Intelligent Design: Did you design yourself?

[Heywood]

This is not how we identify design. This is an inductive argument that if things are like those things that are designed, then there is a probability that those things also were designed. Yet the only way that you've identified a designed lineage is by knowing its history. If that's what you mean by "experience" then it's a dry well, as we don't know the history of the seemingly naturally occurring lineage of life on earth. Can we look to similarity of construction? No we can't, as all artificial lineages of life created so far, and likely to be, are copies of the existing lineage, so what the artificial life looks like tells us nothing about what a lineage created de nuovo would look like. All artificial lineages created on the model of "natural" life would also be thus tainted. So your first premise doesn't lead to where you want it to go.

Moreover, this is just the abiogenesis / evolution dichotomy in cloaked form. No, I don't know where this current "natural" lineage came from. I never claimed I did, despite your asserting that I have. What I do know is that the development of life in this lineage can be explained by natural processes, even if its origin has not been explained.

Besides the problems with your first premise, judging which origin a lineage has based on the origin of known created lineages again is merely an inductive argument that most X are Y, therefore a new X is also likely Y. Yet there may be reasons why all X are Y that doesn't hold for this other X, and being purposely created as an imitation of the X is one such reason. You don't know that life created de nuovo would have any of the characteristics of life as it exists because nobody is coming close to accomplishing that feat, and may never be able to do so given that we are tainted by knowledge of this lineage.

You've constructed a clever argument to cloak the abiogenesis problem in new robes, but at the end of the day that's all it is. And your claiming that we know something is designed by "experience" by knowing that all things of its "kind" are also designed is a claim which doesn't ring true. We identify the "lineages" you've identified by knowing the history. We identify stone tools by a variety of factors, but them only being created by artifice isn't the main or only one. You're simply wrong. For more on why your argument from "experience" is wrong, see my previous thread debunking this line of reasoning.

On the appearance of design

I agree it is an inductive argument. It doesn't prove our lineage is the product of intelligent design. I never said it did, I always said it provided "good cause" for theists to make the claim.

Second you claimed my method of differentiating designed from not designed was wrong....but you don't offer an alternative method which is right. I think you are wrong about your assessment of my rule for how we differentiate designed from un-designed. You claim it relies on knowing this history of an object, this is not true. It relies on our experience on how those kinds of objects come into existence. The example of machinery found on Pluto I used in another post, we don't need to know the history of that specific piece of machinery to know it is the product of intelligent design. Our experience tells us those kind of things only come into existence via intelligent design so we have reason to rely on the assumption that this one did as well.

You stated, "...we don't know the history of the seemingly naturally occurring lineage of life on earth". You are claiming my argument must be wrong because of your a priori belief that the lineage of life on this planet naturally came into existence. This is an assumption you an others make....and really, what sort of justification do you actually have for that assumption? If you are to examine the question objectively, you need to set aside assumptions like this and take the position that it is logically possible our lineage could be designed and it is logically possible it could be the result of naturally occurring processes.

You said, "I do know is that the development of life in this lineage can be explained by natural processes, even if its origin has not been explained". What science has shown us, is that this lineage of life can also be explained by intelligent design. Where is this designer you ask? Well where is this natural process you speak of?

I'll take at look at your other thread later when I have a bit more time. I appreciate your response. You are one of the best in this forum and I always look forward to responses from you.