Debate Review: Is Intelligent Design Intelligent?

"T.A.G You're IT!" Podcast, just recently released a new episode titled: Intelligent Design is not Intelligent. This is a debate style format between Tim Carter and Shawn McCormick. You can find the full debate including the credentials and mini-profile of the two debaters here: https://castbox.fm/episode/The-T.A.G.-You're-It!-Podcast!-Episode-32-id500281-id63107320?country=us

I must fully disclaim, I have a love/hate relationships with debate style formats. I enjoy them on one instance because it is a clean way to hear both sides without interruption and in a laid out process. On the other hand, I find that it limits the conversation between the two. In this debate the moderators did a great job with instructions and keeping both on task. However, I think you'll find from both opponents that they wished they could have "chased a rabbit" to dive into the depths a bit more. The next disclaimer I have is this. I am not a philosopher, I am a science enthusiast. So, I'm writing this blog because it's in the realm of science and faith...which is what this blog is all about. With that said, If I make dumb philosophical remarks in this review, than feel free to correct me...gently, I'm fragile. I am open to being corrected as the evidence and reason lead.

I will not cover everything in this review because I don't want to take away from the meat of the podcast, but these are just some of my thoughts....So with that, let's dig in! *Cue fancy, hip, adrenaline pumping music here*

Opening: Mr. McCormick 10 Minutes

Mr. McCormick opens his presentation by setting up a few of his credentials as a designer/engineer. This is easy enough to tell where he'll be headed later with this set up, but it is good information to know. He wants to challenge his opponent immediately by demanding he answer questions such as; "Clarify who the designer is, Where did the designer come from, evidence of such designer, etc." Some of these are legitimate questions that perhaps should have some time devoted to them.

Mr. McCormick then continues with many other claims that just didn't seem to flow well for me. I think Mr. McCormick was attempting to anticipate his opponents arguments but got a little ahead of himself. Not that he didn't have good questions, but they just didn't flow together. Carrying on from this, he also attempts to give answers in a way that he thinks his opponent (Mr. Carter) would respond, thus letting the listeners know that if he does respond that way, they're fallacies.

Mr. McCormick did bring up one opposition during this opening remarks that did stand out. He mentioned that if there is a designer than he must be perfect thus the design in which he created must be perfect. He attempts to set this up later when he brings about flaws he sees in the universe. His claim is such that sense there are flaws in the universe, the "designer" would be flawed, therefore, it's not intelligent. We'll revisit this later, but what Mr. McCormick fails to do is give us such reason as to why the designer would have to create everything "perfect." Well, other than elementary reasoning. He does give some, but not much convincing in my opinion, when reflecting on historical theology. He challenges Mr. Carter, that he must account for all of the flaws in the universe. I'm not sure that is the case however.

Mr. McCormick concludes his opening statement with more claims he's anticipating his opponent to make and then passes the burden of proof onto Mr. Carter. This burden of proof shift will appear later from Mr. Carter as well.

Overall, and again, this is my opinion, Mr. McCormick seems to be taking a stance that is related to those of Neil Tyson, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens, as far as tone and arguments. He had some good questions I thought, however, I feel he ran ahead of himself.

Opening: Mr. Carter 10 Minutes

Next up is Mr. Carter. Mr. Carter, opens with the Gospel presentation. His opening statement seemed a little more organized than his opponent. Mr. Carter's main argument that he seems to press is an epistemological one. His one point is this; his opponent can't justify intelligence from his worldview.

The claim is explored more but basically suggest that if the atheist worldview is correct than we're all just "random mutations" thus there's no objectivity and his idea of intelligence can't be justified either. If there's no God, than there's no objective truths. Mr. Carter will press his opponent with the question of where in an atheistic worldview, can you justify intelligence, or what standard is it measured? It also seems that Mr. McCormick never really addresses this question which I think is a fair one.

From Mr. Carter's opening that I did find more organized than his opponent's, there's no doubt there is a fragrance of presuppositional apologetics. I'm not going to devote time here to explain that, but in my opinion it's a circular headache. Basically, what I found (unless I'm mistaken) with Mr. Carter's overall argument--when it's broken down--is this:

1. Intelligence cannot exist without God.

2. Intelligence exists.

Conclusion: Therefore, God exist, and with his existence we have objective truths and Intelligent Designer.

This is just the opening however, and Mr. Carter will dive further into this later in the debate.

Cross Examination: Mr. McCormick (Questions) 5 Minutes

Mr. McCormick is now asking questions to Mr. Carter. These are not all the questions, again you should listen to the debate for a greater context.

1. Evidence of your designer?

Mr. Carter says "Divine Revelation." In an attempt for clarification he's asked, "So, the Bible?" Mr. Carter responds with, "I have the bible, creation, and the image of God in me."

Mr. Carter is challenged on this a bit later. The accusation of using the bible to prove the bible. In this case, I have some sympathy for the atheist and would agree in a way. If one is to use the bible as evidence, then it would do well to support why the bible is reliable. However, this was not the topic of debate and not altogether needed from Mr. Carter. Just not my type of brew, but again popular in presuppositional apologetics.

2. Since created in the "Image of God," are you willing to say that God is 99% chimpanzee?

Yeap, that was asked. This comes from the scientific evidence that supports humans and chimps are about 98% matching in our DNA. However, the skeptic in this debate shows his lack of understanding in historical theology and biblical interpretation. Historical theology has never taken this position of the Imago Dei. I think Mr. Carter answered him quite well on this question.

3. God outside of space and time?

Mr. McCormick attempts to clarify that since the answer that is given is yes, that it's the same as saying God doesn't exist. Again, without understanding the work that has been done on this since the beginning of the Church fathers. I think Mr. Carter responds fairly well in his brief time.

Mr. McCormick then attempts to get Mr. Carter to confess that God is a bad designer without knowing it. By using a train collision analogy (listen to it). Then he says, just like two trains heading for each other is a bad designer, we have the Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies on a direct collision course. Therefore, God must be a bad designer.

Except, the analogy fails. When the trains collide, they'll hit each other and create damage. When the two galaxies collide in 4 billion years, they'll just merge to create a maga-galaxy so to speak. Galaxies contain mostly empty space and the stars in the Andromeda and Milky Way won't even come close enough to our sun to mess up the orbit. The Earth won't be bothered. Individual stars probably won't even collide.

Cross Examination: Mr. Carter (Questions) 5 Minutes

1. Presses the first question. How do you justify intelligence outside of yourself?

I found that Mr. McCormick seemed to avoid this question or misunderstood. Even though Mr. Carter asked again towards the end of the debate. I'm not real sure what Mr. McCormick was trying to answer with this. Perhaps if you listen to it you can share it with me.

Mr. Carter also asked more questions but those were more scientific that was answered and not sure it helped his position. But he did repeat this first question but never received a concrete established response.

Summary of Conclusion of the Debate

Let me say this again. Listen to the debate. I left out a bunch of stuff. This blog is just longer than I anticipated and I don't want to take meat away from the podcast. I'll just say a couple more brief remarks about the end of the debate that stuck out to me from both debaters.

From Mr. McCormick he still insisted that Mr. Carter was using fallacies. Some of those instances may be correct. However! He attempted to use the Bible to demonstrate that even the even the Bible shows an ignorant designer. The only thing Mr. McCormick demonstrated in this section was a misunderstanding of ancient literature, biblical exegesis, and historical theology.

From Mr. Carter. He made assumptions and also demonstrated a lack of understanding of the scientific Theory of Evolution and other scientific disciplines. I really appreciated his tone through most of the debate. He also, made it clear when his opponent attempted to put words in his mouth, and corrected it. Well, the best as he could, because he couldn't get too far into it because of the debate structure.

My Concluding Thoughts

My opinion is that I think it would do both sides well to learn the science and theology before trying to use them against each other. I'll conclude with a quote I often use by St. Augustine:

"Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens...and this knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn...If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods and on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason."

I appreciated both guys doing this debate and the podcast moderators, and learned from both sides.