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Who designed the intelligent designer?
William Mulgrew
Issue date: 2/16/07 Section: Ed-Op
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Some oppose intelligent design because it doesn't explain who designed the intelligent designer. It's a metaphysical objection. It demands an answer that scientific observation, analysis and experimentation cannot provide. It presupposes that the Intelligent Designer was designed or had to be designed, and that it was designed by a "who" - some person or sentient being. Whether it's a god or gods, space aliens, or a time traveler who went back in time to create life, ID simply does not speculate on that question.
In the past, it was religious theists who suppressed scientific pursuits because they didn't conform to their beliefs. Now the tables have turned. Opponents want to suppress ID because it doesn't conform to their materialist beliefs. Your religious views don't dictate what's taught or not taught in the science classroom. I'm sorry that ID makes light of scientific evidence in a way that puts atheists in an uncomfortable position, but please don't force your materialist religion on us.
It's all part of that wonderful t-word I hear so often, tolerance. The religious discomfort that life originated naturalistically is something theists learned to tolerate in the classroom for almost a century. Welcome to the club.
Sarcasm aside, if religious implications are the standard by which we allow or disallow origin-of-life subject matter in the classroom, then the Big Bang simply has to go.
Science has proved that the universe is not eternal. It has a beginning, what scientists call the "Big Bang."
Einstein reached this conclusion with his Theory of Relativity, which showed that time, space and matter are interdependent; they cannot exist without the others. The scientists Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson discovered cosmic background radiation from the Big Bang by accident in 1965. NASA astronomer George Smoot and his team observed ripples in the temperature of that background radiation through the COBE satellite. The ripples were so precise that they allow galaxy formation without causing the universe to collapse on itself. "If you're religious, it's like looking at God," Smoot would describe the findings. The universe is still expanding, which suggests a point of origin.
In the past, it was religious theists who suppressed scientific pursuits because they didn't conform to their beliefs. Now the tables have turned. Opponents want to suppress ID because it doesn't conform to their materialist beliefs. Your religious views don't dictate what's taught or not taught in the science classroom. I'm sorry that ID makes light of scientific evidence in a way that puts atheists in an uncomfortable position, but please don't force your materialist religion on us.
It's all part of that wonderful t-word I hear so often, tolerance. The religious discomfort that life originated naturalistically is something theists learned to tolerate in the classroom for almost a century. Welcome to the club.
Sarcasm aside, if religious implications are the standard by which we allow or disallow origin-of-life subject matter in the classroom, then the Big Bang simply has to go.
Science has proved that the universe is not eternal. It has a beginning, what scientists call the "Big Bang."
Einstein reached this conclusion with his Theory of Relativity, which showed that time, space and matter are interdependent; they cannot exist without the others. The scientists Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson discovered cosmic background radiation from the Big Bang by accident in 1965. NASA astronomer George Smoot and his team observed ripples in the temperature of that background radiation through the COBE satellite. The ripples were so precise that they allow galaxy formation without causing the universe to collapse on itself. "If you're religious, it's like looking at God," Smoot would describe the findings. The universe is still expanding, which suggests a point of origin.
Viewing Comments 1 - 4 of 6
daenku32
posted 2/16/07 @ 9:23 AM EST
Is this a joke?
You used Big Bang as an example of why ID is part of science, and you attempted to justify an Intelligent Designer using scientific (materialistic) principles. (Continued…)
Roddy Bullock
posted 2/16/07 @ 11:13 PM EST
Mr. Mulgrew's analysis is right on point, and his article is worthy of careful consideration. Objective science simply lets evidence lead the inquiry, and does not shy away from certain inferences because of the implications. (Continued…)
Andrew Gall
posted 2/21/07 @ 4:38 PM EST
I found the article be kind of scattered and inconclusive. Seems like you might some okay points hidden under the hood but maybe you should try unifying them and building a stronger argument. (Continued…)
Joel Judge
posted 3/22/07 @ 4:07 PM EST
I just find it funny that in the first paragraph he states that I.D. doesn't need to answer the question of who designed the designer and then on the second page he uses the law of causality saying "everything that has a beginning had a cause. (Continued…)
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