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God doesn’t design… he doesn’t intervene in the world ever either. What’s he good for?

Good question, and I’ll split this out into a new thread.

In my view the world as it is appears indistinguishable from one where God doesn’t intervene (apart from Jesus), and doesn’t design.

So I guess my question in response would be, in your view, how is the world different here and now from one where God doesn’t intervene or design? What tangible difference do you see between the two?

For starters, if God didn’t design I don’t think metabolic networks would exist. And if God didn’t intervene, none of us could know him.

But why must the language of design go? Must the language of provision also go when discussing rain? Sure the water cycle explains it! But I will stand with Jeremiah and say:

22 Can any of the worthless foreign gods send us rain?
    Does it fall from the sky by itself?
  No, you are the one, O Yahweh our God!
    Only you can do such things.
    So we will wait for you to help us.

I wish you weren’t a heretic Luke. I’d suggest you read Job, which is all about God’s hidden interventions, but as it’s most likely translated and edited from a pagan source, why would we think it still has any value in explaining the nature of God.

I think it would be helpful for everyone to look at the issue of the known scientific history of evolution as known by evidence. This knowledge is not just dreamed up.

For example Wiki link Evolutionary history of life

The evolutionary history of life on Earth traces the processes by which living and fossil organisms evolved. It stretches from the origin of life on Earth, thought to be over 3,500 million years ago, to the present day. The similarities between all present day organisms indicate the presence of a common ancestor from which all known species have diverged through the process of evolution….

Fossil evidence indicates that flowering plants appeared and rapidly diversified in the Early Cretaceous, between 130 million years ago and 90 million years ago, probably helped by coevolution with pollinating insects. Flowering plants and marine phytoplankton are still the dominant producers of organic matter. Social insects appeared around the same time as flowering plants. Although they occupy only small parts of the insect “family tree”, they now form over half the total mass of insects. Humans evolved from a lineage of upright-walking apes whose earliest fossils date from over 6 million years ago. Although early members of this lineage had chimp-sized brains, there are signs of a steady increase in brain size after about 3 million years ago….

Life on earth is based on carbon and water. Carbon provides stable frameworks for complex chemicals and can be easily extracted from the environment, especially from carbon dioxide. The only other element with similar chemical properties, silicon, forms much less stable structures and, because most of its compounds are solids, would be more difficult for organisms to extract. Water is an excellent solvent and has two other useful properties: the fact that ice floats enables aquatic organisms to survive beneath it in winter; and its molecules have electrically negative and positive ends, which enables it to form a wider range of compounds than other solvents can. Other good solvents, such as ammonia, are liquid only at such low temperatures that chemical reactions may be too slow to sustain life, and lack water’s other advantages. Organisms based on alternative biochemistry may however be possible on other planets.

Research on how life might have emerged unaided from non-living chemicals focuses on three possible starting points: self-replication, an organism’s ability to produce offspring that are very similar to itself; metabolism, its ability to feed and repair itself; and external cell membranes, which allow food to enter and waste products to leave, but exclude unwanted substances.[43] Research on abiogenesis still has a long way to go, since theoretical and empirical approaches are only beginning to make contact with each other

I also believe we should encourage everyone to read a bible, particularly the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Trusting this gospel provides spiritual life and a true relationship with our father God. Trusting creationism does not achieve that end, I am sorry to say.

Both of these fountains of knowledge are important. But for different reasons. Blind Freddy could see that the science of evolution, and Gods Word come from different directions.

Many scientists are Christians, and like myself see no problem with coming to grips with both the realities of science and the truth about the existence of the real and living God.

God is the creator of the world. The bible doesnt go into the nitty gritty of how exactly. It just says that God spoke and it happened. But please don’t read the bible like it is a science or history book. It aint!!

Evolution is a theory about genetics. Fossils tell us nothing about genetics, nor can they even tell us if two organisms are related, instead they give physiological evidence only. But when we consider convergent evolution, how useful can it be?

Can I add something else? Please don’t read the Bible like it says nothing at all about how God created the universe and how he’s intervened in our history since then. It doesn’t tell us everything, but it tells us enough to accomplish its theological purposes. I believe that, maybe surprisingly, that even includes some details about how God created.

Blind Freddy could see that the science of evolution, and Gods Word come from different directions.

This is by no means clearly so. Indeed, why cannot an infinite God utilize evolution as a tool within the Creation? To deny this possibility imposes limits upon God! I don’t see at all why Creationism and Evolution are necessarily mutually exclusive.

PS on the label ‘heretic’: the word originally meant ‘one who has an opinion’ - that makes us all heretics!

why cannot an infinite God utilize evolution as a tool within the Creation?

I wonder about that sometimes. But then I think “At what point in the evolution chain does a man become a spiritual being? At what point does he become capable of having a relationship with God? At what point is he worth having Jesus die for him? After all - he would have started off as a sngle cell, or bird, or fish, or whatever.”

I like that definition of the word ‘heretic’.

I think we also need to remember that God promises us eternal life not all the answers.

@Elly - an attempt to answer your question.

I too have wondered, in debates with Young-Earth Creationists (for example), which of the earlier hominids is truly a man - a not unrelated question… Certainly, there is archaeological evidence - ritual burials, shrines, artefacts - that strongly suggests deity-worship and a religious mindset back among homo erecti about 100,000 years ago. And their are also the Shanidar cave burial sites (in Mesopotamia) of Neanderthals from ca.48,000 BC that show definite regard for the afterlife. Not to mention their cave art… For me, one of the things that defines a human being is precisely the cultivation of a spiritual sensibility.

Elly Byrne said:

I wonder about that sometimes. But then I think “At what point in the evolution chain does a man become a spiritual being? At what point does he become capable of having a relationship with God?

I think that being a spiritual being and being able to have a relationship with God are two different things

God revealed Himself to people at a certain time, and that was well after people had devised their own versions of their gods, with their pagan religious ceremonies etc.

As for the claim that science & Christianity come from two different places, I couldn’t agree less. That is an ambit claim for Christianity = Young Earth Creationism.
Biblical literalism may lead to YECS but there is danger there. In no time flat we have to make guesses (guided by evidence) that the claims of a flattish earth covered by a dome of firmament with windows in it to let the rain in are metaphors- but the rest is somehow fact even if internally in conflict. (eg; the order of creation)

We are required to respond to the evidence, if we don’t then we are acting as if God is a liar or a trickster. If He isn’t either then there must be another way of understanding these things. Somehow I took from the OP in this thread that there is an assumption along the lines of: If science explains the ways of nature then there is no room for God and what use is He then?

I’m not sure how this rules Him out of intervention so I’d need clarification as to what underpins that one.
Of course, the other bit is “What us is He?” which is more explicitly stated. Ummm, I wonder if we are empowered to “put God to use” anyway. He is who He is and His use or otherwise is scarcely an issue. He deserves adoration and service for creating and sustaining all things, including our lives. If He does nothing by way of noticed intervention (How would we know really?) for us then He still deserves such. If He doesn’t even notice our worship and adoration, we owe it to Him to worship Him anyway. There is nothing in “His use” that has a priority position.
I haven’t even here touched on the issue of Christ and His salvation, only on the utility of God as an issue.
I think the OP is the wrong question, but a good one to pose.
Thanks

Can I just add a comment on the use of the word “design?
I’m not sure if it harkens to ID or not but I am uncomfortable with ID as a “science”. It hasn’t proven itself as such (quite the opposite) and I am at odds with its attempt to take up a middle ground between YECS and science. I dislike the whole “God of the Gaps” position- which I think ID holds in spades.

I think God did design creation, but in ways that are far more sofisticated than we mere mortals could grasp. Science has been exploring this process and iit is a true wonder.
If He did design us as we are now, you know, mapped out, assembled and plonked on Earth as a complete and well (godly) designed model, then He didn’t do such a bang up job. There are all sorts of design flaws and strange ... er ... appendixes left over from evolutionary processes we didn’t have.
But, if we are a part of an unfolding design, then we are pretty good material and this is cool.

There really are some religious nutters out there. (present company excepted of course)

take this link: The Spanish Inquisition which starts speaking about the slaughter of people by the Jesuits.
But this link states that

The Pentagon is the military arm of the Spanish Inquisition in the U.S. and around the world.
The Pentagon in Washington City is the war making arm of the Spanish Inquisition.
  The Pentagon is the military arm of the Spanish Inquisition.

and on Darwin and evolution:

When is comes to “education” the Spanish Inquisition is absolutely ruthless. They used Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler and Einstein to attack the FIRST book of the Bible and Darby to attack the book of Revelation—the LAST book of the Bible.

In the secular realm they used DARWINISM or EVILution to destroy faith in the Genesis and scientific account of Creation. All the schools under their control teach Darwinism or the theory that the earth is millions of years old and that man came from monkeys.

  This deadly Spanish Inquisition Jesuit has sent millions of soul to hell believing that they were just animals that time and chance happened to place on this small planet.

He stole his theory from ancient Egypt where monkeys were a vital part of the Pharaonic religion.

EVILution destroys faith in God and the Bible. With no fear of a coming judgment, politicians and others have no qualms about taking bribes from the “Federal” Reserve Bank in order to deliver the country to the Spanish Inquisition.

Darwin lied and denied the existence of giants and he claimed to have found the missing link in Patagonia, Argentina.

PS: Sorry Owen, please continue, you were making perfect sense once again.

Ian said:

This is by no means clearly so. Indeed, why cannot an infinite God utilize evolution as a tool within the Creation? To deny this possibility imposes limits upon God! I don’t see at all why Creationism and Evolution are necessarily mutually exclusive.

No, of course God could have used evolution to create. But could have doesn’t mean he did, and the real issue is not whether evolution is incompatible with creation as a generic concept, but whether it is compatible with the specific creation taught by the Bible. I don’t think it is, for two main reasons:

1. I think the Bible teaches that death is a foreign intruder into this creation, not a core essential part of God’s method of creating.

2. I think the Bible teaches that God created the world with strict divisions. For example he separates the water into three parts, and creates animals on separate days depending on what they are. Animals which straddle these divisions are outlawed in the food laws, like bats which are flying mammals, or crayfish which are non-swimming sea animals (though the main point about the food laws isn’t the animals, but that God’s people should be separate from the world and its practices, they should be holy because God is holy.) The basic premise about evolution is that all life is distantly related, and that one type of life will turn into others. All land animals are fish that grew lungs and legs and lost their scales (that’s an oversimplification of evolution I know!)

Owen, what sort of design flaws are you referring to?

Hi Dannii:

1. I would have thought the death to which you refer is spiritual rather than physical.

2. All life on Earth is indeed related - closely! DNA is the link; viruses are its repository. I read in an issue of New Scientist earlier this year that something like 70% of human DNA has been found to originate from viruses… Evolution is a paradigmatic fact, but not without its flaws and mysteries.

@Ken: Your Inquisition link started out factually enough, but really lost its sanity once it addressed the U.S.A., Darwin and Darby (of ‘The Rapture’ silliness). The writers seem to be wacko preterist fundies…

1. It’s both. But Paul draws a parallel between the physicality of the resurrection and the physical death that Adam brought in 1 Corinthians 15. (And similar ideas are in Romans 5.) For Paul it matters that Christ reversed all aspects of the fall, and that means giving physical life to physically dead people, as well as spiritual life to spiritually dead people.

2. Ahh… just because everything has DNA doesn’t mean they’re related! The existence of common features does not prove a common ancestry - it can just as well point to a common designer who reused good design features in multiple independent creations. And no, endogenous retroviruses only make up something like 8% of our genome. And retroviruses are only a small, though significant, subset of all viruses.

1. Don’t forget that large chunks of Genesis are mythoi, not to be (or intended to be) read historiophysically - in particular its cosmogony (which incidentally contains contradictions between Gen 1 and Gen 2, the latter having a Babylonian origin). And of course physical death preceded the appearance of hominids, by hundreds of millions of years: dinosaurs, for example. Funny that paleontologists never find human fossils within the same strata as those of, say, T. Rex. or stegosaurus.

2. I meant that a large percentage of Earth’s life-forms’ DNA encompass the same details - though this doesn’t refute your very good point about a “common designer” (God). However, I wasn’t merely referring to retroviruses in the human genome: I’ll try to relocate the source-article, but I clearly recall the figure 70%.

I wish you weren’t a heretic Luke. I’d suggest you read Job, which is all about God’s hidden interventions, but as it’s most likely translated and edited from a pagan source, why would we think it still has any value in explaining the nature of God.

Oh Dannii, you’ve gone and hurt my feelings :P But seriously, isn’t anyone who doesn’t believe the earth was created 4000 years ago or whatever a heretic in your book?

But lets not turn this into Yet Another YECS Thread (a phrase I’ve used so often over the years I think I’ll just use the catchy acronym YAYECST, there already is a thread for that. And doesn’t it always end in Adam & Eve riding immortal, vegetarian velociraptors? That’s not me being sarcastic (well, maybe that wouldn’t ride the dinosaurs, but then again, why not?), that just always seems to be the outworking of the YECS position.

(Although I did get a kick out of this from the Onion: Sumerians Look On In Confusion As Christian God Creates World).

But again, seriously Dannii, there are some testimonies from students who moves from YECS to theistic evolution here that may be of interest:
- Evangelicals and Evolution - A Student Perspective: Introduction
- My Journey from Opposing Evolution to Studying It
- An Evolutionary Biology Student Discovers Christ ... and the Toxic Anti-Evolutionism that often Taints the Gospel
- My Transition from a Conservative Creationist to a Theistic Evolutionist (albeit with some unanswered questions)

ANYway, back to God & evolution. I recently read someone (it may have been Polkinghorne but I could be wrong—have you checked him out Dannii?) suggest that God gave life the freedom to create itself, and I think that is (as far as I can see, at this point in time), that’s all we can really say at the moment.

The question of when man became human and worth saving (as distinct to any other animal) is a very interesting one, and that’s where I see the Genesis account as allegorically useful, as articulating a profound truth about human nature, specially what makes us human.

As for God’s intervention, I think he certainly did intervene in/as Jesus, and that has obviously rippled through history since, and he’s certainly free to bring people to himself now (which we can certainly observe), as Jesus could be observed during his life/risen life.

However, one thing I find really interesting/weird/hard to understand is the whole personal relationship with God thing as it’s commonly described in SydAng circles (an important qualification). On the one hand, the near-universal desire to worship “god(s)” through time and across cultures I think is really fascinating—it’s either just our overactive imagination that proved helpful in evolution, or a need for something that does exist, just like we have hunger (an innate feeling) for food (a real thing). I obviously come down on the latter side (and for a variety of reasons), but I don’t really understand (or see any biblical justification for) the Gods-as-concerned-about-the-trivialities-of-my-life-as-I-am attitude that seems to prevail…

Hi Danii,

That New Scientist article I cited can be found on-line here:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19926711.600-viruses-the-unsung-heroes-of-evolution.html?full=true

The key part I remembered is:

ERVs have been known of since the 1970s, but the full extent of their infiltration did not become apparent until 2003, when genome sequencing revealed that our DNA is absolutely dripping with them. At least 8 per cent of the human genome consists of clearly-identifiable ERVs. Another 40 to 50 per cent looks suspiciously ERV-like, and much of the rest consists of DNA elements that multiply and spread in virus-like ways. Taken together, virus-like genes represent a staggering 90 per cent of the human genome. ERVs have also been found in rodents, apes, monkeys, koalas - essentially everywhere geneticists look.

So my 70% was conservatively misremembered - make that 90%!

If God does intervene via prayer, then these Christian Scientists are absolutely right:

Christian Scientists seek prayer provision

If the final version of the health care legislation being hammered out in Congress requires all Americans to carry health insurance, Susan Breuer thinks it’s only fair that the new law cover those who rely on her form of medical treatment: prayer.

” ‘Why’ isn’t the question,” Breuer said. It’s “Why are we excluding it?”

A lifelong Christian Scientist, Breuer of San Mateo is a full-time practitioner, meaning she provides prayer professionally for the purposes of healing. Breuer was trained by a church-sanctioned teacher and is paid by those who come to her for healing.

With time running short for Congress to pass a health care bill by Christmas, Christian Scientists are lobbying lawmakers to include a provision that would ban discrimination against “religious and spiritual” health care and encourage private insurers to cover prayer as medical treatment.

Such a provision was passed by committees in both the House and the Senate this year, but was stripped from the House bill as well as the current version being debated in the Senate. But Christian Scientists are hoping they can still get the measure reinserted into the Senate bill, and ultimately locked into the final legislation.

I think this is the pointy end of the stick that most evangelicals & others don’t seem to get—we pray for stuff, but we don’t think about what we’re doing much beyond that. These people above obviously take prayer much more seriously than we do, but I think most people would think they should be shut down and banned for such outrageous quackery.

We can’t have it both ways—either the Christian Scientists are right, or we need to re-think our attitude to prayer & God’s intervention!

Point of order
The Christian Scientist version of prayer is radically different to the one we know. It has a lot to do with realising and getting the sick person to realise we are in an illusion they call the “Adam Dream”  and that connection to Reality (ie; God) is how we are healed of the false belief in illness.

Your points remain valid though. I just thought a note re; Christian Science should be made. In truth, it has sod all to do with any Abrahamic faith and is more akin to Hinduism or Buddhism than anything. They say words that sound like ones we use, but their central faith document “Science & Health With Key to the Scriptures” redefines most of the Bible in ways that would make your mind boggle.

Interesting about their version of prayer & “Christian Science” Owen, thanks for pointing that out! :)

Ian said:

1. Don’t forget that large chunks of Genesis are mythoi, not to be (or intended to be) read historiophysically - in particular its cosmogony (which incidentally contains contradictions between Gen 1 and Gen 2, the latter having a Babylonian origin). And of course physical death preceded the appearance of hominids, by hundreds of millions of years: dinosaurs, for example. Funny that paleontologists never find human fossils within the same strata as those of, say, T. Rex. or stegosaurus.

How can you know how it was intended to be read? Seriously? Yes it may have been a strong polemic against the EE but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t mean to convey some truth about physical historical reality.

So my 70% was conservatively misremembered - make that 90%!

These virii also absort host DNA. I’m not sure they can clearly identify where it originated from. Anyway, how’s this relevant?

Luke, no I call someone who disregards the Bible’s authority and truthfulness a heretic, and that’s you.

ANYway, back to God & evolution. I recently read someone (it may have been Polkinghorne but I could be wrong—have you checked him out Dannii?) suggest that God gave life the freedom to create itself, and I think that is (as far as I can see, at this point in time), that’s all we can really say at the moment.

That would be all we could say if we ignored the Bible. “After its own kind” what do you think that means?

However, one thing I find really interesting/weird/hard to understand is the whole personal relationship with God thing as it’s commonly described in SydAng circles (an important qualification). On the one hand, the near-universal desire to worship “god(s)” through time and across cultures I think is really fascinating—it’s either just our overactive imagination that proved helpful in evolution, or a need for something that does exist, just like we have hunger (an innate feeling) for food (a real thing). I obviously come down on the latter side (and for a variety of reasons), but I don’t really understand (or see any biblical justification for) the Gods-as-concerned-about-the-trivialities-of-my-life-as-I-am attitude that seems to prevail…

When you have such a perverted understanding of God it’s no surprise that you wouldn’t consider yourself worth his care or interest. God is interested in the trivialities of our lives because in everything, even the trivialities, we were meant to be giving God glory. In one way nothing is ever trivial. When we are truly living to glorify God it gives God great pleasure, and when we are not it makes him super angry.

Danni said

“After its own kind” what do you think that means?

That has to be one of the slipperiest words in the YECS lexicon. In discussions with YECSers I have seen that term slip radically from species to genus and all over the shop. I doubt there is a standard meaning for it in YECS terms, why make that demand from others.

Danni, I think your willingness to call Luke a heretic is wrong. He doesn’t share your interpretation of the Bible. If he is a heretic on those terms then you have made yourself the standard for biblical truth.
I think there is a case for just getting over it. Not everyone will agree with the way you interpret the Bible. This is a good thing.

Hi Dannii. You wrote:

How can you know how it was intended to be read? Seriously? Yes it may have been a strong polemic against the EE but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t mean to convey some truth about physical historical reality.

Simple… Apart from contemporary astrophysicists’ cosmogonic theories, no culture’s creation myth is intended to be interpreted literally. Seriously! People’s thought-patterns millennia ago were different to us moderns’. How much of Homer, say, do you read as literal history? Circe turning Odysseus’s sailors into pigs? Yeah, riiiiiiight…. The only conclusion one can draw from Gen 1-2 - particularly given its internal contradictions - is that (a) God created the universe (b) in an orderly, well-designed manner.

By the way, what’s “EE”? You mystify me there.

The viral-origins-of-human-DNA is relevant because it refutes the standard YECS argument that evolution is impossible due to loss of genetic information. No. Rather, viruses ‘invading’ host DNA ‘replenishes’ the information-level, thereby permitting evolution.

Dannii: I think you need to learn to appreciate that Biblical truth is a slippery thing indeed, often at the mercy of human interpretation. One can honour God’s and the Bible’s authority and truthfulness without conforming totally to your own particular Weltanschaaung. In fact, I’d encourage you to ‘evolve’ beyond YEC - if only because YEC is an obstacle to evangelism, being repugnant to thinking potential-Christians who are given the impression by the YEC take on Genesis that they must leave their brains outside the Church door.

Shalom.

Owen, I think what it means is that all life breeds life that is like it. When we consider all the changes that are apparent within a human lifespan this is true, all the new life we see is incredibly similar to its ancestors. However if evolution were true, then life would need to be vastly different from its ancestors, and I personally think that would violate the “after its own kind” command from God.

For people who disagree, what does this phrase mean, such that it is consistent with your understanding of reproduction?

Interpretation isn’t the issue. Lots of people have different interpretations, but I’ll only call a few heretics ;) No the problem is that from everything I’ve seen Luke say I can’t see how he could believe the Bible is our ultimate authority in all knowledge, that it is God’s word. That’s definitely fulfills my heresy criteria.

Ian, well I think that Genesis is fundamentally different than all the other origin myths, in that it is exactly what God wants to tell us about the origins of the earth, humanity and all other life.
But again, how can you know that no culture though their creation myths should be understood as refering to actual history?

EE = Enuma Elish

It doesn’t refute that argument. All the virii can do is shuffle DNA from one organism to another. If the whole set of life is considered, they do not generate new information. Information may be added to one organism, but that information must have come from another in the past. The origin of that information is still unaccounted for.

Also, why do you assume I am a YEC?