Debate: DO YOU SUPPORT PRESIDENT OBAMAS DECISION TO BUILD A MOSQUE AT GROUND ZERO
Side: No

The belief that the complexity of the universe, and of life, and everything, can not possible be the product of blind chance is held by many, probably purely by instinct and not by research.This is a strawman. Evolution works by natural selection, a nonrandom process that shapes a population over an environment and selects beneficial random mutations.There are a lot of people out there that cannot ever come to believe that there is not a force/entity/God/thing, whatever you want to name it, holding all of this together. You simply can't blow these people away with impressive scientific concepts and change their minds because no matter what you reveal to them they will simply agree with your research and say 'uh yeah, sounds pretty damn impressive and organized, hence an organizer! (ID).I don't really care to "blow them away." People will always believe in crazy things, and call it god, chi, takyonics, feng shui, voodoo, etc.I'm sure you don't like the ID argument 101 which pretty much says everything we have ever observed in our life that has intelligent organization to it (a refrigerator, toilet, computer, etc.) has had a designer, therefore why would we not assume (based on a lifetime of experience not ignorance) that when we reach the top of the mountain (the universe itself and all in it, which is more impressively organized then anything) the same is not also true?It's the teleological argument masquerading as science. Evolution demonstrates that complex things like proteins, organs, and so on can and will evolve when conditions are met. Therefore apparently designed things do not require a designer. That is a false premise, as exposed by evolution.This is an example of evidence. Brushing it away as "evolution is a hoax" denies this evidence and means any conclusion you reach doesn't fit all the facts.Is not every single example in life of organization having an organizer good evidence to judge that which is beyond life (the power source of it all)? Is that really ignorant?It leads to an infinite regression or a special pleading fallacy if you think that way. Further, there are natural processes that organise matter without intelligence, like crystalisation, evolution, and in thermodynamics there is a rare case where systems can organise into less entropy, as a matter of statistical probability.I see it as a conclusion using simple probability. Do you really not see how holding this belief can totally have nothing to do with religion for people but merely a philosophical stance?A religious position is inescapable. Because the nature of the argument asks for ever-escalating, more complicated intelligences to design the former, and because the nature of an infinite progression with increase leads to a "god" intelligence.All the facts you are telling me are the result of a designer or of random processes!Neither, it is evolution.I don't deny any scientific facts you point out but none of them can argue for or against intelligent design vs. random chance. Intelligent design denies the evidence of common decent, and creates a strawman of evolution that makes it appear random.Evolution isn't random. It is heredity, reproduction with variation, competition for resources, and random mutation. Together natural selection automatically follows from it, killing off those organisms least suited to the environment.The strawman is to claim that evolution is random mutation. Natural selection isn't random, the most fit organisms are what survives.Science is constantly observing and predicting and discovering new things about the physical world around us. But to make a claim about the driving force behind the physical world will always be totally unprovable, untouchable, you can't research it it's an idea without concrete data. It is a matter of religion or philosophy. ID is unprovable. Evolution depends on the fossil, genetic and other evidence. These have been found and they support it.Einstein knew 800 times more about how the universe works than I do, but he can't have a better guess than me about what is causing the universe to work that way because such a question can not be researched, it's philosophical.It's philosophical if it is unknowable. Depending on what we learn about our universe in the next century, it may be knowable. Some evidence points to quantum fluctuation. However we do know that the universe expanded from a singularity.The whole ID vs randomness/evolution is actually a strange argument because it's not really a science argument anyway.Evolution is a science.Religious man sees scientific data, 'oh God's power is causing this'. Science man sees the same data, 'oh evolution is causing this.' A religious person is committed to a conclusion that cannot be shaken from his mind.A scientist works with established theory.How on Earth do you measure what force is causing it and tell the other guy that he's wrong?You can show through genetic sequencing that we are related to other animals in a way that is consistent with a historical lineage.Transitional forms fill in gaps to genome sequencing with organisms that are extinct but have no DNA preserved.Molecular analysis shows how proteins and enzymes evolved by comparing with different branches.What me and you have basically been doing is going back and forth about who better understands how X operates, and how X changes, and how X reacts, and how X evolves, etc. THen saying to each other 'Well because I better understand how X works I am in a better possition to tell you what is 'causing' X to work.You aren't in a position to have this kind of conversation anyway because you have demonstrated that you do not know how evolution works. You only have a caricature.THat doesn't make sense, nobody has a better guess at what MAKES the universe work simply because they better understand HOW the universe works.There is no dualistic nature to the universe that makes it operate on some sort of unseen background. The properties of the universe operate independently of each other and together, giving us what we have. Understanding these properties lets us understand the universe.Science can answer things like 'What', 'How often', 'Where', etc, it can't answer 'Why.' That is speculation for anyone.What good can come from speculating a "why" for the universe? It isn't a created object with given purpose.