Dan,

There is so much trouble in the world and it is all Man-Made, and we are all to blame - whether by action, inaction, or over-reaction.

We should all recognise this simple fact, but so many don't and won't. Just so much rejection of reality, it is always someone else's fault. Who or what else is to blame? God?

Whilst there are many people in this world living in close harmony with their environment, as best they can, there are many others who place themselves too high, attributing themselves some special placement in the order of things, a position of privilege, looking down upon those 'lesser' humans and all other 'lesser' life-forms, or not thinking about them at all.

Where is the greater fault? Those bereft masses living on the world's garbage or eking out a meagre existence, and accepting, not always willingly, but accepting nonetheless. Or, yet others who are selling God short, denying the miracle of the natural order, presuming that God is controlling everything, and expecting God to intervene - and do what? Make everything better? Perform another miracle? Send a new messenger?

There is a natural order, and it has existed for an eternity, forever developing in complexity and variation, and part of this order is Man. But, Man is not the only intelligent species, not the only rational and emotional species. Yet, Man rails against this reality, perceiving himself as the very embodiment of God. Vanity and conceit.

Many messengers or enlightened men have endeavoured to instill harmony, some by the sword, others by peaceful protest and example. The time for the sword should be over, the time for more subtle demarcation and exploitation should also be over, but elements of mankind still ravage, and God is not going to intervene.

What mankind does with this opportunity, mankind is going to have to live with. All else is illusion and delusion.

SM,
ID is not a valid theory, according to a judge in the District court. That you hold so much on the opinion of a District court judge shows how flimsy is the structure of evolution, and what lengths certain people feel they need to go to suppress discussion of others views. However, real scientific battles are not fought or won and lost in law courts. For example, which side won the Scopes trial? Not the evolutionists. The Tennessee law was upheld, but the decision was futile and meaningless in the long run.

ID is a valid alternative theory according to numerous scientists (I could name some if you'd like.)

Lawyers from the ACLU might be able to convince a District court judge. The problem with the idea of evolution, more than a Century after Darwin gained its favour, is that it is just not very convincing. David Berlinksi put it like this “The facts [on Darwin’s theory] are what they have always been: They are unforthcoming. And the theory is what it always was: It is unpersuasive.” Many scientists remain unconvinced, and while much of the general public think of evolution as a fairy tale for adults.

Pericles,
You're right in that we've been around the block before on these pages about the Lenski experiment. That evolutionists put that experiment on top of their list when scratching around for an example of increasing genetic information shows how much their willing to grasp at straws.

But you spoke a lot in your last post about what are and aren't facts. Berlinski says the facts on Darwin are “unforthcoming”. So I invite you to give us one stone cold, incontrovertible fact about which you know concerning Darwin's view of our origins, and how people came to evolve from lower life forms.

[To anyone or all concerned,] I'm curious as to where is the opinion of Madeleine Kirk. She says she enjoys arguments about the existence of God. Did she join in the conversation under a pseudonym at any point?

ID is not a valid theory to most of the world's scientists. A district court judge could not be convinced that ID held any merit what so ever.

The only people for whom ID has any merit are Christian fundamentalists. Scientists are human as well, and many fall foul of using ideology or religion to define what they wish to discover instead of using the scientific method.

Nice try, Dan S de Merengue. But it still won't work.

>>So I invite you to give us one stone cold, incontrovertible fact about which you know concerning Darwin's view of our origins, and how people came to evolve from lower life forms.<<

Let me remind you first of this claim that you made:

>>You have been presented with fact based evidence from believers on this thread<<

It would appear that you should finally bite the bullet, and confess that this was untrue.

With that out of the way, apparently it's my turn to present some "facts" about evolution.

Sorry to disappoint you, but I don't have any. Just a bunch of persuasive theories that are based upon deep and thorough research of the available physical evidence. This evidence has been collated by a bunch of -ologists, among them anthropologists, archaeologists, ethnologists, geologists, paleontologists, paleozoologists and paleobotanists.

To name but a few. They are the people who fit the facts into theories, or devise theories that fit the facts that are available at any given time.

I start from the premise that we don't know everything. But, being curious, we enjoy each new discovery as it is made, and then work out whether it agrees with our current orthodoxy, or whether it challenges that orthodoxy. If it is found to be inconsistent, new theories are formed that permit the new information to either supplement the old, or replace it.

So my "facts" can only be the raw materials: fossils, sedimentary layers, rock formations etc., the same as yours. Which of course is why I don't go around claiming to have facts that disprove the existence of a God. I simply weigh up the balance of evidence, or contemplate the lack of evidence, and declare myself convinced.

Your approach is different. You accept as a given, before examining anything, the existence of God. A very specific, uniquely Christian God. This methodology is necessarily highly limiting, and severely cripples the scope of any theory that you arrive at.

As it patently does, when you claim to have "facts" that support young-earth creationism.

Dan,

The foundation of Intelligent Design is surely that God created Man in his own image - yes, or no? I mean, what other alternative is there, if Man is not descended from the Apes?

To test the efficacy of this foundational premise answer me this - how come God saw fit to make so many different variations of mankind? Was God experimenting with configurations? Or, has mankind simply evolved, like all the other natural life-forms on this planet, with mankind's variations likewise an adaptation to each specific environment and its demands?

How many vain (both meanings being applicable) attempts have there been by various white anglo groups to 'prove' they were 'special' and that other 'groups' were really 'sub-human'? Could such vain ambitions have also been part of God's plan?

In addition to this, have you noticed how many similarities there are between mankind and the higher anthropoid apes? Similar genetics, similar skeletal, cranial and cerebral configuration? Apes may not talk or smile like a man, but they also live in harmony with their environment, where mankind has set out to conquer the environment and has proven time and again to be not only the most powerful but also the least trustworthy species on the planet, by a long country mile.

If anything, Man is a defect of nature, not a glorious breakthrough, as his destructive self-interest clearly exemplifies. Efforts to view Mankind as a species apart, exempt from the natural order, are nothing more than an escape from brutal reality, and most likely a delusory construct of a troubled conscience.

With regard to Christopher Hitchen's passing, sadly he did not get to know God. Those who don't know God cannot access God's forgiveness.