Posted on 10/31/2009 6:48:08 PM PDT by Coleus
Nor, strictly speaking, do you have the assurance that the design has neither altered over time, nor been tampered with, nor moved to conditions completely foreign to the purposes of the original design ("and the lion shall eat straw like an ox." paraphrase of Isaiah 11:7). Death (at least of animals) was not part of the original design; I haven't yet see anyone cover whether death of plants (due to being eaten) was expected, or somehow in a different category.
Cheers!
Not following you here, brumuy. Incidental to what? The circuit design and power consumption are based on adherence to certain set physical laws and conditions; depending on the level of detail of knowledge of the laws, and the technological sophistication of the designers and fabricators, all cell phones will (presumably) have certain features in common, other things being equal: hence rendering the identity and characteristics of the designer irrelevant for functionality and/or analytical purposes.
But among the things which are NOT necessarily equal, but still relevant to the identity of the designer--and possibly the design of the phone--are such things as cost to the designer in their condition, intended use of the device, and (maybe) intended market for the devices--and therefore these factors, reflected IN the design, could be used in an indirect sense to shed light on the designer.
And of course, the question of aesthetics comes in too: your description assumes that the designer is a master engineer. Why not a schoolboy on a lark, a hobbyist, or a class on an assignment given artificial design constraints; or even an artiste?
Cheers!
“Yet you think that by insisting that it matters who made the cellphone, you will discover something. No you won’t. Because it doesn’t matter. It is incidental to everything else.”
You completely missed the point. My point was that you can ascertain design without knowing anything about the designer. I did not “insist that it matters who made the cellphone.” You are either a careless reader or are not very bright. I don’t really care which it is. I learned a long time ago that people like you can waste a lot of my time if I let them. But I won’t.
Your imagined God seems strange. He obviously, lovingly creates an absolutely marvelous, infinitely interesting universe and than doesn't seem interested or just barely and steps back almost entirely uninvolved.
The God of our universe, and the miracle of almost unbelievable varieties of intricate and exciting living things, shows forth Himself as one who is passionately involved and interested in what He poured Himself so lovingly into. The thought and creativity He invested into creation is way beyond anything we can possibly imagine or fathom. Why would He do this just to be dispassionate and standoffish?
So unless you can examine and cross examine the people who made ancient ruins you could not prove that they were not merely accidents of nature?
God is of immense intelligence. It is His intelligence that creation is witness of, not just "something" but unthinkably massive intelligence, someone. Someone who calls Himself I AM.
The God of our universe, and the miracle of almost unbelievable varieties of intricate and exciting living things, shows forth Himself as one who is passionately involved and interested in what He poured Himself so lovingly into. The thought and creativity He invested into creation is way beyond anything we can possibly imagine or fathom. Why would He do this just to be dispassionate and standoffish?
I have no problems with intelligent design and I also have no problems with total evolution as presented by secular scientists.
As any engineer/architect would tell you, the greater feat of design would have been to create all laws of the universe from which everything followed at the moment of creation ie "big bang"... the instant something emerged from nothing. Perhaps God periodically intervened to guide his creation in the form of intelligent design. This need not diminish the greatness of his creation. Perhaps he had to intervene because some other being kept interfering with his creation. Who knows? We can only speculate because the bible doesn't say.
My point is that scripture is too vague concerning matters of creation to form hard and fast opinions. The user manual for my leaf blower is larger than the entire creation account. God gave a simple explanation suitable for a primitive people to understand he created all things. He didn't say how, just that he took credit for it.
I try.
“How does that contradict my post?”
I may have missed your point. Scripture is vague on what?
Scripture is too vague concerning the creation to form hard opinions. The bible is not a science book. The user guide for my leafblower is longer and more detailed that the biblical creation account.
In a manner suitable for a primitive people to understand, God took credit for having created everything. Exactly God created all things he didn't tell because there aren't enough trees on the planet to produce the paper on which to write such design specification. Again, the bible isn't a science book.
Without understanding how he did it; classical evolution or intelligent design, we can give all credit to God. Once we begin speculating as to how God might have gone about his creation, any engineer/architect would tell you, the greater feat of design would have been to create all laws of the universe from which everything followed at the moment of creation ie "big bang"... the instant something emerged from nothing.
Also valid for speculation is that God periodically intervened to guide his creation in the form of intelligent design. This need not diminish the greatness of his creation. Perhaps he had to intervene because some other being kept interfering with his creation. Who knows? We can only speculate because the bible doesn't say.
“In a manner suitable for a primitive people to understand, God took credit for having created everything.”
That’s the dumbest thing I’ve heard... well, this morning anyway (don’t feel bad; I haven’t heard much yet).
I’m not sure if you meant to frame it this way, but “God took credit” suggests that He was misleading or lying about His role in creation just to make it easy on the cavemen. Lying or misleading goes completely against the nature of God.
Your personal feelings on whether a person can “form hard opinions” “concerning creation” are irrelevant. I don’t thing anyone is arguing here (at least not me) whether the Bible is a science book. This is an argument brought up time and again by the DU’ers here on FR to try and prove the Bible is not valid. Not the first time I’ve heard it.
I don’t believe you or I are smart enough to determine the motives of God in a particular scriptural statement. “In the beginning GOD CREATED THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH.” Adam would not have argued with this statement, and I think this brings up the question, “Who’s the primitive one here?”
By the way... that’s one fancy leaf-blower you got there.
Ok. Let me rephrase it. God told a primitive people in a manner which they could understand that he created the heavens, earth and all things in it.
Your personal feelings on whether a person can “form hard opinions” “concerning creation” are irrelevant.
How so? The article was about intelligent design and I merely pointed out that scripture is insufficiently detailed to say that is the manner by which God chose to carry out his creation.
I don’t believe you or I are smart enough to determine the motives of God in a particular scriptural statement.
We can certainly agree on that.
“In the beginning GOD CREATED THE HEAVENS AND THE EARTH.” Adam would not have argued with this statement
Where's the argument? God doesn't say how he did it, just that he did it. Your quote is consistent with the big bang theory as the heavens and earth emerged before life.
May be just a matter of semantics... I don’t know whether there was a big bang noise when God created the heavens and the earth (When God makes the world and no one is there to hear it does it make a sound?). I reckon creation would be some noisy business, but what it IS laid out in scripture is the number of days it took to create everything and the order in which it was all created. I’m one of those crazy guys who assume that the Word of God is literal in light of the fact I have no way to verify it one way or the other.
I have no idea how primitive the minds of our ancestors were, but I don’t have Cro-Magnon in mind when I see them. The folks that are described in the scriptures seemed to be as capable of understanding complex ideas as we are today. I’m not sure that we understand original creation with our “heightened intellect” any better than they would have. We can teach a child about science and they grow up understanding. There’s simply no evidence that the human mind was any less advanced thousands of years ago. No difference in the ability to understand but without television and computers we tend to view them as being somehow intellectually inferior. I would posit that they were in fact more capable of grasping new concepts because their minds were not clouded with an array of abstract concepts and misinformation.
We may not be that far apart in our beliefs on this, I think we probably just express it in different ways.
Thanks for your reply.
GG
“Use your brain. all ID does is remove the problem 1 level.”
Doesn’t the big bang do the same thing?
You seem to be completely ignorant of the fact that Newton is widely considered the greatest scientist of all time. I suggest you find out why.
LOL.
I’m not arguing your point, although I’m not sure he was “the greatest scientist of all time.” Certainly made some rather important calculations to say the least.
But that wasn’t my point. My point was that some here think the fact that he wasn’t an evolutionist is interesting. I find that strange.
The Bible was not written for a primitive people but rather was written to express exceedingly more than just science. The LORD need not many words to say what He wants to convey. In a few words He says much more than we can in a life time.
“All records of miracles teach the same thing. In such stories the miracles excite fear and wonder (that is what the very word miracle implies) among the spectators, and are taken as evidence of supernatural power. If they were not known to be contrary to the laws of nature how could they suggest the presence of the supernatural? How could they be surprising unless they were seen to be exceptions to the rules? And how can anything be seen to be an exception till the rules are known? If there ever were men who did not know the laws of nature at all, they would have no idea of a miracle and feel no particular interest in one if it were performed before them. Nothing can seem extraordinary until you have discovered what is ordinary.”
by C. S. Lewis Miracles (New York: McMillan, 1952), p. 47.
“Can you guess why Newton didn’t accept the evidence for evolution? And what of his passion for alchemy? Trotting out Isaac Newton as a great creationist mind is a bit, um, odd. “
Obviously a poor scientist...
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