One at a time, please.

It might help here if you let me know who you believe is a "Darwinist", Dan S de Merengue, and whether they differ from those who simply prefer the various theories of evolution over the God-designed-it-all school of thought.

>>Pericles, who are the people saying the body is poorly designed? Tony Lavis, for one, is saying so<<

Is Tony a "Darwinist"? If he is, then your statement might better be phrased "some Darwinists argue", until we decide who is and who isn't.

>>The creators of the journal Panda’s Thumb speak of poor design. It’s there even in the naming of their journal. They’re Darwinists aren’t they?<<

I don't know. Are they? A brief glance at their web site doesn't provide any clues. If you search the site for "Darwinism", you will find that it is a term used predominantly by creationists - presumably as some form of pejorative naming convention. I guess it's easier to target a dead nineteenth-century naturalist than to line up against folk who believe in modern science.

I think you may be clutching at straws here. To my way of thinking, using "design", good or bad, as evidence of anything at all is a fairly dumb approach. After all, if the thumb of a panda, or the human trachea, really are aberrations, surely they could equally be used as evidence against natural selection, as well as "design", no?

And runner. How quaint.

>>Unfortunately also some men and women are fiercely attracted to young girls and boys.<<

Are you offering this as further evidence of God's design? That he/she deliberately designed young girls' and boys' bodies to be attractive to a particular type of individual?

Whom, by the way, he/she also designed...?

An interesting angle on the whole question, to be sure.

I'm a neo-Lamarckist.

In crossing a heath, suppose I pitched my foot against a stone, and were asked how the stone came to be there; I might possibly answer, that, for anything I knew to the contrary, it had lain there forever: nor would it perhaps be very easy to show the absurdity of this answer. But suppose I had found a watch upon the ground, and all the numbers were 'six', and it lacked for an hour hand.

What conclusions would you draw from such a shoddily constructed watch? It doesn't suggest a blind watchmaker to me: it suggests a hopelessly incompetent watchmaker. Either that, or no watchmaker at all. I go for the latter.

Cheers,
Tony

Pericles,
I hesitate to keep this line of discussion going as it is beginning to stray off topic.

Is Tony Lavis a Darwinist? Perhaps you should ask him. He didn’t say precisely. Yet he did want to challenge God’s credentials as Designer.

For those who wish to challenge the suggestion that God is the creator of life, the main theory given any plausibility these days is some form of Darwinism or Neo-darwinism. That is the going theory. Is there anything else on offer? Are you proposing some other theory? I don’t see the people from Panda’s Thumb proposing anything else. I don’t see them viewing the term Darwinist as pejorative.

You claim to be a Darwinist. You also claim the body is well designed. So you’re one of those caught in the dilemma of seeing and acknowledging design while denying the Designer.

Through design in nature (that many including you admit is apparent) we clearly see God’s invisible qualities, his eternal power and divine nature. The sound response when one sees wonder in design is to give credit to the designer.

If all those have who want to deny God’s divine qualities is recourse to whom you call 'a dead nineteenth century naturalist', then more pity to them.

No, I think we are still well on topic, Dan S de Merengue.

>>Pericles, I hesitate to keep this line of discussion going as it is beginning to stray off topic<<

In my view, the appearance of "God's Design" in this thread is apposite. After all, if you believe that man is God's design, you will also need to accept that the design includes homosexuality. Which was my point to runner.

But you may be right, that this Darwinism, neo-Darwinism stuff is all a little tedious and irrelevant. But just a couple of points before I go.

>>You claim to be a Darwinist<<

Only, as I took pains to point out, if you classify anyone and everyone who accepts the concepts of evolution as a "Darwinist". But as I also observed, it seems to be some kind of swear-word in the mouths of creationists, so I took a little time out to wonder why this should be.

>>You also claim the body is well designed<<

¿Qué?

Absolutely I did no such thing. As it happens, I believe there are quite a number of changes that would be most beneficial, straight off the bat.

What's with toenails?

And how about those disgusting clumps of hair sprouting from the ears of the bloke in front of you in the bus?

And how come I can't see clearly any more without bits of plastic in front of my eyeballs...?

>>So you’re one of those caught in the dilemma of seeing and acknowledging design while denying the Designer<<

I'm afraid that takes us back to our favourite circular argument.

You can accredit a Designer only if you first believe that there actually is a Designer.

There is nothing missing from evolution theory that requires us to say "ok, that makes no sense. It must have been designed by some supreme being.".

So I'd be genuinely interested in a creationist's view on the design benefits of a toenail. Particularly as one of mine is horribly black, ingrowing and painful at the moment, having recently had a close encounter with a cricket ball.

The term “Darwinist” is used by creationists to make evolution sound like an ideology and the need creationists feel to do this (in lieu of any sort of evidence whatsoever) is evident in Dan’s persistent use of the term despite other less ambiguous alternatives.

“Evolutionist” sounds more scientific because it contains the word “evolution”, but by using a term that is based on a name (the name of the person who first hypothesized that natural selection was the driving force behind evolution) creationists get to make it sound like it’s a mere philosophy, like Marxism or Keynesianism or Stalinism, and just one man’s idea.

Pericles’ point, that “Darwinism” is a form of pejorative naming, is spot on.

>>Is Tony Lavis a Darwinist? Perhaps you should ask him. He didn’t say precisely.<<

What part of neo-Lamarckist don't you understand?

>>If all those have who want to deny God’s divine qualities is recourse to whom you call 'a dead nineteenth century naturalist', then more pity to them.<<

I don't want to deny God's divine qualities: I just don't think It's the Designer. Why is it necessary to believe that God is in the watchmaking trade to believe that It exists?

Cheers,

Tony