INTELLIGENT DESIGN:
does "infinity" exist?

I cannot help but feel that there are a number of
semantic misconceptions surrounding the concept
of "Intelligent Design" [ID]. The chief one being:
is ID scientific? And how do you define "science"?

The commonsense approach would be to say that
science is evidence based. Those of us who would
seek physical evidence of "design" would hope
that such evidence [if found] would [in principle] be
accepted as "scientific".

But it seems to me the debates surrounding ID
founder not on evidence but on one's philosophy of
science. For some, "science" is by definition natural-
istic and rejects the "supernatural" [a distinction
they themselves created], so on such a definition
any evidence of design cannot be science for that
very reason - the conclusion is built into the
definition. If they label something "supernatural"
it immediately makes it inadmissable as scientific
evidence. In a universe full of remarkable
implausabilities some are ruled in and others are
ruled out. The debate about "Creation Science" is
particularly acute in the USA where the state
education system is bound by the principle of
the separation of church and state.......and there
the debate is not science but the philosophy of
science. In short the presuppositions one starts
with determine the outcome - no wonder these
discussions are often debates of the deaf.

The concept of "Intelligent Design" stands or
falls on the principle of 'irreducible complexity'
[it is a falsifiable theory] and seeks to discover
biological systems [which can be studied objectively]
that cannot function in a precursor state [testable].
The classic example is the mousetrap comprising
spring, catch, trap and base plate; it cannot
function without all the components in place.
(It might have served a different function in a
precursor state - but the onus is on the naysayer
to state what that function was). A mousetrap
cannot evolve piece by piece - it is all or nothing -
hence 'irreducible complexity'. There are any
number of biological systems which fall into this
category.
Is it so unreasonable to ask about the origin of such
systems? At this stage no one is invoking God as
an explanation - we are merely raising biological
questions, but the materialist will invoke the
"slippery slope " argument. It is a paradigm they
are not prepared to explore.
Conversely, from a Christian perspective, the limit
in the creationist's argument is that even if we prove
the likelihood of a creator on material grounds, we are
still not able to identify conclusively who that Creator
is, not without special revelation anyway. So there is
only a limited mileage in the ID argument to start with.

But returning to the "Secular Fundamentalists" as
my chief target...someone will object and say that in
an infinite universe all sorts of improbable things will
happen. But it seems to me that one cannot
airily wave the word "infinity" over any given
problem and magic it away. You disallow one set
of improbabilities but admit this set (which
serves the same "god" function) because it fits your
preconceived ideas better - why is that?

Can I be provocative? Does "infinity" exist anyway?
Yes, I know it exists as a mathematical notion.
Yes, I know that space is infinite (albeit bounded). But
these are beside the point. Crucial to the materialists'
argument is not the size of the vacuum of space; what
matters to the materialist is matter [well, it would,
wouldn't it?] What matters is the stuff which makes
the world we inhabit and forms every biological sytem.

Is matter infinite? Well no it is not. According to the
Cornell University website the mass of the observable
universe has been calculated to be 25 billion galaxies
worth (and that includes dark matter). From this we
know that the universe will continue to expand - there
isn't enough mass (and so gravity) ever to draw
it back together. Indeed Cornell University go on to
say that the universe isn't big enough to contain
another Earth with another You! If we can quantify
the mass of the universe it is ipso facto not infinite and
does not contain the infinite possibilities you think it
should.

Given that - what is so unreasonable about flagging
up the "what if God does exist?" question?