Something other than a god being the intelligent designer?

Robert Oz

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Robert Oz
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Since the ID crowd try to avoid mentioning God when discussing their "scientific theory", are they open to the possibility that someone or something other than a god is the intelligent designer?

Here are a few options I've thought of on the spur of the moment (feel free to add any you can think of):

1. A god created the universe.

2. Multiple gods created the universe.

3. A highly advanced alien life form created the universe.

4. Humans from the distant future travelled back in time to create the universe (I know, major paradox, but I liked this one too much not to include it).

5. Humans from a parallel dimension created the universe.

6. Something unimaginable - but certainly not a god - created the universe.

If evidence of any of the above - apart from number 1 - were to come to light to prove the "Theory of Intelligent Design", would the IDers accept it and say, "See, we told you so", or would they reject their own theory?
 
From what I understand, most garden-variety IDers (i.e. Christians) tend to distance themselves from IDers who advocate for an "alien-intelligence" Designer. For instance, I'm not thinking the folks at the Discovery Institute particularly like being equated with the Raelians :)
 
I think one that I've read on sites is some kind of a source/unimaginable energy started it, got the ball rolling. Then civilizations after civilizations later highly advanced aliens or you can say "many gods" created what we are now.

That goes along with #1, #2, #3 and #6.
 
Asimov had the best explanation for who created the universe in his short story The Last Question.

We did!

Norm
 
^that would go with the spiritual thinking that God is inside all of us..we are God experiencing life on earth.

there ya go lol.
 
aviolet4u said:
^that would go with the spiritual thinking that God is inside all of us..we are God experiencing life on earth.

there ya go lol.
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Not really - Asimov's take on this was totally idifferent to Heinlein's groking that thou art God, or the more generic Gaia hypothesis (which is something else again)

Norm
 
Robert Oz said:
Since the ID crowd try to avoid mentioning God when discussing their "scientific theory", are they open to the possibility that someone or something other than a god is the intelligent designer?

Here are a few options I've thought of on the spur of the moment (feel free to add any you can think of):

1. A god created the universe.

2. Multiple gods created the universe.

3. A highly advanced alien life form created the universe.
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I still don't see how the first two differ from the third. The typical concept of a god as not just infinite, but the ultimately infinite creature possible, is mathematically not possible (thanks to Cantor and transfinite numbers.) Hence that kind of god doesn't exist, and can't.

That only leaves Odin-style creatures that are akin to advanced aliens rather than the infinite type of god. And the difference from said alien is academic to the point of vanishing.
 
Well as there is absolutely no evidence for a designer in any of the alternate ID "hypothesis," they are all equally (un-)likely.

I'm guessing the point of the thread is to come up with creative ways of getting under an IDer's skin?
 
Robert Oz said:
If evidence of any of the above - apart from number 1 - were to come to light to prove the "Theory of Intelligent Design", would the IDers accept it and say, "See, we told you so", or would they reject their own theory?
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Probably the latter, or more precisely, they would hastily modify their "theory" to exclude that possibility. The Wedge Strategy makes no bones about who the "designer" is:
Phase II . . .Alongside a focus on influential opinion-makers, we also seek to build up a popular base of support among our natural constituency, namely, Christians. . .
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Governing Goals

* To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies.
* To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by God.

Five Year Goals

* To see intelligent design theory as an accepted alternative in the sciences and scientific research being done from the perspective of design theory.
* To see the beginning of the influence of design theory in spheres other than natural science.
* To see major new debates in education, life issues, legal and personal responsibility pushed to the front of the national agenda.

Twenty Year Goals

* To see intelligent design theory as the dominant perspective in science.
* To see design theory application in specific fields, including molecular biology, biochemistry, paleontology, physics and cosmology in the natural sciences, psychology, ethics, politics, theology and philosophy in the humanities; to see its influence in the fine arts.
* To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life.
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If real, scientific evidence pointing toward design by an alien race, a pan-dimensional being, or an artisanal planet-building contractor began to mount, the ID'ers would undoubtedly scramble to reconfigure their manifesto.
 
7. Evolutionary processes are a form of intelligence.

Respectfully,
Myriad
 
The correct answer.

The actual correct answer to the question, "Who or what created the universe?" is very simple and quite obvious:

I don't know.

Nobody does, and until science gets better, nobody will.
Welcome to agnosticism. Please... stay a while. ;)
 
To be more specific, "I don't know whether the Universe was created at all in the first place", since the first one seems to imply that someone must have created the Universe and we just don't know who
 
Ron_Tomkins said:
To be more specific, "I don't know whether the Universe was created at all in the first place", since the first one seems to imply that someone must have created the Universe and we just don't know who
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Good call.
 
Robert Oz said:
Since the ID crowd try to avoid mentioning God when discussing their "scientific theory", are they open to the possibility that someone or something other than a god is the intelligent designer?

Here are a few options I've thought of on the spur of the moment (feel free to add any you can think of):

1. A god created the universe.

2. Multiple gods created the universe.

3. A highly advanced alien life form created the universe.

4. Humans from the distant future travelled back in time to create the universe (I know, major paradox, but I liked this one too much not to include it).

5. Humans from a parallel dimension created the universe.

6. Something unimaginable - but certainly not a god - created the universe.

If evidence of any of the above - apart from number 1 - were to come to light to prove the "Theory of Intelligent Design", would the IDers accept it and say, "See, we told you so", or would they reject their own theory?
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The problem with the idea of a non-supernatural "designer" is that ID is based on the assumption (or as IDers would have it "law") that complexity or information cannot appear spontaneously, so therefore life must have been designed. However, this also means that the designer must have been at least as complex as life and so cannot itself have arisen spontaneously, and must therefore have been designed by another at least equally complex designer. Unless you invoke a supernatural designer, it's turtles all the way down.
 
Robert Oz said:
Since the ID crowd try to avoid mentioning God when discussing their "scientific theory", are they open to the possibility that someone or something other than a god is the intelligent designer?

Here are a few options I've thought of on the spur of the moment (feel free to add any you can think of):

1. A god created the universe.

2. Multiple gods created the universe.

3. A highly advanced alien life form created the universe.

4. Humans from the distant future travelled back in time to create the universe (I know, major paradox, but I liked this one too much not to include it).

5. Humans from a parallel dimension created the universe.

6. Something unimaginable - but certainly not a god - created the universe.

If evidence of any of the above - apart from number 1 - were to come to light to prove the "Theory of Intelligent Design", would the IDers accept it and say, "See, we told you so", or would they reject their own theory?
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Front office: Hey guys, we're going to need another turtle to slip into the stack.

Shop: What do you want it to look like?

Front office: Well, we've been shown six different models, but in the end, it's just another turtle.
 
The problem, if we found any being or beings capable of creating a Universe, would we truely be able to distinguish them from a deity?
 
Robert Oz said:
If evidence of any of the above - apart from number 1 - were to come to light to prove the "Theory of Intelligent Design", would the IDers accept it and say, "See, we told you so", or would they reject their own theory?
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ID proponents have already proven able to simply ignore evidence that doesn't support your option #1, I am sure they would have no difficulty ignoring anything that supported any of the other options you offer.
 
Does the designer have to be more complex than the thing he/she/they/we/it designs? Is this really an assumption of the ID community? It doesn't seem to me at all the same as saying complexity can't arise spontaneously.

I remember it coming up in an Azimov story where a robot didn't believe it was designed by a human based on this argument.
 
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shuttlt said:
Does the designer have to be more complex than the thing he/she/they/we/it designs? Is this really an assumption of the ID community? It doesn't seem to me at all the same as saying complexity can't arise spontaneously.
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See the "law" of conservation of information.

The entire premise of ID is that life has to have been designed by God a complex designer.
 
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