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The humor of this discussion is that we, Vade, are speaking two different languages. You no doubt possess a superior mind for biology and physics. You could talk circles around me on the subject of conserved intron sequences. I couldn’t spot a conserved intron sequence in a police lineup, and it doesn’t sound like it goes down well with a pint of Guiness, so I don’t really think I’m missing anything. But the truth or falsehood of naturalistic evolution or the idea of a Creator will never be found by arguing about conserved intron sequences. I will leave that for the other Freepers.

Instead, let me show you why the “crushing preponderance” of evidence, in your argument generally, and in the 29 Evidences for Macroevolution specifically, is a result of faulty reasoning from the basic premise as stated.

“The defining characteristic of science is the concept of the testable hypothesis. A testable hypothesis must make predictions that can be validated by independent observers.” Thus says the author. The existence of God and the moment before Creation/Big Bang are unobservable and untestable, therefore not scientific according to those terms. There is no strict scientific evidence for these. Agreed.

But wait – the author also mentions the “solipsism” hypothesis, that the universe is an illusion. This is also unobservable and untestable, but it is assumed to be false, because it would render everything else meaningless. All of the assumptions that make science possible – that our minds inform us about reality, that knowledge is possible, that mathematics can be applied to knowledge, that we are freely choosing scientific inquiry – all of these things are unscientific, in that they cannot be proven by the scientific method. And yet, science would be absurd without the existence of these ideas. The foundation and first word of human knowledge is not science, but philosophy. And this particular philosophy is erroneous, because it assumes only the existence of the untestable hypothesis which support the argument, and rejects the other untestable hypothesis on the grounds that they are untestable. Are you there, PatrickHenry?

This is how the author can make the extravagant claim that it is “axiomatic” that abiogenesis occurred (how convenient! That is only the biggest question of them all), because of a mistaken assumption that science can be our only trusted source of knowledge and not logic, even though science itself would not exist without logic. The scientific method is an important tool for obtaining knowledge, but the ultimate source of truth and lies outside of the domain of science.

But wait – the author also mentions the “solipsism” hypothesis, that the universe is an illusion. This is also unobservable and untestable, but it is assumed to be false, because it would render everything else meaningless.

It cannot be proven false, but it is easily demonstrated to be useless.

[Abiogenesis] is only the biggest question of them all.

Oddly enough, Darwin barely touches upon abiogenesis. The article you have just read also pays scant attention to the subject. The questions of whether the first life had a truly non-miraculous, non-designed orgin and whether all current life on earth shares a common ancestry are easily separated. The second of the two, as the article (or even a reading of the evidence available to Darwin) demonstrates, is very easily answered.

All of the assumptions that make science possible – that our minds inform us about reality, that knowledge is possible, that mathematics can be applied to knowledge, that we are freely choosing scientific inquiry – all of these things are unscientific, in that they cannot be proven by the scientific method. And yet, science would be absurd without the existence of these ideas. The foundation and first word of human knowledge is not science, but philosophy. And this particular philosophy is erroneous, because it assumes only the existence of the untestable hypothesis which support the argument, and rejects the other untestable hypothesis on the grounds that they are untestable. Are you there, PatrickHenry?

Yes, I'm here. Those "assumptions that make science possible" are known as axioms. Axioms are never proven. If they could be proven, they'd be theorems. At the base of all rationality are the axioms you listed (some not quite rigorously enough. For example -- "that our minds inform us about reality," isn't correctly stated. The axiom involves the validity of sensory evidence for information about reality.

Anyway, such axioms are taken as true by necessity. If, for example, our senses gave us useless information, we'd all be hopelessly in the dark (so to speak) and we'd have no source of information -- other than what some swami claimed to have received from what he claimed was a superior source. We'd essentially know nothing, which would rule out science altogether.

By questioning the basic axioms upon which science rests, you are actually challenging reason itself. It's your right to do so. But don't then come in here and attempt to use reason to persuade us of the logic of your position. You can't use the tools which you have chosen to reject.