Having read some more on this debate and pursued discussions with passionate and opinionated friends and colleagues, I am coming to realize that the debate on 'Intelligent Design' must 'evolve'. I assert that the real nature of the debate should not focus on Intelligent Design but on 'Intelligent Assembly'. This is essentially the 'Unifying' theory that brings together 'Darwinism' (explaining lots of phenomenon, such as the presence of Cytochrome P450 across the phylum) and 'Creationism' (offering deep and enriching explaination for 'eyeballs' and watches). It is much easier to accept the assertion that 'some' parts 'evolved' and 'others' were 'designed' and an overall assembly process occurred.
Remarkably, these two theories come together (at least in my mind) around the same time as the unification of the Theory of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics (into a 'String' theory most of which still remains to be proven but what the heck)-- which now concludes that we are all in a two-dimensional world and experiencing 'holographic' illusions with the third-dimension interacting with quarks, gravity, time, etc. (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa006&colID=1&articleID=0002B59B-5B5C-1359-9B5C83414B7F0119)
I love it because thinking of myself in a two-dimensional world and having holographic illusions of having been 'creatively' assembled and evolved simplies a lot for me.
I feel Unified.
Sanjiva, Orinda, 11/11/2005
As one of the opinionated friends, I feel obligated ... One major headache we have been relentlessly asking for is to try to rush into conclusion of something we've known little to nothing about. For xyz's sake, if we can't explain something, don't randomly come up with a filler. Why can't we enjoy the mystery and the unknown? I think I would be very excited if I became the all-mighty God who certainly knows everything, but at most for the first 24 hours. Would be bored to death afterwards.
So, when something cannot be explained using a "natural selection" theory, we don't have to immediately build an "unnatural" theory to replace or complement it, unless of course when a science or philosophy paper is overdue. One of the trillions of possibilities is that an extraterrestial species with an intelligence of 1000 times of human's was responsible for life on Earth. In that case, we were created (with admittedly numerous faulty designs) but there was not a bit of "unnatural" about it. Another possibility is that there is really a God not bored to death yet. But then someone who had to mix Tylenol with pinto beans in burritos would have to figure out how this God was naturally or unnaturally selected.
Posted by: Leo | November 15, 2005 at 11:13 AM