Design implies a designer. A circumstancial case for design presupposes a designer. Else, how is one put in the frame of mind to even begin to explore the notion of design?
Hi Teleologist Actually, I wasn't so much interested in the subtle clues used to make an intuitive circumstantial case for ID/Creation. You mentioned that you had empirical data which supported a particular inference, namely, that the first cells were designed. It is these data that I am very interested in seeing. I always question my own beliefs, and if there exist empirical data which support the inference you mentioned, I am very eager to see it. As I have said, the central point of the thread from our side is that ID is simply an opinion, or a faith-based belief, identical to a belief in the Creation Myth. After you said that you had empirical data to support the inferences you were making, everything changed. Any honest participant here must review that data and provide an alternate explanation and back it up if he can. If he can't, we must move forward on the assumption that your inference is correct. To do otherwise would be intellectually dishonest. I appreciate the 'clues', but it would be a lot better if you could just cite the actual data. After all, this isn't a treasure hunt! I await your prompt reply with either a summary of the research you mentioned or a link. Thanks Nik
He's got squat. By empirical, he means simply observed "evidence." You know, like, "oh, it looks like a train... possible evidence of design." Or, "it looks like an engine. Must be designed." That is literally as good as it gets. I am 110% certain. Why? Because of the presupposition one HAS to make in order to even begin to observe things as designed and then infer design from observation. (There's a perfect circle in there.) So of course this intellectual piker's going to play the "nanny, nanny, poo, poo I ain't gunna show you" game ad naseum. What makes me laugh is that he thinks I'm an ID critic when in fact I support ID on ideological grounds. I just shake my head and often laugh when other IDer's think they can claim it science and not at all metaphysics. HA! HA! Madness...
An eternal process of an eternal design, followed by creation, maintenance, and dissolution, followed by the same cycle eternally would require no external creator. The flaw is you continue to bind God, or a creator, or an eternal computer, or ID as something separate from the universe and what is within the universe, and as assuming that the universe is not eternal in its essential nature. It is logically possible that the physical universe is eternal, therefore there is no need for a creator, however we do witness the process of creation, maintenance, and dissolution from a limited perspective. Things are born, they live, they die, but all of this can logically be designed, or programmed if you will by an eternal design or an eternal program. We see this cycle of birth, maintenance and death in both living and non living manifestations within the universe, (scientists surely think planets are "born" they "live" a finite period of time, and eventually they will "die." To our knowledge, this has been happening for as long as the universe has been in existence, as we have no evidence that there ever was a time when this process was not in play. No one thinks they cease to exist when they go unconscious for a period, called dreamless sleep, then awaken again. Within the boundaries of human life, there is a sense of eternity, continuity, even after waking up from a deep sleep, or a coma for years and years. So why is it so difficult to logically imagine the same phenomena in the "sleep" period of the universe, to awaken again to create, maintain, and then dissolve back into its state of pure potentiality. I mean, really, it is a very simplistic axiom that anything that exists, first had to have the potential to exist. So a state of pure potential, and no actual is logically possible. The pure potential wakes up, manifests, which temporal beings see as a creation of something "new" and the cycle goes on forever. No need for a creator, no need for God, simply an eternal process...which is not mindless and by random chance, but by the nature of the universe. I posed the questions as to why life shows certain characteristics, i.e. a birth, a period of life, a death, a desire to maintain life by attempting to adapt and survive, and this life coming from life, not death. No one offered any answer as to why life has this nature. Evolutionary theory is essentially meaningless as a theory until and unless the reason life has these properties is known, as it is a theory that has no relationship to the understanding of why life is the way it is. The study of process alone will not reveal truth...of anything but process.
Zx10, Call it whatever you wish. Point is, Design implies a designer. Which you proved by describing another type of designer; which is still patently metaphysical. And based on your presupposition of your metaphysical conjuring of a designer, you observe things as designed. *shrug*
Oh, I understand limited thinking....I see it a lot around here. If a person cannot conceptualize an eternal situation, which naturally will induce limited thinking labels such as "design" as they are bound by time and space, relativity, etc. when talking about the universe, I really do understand. I do observe lots of things as designed, and created from one point of view...rather than randomly ignorantly produced, but simultaneously I don't fathom that there really is anything new under the sun... Nothing, but nothing can exist from nothing, as all that which we observe existed first as potential to exist, which in its purest form is Absolute potential...for which there is nothing new at all to design, or create...
Oh, a couple of more points. I am not a creationist, and I oppose the belief of ignorant random mindless chance existence, which I call the opposite of ID. So, for me, ID, intelligent design is not creationism at all. I suppose a creationist will think ID is creationism, but I do not... Therefore, by at least one person (I happen to think there are actually a lot more than just myself) supporting ID but not creationism, the title of this thread makes perfect sense. It really is funny how Judeo Christian thought has shaped the western thinking, both in the theists rhetoric, and the atheistic rhetoric. Little do the Judeo Christian/Muslim based religious thinkers understand that from a world religion point of view, they are still in a minority. Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, etc. Because we are western centric, we pit the western materialist thinkers versus the Judeo Christian thinkers, completely ignoring the other possibilities seen in Eastern religions, that would actually agree with both points of view simultaneously...i.e. that the universe is definitely material and bound by laws of time and space, yet that phenomena exists within an eternal cycle.
LOL, limited thinking. I granted you, your thoughts on a designer. Etheral, eternal, whatever-ya-ma-callit. Yet you attempt some high minded goobly gook in hopes of transcending the concept of design. All the while reverting to scoffing at your polar opposite, non-design. Bouncy bouncy bally, sister's name is pauly. Or how about... Hickory dickory dock, the mouse went up the clock. *shrug, sigh, smirk*
So to you it is goobly gook. Okay... As I said previously, some people around here do struggle with their west centric thinking and the inability to think abstractly...so they generate "low minded" responses like the one you just did....modern day western thought both theistic-ally and atheistically these days is dominated by a focus on materialistic understanding and ways of life. Anyway, let's leave it at that, and rest assured you are gave it your 110% effort to understand a different point of view than your own...