Intelligent Design

[nailit]

More a question for Theland than anyone else (or any other literalist Bible believer)
Can you explain to me why you believe that the universe is intelligently designed?
In fact, lets narrow it down a bit and just say Earth. (when I say 'narrow it down a bit', I actually mean considerably)

*The Earth has been home to over 99% of (now) extinct species of life forms.
*Life has evolved on this planet to eat other life forms
*Parasites live of other beings
*Cancer cells mutate indiscriminately (children, animals, Christians, atheists)
*Volcanos, earthquakes, tidal waves, etc don't discriminate whom they destroy

I could go on but I won't. But please tell me why you think that there is a divine intelligence in orchestrating the above. If its intelligent then its certainly malevolent.

[Old_Geezer]

You can't know it's malevolent; you don't know what the alternatives are.

[naomi24]

//If its intelligent then its certainly malevolent. //

I agree, Nailit.

[Canary42]

Although I'm an atheist, I must point out that intelligent doesn't mean mistake-free. You're just picking on the mistakes.

[Baldric]

Oh, good grief, we have another one amongst us!

[cassa333]

I don’t believe in god but there may have been some sort of more intelligent being sometime in human existence history.

No no no not god. Just an intelligent alien able to manipulate evolution perhaps. Just because it may have done that doesn’t mean it deserves worship.

Ambivalent at best I think. Done the deed then bugggered off.

[vetuste_ennemi]

There's an excellent - or at least a very plausible - case to be made for "intelligent design". (Paley etc.)

There is no case in the least bit plausible for a moral designer.

[jim360]

I always thought that "Paley and the Watch" was merely a demonstration that God is crap at making watches.

[vetuste_ennemi]

The argument was that the watch found on the beach, however imperfect, was not the result of random forces like wind and tides.

As you very well know., I suspect.

[vetuste_ennemi]

Paley's best-seller was written about twenty years after Hume had suggested alternative explanations (anticipating Darwinism in some aspects, perhaps) in his "Dialogues concerning Natural Religion".

[jim360]

I do indeed, but that's why I think it shows that God can't make watches. To be serious for a moment, the very reason that the watch is distinctive and noteworthy is because it is manifestly different from everything around it. Paley wouldn't have stopped to look at the rock on which it rested, or at the beach, or the waves, but when he came across the watch he would ask, "I wonder who made this, for I know that it cannot have formed on its own." (My italics)

I think he then goes off about how the watch is actually clearly constructed because of its order, etc, and then the order is the same as what we see in the Universe, ergo the Universe was also made; but, as I am arguing, that's not why he perceived the watch as special. It's clearly no argument at all to say that it is different from nature (being manifestly created), and then therefore the same as it.

Or, in short... God can't make watches.

[vetuste_ennemi]

Hume's criticism in the Dialogues is that the analogy is imperfect. Or poorly formulated.

The watch is "like" things I know - cooking pots, knives made from flints. Therefore intent.

Hume's contention in the Dialogues is that the "unlike" things may have arrived by other means. In the example of the tree, which is better in most ways than most watches, he posited through his character Philo alternative means by which complex structures may arrive. I think he called it "vegetation". That's if I remember it right, Jim. And I probably don't.

The "vegetation", or whatever, thing is where the chemists take over from you physicists, isn't it?

[vetuste_ennemi]

Is that the same or a different argument from Jim's earlier post?

Back to the Ghost Writer film.

[jim360]

I suspect it's the same sort of idea, although I've never read a word of Hume.

[Theland]

Yes I believe it was. The fine tuning of a inverse from nothing. The impossibility of abiogenesis. Not enough time for unconscious natural processes to, "evolve," into anything resembling life, and certainly not man.
The impossibility of evolution being true.
That's just some of it.
As far as the imperfections and evils of this world are concerned, the fall of man allowed sin to enter into an otherwise perfect creation. Hence cancer for example.
But of course this is not an exhaustive list of the basis of my belief.
Glad to see you back Nailit. Hope you are on the mend.
I know you and others like to throw me a worm and watch me bite so you can wrestle with me and put me down. I am too tired for that and am comfortable in my faith.
I hope my answer is of some use to you.

[Theland]

https://youtu.be/vl802lHAk5Y

Just one of many videos on the subject.

Have a look on YT yourself and find more.

Stephen C Meyer is highly watchable.

[Hazi-Hammenuhoth]

I certainly believe in a Creator God. One need not look beyond the infinite complexity of the human body to see enough evidence that the whole thing could not possibly have happened by "chance" or "accident".

When we see a painting, we know there was an artist. When we see a book, we know there was an author. When we see a house, we know there was an architect and a designer. When we see Creation we presume it all just happened by accident and there was no author, creator or intelligent being...? Where's your logic?

[Peter Pedant]

// You can't know it's malevolent; you don't know what the alternatives are.//

hey this is a gloss on St Anselm's argument ( 1063)
the famous ontological argument for .. God
( more clearly ! once you have to the bit where you know what the alternatives are ( er tha you dont know ) you are near 'God' )
cute huh ?
I just thought I would say

[Peter Pedant]

yeah but no but
you have to say that the Intelligent Design is working around us at this very moment dont you ?

in the nineeteenth century someone noticed rock formations and incongruity
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unconformity
( think of a layer cake wiv one bit at right angles to anuvver) - which meant that if God had created it ( sedementary rock), it had turned after creation, so either he had done it - or.. creation wasnt finished yet

the idea of naturalism grew up - which was crediting God should not be done, if there were a natural explanation. Sedimentary rocks were formed by sediment and not by Gods will if he had nothing to do on a wednesday.
Both conflict with the seven day bit

These ideas 1800-1830 peddled by dons at Cambridge who were also anglican priests- Lyell, Whewell Sedgwick who clearly believed in Creation - and influenced Darwin - who um clearly didnt.

the nineteenth century lot had far greater difficulty in squaring the circle than we do - ('some intelligent design clearly isnt that intelligent')

[Peter Pedant]

// The impossibility of evolution being true. //

hey there are some real theological aguments masquerading as fact ...

Didnt Tertullian say : I believe it because it is unbelievable?

he sure did baby - credo quia incredibilis
in Latin - around 300AD

Jim - you might look at Hume - Scorts Enlightenment 1800 - big intellectural movement then
Hume refuted the principle of (scientific) induction, [collecting facts and then concluding from the facts collected]... (a very important technique even now)

by asking - what makes you think it is valid to collect facts and conclude from them?
( answer: because it seems to work, wasnt deemed good enough)

Hey Jim good huh I bet you read induction and went foooooo!

[1ozzy]

//('some intelligent design clearly isnt that intelligent') //

Standing ovation from me!