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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1435 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
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Author | Topic: What we must accept if we accept evolution Part 2 | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1435 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
Of course it implies no purpose. All those thinkers I mentioned took it to imply no purpose. That was THE philosophical effect of Darwinism at the time and it continues as a general undertone in culture, the psychological undercurrent of all personal identity these days. Why can't this just be acknowledged? "Not providing one" is just a species of denial. If humanity is nothing more than something the physical universe tossed up by accident it most CERTAINLY implies NO PURPOSE to our existence, and it is psychologically FELT to imply no purpose too. There was no purpose to our just happening to get evolved, it could have not happened at any point along the way. There is simply nothing special about humanity in this view. Some entirely other kind of creature could have evolved as the pinnacle of the evolutionary tree. Again, just because WE can invent purposes doesn't change this fact.
I'm not talking about God (yahweh). I am talking about a hypothetical god. A creator god that happens to be cruel. Such a god can exist, have created us for a purpose and have created the 'cruel' evolutionary process. That is theologically consistent with a cruel god and logically consistent with evolution, assuming evolution is cruel. But I believe Robin's point was that such a construct is not even believed by those who think it up. It's merely a logical construct that you couldn't care less about, so hypothetical it isn't even worth a passing thought, something you have hardly even thought about, just to the barest outlines. The point is that people DON'T believe in such a God and the Creator Gods they do believe in -- not the pantheons but the concepts of an omniscient omnipresent omnipotent God -- are logically incompatible with Darwinism (and let's use this term to cover all the elements involved since you protest the use of the ToE).
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1457 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
If humanity is nothing more than something the physical universe tossed up by accident it most CERTAINLY implies NO PURPOSE to our existence, and it is psychologically FELT to imply no purpose too. I just don't get it, Faith. I literally don't see the connection between "not having a purpose provided by Providence" and "not having a purpose at all." What, in your view, is inherent in the idea of "purpose" that prevents one's purpose from being something they determine for themselves?
Again, just because WE can invent purposes doesn't change this fact. I don't understand why you so sneeringly dismiss the idea of a self-determined purpose.
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Faith  Suspended Member (Idle past 1435 days) Posts: 35298 From: Nevada, USA Joined: |
If humanity is nothing more than something the physical universe tossed up by accident it most CERTAINLY implies NO PURPOSE to our existence, and it is psychologically FELT to imply no purpose too. ======= I just don't get it, Faith. I literally don't see the connection between "not having a purpose provided by Providence" and "not having a purpose at all." I didn't say anything about Providence. All I'm talking about is what seems to be the obvious, logical and in fact historically verified inference about a lack of human purpose from Darwinism.
What, in your view, is inherent in the idea of "purpose" that prevents one's purpose from being something they determine for themselves? Nothing whatever. You can determine your purpose all you like. That is in fact what people do with Darwinism, make up our own purposes, invent ourselves, our own morality, live as the Aesthete or the Punk or whatever one chooses. It's wide open, not at all being prevented, but the opposite -- there is no FORMAL OBJECTIVE purpose to humanity, so all these subjective invented purposes ARE what we have.
Again, just because WE can invent purposes doesn't change this fact. ===== I don't understand why you so sneeringly dismiss the idea of a self-determined purpose. I don't understand why you think I said that "sneeringly" and I also don't understand why you think I'm "dismissing" anything. Subjective self-invented purposes for our identities ARE what we have. What we DON'T have under Darwinism is an OBJECTIVE purpose for humanity.
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macaroniandcheese  Suspended Member (Idle past 3918 days) Posts: 4258 Joined: |
if indeed evolution implied that there was no god (which it does not.) then just because the chief end of man is NOT to glorify god and enjoy him forever, does not leave us with no purpose. we have great purpose. we have the purpose of surviving and procreating and exploring and naming. even the bible suggests that the purpose of man is to name creation. since we have yet to finish exploring, we have yet to finish naming. and since the universe is expanding, we will probably never finish exploring.
christianity states that animals do not have souls and therefore do not go to heaven. what then is their purpose? if they have no soul then they must have no purpose. if they have no purpose, why don't they disappear in a puff of logic? are you going to tell me that their purpose is to make us happy by food or whatever? that's a rather rude purpose.
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crashfrog Member (Idle past 1457 days) Posts: 19762 From: Silver Spring, MD Joined: |
It's wide open, not at all being prevented, but the opposite -- there is no FORMAL OBJECTIVE purpose to humanity, so all these subjective invented purposes ARE what we have. Well, yeah. So? Invented purpose is all we had in the first place. We were simply mistaken about the source of that purpose. But the fact that there's no universal purpose for humanity was known long before Darwinism; the evidence for this would be all the people who wandered around, wondering what the hell the purpose of humanity was supposed to be. The fact that all these people had to ask is the proof that there never was one.
What we DON'T have under Darwinism is an OBJECTIVE purpose for humanity. We don't have it under anything else, either. Why single evolution out for not providing something that it was never supposed to provide, something that nothing provides?
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
We don't have it under anything else, either. We would have one, maybe, if we were made by God. Evolution shows us there is no God. It's the most powerful evidence there is that there is no God.
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
we have the purpose of surviving and procreating and exploring and naming. OK, Brennakimi, you go around and do your naming and I'll do something else. I am interested in getting rid of all mountains and hills. I prefer flat land. So I'm going to work on that, and when I come to the end of my life, I can die satisfied that I have done my duty. Of course, I will not get rid of all the mountains, but I will have made a start, and then the generations that follow me can carry on this mighty endeavor.
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macaroniandcheese  Suspended Member (Idle past 3918 days) Posts: 4258 Joined: |
oh sure
i was trying to find some kind of objective purpose since poor faith seems to be worthless without one. sucks to be her. anyways. i've little interest in naming things. but it is something we do without knowing. it speaks strongly of our habit of labeling things...
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
All purposes are equally arbitrary.
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macaroniandcheese  Suspended Member (Idle past 3918 days) Posts: 4258 Joined: |
see. i know this.
faith may or may not. This message has been edited by brennakimi, 02-06-2006 06:40 PM
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
faith may or may not. I meant all Subjective purposes are arbitrary. Faith thinks she and everybody else do have an objective purpose.
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nwr Member Posts: 6408 From: Geneva, Illinois Joined: Member Rating: 4.3 |
Faith thinks she and everybody else do have an objective purpose.
We evolved as members of a social species. As such, our purpose is to support the society. Impeach Bush
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robinrohan Inactive Member |
We evolved as members of a social species. As such, our purpose is to support the society. I don't have much love for my fellow man when considered en masse. I reject that purpose.
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nwr Member Posts: 6408 From: Geneva, Illinois Joined: Member Rating: 4.3 |
That you choose to reject it, does not demonstrate that there is no such purpose.
Impeach Bush
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ramoss Member (Idle past 602 days) Posts: 3228 Joined: |
Faith does not have objective evidence of that. Faith just has subjective evidence of that.
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