Non-theistic theories have not adequately accounted for the existence of the universe, the order therein, or the life forms that we see around us.
Correction: science has accounted for an enormous amount and far better than any religion ever has. No religion ever produced reproducibility or controlled experiments. No religion can predict anything. What they do not know they call "mysterious ways". What they cannot predict, they call "divine will". What they do not understand, they call "miracle". In comparison to even the most rudimentary scientific tool or result, religious knowledge is utterly impotent. Priests cannot do jack, they cannot heal, they cannot resurrect, they cannot move mountains, they cannot even fly. Scientists and engineers put a man on the Moon, charted the planet, cured diseases, built towers into the sky, made man fly like a bird, speak, see and hear through great distances, and control his environment like never before. Priests still just talk the same old talk, just rewritten a bit so that people wouldn't wonder.
Just because science still has areas to be charted while religion boldly proclaims unprovable answers, does not make science wrong and religion right. See what I wrote in response to LAK as well.
No, but the original molecules and elements had to emerge from something.
And they did. Big bang theory. Fusion. Fission. Electromagnetism. Gravity. Chemistry. "We are star-stuff".
Quite right, and quite beside the point. Christianity posits an orderly, comprehensible universe; made by a rational God.
Anthropomorphism. "God must think like us". See above.
Further, if you accept that the universe is governed by laws, then where is the place of the divine? If the machinery is set up and in motion, where is the "divine will"? Does the divine will break its own laws to do something extraordinary? If not, then everything, even this conversation is "divine will". But if it is, then there is no free will. And we have arrived at an irreconcilable contradiction within the dogma, because the dogma says there is free will. Otherwise people cannot be good or evil. But, if there is free will, then the divine either does not act or it acts by breaking its own laws. But, if the divine is rational and lawful, it would not break its own laws. Any ideas?
You seem to think God is dead or at least unemployed because certain phenomenon are better understood than previously.
Precisely. See the above for the explanation.
If you want measurable evidence for the existence of God, the ID researchers will be glad to provide some. I.e., highly complex organisms and interactions that make evolution very long odds, indeed.
Excellent. You finally admit that it is indeed possible for everything to have been built by evolving from the simple to the complex. You just believe the odds are so small that external influence must have been involved. First, I am not convinced that it is so improbable because life is autocatalytic and self-reproducible, so that cuts down on time necessities quite quickly. Furthermore, you roll a lot of dice simultaneously, because the planet is so big and water so abundant. Finally, there is non-life related evidence that our planet is at least 5 billion years old. This amount of time is just mindboggling. If you believe that is not enough time for the combinatorics to work out, I'd like to see the calculation.
On the next point, I will reproduce Special Creation when you reproduce one organism evolving into another. Whenever you're ready.
How long are you willing to wait while I subject subpopulations to different conditions, until they no longer can produce fertile crossbred offspring? 1 million years?
If you truly apply the scientific method, the only reasonable conclusion would be:"There is no evidence of existence." Instead you are convinced in the opposite.
I'm not sure what you mean here. I think you left out a word.
No evidence of the existence of the divine.
I'm saying that if Darwin came along and posited his theory today, it would see much less acceptance. In Darwin's time, it was easy to imagine that simple forms of life could spring from primordial goo, because Darwin and his colleagues didn't understand the complex structures necessary for even a one-celled organism. They didn't understand how much detailed information was required for DNA. They knew there were gaps in the fossil record, a lack of transitional forms, but these were expected to eventually come along. Billions have been discovered, but few that even approach the status of a transitional organism.
Darwin did not need to be right about complexity of bacteria, to be right about evolution. His observations were based on species of birds, rather than bacteria. While there are gaps beyond a certain point in time, you seem to ignore detailed meticulous overabundant evidence of evolution from one species into others all over the world in a very wide interval of time, as assembled by comparison of current species with fossil records. Am I to understand you accept evolution but reject spontaneous creation?
What is the detailed information required for DNA? Required of whom? DNA is just a molecule, a cog in the biochemical machinery. There is nothing exceptional or mysterious about it. As expected, simpler organisms have fewer genes and simpler machinery. That is no surprise from evolutionary standpoint. Why is that evidence of design?
I oppose it on a scientific level - I don't have enough faith to believe that time, chance and natural selection can create new organisms and I don't see any evidence for it.
Actually, the more accurate way to put it is that you have enough faith in that such an occurrence is impossible because you judge it is extremely unlikely, therefore the divine must have done it. There is a big difference. The fundamental logical basis of your conclusion is thus faith, not observation or logic. It is faith that for you bridges the gap between "impossible" and "extremely unlikely". That is a bridge I would not cross.
Why do you assume that we should "finish the job without it"?
Occam's razor. Anything superfluous must be cut. The divine would then be superfluous...
It is very amusing that you think you may find some mysterious energy in the nucleus of an atom. "Here is the divine!" you will say, as you diagram it on a whiteboard. Again, you only have a use for God when it explains something you don't understand.
Actually, I have no use for it. But, I can see how many people would look for it there. Many do. And no, it would no longer be mysterious if we can chart it, categorize it, dissect it, analyze it, and get to know what makes it tick. In fact, we would then truly "kill" it for everybody else.
Does that mean that God will no longer be in the gravity business? Not at all. HE CREATED IT. He made the universe to work as it does so that you could study it and see how it works and praise Him for it. Not so that you could claim to be the master of it, and that you no longer need the supernatural.
You got to decide if you believe the divine is active or not. If it is not active, then we live in a universe only governed by immutable laws and our will. If it is active, then it cannot act in any other way but by breaking its own physical laws or infringing upon our free will. The first would make it lawless and possibly irrational, the second tyrranic. Both clash with current dogma. I think you worked yourself into a contradiction.
