Ponder: Did God Create the Universe? (Intelligent Design)

Evidence and Creationism

One would think that, with such wild claims being proudly bolstered in its name, there would be some substantial evidence in favor of creationism. Anyone with such a notion would be, to put it bluntly, entirely incorrect. The advocates of intelligent design can often be found shouting their supposed scientific basis from pulpits and podiums across the nation, but careful investigation shows that, in reality, not a single shred of reliable evidence for design has ever been presented in the entirety of human history. Rather, the pillars that creationism is built upon are pillars of tradition and personal conviction. They do not know that their beliefs are true, and many of them admit this. They just keep believing because it feels good to them and they do not want to lose that assurance, or because they are too intimidated by the idea of disrupting age-old tradition to think for themselves. This warm feeling may be comforting, but it in no way gives any shred of legitamacy to their argument. The lack of evidence stands glaringly apparent. In the words of the late Christopher Hitchens, "What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." There is no reason to waste time putting evidence against a claim when the claim is lacking any evidence of its own.  

Unfortunately for the creationists, there is more to the argument of their interlocutors than reliance on creation's lack of evidential support. The opposition to creationism has incredible amounts of evidence. Darwinian Evolution is easily one of the most soundly supported and evidently correct explanations that has ever been presented. Time and time again evolution has been tested, and it has yet to fail a single one of those tests. The accuracy with which scientists can predict the effects of natural selection is astounding, to the point that entire layers of the fossil record can be correctly mapped out and described before a research team ever lands on the sight. Moreover, even if evolution was demonstrated to be false tomorrow, that would not in any way suggest that magical spirits poofing life into existence was the actual answer. Even when science has been wrong in the past, it has never been replaced by a supernatural explanation, just a more advanced and accurate scientific one. But, of course, the creationists don't care about that kind of logic-- or any stable logic, for that matter. The modern model of gravity has failed far more tests than evolution, but "Anti-Gravity Education" is not one of the ID movement's commands. Clearly, the refusal to acknowledge the legitimacy of evolution is calculated and deliberate, the most blatant example of the intentional ignorance that the modernly educated inhabitants of this pale blue sphere have ever had the utter displeasure of witnessing.

While there is no real calculative evidence in support of intelligent design, one would be misrepresenting the idea as a whole if they did not include the primary thought process through which creationists convince themselves of their own madness. Perhaps the most frequently used response that creationists give when asked for evidence is to motion to whatever may be near them and say, as Ray Comfort often does, "Just look around you, everything looks so intentional!" This is known as the argument from irreducible complexity, the argument that things are just too good to not have been designed. In some sense, Ray actually is not wrong. When looking at the universe in the scope that humans see it in day to day life, it would not be illogical to think that the universe ran too smoothly to be without a designer. However, this view of purpose and causation is shattered once the universe is observed on a larger or smaller scale. On a subatomic scale, everything in the universe, including biological life, can be explained through regulated and expected chemical reactions. On the indescribably massive scale of our entire universe, we find that events of amazing consequence are left purely to the unguided motion and development of bodies floating in a void of nothing. Controlled experiments and observations consistently point away from intelligent design, not toward it.