In the beginning

The basic story is that the serpent talked Eve into eating fruit from the Tree of Knowledge and she learned good and evil. I've long assumed that this is a standard Pandora's Box type myth where the diety says "watch this but don't open or eat it while I walk over here and turn my back". It's using reverse psychology to get the people to do something it isn't willing or able to do itself.

It occurred to me the other day that the fruit may have done exactly what the serpent said. Adam and Eve both developed intelligence on the level of God yet weren't smart enough to turn around and immediately eat from the Tree of Life before getting busted. The duo left Eden while discussing the impact an 8th dimensional drive would have on the relativistic effect of traveling at or near the speed of light or something similar that maybe half a dozen people can start theorizing about even now. They go off and have some kids who seem to have the mental capacity of slime molds with an extra chromosome pair compared to their parents.

Another idea is that humans weren't God's first attempt at intelligent species. A test was needed to prove the species was worth releasing from the lab into the general population. A lesser creation would be told "OY! You there! Hands off the pomegranates." and would say "OK" and leave the fruit alone. Like computers. Pretty spiffy but not much of a self-starter. No free will. Just data processors. These two, however, were told "Don't eat the pomegranates!" said "OK" and while God was explaining to the parrots "DON'T. EAT. THE. BOOK!" Eve grabbed herself a snack. God sees this and figures he's developed a good enough AI for the humans and sends them out into the world.