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Why Did God Make Ebola?
Question for you religious types: The other day, we were working on digging a foundation for a shed I’m building. We ended up digging up an underground wasp nest. My daughter is mildly allergic to wasp stings, so she freaks out when even a single wasp is flying around. She asked me “Why did God make wasps? What do they do besides make nests where they shouldn’t and sting people? Do they pollinate flowers like bees do?” My answer was “I don’t know.”
When I was reading about Ebola the other day, I asked the same question: “Why did God make Ebola?” Any takers?
Published in General
On wasps: They feed on other insects, so they do serve a service. They just happen to be the jerks of the insect class.
On Ebola: That’s not an easy question. As Fake John Galt states, according to Christians the world as originally designed did not have such worries. The question remains, however, if we take the Fall of Man as an event, then where did it come from. Well either before or after the fall. After might make sense, but if we accept the world made as “complete” prior to the Fall, then it would imply it was there before.
If so, then what was its purpose? Hard to say. It may be that at one time it had been designed for an entirely different purpose. Of course, because we aren’t able to recreate this scenario it’s hard to say what that would be. In any case, the Fall corrupts man and all creation with him. Thus things that had a purpose have it twisted somehow.
This is amateur philosophy and theology. Take it with several grains of salt. Like a handful. Maybe rim that salt around a glass and mix a great margarita. It’s really a long way of saying, “I don’t know.” It’s not a very satisfying answer.
And it doesn’t kill them.
You seem to be under the impression that things being killed isn’t a valid purpose.
I cannot read the mind of God with respect to His purpose for this specific virus.
However, a very strong argument can be made that viruses in general are a necessary component for life as we know it (as well as humanity as we know it) to exist.
Viruses are found in almost every ecosystem on Earth and are the most abundant type of biological entity.
Viruses are an important means of “horizontal genetic transfer” (the transfer of genes between organisms in a manner other than traditional reproduction), which increases genetic diversity.
Within the human genome, there are traces of ancient viruses which have been passed down from generation to generation. Therefore, it can be argued that human beings would not be the way they are without the existence of those ancient viruses.
If we believe that God’s plan was to create the Universe in a way that guaranteed that human beings would eventually develop in the way that we did actually develop, then viruses are a necessary component of that plan.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus
Agreed.
This may well be part of their purpose, but even if not, I’m curious why Spin doesn’t think God might have a valid purpose in some humans dying prematurely.
Meaning it is part of the fallen creation?
Why did God make us is a better question.
Spin doesn’t think that. Let’s take a rattle snake as a better example than a crab. The snake can keep down the mouse population. It can also kill a person. So it’s got more than one purpose. Does Ebola serve only to kill? I mean, maybe that’s the answer. Is that your answer?
Well there you go, then.
He made me to think up questions to post on Ricochet.
I think this scenario makes Rob Long God. Or possibly Peter Robinson. Lileks must be the archangel Gabriel.
Building on my previous comment, we do not know God’s plan for the future development of planet Earth. We can only make educated speculation about the events in God’s plan which have yet to occur.
As such, it is possible that the reason we cannot discern Ebola’s role in the plan is because Ebola has yet to fulfill its purpose.
It’s also possible that we can never know Ebola’s purpose (unless it’s revealed to us in the next life), because its role in the plan occurs at the microscopic level, which is incredibly difficult for us to perceive.
It is also possible that Ebola’s purpose has nothing to do with us, and that it’s merely human vanity that assumes that it does. It’s purpose may be to support some other function of life on planet Earth.
The Earth is a phenomenally complex place, and even with all our knowledge we still know so very little about how it works.
In short, the simple fact is that we do not know enough about the Ebola virus to answer the question with any certainty (let alone the fact that we do not know enough about God’s plan in the first place).
I won’t pretend to know the answer, as I lack omniscience. But I am curious why it needs a purpose besides killing. Is this just working under an assumption that God wouldn’t create something that serves no purpose but to end some human’s lives prematurely?
Why are you referring to yourself in the third person?
God made us free. Freedom isn’t just about human will. It applies to life in general. If people weren’t free to make mistakes, they couldn’t be any free will or free thought. Life, to be life, must evolve and develop. If life wasn’t free to evolve in unpleasant directions, there would no life at all.
Here is a Jewish answer:
The world of nature is raw, amoral, and unholy (the opposite of “holy” in the Torah is “original”).
Disease exists so that we invent medicine and improve the world. That is part of mankind’s mission, the way in which we fix and elevate nature. Fixing disease is one of many ways in which we create holiness.
George likes his chicken spicey.
I like that. I like it a lot.
And wasps exist so we can dig them up and kill them.
Wasps are a pretty broad category, actually. They tend to prey on or act as parasites on other insects. They are like medieval mercenaries, in that they are really useful in getting rid of pests, but once the latter is gone the former sticks around and harasses everyone with their short-tempered pointiness.
Jack Vance once used the phrase “As malignant as a wasp” to describe one of his characters. It struck a chord.
One answer would be that if one believes that the Universe operates according to a plan invented by God, that implies that every “thing” in the Universe must have a necessary purpose to fulfill within that plan.
Of course, in support of your point, even if we believe the above there is still a lot of wiggle room.
For example, what qualifies as a “thing”?
An Ebola virus is made up of 19,000 RNA nucleotides. Maybe the “thing” that God has a plan for wasn’t the virus, but instead was the nucleotides.
But then, each nucleotide is made up of atoms. Maybe the atoms are the “things” that God has a plan for, rather than the nucleotides.
But then, the atoms are made up of protons, neutrons, and electrons. Maybe those particles are the “things” that God has a plan for, rather than the atoms.
Etc, etc, etc.
Something like 90% of the cells in our bodies are non-human – including viruses. So these things all fit in somewhere.
Some of the things that fit in we like and some are no good. Dogs protect us from intruders but crocodiles bite our legs off. Some viruses help our bodies work and some kill us.
So in order for this to be, that has to be too.
So does good immediately spring into existence as soon as something bad happens? If good is a good thing and it can’t exist without evil then doesn’t evil serve a good purpose? If so, can it be said evil even exists? Is the struggle to make our own existence evil free, or at least minimally evil, ultimately self defeating? From a good maximization standpoint wouldn’t propagating easily responded to evil, at minimal cost, be the optimal thing to do?
Maybe ebola is an arbitrary means for cleaning and or redirecting the gene pool of humans and other species? In the end, ebola will show no preference for any of the human variants, and the survival rate is about 50%.
To make Darwin proud?
A weapon of one of the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse?
It doesn’t necessarily (need another reason(. This is a discussion, Frank. We are just tossing around ideas.
That’s way to deep.
Going back to my original story, to a young girl trying to make sense of the natural world in the context of her faith in God, I think it’s at least important to understand if all things have a specific purpose, and if they do, what that purpose is.
The sole purpose of ebola may just be to challenge humanity’s ability to survive.
I don’t know. But I think it’s interesting to ponder.
This is precisely what you get when you ask such a difficult philosophical question. You have only yourself to blame.
;-)
Well, then, maybe Ebola will stop global warming, climate change, killer storms? or speed it up?
or a kill few thousand terrorists?