Design flaws in organisms indicate evolution, not intelligent design

[Compassionist]

The existence of design flaws in living organisms is often cited as evidence for evolution by natural selection rather than intelligent design by an all-loving, all-knowing, and all-powerful deity. If such a being existed and created life intentionally, we might expect optimal design — yet what we see instead are structures and processes that are inefficient, prone to failure, or even harmful.
Here are some significant biological design flaws that point to evolution rather than perfect design:
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1. Human Birth Canal vs. Big Brain
• Flaw: Human babies have large heads due to our large brains, but the human pelvis is narrow for bipedal walking.
• Result: Childbirth is extremely painful and dangerous — a leading cause of death historically.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Our ancestors evolved larger brains and upright walking separately, leading to a dangerous compromise.
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2. Wisdom Teeth
• Flaw: Most people don't have room for third molars, causing impaction, infections, and pain.
• Result: Many need surgery to remove them.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Our ancestors had larger jaws due to diet, but modern humans' jaws shrank faster than tooth evolution could keep up.
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3. Human Retina Is Backward
• Flaw: The photoreceptor cells in the human eye are behind layers of neurons and blood vessels.
• Result: Creates a blind spot and reduces image quality.
• Evolutionary Explanation: The eye evolved incrementally, not from a clean-slate design.
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4. Recurrent Laryngeal Nerve (Giraffe Example)
• Flaw: This nerve travels from the brain to the larynx, but loops around the aorta.
• Result: In giraffes, it travels over 15 feet instead of a direct path of a few inches.
• Evolutionary Explanation: It's a leftover from fish ancestors, where this path made sense. Evolution modified existing structures rather than redesigning from scratch.
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5. Human Menstrual Cycle
• Flaw: Humans shed the uterine lining even if not pregnant, wasting resources and causing pain.
• Result: Menstrual cramps, anemia, mood changes.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Other mammals reabsorb the lining. Our approach may have evolved due to pathogen risks in internal fertilization.
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6. Shared Path for Food and Air
• Flaw: The esophagus (food) and trachea (air) share an entrance.
• Result: Risk of choking — a leading accidental cause of death.
• Evolutionary Explanation: The throat evolved in stages, without foresight.
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7. Human Spine and Back Pain
• Flaw: Our spine is an S-curve not ideally suited for upright walking.
• Result: Many people suffer chronic back pain, herniated discs, etc.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Our ancestors were quadrupeds. The upright posture evolved later, leading to inefficient structure.
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8. Brain Vulnerability and Mental Illness
• Flaw: The brain is highly energy-consuming and prone to many dysfunctions.
• Result: High rates of depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, etc.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Natural selection favored reproductive success, not mental wellness or long-term wellbeing.
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9. Knee Joint Design
• Flaw: Knees bear immense strain, especially the ACL (anterior cruciate ligament), which often tears.
• Result: Common injuries in sports and aging.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Knees evolved from quadruped ancestors, not optimally engineered for bipedal running and jumping.
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10. Genetic "Junk" and Mutations
• Flaw: The genome is full of non-coding or redundant DNA and is prone to harmful mutations.
• Result: Genetic diseases, cancer, and congenital defects.
• Evolutionary Explanation: DNA accumulates "baggage" over time. There's no intelligent editing or streamlining process.
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11. Susceptibility to Cancer
• Flaw: Cells divide for life but are prone to mutations that cause cancer.
• Result: One of the top global causes of death.
• Evolutionary Explanation: Cell division is essential for life, but natural selection can't eliminate all cancer risk — especially after reproductive age.
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12. Human Psychology Biases
• Flaw: We are prone to cognitive biases (e.g., confirmation bias, tribalism, overconfidence).
• Result: Misjudgments, discrimination, and conflict.
• Evolutionary Explanation: These evolved to enhance survival in specific environments, not to produce truth-seeking rationality.
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If we were designed by an omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent being, such flaws are impossible to justify. Evolution by natural selection, on the other hand, explains these quirks and imperfections as the result of a messy, blind, trial-and-error process — where old parts are tweaked, not replaced, and survival/reproduction, not perfection, is the end goal.

[Jose Fly]

Excerpt below from:

https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/ ... eases.html

For decades, scientists have known that, despite its name, “junk DNA” in fact plays a critical role: While the coding genes provide blueprints for building proteins, which direct most of the body's functions, some of the noncoding sections of the genome, including regions previously dismissed as “junk,” seem to turn up or down the expression of those genes.

But it’s been unclear how certain noncoding regions influence gene-expression levels — that is, the number of times a gene is copied into RNA and used to make proteins.

Now, a new study by Polly Fordyce, PhD, associate professor of bioengineering and of genetics, and her colleagues has unraveled some of the mystery. Their discovery may help researchers understand complex genetic conditions, including autism, schizophrenia, cancer and Crohn’s disease.

"We've known for a while that short tandem repeats, or STRs, aren't junk because their presence or absence correlates with changes in gene expression," Fordyce said. "But we haven't known how they exert these effects."

Authors of the study, published Sept. 22 in Science, believe it's the first to offer a roadmap to understanding how STR changes can impact gene expression.

An evolving view of 'junk DNA'

STRs make up about 5% of the human genome. "Starting in the 1980s, researchers noticed that changes to these repetitive sequences can affect gene expression," said the study's lead author, Connor Horton, who was a technician in Fordyce's lab. "That's the trail of breadcrumbs we've followed."

For the study, the researchers looked at how STRs interact with proteins called transcription factors. Transcription factors attach to noncoding DNA, regulating the expression of protein-coding genes.

"Researchers have spent a lot of time characterizing these transcription factors and figuring out which sequences - called motifs - they like to bind to the most," Fordyce said. But current models don't adequately explain where and when transcription factors bind to noncoding DNA to regulate gene expression. Sometimes, no transcription factor is attached to something that looks like a perfect motif. Other times, transcription factors bind to stretches of DNA that aren't motifs.

Geez, I was chastising creationists for making this mistake 20+ years ago, and y'all are still repeating it!

FYI, finding a function for some portions of the human genome that were considered to be non-functional doesn't mean that therefore all of them are functional. As I put it back then, it's like finding a needle in a haystack and concluding that the entire stack is therefore all needles.

[Jose Fly]

Pointing out the FACT that scientists, who obviously didn't understand the function of the overwhelming majority of DNA, decided to label it as "junk", so they could pretend to know what they're talking about, when they obviously didn't,

Is that really what you think happened?

[A Freeman]

Pointing out the FACT that scientists, who obviously didn't understand the function of the overwhelming majority of DNA, decided to label it as "junk", so they could pretend to know what they're talking about, when they obviously didn't,

Is that really what you think happened?

Is it your intention to pretend otherwise?

[Jose Fly]

Pointing out the FACT that scientists, who obviously didn't understand the function of the overwhelming majority of DNA, decided to label it as "junk", so they could pretend to know what they're talking about, when they obviously didn't,

Is that really what you think happened?

Is it your intention to pretend otherwise?

I don't have to pretend, I know otherwise. I've been working alongside geneticists for decades.

Where specifically did you get the impression that they just labelled parts of DNA "junk" as a ruse to cover up their lack of knowledge?

[Compassionist]

[Replying to Compassionist in post #1]

U R lost

That's all you have to say about this thread?

[Compassionist]

...
Recurrent Laryngeal Nerve (Giraffe Example)
• Flaw: This nerve travels from the brain to the larynx, but loops around the aorta.
....

Thanks, I believe there is a good reason for that, and I will wait till "science" self-corrects.

There is no good reason for that.

[A Freeman]

Pointing out the FACT that scientists, who obviously didn't understand the function of the overwhelming majority of DNA, decided to label it as "junk", so they could pretend to know what they're talking about, when they obviously didn't,

Is that really what you think happened?

Is it your intention to pretend otherwise?

I don't have to pretend, I know otherwise. I've been working alongside geneticists for decades.

Where specifically did you get the impression that they just labelled parts of DNA "junk" as a ruse to cover up their lack of knowledge?

There's a huge difference between thinking one knows something and actually knowing.

At no time was it personally said, nor implied that the doctors and scientists were engaged in subterfuge; only that they clearly didn't know what they were talking about when venturing a guess that there was such a thing as "junk DNA".

If we were only observing and studying DNA, to genuinely learn more about its creation, we wouldn't be attempting to make changes to it, particularly given how little we actually know about it and its function.

Instead, we do what arrogant/ignorant humans always do, believing we know better than The Master Designer/Programmer, creating an entire industry out of manipulating genetic code with absolutely disastrous results that threaten the very existence of all life on Earth.

[Compassionist]

....My conclusion is that the Bible is false. The Biblical God is imaginary and evil. By the way, recent research has discovered utility for "junk DNA". Science is self-correcting. That's what I love about science. Religions do not self-correct.

Ok, I don't think anyone can prove Bible false. And I don't think God is evil. But, when science is self correcting, why would anyone trust it is now correct? After 50 years it may have corrected the ideas you now have, and you will look foolish, when you have founded your beliefs on it.

If religion does not self correct, it can be because there is no good reason for doing so.

The Bible, like many religious books, makes claims about what is real. These claims contradict each other and what we know from scientific research. You don't understand how science works. You are benefiting from science every day - the fact that we can discuss ideas on this forum is entirely due to science and technology developed due to science.

Why would a God who is supposed to be omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent and the creator of the universe and all living things, command murder? The answer is that God didn't command murder. Liars and murderers made up a God who commanded genocides so that they could rob the lands of other people in their God's name as God's Chosen People. Think about it. These are self-serving lies.

"On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord in the presence of Israel:
“Sun, stand still over Gibeon,
and you, moon, over the Valley of Aijalon.
So the sun stood still,
and the moon stopped,
till the nation avenged itself on its enemies,
” - Joshua 10: 12 - 14, The Bible (New International Version).

Yet: "The LORD was with the men of Judah. They took possession of the hill country, but they were unable to drive the people from the plains, because they had chariots fitted with iron." - Judges 1:19, The Bible (New International Version).

So, this God made the sun stand still and the moon stand still so that his Chosen People could murder more, but couldn't defeat the people with chariots fitted with iron!

"The Lord regretted that he had made human beings on the earth, and his heart was deeply troubled. So the Lord said, “I will wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground—for I regret that I have made them.”" - Genesis 6:6,7, The Bible (New International Version). This is not the behaviour of an all-loving, all-knowing and all-powerful being. Such beings, if they existed, would always make perfect choices and they would never regret anything.

These are the reasons I am 100% certain that the Biblical God is imaginary and evil.

I am not at all certain about whether or not a Theist or Deist or Pantheist or Panentheist God exists because such Gods are unfalsifiable. I am an agnostic atheist because I don't know if such Gods exist or not.

[Jose Fly]

Pointing out the FACT that scientists, who obviously didn't understand the function of the overwhelming majority of DNA, decided to label it as "junk", so they could pretend to know what they're talking about, when they obviously didn't,

Is that really what you think happened?

Is it your intention to pretend otherwise?

I don't have to pretend, I know otherwise. I've been working alongside geneticists for decades.

Where specifically did you get the impression that they just labelled parts of DNA "junk" as a ruse to cover up their lack of knowledge?

There's a huge difference between thinking one knows something and actually knowing.

Yep, like when someone says scientists decided to label parts of the genome "junk" "so they could pretend to know what they're talking about". Anyone who says that clearly doesn't know genetics.

At no time was it personally said, nor implied that the doctors and scientists were engaged in subterfuge; only that they clearly didn't know what they were talking about when venturing a guess that there was such a thing as "junk DNA".

Are you the same person who used to post here under the user names "Sherlock Holmes" and "Inquirer"? I ask because he used to do this exact same thing, where he'd post something and then bizarrely deny he ever said it.

Here is what you claimed to be a "fact": "scientists, who obviously didn't understand the function of the overwhelming majority of DNA, decided to label it as "junk", so they could pretend to know what they're talking about, when they obviously didn't".

That's a direct accusation that they deliberately labelled sequences as junk to cover up their ignorance. But if you want to now admit that the claim is wrong, do so and we can move on.

If we were only observing and studying DNA, to genuinely learn more about its creation, we wouldn't be attempting to make changes to it, particularly given how little we actually know about it and its function.

Instead, we do what arrogant/ignorant humans always do, believing we know better than The Master Designer/Programmer, creating an entire industry out of manipulating genetic code with absolutely disastrous results that threaten the very existence of all life on Earth.

You're not even making sense.

[Diagoras]

Ok, I don't think anyone can prove Bible false. And I don't think God is evil.

This is your personal opinion.

But, when science is self correcting, why would anyone trust it is now correct? After 50 years it may have corrected the ideas you now have, and you will look foolish, when you have founded your beliefs on it.

<bolding mine>

Maybe you’ll relate to Corinthians 13:11 -

https://www.biblestudytools.com/1-corin ... %20things.

Learning that you were previously wrong about something is a natural part of maturing and growing. Do you consider your six-year-old self ‘foolish’ now?

If religion does not self correct, it can be because there is no good reason for doing so.

But it does ‘self-correct’. One obvious example: plenty of Christian denominations now accept gay priests, rather than treating homosexuals as ‘abominations’ to be stoned to death.

Why would you trust that 50 years from now, we still couldn’t have a female pope?