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-- there is no G-d? religion is bull? read this and I DARE YOU TO ARGUE :)
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well baron,
i'd love to argue with you. but so far, all you have done is post a couple articles that are full of so many fallacies i don't know where to begin. it appears that renegade has already thorougly refuted the watchmaker and analogous teleological agruments. the rest of your articles appear to be nothing but strawman anti-evolution propaganda (monkeys typing, 747), which are mischaracterizations of evolution, as they don't take into account the non-random aspect of evolution: natural selection. furthermore, evolution is not abiogenesis.

how about you pick an argument or two that you think are the strongest, and focus on those. so far you've just bombarded us with about a dozen at once.


richard


"...imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in 'an interesting hole I find myself in 'fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!'" --Douglas Adams

Re: spice it up

quote:

Originally posted by DJBARON guys for every time you see the word G-d appear anywhere here, take out our subjective understandings of the meaning of the word, and replace it with 'ABSOLUTE PERFECTION LACKING NOTHING' because in essense we can only understand this about G-d, that G-d is ABSOLUTE PERFECTION, and LACKS NOTHING. so therefore, echange the word G-d for PERFECTION LACKING NOTHING, and see the results of our discussion when you do that... big difference eh?

GOD
GOD
GOD
GOD
GOD
GOD
GOD
GOD
what

DJBARON

Re: Re: spice it up

quote:

Originally posted by rizen GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD GOD what

Not getting the point you're trying to make here, but I Love the rainbow motif, reminds me of an old Kurt Cobain grafitti scrawl, "God is Gay"...

Re: Re: Re: spice it up

quote:

Originally posted by CortexBomb Not getting the point you're trying to make here, but I Love the rainbow motif, reminds me of an old Kurt Cobain grafitti scrawl, "God is Gay"...

oh yeah, didnt notice lol

quote:

Originally posted by DJBARON Dr. Michael Denton, "Evolution: A Theory in Crisis"

Ok this proves just HOW close minded most uber-religious people tend to be. For the purpose of argument lets presume humans are the product of millions of years of evolution. It doesn�t for a second mean that god wasn�t involved does it? Who�s to say that god didn�t get the ball rolling on the evolutionary front and let things happen? Yet it�s an assumption that evolution equals godless. Evolution is a sound theory and no matter how much tire rhetoric, unless you can provide HARD evidence to the contrary (and; �but it�s really really complicated� doesn�t count), I won�t think otherwise in a hurry.

Interesting side note: Strange how many of the people who don�t believe in evolution still subscribe to the ideas of Social Darwinism isn�t it?

quote:

Originally posted by DJBARON ADDRESSING ARGUMENT NUMBER ONE - "design implies designer"

Download a fractal generator program � hit the button and using a mathematical formula a beautiful and infinitely complex pattern is displayed. It looks intelligent � surely there would have to be a creator for this, after all the design imply designer. No, not at all. It�s the sheer product of numbers. One could argue that the program, the formula and numbers are all inputted by a human, thus there is a creator. With this I disagree. The original fractal formulas were not �created� by anyone but discovered by accident and then refunded over time. Of all the countless billions upon billions of formulas that have been used by humans in society it was that luck one that managed to make the fractals. Bottom line was � it�s random.

Here�s another example. You walk down to the beach, pick up a pebble and it�s perfectly round. All the other pebbles you see are different shapes and sizes, with a few close, but not quite perfectly round. Which is more likely � someone created this perfectly round pebble and deposited it right in the middle of the beach or the ebbs and flows of the sea resulted in this perfectly round pebble?

quote:

Originally posted by DJBARON Perhaps the reason why some people take issue with this application of logic is due to the accompanying consequences.

Perhaps the reason why some people take issue with the idea that there is no God or creator is due to the accompanying consequences of this argument.

quote:

Originally posted by DJBARON WHAT ABOUT RANDOM EVOLUTION? For all intents and purposes, an event with the probability of 1 in 1040,000 qualifies in real-world terms as impossible.

Simply put; Just because something is highly IMPROBABLE, it does not mean it is IMPOSSIBLE. Given the mind bogglingly vast size and age of the universe, virtually anything can, will and has happened by sheer law of numbers. 1 in 1040,000 may qualify in real world terms as impossible, but in universals terms, that�s nothing. There are way more then 1040,000 planets in the universe, thus more than ample for life to develop.

Now that your initial post is dealt with, I�d like to raise a few questions myself. For the purpose of argument let�s presume that God did create life. But wait, we�ve stumbled on a problem already � who�s god created it? There are countless numbers of religions (ignoring denominations and sects!) which claim to have a creator or god.

Secondly, if there is a god why is it concerned with us? If the concept of god is correct, I.e something which has the power to create and destroy the universe, why would it be so concerned with the issues of the poor lowly idiots who are slowly destroying one of his creations?

Anyway even if there is a creator � I see no need to worship them. They did a terrible job of creating if I�m to live in this rubbish world that has been desecrated by their all the little monkey that it was populated with.

Oh and while we�re in the habit of quoting people: Karl Marx: �Religion is the opium of the masses�

quote:

Originally posted by Spin Doctor Anyway even if there is a creator � I see no need to worship them. They did a terrible job of creating if I�m to live in this rubbish world that has been desecrated by their all the little monkey that it was populated with. Oh and while we�re in the habit of quoting people: Karl Marx: �Religion is the opium of the masses�

please post more often

btw i do believe theres a higher power, but just that she/he/it doesnt care anymore. everything couldnt have been created from nothingness... or can it

quote:

Originally posted by rizen please post more often

he he! I do like to post in the politics forum but there usually isn�t enough good topics to start with, and when they are they are about 100 pages long and I can�t be bothered to read through it all.

Here are some links you might find interesting rizen:
http://www.enemies.com/index2.html
http://www.gnosis.org/
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06592a.htm

Basically, Gnosis is like this hybrid Christian/Buddhist religion that believes the world was created by a demented half wit lunatic god which is why it is so terrible. The only way to get out of here is through meditation to try and achieve enlightenment!

Anyway, here�s another gem for everyone to consider. Because our minds are so small and limited, even if there was a God who created the universe, we would never truly be able to understand or comprehend them or it � thus why bother?

quote:

Originally posted by rizen please post more often btw i do believe theres a higher power, but just that she/he/it doesnt care anymore.

sounds to me like you are a deist.

quote:

Originally posted by rizen everything couldnt have been created from nothingness... or can it

why not? it seems that you are willing to allow for a higher power/creator that wasn't created.. why the double standard?


richard

quote:

Originally posted by rizen btw i do believe theres a higher power, but just that she/he/it doesnt care anymore. everything couldnt have been created from nothingness... or can it

Ahhh a fellow deist ... although I sometimes switch between being a deist and an agnostic depending upon my mood (I blame my Catholic upbringing). At any rate, who's to say that there ever was an origin or a start for anything? Humans have defined time as being a linear entity with a definable start point and end point. This does not mean time behaves according to this principle. Let me ask you something, does time have an end? If time does not have an end, why the presumption that time has a beginning? Superstring theory has some interesting concepts of circular time.

quote:

Originally posted by Spin Doctor Simply put; Just because something is highly IMPROBABLE, it does not mean it is IMPOSSIBLE. Given the mind bogglingly vast size and age of the universe, virtually anything can, will and has happened by sheer law of numbers. 1 in 1040,000 may qualify in real world terms as impossible, but in universals terms, that�s nothing. There are way more then 1040,000 planets in the universe, thus more than ample for life to develop.

I'm glad you posted this, because I forgot to address it in my other posts.

When you talk about the odds of life forming, or the universe being created, or the brain containing x amount of cells being extremely low, even if we assume that the odds are as small as this article suggests, please be aware that to use these odds as evidence of ID, you're overlooking the Law of Truly Large Numbers and the Anthropic Principle as a satisfactory means of explaining why we have defied the odds that suggest, mathetatically, that we shouldn't exist.

The Law of Truly Large Numbers can be best explained by walking along the beach. Stop at a random location, pick up a grain of sand and then look at it. Do you have any idea how small the odds are of you selecting that particular grain of sand at random? Literally billions upon billions to one. You'd have a greater chance of winning the lottery and getting struck by lightning on the same day. Yet is there anything miraculous about bending over and picking up a grain of sand? Must there be something divine about that grain of sand for you to have picked it up against seemingly impossible odds? Let's really screw up the odds then: take off your shoes and go running around the beach. Then, when you leave and get back to your car, scrape all the sand off your feet into a tub or something, study them and then consider the odds: there's probably several hundred (more likely thousands) of grains of sand in that tub, out of several billion that exist on the beach. Do you have any idea what the odds are of you leaving the beach with those grains of sand are? Does someone want to work it out? I wouldn't mind betting that the odds are far smaller than any of the odds provided in the articles - and yet all you've done is go to the beach. The odds of going to the beach and scraping certain grains of sand into a tub are much smaller than the possibility of life, or the possibility of human existence.

And that's all the current state of the universe is - the infinitely improbable (yet inevitable) culmination of billions of billion to one shots of varying importance. Even if we consider the past 24 hours on Earth (an infinitesimally small part of the time and space in the universe as a whole) the fact that it is in the exact state it's in now rather than in some other state is immesurably small. From someone winning the lottery in the UK, to someone getting struck by lightning in Taiwan, to two specific oxygen atoms (out of trillions) combining with one specific carbon atom (out of trillions) in Peru to form a specific Carbon-dioxide mollecule (out of trillions), the cumulative odds of everything that's happened on Earth in the past 24 hours actually happenning would be written as a one placed over the biggest number you've ever encountered in your life. But is there anything that's occurred in the past 24 hours that is especially remarkable or necessarily "divine" in nature? No. It's merely the law of truly large numbers.

The anthropic principle is a little harder to explain, but all it basically states is that these "impossible odds" do occur, and that we shouldn't feel as though it's a miracle in any sense that we do exist in a universe "configured" perfectly to our existence. If the universe wasn't configured like it is now, we wouldn't be around to notice, just as if the world had turned out in a different state (out of zillions of possible states) after the last 24 hours, we wouldn't know any differently. If there are a billion possible outcomes of equal importance - just as there may be a billion grains of sand to choose from at the beach - by definition, one of these billion to one shots must occur, just as, if we were to go to the beach with the intention of picking up a grain of sand, we must go home with one of the billion. There is nothing remarkable about events of a very low probability occuring because, paradoxically, billion to one outcomes must, by definition, occur.

quote:

Originally posted by occrider At any rate, who's to say that there ever was an origin or a start for anything? Humans have defined time as being a linear entity with a definable start point and end point. This does not mean time behaves according to this principle. Let me ask you something, does time have an end? If time does not have an end, why the presumption that time has a beginning? Superstring theory has some interesting concepts of circular time.

Piggybacking here:
Most of the time the people who say there is a beginning say that God created the universe, but you ask where God came from, and they'll say he/she/it has always been. It isn't that much of a leap to say the universe has always been here.

quote:

Originally posted by Renegade The Law of Truly Large Numbers can be best explained by walking along the beach. Stop at a random location, pick up a grain of sand and then look at it. Do you have any idea how small the odds are of you selecting that particular grain of sand at random? Literally billions upon billions to one. You'd have a greater chance of winning the lottery and getting struck by lightning on the same day. Yet is there anything miraculous about bending over and picking up a grain of sand? Must there be something divine about that grain of sand for you to have picked it up against seemingly impossible odds?

to better illustrate the the question-begging nature of ID, i'd like to take your "sand on a beach" analogy a little further. you've shown that the improbability of picking up any one particular grain of sand is extremely low. however, as you have also shown, that probability is meaningless. it is meaningless unless there is some form of intent. now if someone, using a high powered microscope and a tiny laser, branded a grain of sand with a marking/number/picture and then placed it somewhere on a beach without you seeing where, and told you to go pick the branded grain up, and you went and picked it up on your first try... then that low probability would actually mean something. the problem with the ID argument, is that it doesn't differentiate between these two scenarios. it takes the first scenario (picking up any old grain of sand) and interprets that meaningless probability as being analogous to the second scenario.

quote:

Originally posted by Renegade The anthropic principle is a little harder to explain, but all it basically states is that these "impossible odds" do occur, and that we shouldn't feel as though it's a miracle in any sense that we do exist in a universe "configured" perfectly to our existence. If the universe wasn't configured like it is now, we wouldn't be around to notice, just as if the world had turned out in a different state (out of zillions of possible states) after the last 24 hours, we wouldn't know any differently. If there are a billion possible outcomes of equal importance - just as there may be a billion grains of sand to choose from at the beach - by definition, one of these billion to one shots must occur, just as, if we were to go to the beach with the intention of picking up a grain of sand, we must go home with one of the billion. There is nothing remarkable about events of a very low probability occuring because, paradoxically, billion to one outcomes must, by definition, occur.

the anthropic principle is closely tied to my example above. however, a common argument in which IDists misuse the anthropic principle, is the Fine Tuning Argument. Basically, the argument goes, the physical constants of this universe are so finely tuned, that if they varied the slightest bit (like 1 in 6 x 10^23rd, or something like that), then life wouldn't exist. So IDists argue that because life is so improbable, this universe must have been designed to support life. The fallacy should be quite apparent already, since according to the anthropic principle, we should expect exactly the universe we see, and any after the fact probability calculation will beg the question. but in case there are some that don't see the fallacy yet, here is a thought experiment that should demonstrate the problem with this line of thinking.

Imagine that there are 10 possible universes (not to scale.. 10 is just easier for discussion than 6 x 10^23); each with different physical constants that would produce completely different universes: a b c d e f g h i j

Only universe a has physical constants that allow it to produce life. And if you picked just one universe at random, it is improbable that you would pick a universe that can produce life since there is only one of them. And that is how you get the low probability that is the basis for the fine-tuning argument.

But universe a is not any more improbable than universe j. Universe j is different from the rest of the possible universes just like a is, and the same "improbability" applies to all of the individual possible universes. However, the fine-tuning argument make a baseless assumption that intelligent-life-producing constants are diametrically opposed to all other constants, rather than giving all aspects of all possible universes equal consideration when making that probability calculation.

Implicit in that assumption, is the assumption that the purpose of any of those possible universes would be to produce intelligent life. The fine-tuning argument assumes that universe a accomplishes this a priori special purpose and that the others don't accomplish that purpose, in order to make the probability "a vs. bcdefghij" (improbable) rather than "a vs. b vs. c vs. d, etc...." (just as probable as any other). But to assume that purpose/intent is begging the question... Intent is what is trying to be proven from an improbability, but that improbability wouldn't "exist" (or have meaning) if intent wasn't assumed.


richard


"...imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, 'This is an interesting world I find myself in 'an interesting hole I find myself in 'fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!'" --Douglas Adams

ID is doomed for failure. Instead of a theory that is adapting to the facts, it is attempting to adapt the facts to the theory. Notice how much of the nature of ID'ists is not to provide factual arguments supporting the probablility of their claim but to attack the probablility and factual evidence of any other competing theory. In due time, I think we'll see ID go the path of geocentricism. Ah yes, religion really called the ball on that one.

Anyway, allow me to deviate from the topic of evolution briefly, DJBaron or whoever, does God have a master plan for each and every one of us? If a baby or a loved one dies, was that God's will and the child/loved one now in heaven?

quote:

Originally posted by occrider Let me ask you something, does time have an end? If time does not have an end, why the presumption that time has a beginning? Superstring theory has some interesting concepts of circular time.

i have no idea, but theres an intresting theory of time being one large loop. big bang, universe collapsing, big bang, collapsing, big bang..... over and over

quote:

Originally posted by rizen i have no idea, but theres an intresting theory of time being one large loop. big bang, universe collapsing, big bang, collapsing, big bang..... over and over

Not to be too anal here, but that cosmic outlook is pretty dated. Most recent evidence in the past 5-8 years or so clearly suggests the universe is expanding without any hopes of a collapsing cycle. I guess that's a good thing to our future generations (I think).

Some very good points in this thread, but to me it screams out for the same conclusion. We cannot prove or disprove that there is a God! It is my personal belief that there is not a God, should this matter to anyone else? Does not believing in a God make me a bad person? Should I dislike a person whos views do not concur with my own?

No, no and no!

quote:

Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Not to be too anal here, but that cosmic outlook is pretty dated. Most recent evidence in the past 5-8 years or so clearly suggests the universe is expanding without any hopes of a collapsing cycle. I guess that's a good thing to our future generations (I think).

Hmmm misteropus, haven't seen you for a while. I was gonna post a thread about how they were bringing back doonsbury but I figured you were gone for good. At any rate, yes given the velocity/mass of the universe it appears we are going to continually expand. But circular time does not necessarily theorize that there are ever reoccuring bangs and crunches so much as it analyzes the property of space and time itself. I'll have to find that book I read that discusses the theory in detail and I'll post back about it. However, I'll caution that we know very very little still at this point, Given that we have no idea what dark matter really is, I stipulate that we're going to be going through a lot of shifts of what we know/think about the universe.

Edit: err not doonsbury but that comic with bill the cat.

quote:

Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Not to be too anal here, but that cosmic outlook is pretty dated. Most recent evidence in the past 5-8 years or so clearly suggests the universe is expanding without any hopes of a collapsing cycle. I guess that's a good thing to our future generations (I think).

never said it was currently collapsing or is about too any time soon. also we cant investigate all of the universe, every once in while you read about scientist discovering new stars and other stuff that are x light years away. agian its only a theory, and a very well possible one.

[

quote:

Originally posted by Acid Circus Some very good points in this thread, but to me it screams out for the same conclusion. We cannot prove or disprove that there is a God! It is my personal belief that there is a God, should this matter to anyone else? Does not believing in a God make me a bad person? Should I dislike a person whos views do not concur with my own? No, no and no!

Absolutely no, it doesn't make you a bad person. I too believe in a God, but I sorted out my faith from scientific fact and observation long ago. The problem with Creationists/IDers is they want so desperately to explain their faith beliefs via scientific methodology in order to justify what they believe. In essence, I sincerely believe such individuals actually have less faith than most true Christians/Muslims who don't see such conflicts. Seriously, the Pope himself doesn't have a beef with evolution, doesn't that tell you a little something, considering the Catholic faith endorses evolutionary origins of life?

But to the topic at hand, names and books such as Denton, Behe, Dembski, and Phillip Johnson have all been so easily debunked that its really old news. Nothing new has been presented in the ID field, just regurgitating the same illogical topics over and over. I guess if you say something that is false enough times, they believe it will eventually come true, or at least they'll find enough suckers to buy it (like my state Board of Education). As it's been said, it is nothing but logical fallacies being repeated over and over, primarily God of the Gaps (aka argument from incredulity). Of course the Straw Man fallacy is used quite repeatedly as well, especially the probability argument as depicted earlier. Or I guess to be technical, the Posterior Probability Fallacy: The probability of an event occurring, after it has already occurred, is exactly 100%. Just because a given event has occurred in a certain way doesn't mean it couldn't have been just as successfully configured in a bazillion other possible ways.

I anxiously await any new research in the primary literature that supports ID/Creationist ideas. So far my PubMed search gives me 0 hits. I wonder why? Perhaps it's what Dembski states in an interview about his book, "No Free Lunch" (Dembski's a mathmatician who uses probability to attempt to explain ID, quite poorly I might add):

"I've just gotten kind of blas� about submitting things to journals where you often wait two years to get things into print," he says. "And I find I can actually get the turnaround faster by writing a book and getting the ideas expressed there. My books sell well. I get a royalty. And the material gets read more."

Oh you poor baby, Dembski, 2 years for publication? Cry me a fucking river! That's what the process involves! I submitted my Thesis paper in 2000, and I just received word of it's publication 2 months ago, and it won't even be in print until next year! Statements like these indicate that he is somewhat disingenuous in his beliefs, and more inclined to get his "royalties" off controversal books.

In order for any Creationist/ID research to be sound it has to be:

1. Positive - the opposite of negative (attempting to disprove other known theories)
2. Testable
3. Falsifiable

It has never met any of these three criteria. It is therefore nothing shy of unsound opinion.

quote:

Originally posted by occrider Hmmm misteropus, haven't seen you for a while. I was gonna post a thread about how they were bringing back doonsbury but I figured you were gone for good. At any rate, yes given the velocity/mass of the universe it appears we are going to continually expand. But circular time does not necessarily theorize that there are ever reoccuring bangs and crunches so much as it analyzes the property of space and time itself. I'll have to find that book I read that discusses the theory in detail and I'll post back about it. However, I'll caution that we know very very little still at this point, Given that we have no idea what dark matter really is, I stipulate that we're going to be going through a lot of shifts of what we know/think about the universe. Edit: err not doonsbury but that comic with bill the cat.

Yeah, I heard about that, and I'm excited as hell! It was originally called Bloom County, then after a little hiatus, B. Breathed changed the name to Outland. Don't know what the knew one will be called.

I've been away because my wife was involved in a serious car accident a little over 2 weeks ago. She was broadsided on her side of the car, which unfortunately fractured her pelvis in 3-4 different places. I was following her in my own car and saw the whole damn thing. I guess it was a blessing a curse to be there. She was flown down to Wichita to see a specialist, whom was an expert in this particular fractured area (acetabulum). He performed 5-hour surgery on her 5 days after the accident, and we're finally back home less than a week ago. She'll eventually be okay and will be on both feet in a month or two, but there's some long and painful rehab days ahead. I haven't really had the energy or desire to get back on the internet and fuck around, but I guess in some ways it is healing to be back on these forums, wasting my day away!

quote:

Originally posted by MisterOpus1 Yeah, I heard about that, and I'm excited as hell! It was originally called Bloom County, then after a little hiatus, B. Breathed changed the name to Outland. Don't know what the knew one will be called.

the new one is going to be called: Opus


richard

quote:

Originally posted by Renegade And that's the crux of it all right there. All ID arguments run, basically, along this pattern: 1) Nature is complex 2) Everything that is complex requires a creator 3) Therefore nature has a creator Take the watch-maker argument you provided, for instance, the most overused anology in theistic apologetics: 1) Both the watch and nature are complex 2) Everything that is complex requires a creator 3) Therefore, both the watch and nature require a creator What the argument fails to take into account, though, is that the universe and the watch possess different types of complexity. The watch contains artificial, mechanical moving parts none of which can be explained or created via a natural process. The cogs, the springs, the watch-face, the hands - none of these things can be created "naturally" on their own, let alone assemble themselves in the exact form necessary to function as a "watch". If we were to find a watch while strolling along the beach we could only assume that it must have been created by an intelligent designer because the facticity of the watch (that is, the sum of all its properties) possess a complexity far different to that which we find anywhere else in nature. "Natural complexity" though - which we can view in the form of the "laws" of nature, especially in seemingly more "complex" bodies such as living things - is far different. Whereas a watch is made up of components that are entirely artificial - i.e. that cannot be created via a natural process - there is nothing artificial about the composition of life. Similarly, while it would be impossible for the components of a watch to come together and function "naturally", the components of a living organism require no creator to either come together nor function harmoniously. Besides, what strikes you as more odd? That a dead, blind, purposeless universe could exist without a creator, or that an infinite, omnipotent, omniscient super-being with the ability to create beings of complexity ex nihilo at will can exist without a creator? You can't have it both ways: either all complex beings require a creator or you concede the possibility that some don't. If it's the former, then I can only ask what created God (or point to the flaw in the argument which essentially implies the necessary existence of an infinite number of "creators" - a view that would be nearly impossible to justify) or if it's the latter, then I can only ask why you believe that the universe requires a creator but an even more complex being like God doesn't? Intelligent Design is bunk, and to understand why I suggest you read the following article (though I doubt that, even if you open it, you'll make any effort to understand it): http://www.secweb.org/asset.asp?AssetID=308

This entire discussion is BEYOND me...lol....half the words you people are typing i don't even know...and you can take that to 688th power...what ever that means...LOL

I just have 1 question..to Renegade.....in the quote i took from you above is what you are trying to say that IF there was a God and he DID create the universe, earth and people etc etc then WHO created God since design implies designer, so that God MUST have a designer in theory correct????.....or am i way off base??...but isnt it possible for God NOT to have a designer?...if not why, if so why....sorry for the DUMB questions...just trying to learn.

quote:

Originally posted by tiesto14 I just have 1 question..to Renegade.....in the quote i took from you above is what you are trying to say that IF there was a God and he DID create the universe, earth and people etc etc then WHO created God since design implies designer, so that God MUST have a designer in theory correct????.....or am i way off base??...but isnt it possible for God NOT to have a designer?...if not why, if so why....sorry for the DUMB questions...just trying to learn.

I'm not Renegade, but yes, that is one of the principal problems with a theory of ID, you get to the point where you have to explain the creator away in the same way you'd have to explain the universe itself, without the creator.

ie: If anything as complex as the universe requires a creator, then you have God, but God must be more complex than the universe, surely? And as such he requires a creator, and he a creator, and so on down the line.

At that point you're in an infinite cycle that's impossible to stop, therefore science minded people generally tend to not even start down that path and go with mathematical probabilities.

Understandable given the alternative IMO.

Basically, yes it's possible for God not to have a creator. But all I'm arguing is that if God doesn't need a creator to exist, why does the universe need a creator to exist? If God can exist without having been created by someone, why do people say that the universe can't exist without having been created by someone?

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