Answering four classic questions

How do free will and determinism coexist? We are free to choose from several determined choices.

How can God be both omnipotent and benevolent? It is not God that brings evil and injustice, it is nature which sometimes seems cruel to us as a means of evolving life toward Godhood.

Is there a direction to evolution? The reality of the evolutionary process has shown a direction toward higher, more complex, more intelligent, more conscious forms, in spite of backward and sideways going.

The last question relates to the question, is there purpose in the universe? The purpose of this ongoing evolutionary process is to evolve life to Godhood.

These answers give reason for optimism and idealism. We can civilize the beast and learn to prevent the decline and early death of a people or society by understanding the social and biological patterns that bring collapse, and by applying voluntary population control, and voluntary genetics. We not only can prevent negative ends but we can seek positive ends, even as we recognize that competition, separation, and distinctiveness are a good thing on the evolutionary path to Godhood.