Evidence against Intelligent Design

@sonship said
I am not as quick to assume an eternal and omniscient God who has granted free will to men didn't do things in the best way.

Yet you were quick to assume this god even is omniscient and eternal in the first place.

Even if you believe in ID, you have no way to know if a "Creator" still exists, nor do you know if there was only one intelligent designer. And you certainly have no way to know if such beings are "eternal". In fact, since "faith" is required for your beliefs rather than concrete evidence, you have no basis on which to argue scientifically.

@sonship said

"Cursed is the ground because of you; In toil will you eat of it all the days of your life. And thorns and thistles will it bring forth to you. . . " (Gen. 3:10).

How do you balance this divine spitefulness with divine omnibenevolence?

@ghost-of-a-duke said
Even as a mere mortal I can think of better ways to remind mankind of his sin than creating brain parasites to turn ants into zombies.

And how long did this go on before humans finally discovered it?

All these parasites are causing gruesome suffering in the hopes that some human finally discovers it, and then somehow makes the connection of "oh I guess this has to do with sin."

@vivify said
And how long did this go on before humans finally discovered it?

All these parasites are causing gruesome suffering in the hopes that some human finally discovers it, and then somehow makes the connection of "oh I guess this has to do with sin."

Christians like Sonship want their cake and eat it. They're happy with ID when it relates to butterflies or Koalas but offer bizarre and childlike explanations when it relates to things in nature that are downright revolting and cruel.

Evolution doesn't have this problems. Nothing set out to bring a brain eating parasite into existence.

@Ghost-of-a-Duke

How do you balance this divine spitefulness with divine omnibenevolence?

The "question" is bias and loaded with contempt for God.
To dignify it is to comply with your slander of a "spiteful" God.

If you have some slander towards God you do not have to frame it as a loaded question. Just state your slander and accusation and be done with it.

For my part I am thankful that where something is wrong God has a way from fallen man not to be complacent but REALIZE something is not altogether right when alienated from God.

@Ghost-of-a-Duke

Evolution doesn't have this problems. Nothing set out to bring a brain eating parasite into existence.

Then why does it exist?

Evolution would have the situation that natural selection from random modifications has apparently not yet weeded out the brain eating parasite. And perhaps instead Evolution will enable it to be more and more fit.

The most like creature to survive on earth is the cock roach.
And maybe survival of the fittest will have the parasite win out over all the brains
down the road of future evolution.

That I would say is your problem, along with a generally running down and dying universe anyway.

I have the resurrection of Christ as a foretaste, preview, guarantee, that the God of resurrection will totally swallow up death and every negative thing according to His eternal purpose.

@vivify
Ghost:

Even as a mere mortal I can think of better ways to remind mankind of his sin than creating brain parasites to turn ants into zombies.

No one said it was the only way.
There are many reminders and indicators for there are many kinds of people who respond to many different things.

And how long did this go on before humans finally discovered it?

There are probably still dangers of which we no nothing of yet.
God oversees the development of history.
He is wise enough to consider what stage of knowledge man is currently at.
He is wise enough and transcendent over time to know what stage of knowledge man WILL be at at some future time.

As we discover and develop remedies to problems we also discover new problems. He has it that until the establishment of His kingdom we can never be 100% independent from Himself.

If you had a blood clot wouldn't you rather you feel something so that you would go to the doctor? Wouldn't you rather have some indication signaling you that something is not right with you?

I suffer from high blood pressure. It is called "the silent killer." It is feared because you may not feel anything bad. I have to be very careful about that.

So indications that something is wrong are a mercy to us that we are not destroyed by some silent imperceptible danger.


Some of you guys, instead of manufacturing scoffs to showoff your contempt for God to one another, should stop and think of the all the things you could be thankful to God for. And that even though there are some things you wish He would immediately solve.

I think you should at least, balance your fault finding with some amount of thankfulness. So much you unthankfully take for granted.

All these parasites are causing gruesome suffering in the hopes that some human finally discovers it, and then somehow makes the connection of "oh I guess this has to do with sin."

People with less knowledge have prayed and God has healed them if that is His will.
Do you think everybody over the centuries who has asked God for help totally understood WHAT was the problem ailing them.

God knows, God hears, God understands. And if it is His will can heal WITHOUT you knowing what it is that He is healing.

Modern medicine can make man proud and feel God is out of a job.
Before modern medicine there was a gracious God who heard prayer and
responded to asking Him for help.

Men and women today beseech God for help.
And they may not know, not modern science know, WHAT it is that God knows
and reaches down to help us.

So sometime THANK God even for the dangers He saves you from of which you are completely ignorant. Don't be so unthankful seeking out slanders, faults, complaints, grumblings and murmurings against a good and righteous Creator.

@Ghost-of-a-Duke

Christians like Sonship want their cake and eat it. They're happy with ID when it relates to butterflies or Koalas but offer bizarre and childlike explanations when it relates to things in nature that are downright revolting and cruel.

Well, you're talking to me now.
And I have no problem accepting that there is proper cell division by ID and cancer
of unrestrained cell division. There is also indications as to something having gone wrong.

Look at the fish in the sea.
As you descend deeper and deeper they become uglier and uglier.
As the darkness gathers and thickens they seem more grotesque.

There are some things to contemplate in the wonderful creation of God.
There is Him revealing things to us by the created things.

And there is Him speaking to us in His word.
There is the book of nature and the book or revelation.

@sonship said
@Ghost-of-a-Duke

Christians like Sonship want their cake and eat it. They're happy with ID when it relates to butterflies or Koalas but offer bizarre and childlike explanations when it relates to things in nature that are downright revolting and cruel.

Well, you're talking to me now.
And I have no problem accepting that there is proper cell divisi ...[text shortened]... there is Him speaking to us in His word.
There is the book of nature and the book or revelation.

God created the whole 'shebang' or He didn't. You seek to give credit to God for the lovely things and blame man for all the nasty stuff.

The problem you have is that the whole Adam and Eve narrative is a story, not a historical account. Our species did not begin with two perfect humans in a garden. There was no fall of man to justify all the nasty stuff in the universe.

@ghost-of-a-duke said
God created the whole 'shebang' or He didn't. You seek to give credit to God for the lovely things and blame man for all the nasty stuff.

The problem you have is that the whole Adam and Eve narrative is a story, not a historical account. Our species did not begin with two perfect humans in a garden. There was no fall of man to justify all the nasty stuff in the universe.

Not to mention that the story provides no causal link between humans 'sinning' and suffering entering the world.

Edit: actually, I have to take that back. God is the cause of most of the suffering, i.e. "cursed is the ground for your sake".

@vivify said
The premise is that ID is a better explanation for life or the universe than biological or cosmological evolution.

As already shown, this is clearly false.

My problem is that in terms of ID V Evolution it can only mean God or gods V Evolution because any other designer would presumably have had to evolve into a super intelligent technocratic species themselves and if they did then they are surplus to requirements.
It’s as though someone’s trying to rebrand God because his figures have dropped.

@kevcvs57

My problem is that in terms of ID V Evolution it can only mean God or gods V Evolution because any other designer would presumably have had to evolve into a super intelligent technocratic species themselves and if they did then they are surplus to requirements.
It’s as though someone’s trying to rebrand God because his figures have dropped.

Did you choose to believe that?

Or is it just the random fizzing of chemicals in the physical grey matter of your brain your "consciousness" and your beliefs?

If the long accidental purposeless, goalless, intention-less, and random collisions of matter somehow caused a thinking brain to tumble out of the chaos, what credit can you take for "choosing" some right thoughts over some wrong ones?

Are you not just fizzing randomly to some physical arrangement of atoms which are your "beliefs"? No thanks to any choice you made.

@kevcvs57 said
My problem is that in terms of ID V Evolution it can only mean God or gods V Evolution because any other designer would presumably have had to evolve into a super intelligent technocratic species themselves and if they did then they are surplus to requirements.
It’s as though someone’s trying to rebrand God because his figures have dropped.

This brings up the single biggest problem with ID vs. Evolution: evolution doesn't contradict ID.

Believers in ID are pushing a false dichotomy.

@Ghost-of-a-Duke

God created the whole 'shebang' or He didn't.

I believe as John wrote, that "All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him not one thing came into being which has come into being." (John 1:3)

That of course commits me to believing ultimately the whole shebang could not come into being apart from God.

You seek to give credit to God for the lovely things and blame man for all the nasty stuff.

Some lovely things are man's doing. So that is an exaggeration.

And again, "unto Him and to Him and through Him are all things".
Ultimately nothing could come into being apart from God who calls the not
being into being.

The oldest book in the Bible Job dealt with this problem up front, first thing. "How come bad stuff happens, especially to good people?"

The problem you have is that the whole Adam and Eve narrative is a story, not a historical account.

You don't know that it is not 100% history.
I trust God's speaking.
You don't or believe God spoke or even is.

Neither one of us was there to witness that it was history by personal experience.
You hope it wasn't and replace it with another miracle story of your own
preference - apes gradually became people.

I count the integrity of Jesus Christ as above reproach or questioning.
So it the history of Adam and Eve was good enough for Jesus, I trust it.

Our species did not begin with two perfect humans in a garden. There was no fall of man to justify all the nasty stuff in the universe.

Actually the "nasty stuff" was already in the universe somewhere. That is why Adam was given the mandate to guard the garden. He was enticed to join the opposition party and the "nasty stuff" got the upper hands - temporarily.

I definitely believe that God can cause all things to work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His eternal purpose.

The nastiest of all nasty things that ever happened is man executing the Son of God. And He has turned THAT into the basis of eternal salvation. This is a testament to the transcendent God's ability to cause all things to work together toward His eternal purpose and the good of those who are called into it.

Those who want nothing to do with God are the losers, and infinitely so.
They will go with their leader to his everlasting defeat and shame.

"And many of those who are sleeping in the dust of the ground will awake, some to life eternal and some to reproach, to eternal contempt. And those who have insight will shine like the shining of the heavenly expanse, and those who turn many to righteousness, like the stars, forever and ever." (Daniel 12:2,3)

I trust this.

@vivify said
This brings up the single biggest problem with ID vs. Evolution: evolution doesn't contradict ID.

Believers in ID are pushing a false dichotomy.

Like I say I think they are really meaning a God that poofed itself into existence is a more likely candidate for our existence than evolution but it sounds more pseudo scientific if they use the term intelligent designer. Also why would a God or gods have to rely on something as mundane as intelligence. Whenever I hear the phrase I think about the planet builders in hitch hikers guide to the galaxy rather than supernatural beings for which there is no origin theory at all.