This certainly puts an end to the watchmaker argument.

[Twilight Hue]

If you find an insect in the woods with functional gears.....

Creature with Interlocking Gears on Legs Discovered

This was actually discovered a while back, but I never came across this myself until now.

Creationists can put the watchmaker issue to rest now. It's no longer useful anymore from a creationist viewpoint in vain attempts to invalidate evolution.

It's completely valid however from an evolutionary standpoint that gears can form naturally on their own, and be functional which definitively voids any notion of a God or deity as being responsible whatsoever given the fact that you actually can walk into the woods and see actual functioning gears.

It would be interesting in viewing the cladistics of this particular insect.

 

[Spiderman]

You're too damn smart!

 

[Sunstone]

Darwin killed the watchmaker argument, and it lay dead for a 100 years. Then some creationists resurrected it in zombie form.

It's out there now, it's hungry, and it wants your brains.

 

[ADigitalArtist]

The watchmaker argument was never debatable because it was never coherant. The illustration is about a watch, which they argue is irreducibly complex in contrast to a backdrop of grass and trees which makes the watch stand out. But the grass and trees are also argued to be irreducibly complex by creationists. So why and what differentiates the clock from the forest?

But really the watchmaker argument falls apart due to strong reliance on (tagging @Sunstone for posterity) an argument from incredulity. It seems like things in our universe are too complex to have arisen naturally so they must have been made unnaturally. Which is a very vague argument which doesnt give any barriers to the process, just supposes one exists somewhere. Further, complex things rise from simplicity literally all the time.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Sure, the watchmaker argument might be dead, but what about the Trump-maker argument?
Are you telling me a Trump can form naturally??

 

[Enoch07]

Gonna be a lot upset people when everyone figures out God uses evolution to create.

*Serpentines to avoid sniper fire from both sides*

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Gonna be a lot upset people when everyone figures out God uses evolution to create.

*Serpentines to avoid sniper fire from both sides*

I never understood why some people see evolution as incompatible with God.

 

[Sunstone]

In the West, most ideas as vivid and basic as the watchmaker argument date back in some form or another to the ancient Greeks -- or at least to the Romans. I don't know if the watchmaker argument does, but I would not be surprised if it did.

Having said that, the argument appears -- or reappears, perhaps -- in the 1600s, and seems then to have been inspired by discoveries in the newly emerging sciences. Basically, it starts out as an argument for deism -- near as I recall.

The new sciences had by then discovered amazing regularities in nature. It occurred to some people that nature was thus like a watch. God had created it, wound it up, and set it aside (so to speak) to tic on by itself, without his intervention. That view was fully compatible with deism.

In the early 1800s, the watchmaker argument gets reformulated a bit -- transformed into its most famous version -- by the Rev. William Palely. It's from him we get the modern version.

Palely noticed both that life on this rock was hugely complex, and that it was generally well adapted. In other words, it seemed designed, as opposed to random. His watchmaker argument was basically an argument for the existence of God. You find something, such as a watch, or a world, that very much looks designed, then you conclude that it must have had a designer -- a creator.

Palely's argument had a huge influence on the thinking people of his time. Folks back then were beginning -- just beginning -- to move away from theism. The first openly atheist thinkers had only "recently" appeared within "just" the past 200 years, and now -- by the late 1700s and early 1800s -- lots of thinking people were questioning the nature (and even the existence) of god.

Palely's argument proved to be a wrench thrown into the movement away from god. Folks could convince themselves that the Christian God was unlikely to exist -- but here was Palely showing them that some kind of god must exist because the world looked to all possible appearances to have been designed. So most thinking folks traveled no further away from god than deism.

That lasted about 60 years until Darwin came along with an explanation for the complexity and adaptation of life forms on the planet that did not require any god at all.

Palely's argument was destroyed for at least the next 100 years. Then creationists began resurrecting it -- or at least parts of it -- in zombie form.

As @ADigitalArtist noted, the argument in at least some (and maybe all) of its modern forms can be argued to rely on a fallacy -- reasoning from incredulity.

And that's where we are today.

 

[Sunstone]

I never understood why some people see evolution as incompatible with God.

With god? No, it's not incompatible. With the Christian God? A trickier question. The key issue with the Christian God is that evolution has no goal or purpose as scientifically formulated. But the Christian God places humans at the top of creation, which would suggest that evolution has -- or had -- a goal or purpose. That's the rub. At least one of them.

Another is that, if evolution is true, what becomes of the Fall? Can there have been an Adam and Eve whose sin was passed down to everything because they were the father and mother of us all? And without a Fall, what becomes of the need for Jesus to redeem us from the Fall?

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

I never understood why some people see evolution as incompatible with God.

Evolution describes the way that life developed, and it involves a set of causal factors, none of which are God.

To the extent that it still allows for God, it only allows for the rather ridiculous suggestion of a redundant God that does nothing that wouldn't have happened without him... like Intelligent Falling: "well, yes, gravity would explain why a rock rolls downhill, but you can't exclude the possibility that there's also an invisible angel pushing it an imperceptible amount!"

 

[lewisnotmiller]

Evolution describes the way that life developed, and it involves a set of causal factors, none of which are God.

To the extent that it still allows for God, it only allows for the rather ridiculous suggestion of a redundant God that does nothing that wouldn't have happened without him... like Intelligent Falling: "well, yes, gravity would explain why a rock rolls downhill, but you can't exclude the possibility that there's also an invisible angel pushing it an imperceptible amount!"

Nope, I don't agree.
To be clear, I'm an atheist, and don't believe in a God. But evolution does nothing to harm the possibility of a non-interventionist God. It speaks neither to the motivations of such a being, nor the origin of life.

 

[lewisnotmiller]

With god? No, it's not incompatible. With the Christian God? A trickier question. The key issue with the Christian God is that evolution has no goal or purpose as scientifically formulated. But the Christian God places humans at the top of creation, which would suggest that evolution has -- or had -- a goal or purpose. That's the rub. At least one of them.

Another is that, if evolution is true, what becomes of the Fall? Can there have been an Adam and Eve whose sin was passed down to everything because they were the father and mother of us all? And without a Fall, what becomes of the need for Jesus to redeem us from the Fall?

Ah, Christianity...
The more claims humans make on behalf of their God, the less credible I find their notions.
Let's say instead a Deist God.

 

[gnostic]

Sure, the watchmaker argument might be dead, but what about the Trump-maker argument?
Are you telling me a Trump can form naturally??

Are you talking about his hair style?

 

[Revoltingest]

If you find an insect in the woods with functional gears.....

Creature with Interlocking Gears on Legs Discovered

This was actually discovered a while back, but I never came across this myself until now.

Creationists can put the watchmaker issue to rest now. It's no longer useful anymore from a creationist viewpoint in vain attempts to invalidate evolution.

It's completely valid however from an evolutionary standpoint that gears can form naturally on their own, and be functional which definitively voids any notion of a God or deity as being responsible whatsoever given the fact that you actually can walk into the woods and see actual functioning gears.

It would be interesting in viewing the cladistics of this particular insect.

But has a bug evolved the wristband yet?
No....chalk up one loss for Darwin!

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

Nope, I don't agree.
To be clear, I'm an atheist, and don't believe in a God. But evolution does nothing to harm the possibility of a non-interventionist God. It speaks neither to the motivations of such a being, nor the origin of life.

Evolutionary theory also doesn't exclude the possibility that thunderbolts are thrown by God instead of being caused by a buildup of electrical charge.

Like any theory, evolution is limited in scope, and on the issues it doesn't speak to, it has nothing to say about whether any particular god is involved or not.

... but on the issues that evolutionary theory does speak to, it clearly implies that God is unnecessary, so God is either uninvolved or redundant within the scope of what evolution deals with.

 

[Jose Fly]

But has a bug evolved the wristband yet?
No....chalk up one loss for Darwin!

It's still a bug too, and didn't turn into an elephant, so checkmate atheists!

 

[Rational Agnostic]

Darwin killed the watchmaker argument, and it lay dead for a 100 years. Then some creationists resurrected it in zombie form.

It's out there now, it's hungry, and it wants your brains.

Have you read The Blind Watchmaker by Dawkins? It's a phenomenal book in that he begins by describing in detail the unbelievable complexity and apparent design of living things, even going so far as to state that many creationists actually underestimate the amazing complexity of living things. Then, he goes on to unravel the mystery of the complexity by explaining in detail how natural selection creates the illusion of design. Many people get the wrong impression of Dawkins from YouTube videos where he appears shallow and arrogant, but his writing is very informative and clear.

 

[Revoltingest]

It's still a bug too, and didn't turn into an elephant, so checkmate atheists!

But it did turn into a watch, so atheists are still in the game.

 

[Valjean]

Nope, I don't agree.
To be clear, I'm an atheist, and don't believe in a God. But evolution does nothing to harm the possibility of a non-interventionist God. It speaks neither to the motivations of such a being, nor the origin of life.

'Evolution', physics, chemistry, geology, meteorology, &c don't disprove God, they just render Him unnecessary -- and there's the objection. All the magic and awe that underlay religious belief in the past is being obviated by modern science.

Watchmaker theory is an argument from ignorance and a false dichotomy.
Before the mechanisms of evolution were described it might have made some sense, but today the religious can only bolster their faith by trying to disparage science and poke holes in anything supporting evolution, round Earth, or any other inconvenient theory. They generally do a poor job of this because they really don't understand the theories.

 

[Revoltingest]

'Evolution', physics, chemistry, geology, meteorology, &c don't disprove God, they just render Him unnecessary -- and there's the objection. All the magic and awe that underlay religious belief in the past is being obviated by modern science.

Watchmaker theory is an argument from ignorance and a false dichotomy.
Before the mechanisms of evolution were described it might have made some sense, but today the religious can only bolster their faith by trying to disparage science and poke holes in anything supporting evolution, round Earth, or any other inconvenient theory. They generally do a poor job of this because they really don't understand the theories.

I read "bolster" as "lobster".
Your way is cromulent, but my way is much funnier.