I'm about to blow your mind

[Nathan]

Here's my essay on intelligent design versus evolution, or most of it anyways. I'm gonna add some more arguments in the body and add to the conclusion. Feel free to criticize so long as it doesn't involve me re-writing the whole thing. Plus, if you have any more arguemtns for my side then please share them.





Intelligent design theory is a crude replacement for evolutionary theory. It offers an interesting opposition but it in no way is as complete as biological evolution. The theory demands a certain amount of faith, which has no real place in a purely logical discussion. Faith suggests that a particular amount of assumptions have been made regarding whatsoever an individual holds faith in. Thus, intelligent design is essentially based upon a set of assumptions and consequently should not be granted any appreciable amount of respect as a valid counter-argument in any academic circles. Proponents of evolutionary theory, on the other hand, do not pretend to have all the answers, but rather offer possible explanations for natural biological phenomena based on the most reliable scientific data available. Rather than attribute the vast diversity of the animal kingdom to the workings of some mysterious intelligent creator whose motives and methods remain completely beyond our grasp, evolutionists have opted to amass data concerning the natural world and come up with their own plausible theories based on scientifically tested evidence.
Something has been intelligently designed when it is the product of some thoughtful process that had the creation of said something in mind. In other words, it is a mind that conceives an intelligent design. The "intelligence" part of "intelligent design" represents a certain consciousness that operates with a purpose, that postulates some basic idea and then formulates a plan in bringing this idea to fruition. It doesn't necessarily have to be smart, and it may be working with some purpose in mind that is beyond our sphere of comprehension.
Evolution is the primary theory of biology. It is a powerful tool for explaining the existence of millions of fossils and other evidence, such as the fact that over 98% of the DNA of chimpanzees is identical to that of humans, about the origins of life. It does not, however, maintain that it is the final word in the origins of living organisms. Evolution is only a theory after all, and according to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), a scientific theory is "a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences, and tested hypotheses."
Over the past several years, proponents of the "intelligent design theory", or ID, have spoken out against the generally accepted scientific theory of biological evolution. The movement presents "intelligent design theory" to the public as a theoretical innovation that is supported by scientific evidence, that offers a more fulfilling version of the origin of the immense diversity of life than the popularly accepted theory of evolution. As a response to this, substantial critiques of "intelligent design" have arisen, advocating that conceptual flaws exist in its conception, namely an absence of credible scientific data and misrepresentation of scientific facts. Proponents of intelligent design have been trying to undermine the currently scientifically accepted theory of evolution, yet they have offered no scientific means of testing their theory.
"There is a lot of support for design theory from people who are tired of the dogmatic, authoritarian, reductionist way of doing science," said Baylor University research professor William Dembski, who is a specialist in the study of probability and is the author of "The Design Inference: Eliminating Chance Through Small Probabilities" (Cambridge University Press 1998). He goes on to say, "I think things will change, especially when you have a younger, new generation of scientists able to look at the lack of evidence for Darwinism." This is exemplary of the immense contradiction inherent in theories based upon the existence of a higher being that claim to be scientific in nature. It is nearly impossible for an individual to adhere to a purely scientific means of analyzing the universe if said individual also believes that everything we know is the result of the actions of some mystic creator. This is because the instant one accepts that a higher being is responsible for our universe, then they must also concede that everything is due to the creator and so in order to understand nature, we must understand his motives.
There have been no tests or experiments performed to attempt to prove the legitimacy of intelligent design. Evolution, on the other hand, has a formidable amount of supporting evidence. There are two types of evolution: microevolution and macroevolution. Microevolution deals with changes occurring within a species over time, changes that may be preludes to speciation, the origin of new species. Macroevolution, on the other hand, studies how taxonomic groups above the level of species change. Its evidence draws often from the fossil record as well as DNA comparisons to reconstruct the relationships between various organisms. Microevolution has been upheld by experiments in the laboratory (as in studies of cells, plants and fruit flies) and in the field (as in studies of evolving beak shapes among Galápagos finches). Natural selection and other mechanisms, like chromosomal changes, symbiosis and hybridization, can influence profound changes in populations over time. The historical nature of macroevolutionary study, however, involves inference from fossils and DNA rather than direct observation.
Numerous creationists feel adamantly that speciation (the creation of a new species) has never been observed first-hand and that this is a legitimate reason to dismiss evolutionary theory. The scientific literature does, however, contain reports of apparent speciation events in plants, insects and worms. In the majority of these experiments, researchers exposed organisms to various types of forced of selection, such as for anatomical differences, mating behaviors, habitat preferences and other similar traits. For the most part, they discovered that they had created populations of organisms that did not breed with outsiders. For instance, William Rice of the University of New Mexico and George Salt of the University of California at Davis demonstrated that if they divided a group of fruit flies by their propensity for certain environments and bred those flies separately over a total of 35 generations, the resulting flies would refuse to breed with individuals from a substantially different environment.
Many creationists argue that it is mathematically impossible that anything as complex as a protein molecule, let alone anything as sophisticated as a living cell or an entire person, could arise by chance. Chance plays a role in evolution (such as in the random mutations that can give rise to new traits), but evolution does not depend on chance to create organisms, proteins or other such entities. Natural selection, the principal known mechanism of evolution, harnesses non-random change by preserving desirable or adaptive features and eliminating undesirable or non-adaptive ones. As long as the forces of selection remain constant, natural selection can push evolution in one direction and produce sophisticated structures in exceptionally short times. As an analogy, consider the 13-letter sequence "TOBEORNOTTOBE." A hypothetical team of one million monkeys, each churning out one phrase each second, could take up to 78,800 years to find it among the 2613 sequences of that length (13 letters). In the 1980’s Richard Hardison, a teacher at Glendale College, wrote a computer program that generated phrases randomly while preserving the positions of individual letters that happened to be correctly ordered, in effect selecting for phrases more like those appearing in Shakespeare’s Hamlet. On average, the program re-created the phrase in question in only 336 iterations, which took in total less than 90 seconds. Even more remarkable, it could reconstruct Shakespeare's entire play in just four and a half days.
Evolution does not violate any physical laws characteristic of our universe. For instance, many creationists argue that evolution is a violation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics since if living cells evolved from inanimate chemicals then that might imply an increase in structure or order. The Second Law actually states that the total entropy of any closed system, or a system from which no matter or energy may leave or enter, cannot decrease. It is crucial to understand that the Second Law does not forbid parts of a system from decreasing in entropy, provided that other parts experience a corresponding increase in entropy. Therefore, considering our planet to be a closed system, we see that it can grow more complex since the sun radiates heat and light onto it, and the greater entropy associated with the sun's nuclear fusion more than re-balances the scales. Consequently, simple organisms can consume other forms of living and non-living matter in order to fuel their progression towards complexity.
Proponents of intelligent design argue that since living organisms have phenomenally intricate features at the anatomical, cellular and molecular levels that could not operate in any functional way if they were any less sophisticated, then it must follow that living creatures cannot possibly be the product of evolution. This argument for intelligent design theory is the basis of the majority of recent attacks on evolution, but it is also the oldest. In 1802, theologian William Paley debated that if one finds a pocket watch in a field, the most reasonable conclusion is that it was dropped by its previous owner, not that it was created there by natural forces. Paley argued by analogy that the complex structures of living beings had to be the product of divine invention. Charles Darwin wrote On the Origin of Species in response to Paley’s reasoning. Darwin outlined how natural forces of selection could slowly mold the evolution of elaborate organic structures by acting on inherited features.
Countless creationists have incorporated the eye as a tool in attempting to counter Darwin’s deductions by suggesting that it is a structure that could not possibly have evolved. These critics went on to say that the eye’s ability to grant the gift of vision to its host is dependent on the harmonious arrangement of its parts, and that natural selection could therefore never favor the transitional forms required during the eye’s evolution. After all, what use is only a portion of an eye? Darwin, foreseeing this criticism, argued that even "incomplete" eyes could offer benefits to their host, such as by orienting them towards light and consequently helping them to survive for further evolutionary cultivation. Researchers have even confirmed Darwin’s hypothesis by identifying primitive eyes and light-sensing organs in various organisms and have even been able to track the evolutionary history of eyes by means of comparative genetics.
The term "creation science" is a contradiction in terms. Modern science attempts to explain the universe purely in terms of observed or testable natural phenomena. Therefore, physics describes the universe from stars to atomic nuclei with very specific notions that govern both matter and energy, and it aims to confirm these ideas by means of meticulous experimentation. Physicists bring new concepts into the picture, such as previously undetected particles like quarks, in order to tie up loose ends in their theories only when data show that the prior descriptions cannot adequately resolve observed phenomena. These new particles do not have random properties, rather their attributes are firmly constrained since the new particles must fulfill the tenets of the present framework of physics.
Present day advocates of intelligent design theory may be more sophisticated than their predecessors but they still offer the same fundamental arguments. They incessantly condemn evolutionary theory by suggesting that it cannot possibly account for the diverse array of organisms inhabiting this world and then ignorantly insist that the only possible alternative is that life as we know it is the result of some unknown intelligent being whose motives may be entirely beyond our sphere of understanding.





Comments? Questions? Suggestions?


__________________
Vaginas are your friends.

[FKITLETSGO]

Your statement:

The theory demands a certain amount of faith, which has no real place in a purely logical discussion.

My Opinion:

Evolution requires a certain degree of faith as well. In the evolutionary theory, there are gaps that space out millions and millions of years of fossilized proof. The evolutionary fossils have abrupt changes rather then smooth and fluid "evolving" features. These million year gaps require "faith" to close the gap...

Your statement:

They incessantly condemn evolutionary theory by suggesting that it cannot possibly account for the diverse array of organisms inhabiting this world and then ignorantly insist that the only possible alternative is that life as we know it is the result of some unknown intelligent being whose motives may be entirely beyond our sphere of understanding.

My opinion:

This "sphere" of understanding is explained as four known and defined dimensions. There are dozens of other realms and dimensions not known and undefined. These other dimension are postulated by quantum theory and requires a certain degree of faith to cosmologist and quantum physicist to recognize. There is possibility that the answers lie in between the gaps of these other realms and dimensions. Just as the answers may lie in the gaps between the missing links in your evolutionary fossils. Either way both require faith.


I cannot find the studies right now but books on theology that I have read suggest and prove that the following are true:

If the speed of the expansion of the universe was different in 1 part in a trillion...(.0000000001 seconds faster or slower) then the conversation that we are having would had never happened.

My beliefs lie somewhere in the vincinity between the synergy between science and intelligent creation(God). I believe that without the "puppet mastery" behind the creation of the universe then science nor the universe would exist as we know it. My beliefs lie with theology in that God is the guiding hand behind science and our actions and moves are predisposed.

[FKITLETSGO]

The odds of DNA spontaneously assembling in unison within the laws of physics is 10 to the 40,000 power to 1 [Hoyle, evolution to space].

[Nathan]

As I state in my paper, evolution is a theory. It could very well be wrong and scientists must concede that fact and most (the good ones) do. THAT is the difference. I do not believe in evolution, since to me that would require a small leap of faith. Rather, I accept that it satisfies a great deal of evidence that has been amassed concerning the natural world and so is potentially an accurate description of the origins of life.

I think I know what you are getting at with that expansion of the universe blurb, but it really means very little. I have spent the past four year slearning about it and don't really have much time to discuss righ tnow. Scientists do admit though that they can't explain everything. That is an important concession.

[FKITLETSGO]

by the way....... awesome essay man your gonna kick ass

[monstercojones]

great essay nathan!

[Rickson]

Nathan have you ever read about the Aquatic Ape theory and do you think it is a viable theory.

[Nathan]

Originally posted by Rickson
Nathan have you ever read about the Aquatic Ape theory and do you think it is a viable theory.

no, I have never heard of it. I will look it up when I get home later though. Could you outline it for me briefly?

[kc]

awesome essay..i'm assuming for a phil class? nice organization and great support for your statement

[Strut99GT]

I don't know if you want corrections, but...
regarding whatsoever an individual - should be "what"
concerning the natural world and come up with - should be "have come up..." (tense)
hehe, I don't have time to read this all now, but that's some first paragraph stuff. Looks like an excellent paper! Just make sure you get rid of all the nit-picky grammatical mistakes so you aren't penalized for them.

[David B.]

Originally posted by Rickson
Nathan have you ever read about the Aquatic Ape theory and do you think it is a viable theory.

It makes about as much sense as intelligent design. The main problem with AA theory is that it completely unsupported by any paleoanthropological evidence.

--dnb

[David B.]

Originally posted by Nathan


no, I have never heard of it. I will look it up when I get home later though. Could you outline it for me briefly?

Elaine Morgan, an "outside" anthropologist ("outside" in the same sense as "outside art"...), has this theory that the characteristics which distinguish humans from apes, mainly bipedalism and hairlessness, are the result of our having gone through a phase as an aquatic creature in our evolutionary path from ape to man.

--dnb

[Terinox]

That's toooooooooo long. Can't you just sum it all up in one paragraph, one short paragraph

[monstercojones]

Originally posted by Terinox
That's toooooooooo long. Can't you just sum it all up in one paragraph, one short paragraph

youre a bb, dont be lazy.

[David B.]

Originally posted by monstercojones1



youre a bb, dont be lazy.

It doesn't take much of an attention span to pick up heavy things...

--dnb