Wasteful Intelligent Design

If we accept (I don't bur if we were to) that the universe as it stands and all within it are the process of design, of which the production of higher mammals namely Humans is the intended end result why is it so vast and impossibly wasteful?The universe is about 14 billion years old, Earth just over 4.5 Billion..... Yet Humans as a clear race have only existed about 200,000 years - I'm not an engineer but that seems ludicrously wastefulThoughts?

Thread copied here from the Wasteful Intelligent Design thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.

Just to expand on the idea of waste...If the idea is that humans are special and unique in the universe, then there is even more waste. The universe is so incredibly vast with the observable part from earth being 93 billion light years in diameter, and the habitable part of our solar system is so tiny. What a waste...I can come up with a few proposals that might offered in response to the objection to waste. Some of the arguments might not be considered acceptable by proponents of intelligent design like those at Discovery institute.1. Perhaps there is no other way to make a universe other than to make it big and old and to allow life to evolve in it, even if that evolution is going to be directed. I cannot imagine that a proponent of special creation would find this option palatable. Fundies probably would also dislike the idea of limits on God.2. Perhaps we aren't so special, and the Designer orders and guides life in other systems, and just didn't tell Moses about it. I cannot imagine many fundamentalists liking that.3. The designer built all of the rest of that stuff to awe us and to provide indication of his power and glory. Maybe that might appeal to some ID proponents.4. The universe is only 6000 years old, and every technique we currently use to measure ages of rocks, fossils, planets, stars, etc., and all methods of measuing distances to objects in the universe are each horribly and stupendously wrong. Despite the seeming goofiness of this answer it seems to be one that many people would accept.5. The universe and time were created, with or without divive intervention via the big bang, and life evolved on earth and elsewhere via evolution. No need to explain waste because the waste has no purpose.6. God works in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants His footsteps in the sea
And rides upon the storm.I'm sure there are other possible explanations.

Huh? There's a lot of conditions that have to line up to some relatively tight specs in order for something like humans to evolve. Seems like if you take 1 and divide it by those odds, you're gonna need something really big to ensure that it does happen somewhere. I doubt we're the only sentient beings that have emerged. Without knowing who else is out there its hard to figure up how wasteful it really is.And you could look at it the other way, how damn special are we!? I mean, even godlessly, we're still incredibly rare.

Bur is a typo (damn iPhone it's surely the devils tool) I had meant to say "but", as in I am not a creationist BUT if we can accept their premise for a
Moment etc etcMy personal opinion is that the universe is random, without intelligent purpose
And entirely wonderful :-) we are a rather nifty fluke. BUT (and again there is that but) I'd like to hear a creationist explanation for all the waste - preferribly not "god works
In mysterious ( [sic] and breath takingly cruel and wasteful) ways

Maybe you should wait until you're in front of a proper keyboard before replying I consider ourselves an inevitability rather than a fluke, given the right conditions. Chemical reactions are spontaneous so they're gonna happen whether you want it or not. You probably should have addressed it to Creationists rather than mentioning Intelligent Design.ABE: Oh, hey, if you reply directly to a post, with the button on the bottom right of the post, rather than using the General Reply button at the top, then it'll link the posts together and also send out an email notification to the person you're replying to.Edited by Catholic Scientist, : see ABE

Thanks - I have to say I'm really enjoying this forum, feels great to give my brain a bit of a work outCorrect me if I'm wrong but aren't Intelligent Design and Creationism kinda the exact same thing but with a bit of spin of the media?

The possibility I raise is that the universe is designed, but it was designed to be sterile. It is just possible that our universe was designed by a Jr. High school student from a very advanced species. He was given the task of designing a universe for the highest number of black holes, but with no life. He failed, but only barely. The teacher could find millions and billions of black holes, but only a handful of planets with life. He got a B+.

Ponder this, co-habiting the human body is more organisms than are cells that comprise the human. And they contain more genetic information than the human they inhabit. perhaps we are the waste. We were created and exist to provide a host, food source and locomotion for the human biome. Human microbiome - WikipediaEdited by 1.61803, : link edit

Well, the concept of "waste" only applies to someone with limited resources. But it's not as though God's going to run out of firmament, or has to pay for it by the yard, is it? And on the seventh day, God's boss came back from his business trip, and lo, he said, 'Dammit, God, there was enough space-time there for a dozen universes! That's the last time I leave you in charge.' ... not gonna happen, is it?

Which supports a natural process rather than design. We're not. Here on Earth there are plenty of sentient beings.If the question is the emergence of a species as highly developed as ours, or further advanced, I've always been doubtful.- Oni

I'm loving the replies to this!I don't really have anything to contribute to my own conversation, but rather enjoying reading it.(perhaps clarify "waste" in this case meaning unneeded extras)

Assuming the designer didn't use natural processes... Oh, yeah, I meant like us. I don't have any reason to doubt there's others. Given the sheer size of it all, its seems inevitable that there are.You really think Earth is the only planet with highly intelligent life on it?

All the fun things in life are unneeded extras.If you look up at the stars in a clear night sky and think to yourself: "Dear me, how unnecessary", then you're doing it wrong.

I've been watching a lot of John Ford movies lately. He used to say that the best things in movies often happen by accident. Mind you, he also said that his function as director was to set up the conditions in which those accidents could happen.