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Author Topic:   Evidence for Intelligent Design-is there any?
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 1 of 220 (480410)
09-03-2008 10:47 AM


I am always being asked to give my evidence for intelligent design.However, no matter what I say, the same question comes up as if I never had anything to offer.
For example:
bluescat48 writes:
Then show the evidence. If evidence can be found then it would change ID from pseudoscience
My reply was as follows and Granny Magda's answer to that follows thereafter:
Beretta writes:
Why is it that nobody has ever seen me mention any evidence, no matter how many times I mention various lines of evidence?
Lets see, how about
-the fossils, sudden appearance and general stasis
-the Cambrian explosion -sudden appearance of practically all phyla
-the information rich genetic code
-the inability of ”science’ to explain how the information got there
-the lack of transitional forms
-the continually rehashed icons of evolution that despite being a collection of old worn, some fraudulent, others thoroughly discredited, most out of date somehow never seem to change. One would think with all the vast network of science, something more convincing would come along, but no.
-mutational load, absence of beneficial mutations being demonstrated, surplus of examples of negative effects of mutation
-the specified complexity of living things.
Granny Magda writes:
None of the arguments you list is positive evidence for ID. Not one.
Each of the items you list is an argument against evolution.
I contend that my examples are evidence for intelligent design.

Replies to this message:
 Message 4 by dokukaeru, posted 09-03-2008 11:54 AM Beretta has replied
 Message 7 by Granny Magda, posted 09-03-2008 2:00 PM Beretta has replied
 Message 8 by Huntard, posted 09-03-2008 3:10 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 9 by Straggler, posted 09-03-2008 4:16 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 10 by Deftil, posted 09-03-2008 4:28 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 11 by Straggler, posted 09-03-2008 4:30 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 13 by RickJB, posted 09-04-2008 7:17 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 14 by LucyTheApe, posted 09-04-2008 7:28 AM Beretta has replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 12 of 220 (480507)
09-04-2008 6:42 AM
Reply to: Message 2 by AdminNosy
09-03-2008 10:52 AM


Re: Thread Topic
Hi adminnosy,
My strong suggestion is that this thread be restricted to the issue you make in it's title. That is, the validity of the individual points NOT be discussed here.
Ok great -lets go with that.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 2 by AdminNosy, posted 09-03-2008 10:52 AM AdminNosy has not replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 19 of 220 (480534)
09-04-2008 9:28 AM
Reply to: Message 4 by dokukaeru
09-03-2008 11:54 AM


The Cambrian Explosion
Hi docukaeru
When you say explosion, we are talking 70-80 MILLION years, not for instance, a single week.
Well compared to the time that unicellular forms apparently hung around unchanged -very explosive -work it out compared to how many unique and complex forms there are, it was a fraction of the time one would expect for such diversity by mutation and selection.
We would expect everything diverse to appear complex and suddenly which is why it works far better for ID then it does for gradualism. It would also fulfil a prediction that we wouldn’t find hundreds or thousands of gradual steps leading up to the forms found.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 4 by dokukaeru, posted 09-03-2008 11:54 AM dokukaeru has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 20 by RickJB, posted 09-04-2008 9:32 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 30 by gluadys, posted 09-05-2008 3:26 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 31 by bluegenes, posted 09-05-2008 4:43 AM Beretta has replied
 Message 43 by subbie, posted 09-05-2008 4:49 PM Beretta has not replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 21 of 220 (480539)
09-04-2008 9:50 AM
Reply to: Message 7 by Granny Magda
09-03-2008 2:00 PM


Re: Positive and Negative Evidence
Hi Granny,
Beretta writes:
-the fossils, sudden appearance and general stasis
Granny Magda writes:
If true, this is something that might legitimately cause us to doubt evolution.
Well we know that it is generally true which is why PE was produced as an explanation. PE would explain it, I suppose, though like you, I’m not a fan of that sort of forced explanation.
I wouldn’t really put it down to a limited fossil record, it occurs in a similar fashion no matter how many fossils are found over the years.
Though it may not necessarily be the automatic default explanation, it is nonetheless what we would expect and so would fulfil a prediction of ID’s and I think that that is the point. It is a point both against gradualistic evolution and for sudden appearance of created biological creatures.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 7 by Granny Magda, posted 09-03-2008 2:00 PM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 22 by Granny Magda, posted 09-04-2008 10:05 AM Beretta has not replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 23 of 220 (480543)
09-04-2008 10:06 AM
Reply to: Message 14 by LucyTheApe
09-04-2008 7:28 AM


What other options are there?
Hello Lucy,
I'm confused, I thought Intelligent design was the default position until Darwin formalised biological evolution. What other theories are there?
Well I couldn't have said it better. In fact everything that evolutionists do seems to be done to disprove creation just as much as creationists try to disprove evolution. Why? Evidence against the one IS evidence for the other in a general sense. Personally I don't think there are any other valid theories worth looking at. We were created/we were not created. God created everything/nothing created everything
...what else is there?
You just have to consider that for a little while and apart from the obvious absurdities, that is all there is.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 14 by LucyTheApe, posted 09-04-2008 7:28 AM LucyTheApe has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 24 by Granny Magda, posted 09-04-2008 10:20 AM Beretta has replied
 Message 25 by RickJB, posted 09-04-2008 10:23 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 26 by Coragyps, posted 09-04-2008 10:29 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 27 by Huntard, posted 09-04-2008 12:02 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 28 by Coyote, posted 09-04-2008 12:03 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 29 by Straggler, posted 09-04-2008 6:46 PM Beretta has not replied
 Message 35 by Percy, posted 09-05-2008 7:39 AM Beretta has not replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 34 of 220 (480626)
09-05-2008 7:06 AM
Reply to: Message 24 by Granny Magda
09-04-2008 10:20 AM


Re: What other options are there?
What you mean like believing that a big magic man who lives in the sky made everything that exists, in 6 days, despite despite an overwhelming amount of contradictory evidence from a multitude of different scientific disciplines?
I wasn't aware that there was so much contradictory evidence. As far as I know there are differing interpretations of the same evidence and one interpretation works better than the other. Which contradictions are you talking about?
Trust me, no matter how absurd you find alternative explanations (such as RickJB's robot example), it's no more absurd than I find your Biblical explanation.
Hopefully one day you'll realize how absurd and against the evidence the whole concept of macroevolution is as well.
Why do you imagine that creationism ever fell from favour as the pre-eminent explanation for life on Earth? Because it was criticised to the point of collapse, at which point Darwinism took over by default?Of course not! Darwinism took over because it had positive evidence that better explained the facts.
That's not what I hear - most people gave up the old model because they were induced to believe that 'science' had evidence for an old earth that was incontrovertible. At that point a lot of them started to compromise in order to fit in with that supposed fact. Many never ever believed in evolution however and never needed to throughout their professional careers.Certain university courses have a tendency to turn people into atheists via brainwashing into their philisophical worldview and announcing as fact that which is not.
It made predictions which have been verified again and again over the last century.
Like lining up dead fossils in series that can never actually be verified and announcing their perfect fit even if nobody can actually see much less prove the connection or relation at all? Or like finding human or ape remains and insisting that they are human/ape intermediates for this or that obscure reason until they realize that they have been using artistic licence to the extreme and none of what they imagined was true after all.It's amazing what you can find if you believe that something happened...remember Piltdown man? and Nebraska man? and archeoraptor?...just a few off the top of my head that sucked an incredible number of supposedly intelligent people in. As far as I can see it's just never ending self deception when you decide that something is true.Of course you'll say the same for me but I wonder who is actually right...
When you have life, you need organization and for organization, you need intelligence.Life doesn't just come from arranging the parts either or you would be able to raise the dead since they have all the correct proteins and other components already in place.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 24 by Granny Magda, posted 09-04-2008 10:20 AM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 36 by Huntard, posted 09-05-2008 7:49 AM Beretta has replied
 Message 38 by Percy, posted 09-05-2008 8:02 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 40 by Granny Magda, posted 09-05-2008 8:17 AM Beretta has not replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 37 of 220 (480630)
09-05-2008 7:59 AM
Reply to: Message 31 by bluegenes
09-05-2008 4:43 AM


Re: The Cambrian Explosion
You seem to be trying to suggest that mutation and natural selection could not produce the variety seen in the Cambrian over 70 million generations. It certainly could.
The problem is this -perhaps it could but on the other hand perhaps it could not. It's no good looking at what is present in the fossils and saying 'well there it happened, therefore it must have been possible'. You don't know that it happened by evolution.The probability of Darwinist evolution depnds apon the quantity of favorable micromutations required to create complex organs and organisms, the frequency with which such favorable micromutations occur just where and when they are needed, the efficacy of NS in preserving the slight improvements with sifficient consistency to permit the benefits to accumulate and the time allowed by the fossil record for all of this to have happened.Unless we make calculations taking all of this into account, we have no way of knowing whether it is probable or improbable.
"Whether one finds the gradualist scenarios for the development of complex systems plausibleinvolves an element of subjective judgement. It is a matter of objective fact, however, that these scenarios are speculation." (Phillip Johnson -Darwin on Trial)
This absence of historical or experimental confirmation is presumably what Gould had in mind when he wrote that "These tales, in the just-so tradition of evolutionary natural history, do not prove anything." So is this science?
I understand that generations are much more important than years but that doesn't mean that there were enough generations available just because you believe that it happened.That's philosophy, not proven fact.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 31 by bluegenes, posted 09-05-2008 4:43 AM bluegenes has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 41 by bluegenes, posted 09-05-2008 10:10 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 57 by John 10:10, posted 09-06-2008 11:14 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 68 by BeagleBob, posted 09-06-2008 2:58 PM Beretta has replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 70 of 220 (480957)
09-08-2008 2:09 AM
Reply to: Message 36 by Huntard
09-05-2008 7:49 AM


Re: What other options are there?
However a new thread about the "Icons" would certainly atract my attention.
Good one -soon I'll let you know unless you'd like to start it?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 36 by Huntard, posted 09-05-2008 7:49 AM Huntard has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 79 by Huntard, posted 09-09-2008 2:32 AM Beretta has not replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 71 of 220 (480958)
09-08-2008 2:52 AM
Reply to: Message 68 by BeagleBob
09-06-2008 2:58 PM


The Cambrian Explosion
You sure this is Gould?
Yes it was Gould.He doubted a lot of his colleagues' imaginative stories -but somehow, inexplicably he didn't give up on evolution despite this and his comments on things like sudden appearance and stasis in the fossil record.
Yes, a good deal of evolution involves the crafting of hypothetical situations, especially in the step-by-step construction of transitional forms. And this is exactly what good science does!
The problem with this is that if you're going to craft a hypothetical situation and you have no alternatives to consider, your crafting wins in the absence of competition. It's like deciding between three different suspects in a murder case. You have to have something to check your theories against. Could it have been this one or does he have an alibi; maybe the next one, any reason why not? -but not with evolution, its just a matter of which just-so evolutionary tale do we accept?There is no other option that they are willing to consider -so as far as forensics goes, it's pretty easy for evolution to win every time.
Evolutionary biologists, on the other hand, study how organs like wings and ears and the like work across many different species, and as a result can construct coherent maps of how organs must've transitioned.
The problem with this is that there is the initial philisophical assumption that these things are related via a common ancestor that clouds any clarity of vision on the topic.
Homology is supposed to explain the formation of the gut in vertebrates but if it were true, the gut should form pretty much the same way embryonically but they so often don't -instead they often form from totally different genes in different parts of the embryo defying the logic of relatedness.
So there, how about that for evidence of ID -homologous features in apparently evolutionarily related creatures have no embryological developmental connection whatsoever, so ID is a better explanation. You may say that is evidence against evolution but it certainly is evidence for separate creation of different kinds of biological creatures.
as a result can construct coherent maps of how organs must've transitioned.
There we go -constructing just-so stories on the assumption that organs have transitioned -philisophical bias there.Has not been proven -no mechanism for it.
Evolutionary biology is therefore based on just as much empirical evidence
Dead bones -no date attached, no-one was there -can't prove that any one of those fossils is related to any other(unless you can catch them fossilized while giving birth.)Forensics is just not quite the same as things like gravity.

This message is a reply to:
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Replies to this message:
 Message 74 by Straggler, posted 09-08-2008 8:47 AM Beretta has not replied
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Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 72 of 220 (480959)
09-08-2008 2:56 AM
Reply to: Message 67 by Granny Magda
09-06-2008 1:45 PM


DNA
The coded information in DNA is evidence for an intelligent designer
-specified complexity.
Now you tell me why it is better as evidence for evolution or why an intelligent designer is not allowed as an alternative explanation.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 67 by Granny Magda, posted 09-06-2008 1:45 PM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 73 by Granny Magda, posted 09-08-2008 8:32 AM Beretta has not replied
 Message 78 by Percy, posted 09-08-2008 6:39 PM Beretta has replied

  
Beretta
Member (Idle past 5628 days)
Posts: 422
From: South Africa
Joined: 10-29-2007


Message 81 of 220 (481279)
09-10-2008 9:59 AM
Reply to: Message 78 by Percy
09-08-2008 6:39 PM


Specified complexity
Well Percy I'm sorry that you were not impressed by the logic of the argument for specified complexity because I was. I suppose since evolutionists do seem by and large to support 'the theory of no design' even when it looks like design, it is to be expected.
The problem is again in the philosophy of the evolutionist - it can't be designed because there is no designer so even when it looks like design by reason of its intricate organization, we call it 'designoid' or 'apparent design' as if you know for sure that something that truelly looks like design truelly can't have been designed.
In the Bible it is called 'willful blindness' -we can't see it because we don't want to.

This message is a reply to:
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