I need to rework this so I understand it.
To use the mousetrap analogy often quoted in early ID discussions, ID says that the trap couldn't evolve because without any one of its components - the base, the lever, the spring, the trigger - it wouldn't function. Ie it is irreducibly complex.
Evolution says that if each component had an earlier and independent useage, they could combine later to form a functioning trap. (And in the case of your flagella, those independent molecules have been found and ID was debunked.)
Consider an all metal trap made of carbon steel. A pure ID trap would have all the components - the base, trigger, lever, spring made at the same time so carbon dating the steel would produce the same date for all components.
If however, the trap evolved over time, each component would necessarily have differing dates.
OK so far?
The bit I'm struggling with is your added complexity of ID needing to rework previously built components in order to make the mousetrap. The lever doesn't quite fit the trigger so a new section of steel has to be welded in by the designer. This tweaking will contaminate the C dating of the part.
It seems to me that the designer interfering with the part is exactly the same as evolution interfereing with the part and will give the same result.
Or is my analogy incomplete/wrong?
Life, don't talk to me about life - Marvin the Paranoid Android