Why did God create a world with prey and predators?

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minichibi said:
Why did God create predators and prey species, being that a waste of energy. Somehow this sounds like a sado-masochist work, putting the species under unecessary stress, having to struggle their whole life to survive.
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Chibi:

We’re in a “closed system,” for all intents and purposes. God does not sprinkle on food for us every morning. That which lives on Earth must feed here too. No matter what we design to eat, there is some kind of life that is present. A rock has bacteria, perhaps algae, tiny insects, etc. If we are going to draw a line - and not kill and eat larger living things, why draw the line at things larger than insects, or plants only, or worms only? All living things are predators and also, prey.

That is the “nature” of a closed, albeit very large, system.

God bless,
jd
 
I’ve heard people argue that all animals were nice and friendly before the Fall, if that helps.
 
TimeEntrance said:
The implications of the history and evolution of life on earth remains something unsettled as to how it’s reconciled with the Christian narrative. It is problematic - at least from appearances from our perspective with a knowledge limitation of today.

But it also remains unsettled how this is reconciled to an agnostic and atheist world that makes a claim to objective morality similar to that of Christians: e.g., predation is morally wrong.

Hypotheses emerge - all revolving around altruism or even social evolution etc. - but none of these are satisfactory in my opinion and merely engaging in myth making to explain away the obvious: Be a free rider and John Dillinger and impregnate as many women on earth as you can to your liking; take what you want and live like a man and not like a coward.

I understand empathy. Some might call the “God notion” a byproduct of that. And there is a biological root to empathy. However, one’s intellect ought be able tell them the folly in empathizing with the rich and landowners or even the middle-class. Engage them - violently if needed - and take what you want, including their women. Be a silver back gorilla.

I don’t know that evolution can explain the full scope of the human experience. One of my biology professors said during lecture that humans really are no more than another type ape. Well, these apes have large scale prisons systems and do the utterly ridiculous like empathize (and moralize over) with the rape of some 14 year old girl half way across the world that they don’t even know. More ridiculous is we even care if women have the right to vote. And so what if black people were lynched, and?

From my perspective the U.S. prison system exists because God exists. Since atheists know right from wrong and can rejoice or see benefit in justice that requires punishment of the predator, so to does God, ergo His prison of hell for the serial killer.

We are the image of God after all. We sentence people to purgatory or give out life sentences in hell. So does God. We create and have the greatest intellects in the universe so far we know, and so it is with God to even a more majestic degree we say.

So, I have no idea why God created a world of predators and prey. But then I don’t know why humans do half the things we do. Having a world full of nuclear bombs is but one example. Presumably, humans could vote created a pretty harmonious world for all humans to live in if we wanted too. But fat chance of that ever happening.
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Seeing predators and prey as a negative thing is a human idea. God is not human or close. You can take water and the universal seed which comes from heaven or the dew and mix various part of the water and come up with little shrimp, plants, or minerals. Depending on how the water is mixed. Electrical shocks at certain wavelengths to water can create mites. Thusly “god created” life.
 
Regular_Atheist said:
I’ve heard people argue that all animals were nice and friendly before the Fall, if that helps.
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That certainly isn’t the teaching of the Catholic Church. And a reading of the Book of Genesis leaves me wondering how they could have come up with the idea. Its just not in there.

As to why God created predators and prey, I don’t know. Perhaps it was to remind us that suffering is inescapable in life. After the Fall, we joined in that worldly suffering. We can mitigate it, as stewards of Creation, but we can’t eliminate it.
 
Dale_M said:
That certainly isn’t the teaching of the Catholic Church. And a reading of the Book of Genesis leaves me wondering how they could have come up with the idea. Its just not in there.
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Loads of Protestants always claim that it’s true, such as the Creation Ministries International folk, and it’s also written in a leaflet a Creationist preacher gave me as an answer to why the world appears to be badly designed (they claimed original sin ruined the creation of God).
 
billcu1 said:
Seeing predators and prey as a negative thing is a human idea. God is not human or close. You can take water and the universal seed which comes from heaven or the dew and mix various part of the water and come up with little shrimp, plants, or minerals. Depending on how the water is mixed. Electrical shocks at certain wavelengths to water can create mites. Thusly “god created” life.
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Naw, he was Jesus, and he said turn the other cheek for intra-species predators. The Christian narrative really does not align well with what we know - or think we know - of the evolution of all the various species on earth including our own.

We might have preyed on and eaten other species of humans for all I know.

Anyway… I have faith in Christ and the Holy Trinity. I just accept that there are things I either don’t know or perhaps wouldn’t be able to even understand.
 
billcu1 said:
Seeing predators and prey as a negative thing is a human idea. God is not human or close. You can take water and the universal seed which comes from heaven or the dew and mix various part of the water and come up with little shrimp, plants, or minerals. Depending on how the water is mixed. Electrical shocks at certain wavelengths to water can create mites. Thusly “god created” life.
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:confused:

God bless,
jd
 
the antelope which deny cheetahs and cheetah cubs (kittens?) their daily meat are evil.
 
TimeEntrance said:
Naw, he was Jesus, and he said turn the other cheek for intra-species predators. The Christian narrative really does not align well with what we know - or think we know - of the evolution of all the various species on earth including our own.

We might have preyed on and eaten other species of humans for all I know.

Anyway… I have faith in Christ and the Holy Trinity. I just accept that there are things I either don’t know or perhaps wouldn’t be able to even understand.
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neaderthals bones cracked and burned have been associated with the cro-magnon site at geico in southern france, clear signs of our ancestors chowing down on other species of humans.
 
Jerry_Westerby said:
this is a big issue in quantum mechanics, as a casual google search of “quantum entanglement” shows. I suspect the problems humans have in expressing the difference between what we understand as cause and effect and causality as it really is in the universe as a whole (or as seen through God’s eyes) are attributable to the limitations of the human mind, limitations of common sense experience and the limitations of language.

Westerby
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As I understand it, even though the concept of causality at quantum scales is apparently meaningless that doesn’t mean that it’s meaningless at larger scales. The arrow of time stills points in one direction. I also think it’s not by accident that new age woo, paranormal research and traditional religious mysticism all converge in an area of science we understand least.
 
cornbread_r2 said:
As I understand it, even though the concept of causality at quantum scales is apparently meaningless that doesn’t mean that it’s meaningless at larger scales. The arrow of time stills points in one direction. I also think it’s not by accident that new age woo, paranormal research and traditional religious mysticism all converge in an area of science we understand least.
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the woo woo element is always quick to jump onto science it isn’t equipped to understand, if only to pervert it.

our concept of “normal” cause and effect in the macro world separates from causality in the subatomic level by how we perceive the universe, and I think that’s an arbitrary distinction. arbitrary in the sense human minds and language evolved through senses tuned to the world above the subatomic. we don’t have direct sensory experience at quantum scales, so we don’t have an intuitive grasp of it, nor do we have even have language to adequately describe it. instead we have awkward constructs like “particle/wave duality” to harmonize seemingly contradictory but shared attributes. we describe in an indirect way what’s happening through pure math, or awkward words, or even more awkward analogies.

God (who is outside of time’s arrow) perceives the universe in its entirely directly, for Him there is no contradiction between quantum causality and cause and effect in our human scales. our limited human minds just cannot do this, and I believe much human speculation about the nature of God fails for this reason. I’m content to call it a mystery.

Westerby
 
minichibi said:
Why did God create predators and prey species, being that a waste of energy. Somehow this sounds like a sado-masochist work, putting the species under unecessary stress, having to struggle their whole life to survive.
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Are you judging God?
 
minichibi said:
Why did God create predators and prey species?
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Excellent question, my friend! Perhaps first answer: Why did God create? Then the answer to your question will flow seamlessly. Please consider the following:

Why did God create?
-The purpose for creation is for the experience of limitless happiness with unbreakable peace for all, including the Creator, because this experience is the pinnacle of living for any being.

What is the means to achieve this purpose for creation?
-To fulfill this experience, the Creator must create an everlasting society of a limitless number of true friends, given the Creator can participate as a friend, and the Creator initially exists in absolute solitude.

What is the most complex factor of fulfilling this purpose?
-Friends are free to will as they please, however true friends freely choose to will actions which are of patient and kind natures towards one another to maintain the peace and build greater happiness within the relationship.
-Since God is creating this heavenly kingdom, he must create the opportunity for “friends” to freely choose to only will actions of the patient and kind natures, hence the earthly place.

What are some of the requirements the Creator must establish?
-In order to set us completely free to choose, he must create an incredibly complex system for life to appear to come about and appear to sustain itself. This includes having life develop from extreme simplicity to vast complexity to extreme complexity with the ability to reason, including the necessity to eat to live.

So why did God create predators and prey species?
-Since all of these life forms exist with varying complexity, including capability to reason, and must eat to live, one natural effect which comes from this is the by-nature and free-willed opportunity to be a predator of prey. It can also be viewed as a challenge to humans: Given our ability to reason, what will each one of us do with our power? Will we freely choose to prey on others, or will we choose a kinder and more patient method of interacting?

Thank you very much for the excellent food for thought! I look forward to further discussion!
 
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