If we were designed, we were designed to get to 20-25. That we live so much longer is just the residue of good design.

You folks are still avoiding the difficult point of theology here: if God is perfect, all-powerful etc., and we are made in His image, why do humans have any design flaws at all?

Also, Corvair engines never "fell out." The design flaw was a rear suspension design on early models that could make it easier for the car to flip over during very hard turns (like sliding sideways into a curb). By the way, the Volkswagens of the day had a similar rear suspension design, which Nader never made an issue of, interestingly.

The better analogy is like some of NASA/JPL's products: designed to get to and perform its mission at the primary target, and after that, set free to fly off to oblivion. Sometimes the probe "lives" much longer than the designers ever expected, occasionally even being sent to new, and unanticipated destinations. In other cases, it dies in the process, as was intended. (And then there are the kludges needed to overcome the original design failures, and even the occasional miracle.)

As for "in His image" argument, I quote Frank Zappa: "So if we're dumb, then God must be dumb, too. And a little ugly on the side." But seriously, the argument is one made by materialists, because the "in His image" refers to the soul, not the body, and materialists can't see beyond the body.

Papaya:

Ever read Genesis? The notion that God or His Creation are perfect is anti-Biblical.

OK, allow me to rephrase: why would God create a multitude of creatures, all with strange features and faults that make it look as if they all arose by evolution? I grant there are nitpicky ID arguments about specific cases ("So how did eyes evolve, well!?"), but those are few compared to the hundreds of documented cases in biology of strange features that make evolutionary sense, but not ID sense.

My point here is not to argue the radical atheist-evolutionist view, which some around here seem to think is the only evolutionist point of view. I just think a lot of the ID attacks on evolution are silly or internally contradictory, and that a belief in God does not at all preclude belief in evolution.

Look at it this way: when you drop something on Earth in a vacuum, it falls at a fixed rate (32.2 fps squared). I doubt God intervenes in every case to ensure this outcome. It's more likely He was involved in creating the rule in the first place. Atheists may argue the rule happened without divine design, but that's another issue. The point is that if God was involved with this particular thing, it was back at the beginning of the universe, not now. (God may be involved in other things now, that's yet another issue.)

I see evolution as similar. The evidence for it is overwhelming, despite incompleteness and ID nitpicking. But why life evolved that way, nobody knows. Maybe God decided to set things up that way back in the beginning, maybe He intervenes only now and then, maybe He doesn't exist. I have no idea. But in any case it seems very unlikely to me that God laid false clues to trick us into believing evolution occurred when it really didn't, or that He has been directly controlling the DNA in every living thing on Earth for the last X billion years.

Papaya:

Yes, it's obvious that God had nothing to do with creating both the poodle and the bull mastiff or the various finches, but it appears that He does have to intervene every time there's speciation.

this guy knows nothing about engineering and development. kludges abound. clean design is the exception not the rule. leonardo's mother (and your mother, my mother, every mother) produced infinitely more complex and successful "designs" than leonardo himself ever did. compare a real human hand to the most advanced prosthetic available, to put things into perspective.

Humans are imperfect and therefore the things they design are imperfect. However, God is, according to most accounts, perfect, and therefore design flaws in his supposed creations are there on purpose. Either God is malicious, or the "design flaws" of nature result from natural evolution.

As for the "in his image" thing, Raoul, is the division between the evil material body and the good immaterial soul really an orthodox Christian belief, or a pagan Greek idea that has creeped into Christianity? If body is evil and soul good, then why will there be a bodily resurrection when the world ends, according to the Bible?

given that we can't know god's intentions, then we can't judge one of his "designs" as being somehow defficient. which i guess illustrates what mr judd is saying in the header for this post.

toe: From some unknown non-human perspective the "design flaws" can be meaningful, but unfortunately the human perspective is the only one we have. Perhaps there is God and he has a special plan, but the problem is that he has not revealed it to us.

People can do better than "God"; caesarean section is an example thereof.

Perhaps there is God and he has a special plan, but the problem is that he has not revealed it to us.

That's your problem, not His, and not mine, for that matter.

What so many seem to be missing here is a foundational part of the Judeo-Christian worldview: that the Creation, although pronounced "good" immediately after its creation, is subject to the effects of the Fall of Humankind. Thus, things are no longer completely "good."

So it seems to me that many of the things that some people call "design flaws" are actually broken: they no longer are working as they were designed to.

Roy:

That though demands the dodge that God designed us intentionally to Fall, which seems unnecessary. He just biffed.

Morko:

He did reveal it, we just aren't capable of fulfilling it. That's a design flaw and one even He didn't grasp fully until the Cross: Why hast Thou forsaken me?

oj: No. Even if you believe that the Bible or some other "holy" book contains orders for humans to follow to be saved, this does not explain WHY humans were created with serious flaws, or, indeed, why they were created at all. If the Bible said that God is a sadist who enjoys seeing suffering, this would be a sufficient explanation, but it says no such thing (even if it's implied).

Your answer is a bit cryptic, but are you implying that the Christian God is not omniscient? Do the said design flaws then perhaps stem from the fact that God's omniscience has been greatly exaggerated?

Morko:

Yes, it does. Just read Genesis. God isn't omniscient, omnipresent or omnipotent.

If there is truly free will, then God CAN'T be omniscient - although I expect that She's really, really good at prediction.

She just doesn't bat 1.000.

Who says complex machinery is always designed? It's frequently the result of trial and error.

When God uses trial and error to design an organism, the process is known as evolution by natural selection.

Which complex machine wasn't?

oj: I agree with you that if there's God, he is not perfect. This, however, is NOT an orthodox Christian position, it's more like a Manichaean belief. In less civilized times a heretic like you would have been given a hard time by the Inquisition. Besides, if God is not all-good and all-powerful, why should we abide by his rules, and how do we know that it's God and not Satan who wins in the end?

Morko:

To the contrary--it's what the Bible literally says.

God is good, just not entirely competent. It can hardly come as a surprise to humans who are made in His image.

oj, the idea that God is incompetent is not Christian. According to all mainstream Christian churches, God's apparent errors and the consequent suffering don't result from God's incompetence but from the human inability to understand God's mysterious ways.

You would have been burned as a heretic in the Middle Ages, but I like your take on Christianity.

Morko:

Yes, that's the other way to look at it, that God has us understand them as mistakes in order to instruct us by them. That seems overly nuanced though. If you read the Bible literally it's quite clear that God screws up a few times, never less importantly than when He can't find Adam and Eve and when He despairs of Himself on the Cross. I'd happily adopt the Church's position before an Inquisitor--it's not an important point.

Is God still around, by the way?