in general i don't like the oft-repeated 'by natural processes over a very long period of time' line. some people use this line as if it's some sort of credible explanation able to explain anything and everything. it's just a lazy way of not exploring the problems at hand.
Well, either way, it's agreed that that's how evolution happened. You may be right in saying that it's not very satisfying to say that, as if the significant improbabilities involved in the evolution of something like humans were answered by doing so.
In any case, the specifics of long-term evolution are still debated. Some say it's down to punctuated equilibrium, others think differently. Either way, it's agreed that it takes a long time.
When we can answer these sorts of questions, only then can we say that evolution is a complete theory that fully explains humans (although of course it still wouldn't explain how life first appeared on earth)
Well of course. No-one's saying that all the questions are answered, far from it. It's an ongoing process and we probably have an incredible amount to learn about it, and there may well be some things that we'll never know. That's just the way it is.
But if you want to invoke something like intelligent design, then, just like with evolution, you'll need evidence to support the hypothesis. And of course, if ID is something that's happened, the driver behind such a process would likely be some kind of transcendent or supernatural being, which would make it pretty much outside the realm of empirical verification.
So, even if ID did happen, people probably wouldn't know it or be able to verify it. And thus far, instances of so-called 'irreducible complexity' invoked in support of ID have been unsatisfactory.
And of course, evolution can't and will never account for the origin of life. That, as you well know, is the field of abiogenesis.
Of course the whole statement is one of Dawkin's favourite lines. I however find it a bit of a cop-out. We can not make any intelligent statements about God or anything outside our Universe for that matter. We can not make any inteligent statements how such a complex being might have come about or whether He always existed or not - it's possible that He may have always existed and didn't need to be created - we can not rule out this possibility because as we have both already agreed we can not assume to know anything about God since it probably lies outside of human logic, any attempt to define anything about the nature of God, or how and why he exists is likely to be futile. What we can do is speak intelligently of the nature around us - humans are complex. The current theories of science say we came about solely because of evolution - therefore we need to explain our complexity in terms of evolution - if we can not we must accept that their are other factors at play.
Yes, exactly. And it is for this reason that it is largely futile to invoke a god of some kind as an explanatory hypothesis. We cannot verify the existence of such a thing, we cannot verify any instances in which it may have intervened in evolution or the development of life.
And so, we simply have to be content to look at the observable, physical evidence. It may well be that there are some things that we will never know, but as you yourself conceded, it is futile to bring into the equation a completely unverifiable entity. It is invoking an unexplained phenomenon in order to explain and unexplained phenomenon.
I may be misunderstanding you, but it seems as though you're suggesting that ID is a valid or even necessary hypothesis in order to explain the human being, and yet you then concede that such a transcendant being is completely without the scope of human understanding and observation, and so making it completely useless as an explanatory hypothesis.
If indeed 'God' did lend a hand in making us as complex as we are - it's no good asking 'well who created the even more complex God' - since we can not make any intelligent comments regarding whether God himself was created or not - we can not make any intelligent comments reagrding the nature of God and how and why he exists - it's outside the realm of science and human logic.
Ah, yes. It's just that it seemed to me as if you're implying that it's simply not possible for evolution and natural processes to have produced something as sophisticated as humans. I simply responded by saying that given the even more unlikely existence of a highly sophisticated and causeless designer, the designer hypothesis itself, as an explanation, is not a very good one.
Topic: Islam or Atheism - The Big Debate