intelligent algorithm(s), I personally wouldn't be one of the fruits (humans), even after zillions of years of evolution on earth (if not the first living cells on earth came from somewhere in outer space).
Now 'trial and error' is used in what is known as 'Artificial Intelligence'. And I personally use it in some products I design.
Fantastic!. If you have the time and the computing power, no one will hold it against you that you solved a problem using trial and error. Could god be a some kind of a super computer then? My main worry is that there's randomness in the universe and if one can't control it the best technique is trial and error. It's weird in every sense of the word - the simplest problem solving method is the best approach given extreme complexity as when there's randomness involved. That there's randomness suggests god was/is unable to control all the forces that go into making the universe, implying he isn't as intelligent as we'd like faer to be but then fae solved the problem in the most ingenious way possible, with trial and error.
Perhaps this is the "mainstream" view primarily among those already inclined not to believe in God, who are in fact, not actually the mainstream?
I would agree that evolution debunks a childlike Santa's workshop vision of God, which perhaps was prevalent among uneducated peasants of yesteryear. Beyond that, to me evolution seems a point in favor of an intelligent source to reality given that evolution is a self regulating mechanism. Not proof of God, just a point scored for the theist team.
However, that said, I remain persuaded that the theist vs. atheist paradigm is probably so hopelessly flawed as to be largely useless, and that whatever the reality is it likely bears little resemblance to that debate. Generally speaking, my sense is that that debate persists because it's like a familiar card game where everyone knows the rules and thus can be comfortable and generally lazy in playing their preferred cards.
Perhaps we live in a world where originality has taken a long holiday, likely to be extended for some (unknown) reason. I'm trying to work within the system for two reasons: 1. this is where the action takes place and 2. I too am not an original thinker myself.
Coming to the matter of the best approach to the issue of god-evolution, I suppose the whole issue needs to be given a long overdue overhaul - you know, the back-to-the-drawing-board kind of reevaluation. For certain, I'm not among the ones capable of such a feat but I have developed, for better of worse, over the years, a Morpheus of the Matrix trilogy attitude - I'm biding my time waiting for The One who will, if only by crashing the entire edifice of reality we're so familiar with, bring light, so to speak, into the world. I wait patiently but I don't know how long I can hold out. Perhaps you'll be luckier than me...
Sorry, I had to be clearer.
When the inputs to a system couldn't be known for certain, the programmer assumes estimated values and conditions for every possible input which is not included on the list of the known ones.
Then, he has to find out suitable algorithms that let the system adjust the primitive estimated values and conditions anytime it is hit by what was considered unknown input. This may be seen as 'trial and error' because the optimum adjust may not be achieved at the first time/try.
Quoting TheMadFool
Sorry, what do you mean by randomness? Perhaps a practical example can clarify it. Thank you.
We're more or less on the same page is all I can say.
Quoting KerimF
What you said above.
1. Trial and error displays a limited understanding in a problem-solving area.
2. If God is the one behind all of creation and his preferred method is trial and error, then he is displaying a limited understanding in a problem-solving area.
3. If God is displaying a limited understanding in a problem-solving area, then He is not omniscient but is a simpleton.
4. Therefore, if God is the one behind all of creation and his preferred method is trial and error, then God is not omniscient but is a simpleton.
I strongly disagree with premise 3. If anyone displays a limited understanding in a problem-solving area, then I would grant that they are not omniscient, but it does not seem to entail that they are a simpleton, at least not your definition of a simpleton.
Quoting TheMadFool
If displaying a limited understanding in a problem-solving area, entails that one possesses only child-like or apish intelligence, then it seems like all humans would only reach child-like or apish intelligence. All adult human beings do at least one of the following examples of trial and error:
This is only to show that all adult human beings practice trial and error to an extent and to equate that to having child-like or apish intelligence seems wrong. If all adult humans do this, then it does seem to meet the standard of adult human intelligence. This could also be an objection to premise 1 because it seems possible for trial and error to be the best option in some cases. Even with trying new foods, there may be ways to figure out what kinds of foods you will be most likely to like, but it seems to me that you can’t decide whether you like certain foods or not without some trial and error.
In the case that you were not arguing that God is a simpleton but just that His understanding is limited, I think someone could still object to premise 2. One could say that God is omniscient and the reason He chose to create the world in the way that He did is only perplexing to us because we have limited understanding. Furthermore, it doesn’t seem like God would be the one practicing trial and error in this case. It could be the case that God created the world and His creations are making their own free will decisions and sometimes use trial and error to make those decisions.
Actually, God (the supernatural energy/will behind the existence of our universe) programmed all the living things to evolve following certain algorithms (that scientists try to discover) so that their survival has more chance to last in an environment. In other words, evolution could be seen as being based also on 'trial and error'.
But since all matters and the rules that define their existence in the various environments of the universe are also created (with the preprogramed algorithms), the instantaneous status of the world (at every moment) that results from applying the process of 'trial and error' is already known by God. This explains why many men believe that it may be possible to predict the future, to some extend and about certain situations in the least.
Trial and error must be random; the list you provided doesn't contain a single item that is.
Quoting Naomi
You're doing exactly what another poster did - you're acknowledging our ignorance and giving it due attention. Hats off to you for doing that.
As for me, I'm simply relying on and using to full effect the framework of knowledge at our disposal.
Our two approaches are poles apart. You're pointing at the shadows and raising doubts; I'm pointing at the parts that are illuminated and making what are, all said and done, reasonable inferences.
However, it seems that all the laws of nature are in effect at all times, everywhere, and on all things, from atoms to galactic superclusters. This can, in my humble opinion, lead to a vast number of events in which one or more laws of nature are in direct conflict with other laws of nature.
Take the case of the asteroid that caused the Cretaceous-Paleogenic extinction. It was simply obeying the laws of physics from the moment it formed to the instant it slammed into the Earth with such force and energy that the debris from the collision blotted out the sun for years, something that kickstarted a chain reaction of dieoffs beginning with plants and ending with the dinosaurs. In the simplest sense possible, the Crtaecous-Paleogenic extinction was an instance of the laws of physics acting against the laws of chemistry.
In other words, even in a highly ordered system, the laws can and, as I've demonstrated, do work against each other. Given this is so, the best technique to meet such threats which can be as catastrophic as unpredictable is to base life on a trial and error scheme of genetic mutation.
This is doubtful. The universe is orderly, and we represent that order with mathematics. But as we know, human representations are fallible, so we cannot say that the thing represented is the same as the representation. To say that what causes order in the universe is mathematics, is simply to assume a Pythagorean or Platonist idealism without understanding the separation between the cause of order and the human representation of order.
Name a law of nature that isn't mathematical and then we can talk. Plus, the fundamental sciences - chemistry and physics - are completely mathematized. If the ingredients are mathematical, then everything that uses these ingredients must, as of necessity, be mathematical, right?
Human beings represent the laws of nature with mathematics and this means that these representations are mathematical. But this does not mean that the thing represented is mathematical. Do you see the difference between the representation (mathematical), and the thing represented? Some people refer to this as the difference between the map and the territory.
Here's another example. We represent the world, things in the world, and different aspects of reality with language. This does not mean that the world has the features of language, making the world linguistic. Mathematics is a type of language. Why do you think that the thing represented with this language has the features of that language, making it mathematical?.
I'm aware that math is considered a language in some circles but the nexus between math and reality goes much deeper than mere linguistics. There are mathematical theories, axiomatic systems as it were, that fit perfectly with some, possibly all, aspects of reality which, in my humble opinion, bespeaks that reality itself is mathematical.
The difference between ordinary languages like English, Mandarin, Hindi, etc. and math is that in the case of the former you can't construct a theory in them and expect it to match reality in the sense it proves to be a good description but in the case of the latter a mathematician's abstract theory may turn out to be just the thing we need to make sense of reality.
In short, math is not just a map, it's proven itself, on many occasions, to be the territory itself.
Actually, they fit together with the way that reality is perceived by us. And our perceptions of reality are produced by our living systems, just like our mathematical theories are. So I'd say that it's not a coincidence that they fit together, but it's clearly not evidence that reality itself is mathematical. Can we say that living beings live in an environment and they have specific needs? Wouldn't you think that the systems which they produce, such as their capacity to move, their capacity to perceive, and even conscious theories, are designed so as to fulfill some needs, rather than as a representation of reality?
Quoting TheMadFool
But when we think that the mathematician's theory is making sense of reality and it actually is not, we are fools. How would we know whether it is or not?
Quoting TheMadFool
In an idealist ontology, where our perceptions of reality are reality, mathematics might seem to be the territory itself.
I don't understand what you mean at all. To run with your analogy, it's one thing to draw a map after surveying the territory but another thing, as in math, to construct a map entirely in our imagination and then to discover it matches the territory, here reality? I agree with you that this is [probably] not a coincidence but because reality has an underlying mathematical structure.