Obvious Designer?

[POI]

Otseng's statement: "This is the variation of the omnipotent God argument by imagining a hypothetical perfect design. There is no need for God to be a "perfect" designer.

In human designs as well, things are not perfect and have flaws, but they are still designed. Nobody claims since iPhones have flaws in them that Apple engineers are either crappy designers or they don't exist at all."

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There is just so much to flesh out in this cluster of statements, I do not know where to begin. I guess we can start here and see where this goes.

For Debate: Is it obvious humans were designed, or not? Please explain why or why not. If you believe so, does this design lead more-so towards...

a) an intelligent designer?
b) an unintelligent designer?
c) a deceptive designer?

Like all other topics, let's see where this one goes.... And for funsies, here is a 10-minute video -- optional, but begins to put forth a case for options b) or c), if "designed" at all:

[benchwarmer]

And I think it is not reasonable idea, because everything in nature goes to the opposite direction, to less complex/complete.

Now you've lost me. What idea are you talking about? That some complexity and some functionality has changed during the evolution of living things?

Can you give one example of evolution that is not losing something?

Bacteria evolved to consume plastic:
https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2 ... nal-story/

A common environmental bacterium, Comamonas testosteroni, could someday become nature’s plastic recycling center. While most bacteria prefer to eat sugars, C. testosteroni, instead, has a natural appetite for complex waste from plants and plastics.

Which points to the published article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41589-022-01237-7

All alleged evidence for evolution show that things are eroding, not getting more complex.

Cool, please link to some of this (preferably peer reviewed) scientific evidence.

Do you agree that all changes in DNA happen because of errors in the copy process?

So instead of supporting your claim you ask me? I'm not doing your homework for you.

As already pointed out, the theory has no expectations that all things will always gain complexity and/or functionality.

I think you also accepted that the according to the theory all things have evolved from single organism to this variety of organisms. If that is true, then the claim is that the theory gives the expectation that things must have gone also to more complex.

Now you are tap dancing. Please do as I asked and point to some science that says evolution will always result in more complexity and/or functionality. That was your claim. You have yet to support it.

The degeneration supports the idea that everything was once created good and then started to degenerate.

First you have to show this 'degeneration' you speak of. After that, you might be able to use it to support something.

Here are few examples, that I think are commonly accepted, please tell if you don't accept them:
1. Errors in copying DNA is the reason for changes most, if not all changes.

How is this 'degeneration'? We've already established that some species have gained some functions or complexity along the way (you think the theory says they always gain something). So which is it? A copy error might create a new function (or it might not). If it does, how is that 'degeneration'?

Again. Link to science please!

2. Whales lost their legs.

And gained the ability to swim in the ocean for thousands of miles. So? Lost some things, gained some things. What has this got to do with anything?

3. Some birds have lost the ability to fly.

And some things have gained the ability to fly. Again, so what? Clearly things don't always 'degenerate'. If you think so, support your claim with science please.

Oh my. You think scientists think that whales developed the way they are because the whales thought about things and got lazy? LOL!!!

Essentially that is what they suggest.

I didn't ask what you think they suggest, I asked for a link to the research. Which seems to be missing in your reply. I wonder why.

And, if ability to survive is the key principle, everything will regress to single cell life forms, because it is the easiest and durable state.

Huh? I suggest a basic biology course. This is getting too ridiculous.

Please explain why do you think it is not true?

No, I'm not doing your homework. You made some claims, and now ask me to prove you wrong. Please support your claims first. I think readers will notice that you didn't link a single scientific source, but basically just turned the tables and expected me to do your work for you.

[William]

[Replying to POI in post #176]

I don't refer to myself as anything in particular. Why do you ask?

I have already explained why I ask in post 176.

"So we don't waste any time"?

Okay. Well I have given you my answer. What now? What is it that I share on this message board which has you asking?
The way I see things, if folk have a particular position they self-identify with then I run with that in relation to what they contribute to debate.
In relation to that, if someone contributes to debate but does not have/does not say what position they self identify with, I simply take what they have offered and am still able to contribute to debate. My focus is on critiquing what is offered, if/as I can.

[Purple Knight]

No. I'm suggesting that grass is at least as sophisticated a machine as an iphone.

Okay. Do you think its sophistication is by way of "natural processes", or, "design"?

I think the process is natural just like I think the process of us designing an iphone is ultimately natural. Is grass designed? I don't know.

Whether some extreme intelligence has its hand in the soup is not necessary, but is at least suggested, by extreme complexity. If we're really at the top, then some complex things are designed (the iphone) and some came about with no intelligence guiding them (grass) but nothing that is extremely basic and simple is designed by intelligence.

The argument is enough to suggest that complex things might have been designed. But it implodes when it suggests that everything, including rocks, are deliberately designed. If that's so, then the basic intuition we rely on to concede that complex things may well be designed, cannot be relied on at all because we are in error when we say simple things were obviously not designed.

The argument would be enough to suggest, but not prove, a lesser god.

[POI]

[Replying to POI in post #176]

I don't refer to myself as anything in particular. Why do you ask?

I have already explained why I ask in post 176.

"So we don't waste any time"?

Okay. Well I have given you my answer. What now? What is it that I share on this message board which has you asking?
The way I see things, if folk have a particular position they self-identify with then I run with that in relation to what they contribute to debate.
In relation to that, if someone contributes to debate but does not have/does not say what position they self identify with, I simply take what they have offered and am still able to contribute to debate. My focus is on critiquing what is offered, if/as I can.

Sure, but you may miss their intent, nuance(s), or context, which is, quite frankly, what I think you and I have done many times in this exchange alone. If I already know your starting point, then many potential exchanges could be avoided. Everyone has a position. Anywhere between.... I've lived under a rock my entire life and I'm absolutely agnostic to any/all claims placed in this arena, to... I'm a Christian, to.... all in between. Where do you land? Once I have a better gauge, is when we can discuss 'design'.

[POI]

Is grass designed? I don't know.

Whether some extreme intelligence has its hand in the soup is not necessary, but is at least suggested, by extreme complexity. If we're really at the top, then some complex things are designed (the iphone) and some came about with no intelligence guiding them (grass) but nothing that is extremely basic and simple is designed by intelligence.

The argument is enough to suggest that complex things might have been designed. But it implodes when it suggests that everything, including rocks, are deliberately designed. If that's so, then the basic intuition we rely on to concede that complex things may well be designed, cannot be relied on at all because we are in error when we say simple things were obviously not designed.

The argument would be enough to suggest, but not prove, a lesser god.

ID advocates will argue for irreducible complexity. But we've seen how this position falls on it's face. Are there any other argument(s) the ID position has on it's side?

[Purple Knight]

ID advocates will argue for irreducible complexity. But we've seen how this position falls on it's face. Are there any other argument(s) the ID position has on it's side?

I'm a cynic so it's much easier for me to select the worst argument for god, than the best. It's also easier for me to select the worst argument against god, rather than the best. To the latter I say the argument from suffering is a pretty big pile of stench and rot.

You've seen how, if we are buried in things which are designed, our intuition about designed/undesigned is worthless, because we have never seen an undesigned thing. Similarly, every one of us has suffered so we can't know what being free of suffering would look like. It might look like never having been conscious. We don't know. We can't make a comparative argument without a comparison. And though it's hidden in this case, the argument from suffering is similar. It tries to look at something no one can ever have seen - an undesigned thing, or in this case, a world without suffering - and draw conclusions, like that the world without suffering would be better. I say no it wouldn't; we can't know that.

As with the obvious designer argument, where I concede that it is enough to suggest but not prove a lesser designer who did not design everything, the argument from gratuitous suffering can suggest, but not prove, that god if he exists is not omnibenevolent. But the fact that we suffer at all, when used to try to prove there cannot be an omnipotent and omnibenevolent god, has this exact same flaw of not having anything whatsoever to compare to.

[William]

[Replying to POI in post #184]

There is a thread which allows us to ask questions of other forum members. If you use that forum and post your questions there, I will do my best to answer.

[1213]

Can you give one example of evolution that is not losing something?

Bacteria evolved to consume plastic:
https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2 ... nal-story/

A common environmental bacterium, Comamonas testosteroni, could someday become nature’s plastic recycling center. While most bacteria prefer to eat sugars, C. testosteroni, instead, has a natural appetite for complex waste from plants and plastics.

Which points to the published article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41589-022-01237-7

Thanks, interesting article. I don't think it shows the bacteria didn't have that ability also before.

Please do as I asked and point to some science that says evolution will always result in more complexity and/or functionality. That was your claim. You have yet to support it.

Where did I make that claim?

We've already established that some species have gained some functions or complexity

I don't think we have any evidence for that.

And gained the ability to swim in the ocean for thousands of miles.

They had that ability before losing the ability to walk, otherwise they obviously would still live on land.

[TRANSPONDER]

Can you give one example of evolution that is not losing something?

Bacteria evolved to consume plastic:
https://news.northwestern.edu/stories/2 ... nal-story/

A common environmental bacterium, Comamonas testosteroni, could someday become nature’s plastic recycling center. While most bacteria prefer to eat sugars, C. testosteroni, instead, has a natural appetite for complex waste from plants and plastics.

Which points to the published article:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41589-022-01237-7

Thanks, interesting article. I don't think it shows the bacteria didn't have that ability also before.

Burden of proof fallson the claimant. Where is your evidence that bacteria had the ability to consume plastic before there was plastic, or that plastic was organically recycled rather than staying untouched in the ground until plastic -eating bacteria appeared?

Please do as I asked and point to some science that says evolution will always result in more complexity and/or functionality. That was your claim. You have yet to support it.

Where did I make that claim?

You often pull this of forgetting things you posted and demanding we go back and find them But I do recall you put it to me that evolution Ought to lead to more advancement but it can lead to devolution I suppose one might call it like the loss of legs in whales which actually aided them to access fish better.

We've already established that some species have gained some functions or complexity

I don't think we have any evidence for that.

There is plenty Bats were obviously rodents before they evolved flight. Pengins (in the fossil record, too) were less adapted for swimming than they are now. Snakes (in the fossil record) once had legs but their method of locomotion made them redundant. And finally,the cetan sequence. Demonstrable Speciation from a land critter to a sea critter.

And gained the ability to swim in the ocean for thousands of miles.

They had that ability before losing the ability to walk, otherwise they obviously would still live on land.

Rubbish.The land animal could not cross an ocean nor (the morphology AND fossil evidence shows) did the amphibious form have that ability - only offshore paddling. It took the evolved for total sea -life form to get to other lands of the time.

It has to be said, your excuse is utterly uninformed, denialist and wretched.

But 94 guests is not bad at all

[benchwarmer]

Please do as I asked and point to some science that says evolution will always result in more complexity and/or functionality. That was your claim. You have yet to support it.

Where did I make that claim?

Ok, I will concede you didn't directly say that, however, you sure are implying it:

Essentially the theory claims all species have developed from simple organism to this variety of species. Meaning there was allegedly an organism that was basically a single cell, which in time has developed arms, eyes and other complex systems. This is not about getting better, but about getting more complex, or functional.

You keep talking about degeneration as if that somehow contradicts the scientific theory of evolution. That only makes sense if you think things always have to become more complex/functional.

Perhaps you need to state exactly which part of the ToE you don't agree with. It would be helpful if you supplied a link to some science and bolded the bits you think are wrong.

We've already established that some species have gained some functions or complexity

I don't think we have any evidence for that.

I get you don't want to see it, but that's a far cry from no evidence. The entire field of biology disagrees with you. Apparently you and your Bible know better.

And gained the ability to swim in the ocean for thousands of miles.

They had that ability before losing the ability to walk, otherwise they obviously would still live on land.

I don't even know how to respond to that one.... In fact, often it's better to just let your interlocuter rest their case with something like that

I can't help but point out you've yet to supply one single link to actual science thus showing us you even know what that is. I realize we are not in the science subforum, but again, you argue against a strawman and can't seem to bring yourself to bring actual science into it. Oh well.