Was God designed?

I'm not exactly asking 'who designed the designer?'
but rather using the ID logic to ask the subject
title.God, presumably, is a specified, complex entity ... and
therefore designed.If God was not designed, then specified complexity is not
sufficient evidence of design.I know IDers will say ... designer not necessarily god,
but for those who do invoke a god (christian or
otherwise) doesn't that break the argument down?

I would love to hear Dembski's reply to that.I realize he will loop into some sort of circular logic, or merely assert that God can stand outside the causal universe (and so fails to need an explanation of how HE came to be), but it could be fun for a few laughs.holmes

Was God designed?

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I'm not exactly asking 'who designed the designer?'
but rather using the ID logic to ask the subject
title.

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God, presumably, is a specified, complex entity ... and
therefore designed.

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If God was not designed, then specified complexity is not
sufficient evidence of design.******************************************************************... might as well plunge right into some controversy! The above question/argument typically comes from individuals that hold a dominant materialistic perspective and/or that know little-to-nothing about the being that we call God (BTW, 'God' is the God of the Bible... the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob... the Triune God).To ask 'if God was designed' or to say that 'God is a specified complex entity' is to try to encompass God within material constraints. You may as well ask 'what color ambition is' or 'what flavor trust is'. These questions are ill-defined and nonsense.Therefore, the question 'Was God designed?' cannot be addressed since God is eternal in a sense that we cannot conceive or speak of in any past/future-tense. God has always "Been". If you wish to have just a minor glimpse of this unimaginable attribute of God, try reading Georg Cantor's Contributions to the Founding of the Theory of Transfinite Numbers. Happy reading.In Christ,
Joralex

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The above question/argument typically comes from individuals that hold a dominant materialistic perspective and/or that know little-to-nothing about the being that we call God

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I am sure you can recite volumes, but what do you actually know? It is always interesting when people make the claim to knowledge of a creature who is beyond our understanding. Doesn't that strike you as a bit silly?I'm going to dismiss the 'materialistic perspective' comments as insubstantial name calling, unless you can elaborate.

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(BTW, 'God' is the God of the Bible... the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob... the Triune God).

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Why? Why this one? This is a critical question, and one you cannot answer, I'll wager, without a simple appeal to intangibles.

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These questions are ill-defined and nonsense.

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Perhaps you should look at your definition of God? It strikes me as ill-defined-- no, intentionally ill defined-- and quite a lot of nonsense.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Regardless of the true nature of God (or god or gods),
which, let's face it, none of us has a clue about, from
our perspective an entity that could create an entire
universe must be pretty complex, and meet the meaning
attributed to 'specified complex' systems.That your (?) God has no material presence is immaterial
He/she/it/they acts on the material universe (according to
the creationist viewpoint) and thus makes itself a concrete
part of our reality.The problem, fundamental to ID by God, that I was alluding to is the
contradiction summed up as:1) Anything which shows specified complexity must have a designer.
2) God has no designer.
3) God represents an extreme of specified complexity.3 makes 1 & 2 contradictory.The questions which you raised are, indeed, ill-defined.
Asking whether God was designed is not except that there
is no formal defintion of what 'designed' means. Which is
why I cast the question in the context of ID, where
'design' is assumed for anything that shows specified
complexity.Essentially all you have said is that we cannot ask the
question becuase we do not know the nature of God.Doesn't that strike you as evasive, to say the least.If mankind had said 'Fire ... well we don't understand that
let's leave well alone and ask no more' I wonder where we would
be today.

I think it's understood among ID-ist, that intelligent design by human beings, (such as Michalangelo's paintings which they often mention), is also understood to be essentially mysterious. So since you neither can explain how Michaelangelo created his paintings, nor could Michaelangelo explain it himself, neither can you explain how God created Nature. Present a scientific formula for creating paintings why don't you, without referring to such unexplainable things as originality, creativity etc. I think the way science is now, creativity would show up as randomness when measured. Creativity is not concrete, it doesn't have size or weight, but it is more important I guess then concrete reality.regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

Not, in this instance, particulary concerned with how
nature was created (or why), but in the contradiction
that ID introduces if the designer is God.If the designer is not God we have a recursion going on ...
but that's another story.

Essentially your post here manages to miss the point of the message you are replying to.The question actually being asked is "Using Dembski's methodology should we conclude that God is designed". And in fact the answer seems to be "yes". If you disagree with that conclusion then you are only indicating that the methodology is flawed in that it produces the wrong (or "wrong") answer.

But Dembski doesn't argue that this is a specified complex thing, therefore a specified complex thing created it, he argues it was therefore intelligently designed, intelligent design being left mysterious. Sorry but there is no literature I know of about God as a specified complex entitity.regards,
Mohammad Nor Syamsu

"I am sure you can recite volumes, but what do you actually know? It is always interesting when people make the claim to knowledge of a creature who is beyond our understanding. Doesn't that strike you as a bit silly?"Silly? Not at all. Your question, OTOH, is silly. It demontrates what I had alluded to in my first post - a total ignorance of Him.

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You see, He reveals Himself in three ways : through the written word (the Bible), through personal "contact" (prayer life, meditating in Him, etc.), and through His creation (all that is in the universe). Without these things how else would you expect to gain knowledge of Him?

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But then my expectation - based on the tone of your post - is that these things mean very little to you."I'm going to dismiss the 'materialistic perspective' comments as insubstantial name calling, unless you can elaborate."Dismiss all you want. As for being able to elaborate, I can do that but, frankly, I am quite certain that it would be a waste of time (so I will not)."Why? Why this one? This is a critical question, and one you cannot answer, I'll wager, without a simple appeal to intangibles."Wrong again, John. The reason why only the God of the Bible foots the bill requires a great deal of study (if you want to cover all the bases). I could recommend several hundred books on the matter and my first one would be the Bible. But to the skeptic the Bible is nonsense - God made it that way. The bottom line is that this is not a purely intellectual exercise as you believe it to be."Perhaps you should look at your definition of God? It strikes me as ill-defined-- no, intentionally ill defined-- and quite a lot of nonsense."Often times when something exceeds a person's ability to understand it, that something is labelled as 'nonsense'. This is one of the defense mechanisms of pride.

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Did you read Georg Cantor's work on transfinite numbers? It'll help you capture a small glimpse of God's infinite attribute. But then, you're not really interested in knowing Him, are you? Your main interest is in dismissing Him.In Christ,
Jorge

"Regardless of the true nature of God (or god or gods),
which, let's face it, none of us has a clue about,from
our perspective an entity that could create an entire
universe must be pretty complex, and meet the meaning
attributed to 'specified complex' systems."Clearly you didn't catch my meaning. An automobile is a complex piece of machinery and a person's feelings are also complex. Would you think of them being 'complex' in the same sense of the word?

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If you insist, God would be infinitely 'complex'; 'complex' in a way that is incomparable with the complexity of, say, a living cell."Essentially all you have said is that we cannot ask the
question becuase we do not know the nature of God.

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Doesn't that strike you as evasive, to say the least.

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If mankind had said 'Fire ... well we don't understand that
let's leave well alone and ask no more' I wonder where we would
be today."Not true - I didn't say the question couldn't be asked but rather that the question was ill-defined (go back and read).

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Ask all you want, just make sure that the questions being asked are well defined. In this case before asking about God you should first make certain that you understand what is appropriate and what is not.

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Here are more examples of ill-defined questions of God: How much does God weigh? Which baseball team does He like? What is God's IQ? How many pounds can God dead-lift? How 'complex' is God? Infinitely many others...In Christ,
Jorge

"I think it's understood among ID-ist, that intelligent design by human beings, (such as Michalangelo's paintings which they often mention), is also understood to be essentially mysterious. So since you neither can explain how Michaelangelo created his paintings, nor could Michaelangelo explain it himself, neither can you explain how God created Nature. Present a scientific formula for creating paintings why don't you, without referring to such unexplainable things as originality, creativity etc. I think the way science is now, creativity would show up as randomness when measured. Creativity is not concrete, it doesn't have size or weight, but it is more important I guess then concrete reality."Very good, Syamsu! This has some of the essence that I have alluded to.

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Total Reality is far more non-material than what matter is able to encompass.In Christ,
Jorge

"... If you disagree with that conclusion then you are only indicating that the methodology is flawed in that it produces the wrong (or "wrong") answer." Not at all. The methodology is not flawed, it is the object that the methodology is being applied to that is inappropriate.

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Watch : here's a very precise digital scale (measures accurately up to one-ten-millionth of a gram). Now, use that scale to determine the chemical constituents of an unknown substance.

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There's nothing wrong with the scale, right? What is wrong is that it is being employed improperly.In Christ,
Jorge

Hi Joralex:Would you mind expanding a bit on the following statement? It doesn't seem to make sense as written. Thanks.

There is a name for this sort of argument. Special pleading. YOur claim that the method is inapplicable is an assumption, and one that requires support.Dembski claims that his methodology is reliable (indeed he has claimed that it produces NO false positives, i.e. that it NEVER indicates that something is designed when it is not). No exceptions are given, no reasons as to why it should not be applicable to everything.