Well now, I would expect that alien abduction would have some sort of objective proof. Aliens are not, after all, supposed to be creator deities, are they?
However, if, say, fifty or sixty people witnessed an alien abduction, and they all told the same story, and they weren't all members of the 'Heaven's Gate" group, I might think about taking it a little seriously.
My claim here isn't that "Intelligent Design" (i.e., God) is provable by empirical means. It's not. My problem is that for some reason those who insist that there can't BE a God, even though you can't prove that there can't be one for the same reasons you can't prove that there is one,..and therefore anybody who believes that there is, or might be, shouldn't be allowed to practice science and examine the universe through scientific means: that somehow one of the qualifications for scientists is that they take the same untenable position on the other side of this issue that you insist cannot be taken on the 'yeah, there is one' issue.
I am not arguing that one can simply say "God did it" and call it good. Science is about examining the processes of the universe, whether God did it or not. The only thing that ID folks can say is 'yeah, God did it...now let's find out how," and their results and examinations will be precisely the same as those scientists who leave God out of it.
Those who attempt to prove God aren't going to be able to do it.
And those who insist that because there IS no God that nobody who believes in one should be allowed anywhere near scientific examinations of anything are projecting. They are committing the same fallacy that they accuse the ID believers of committing.
And they will end up pulling a Fred Hoyle; so afraid that some discovery might just support the idea of ID that they refuse to accept facts; real, empirical, objective, facts.
The Big Bang MIGHT support a Creator...but then, it might not, too. Now me, I figure that if there is a Creator God, the Big Bang would be a pretty efficient way to start everything up.
Or not. Doesn't matter. Science is about investigating what happened and how things work, not 'who did it."
ID believers will ALWAYS be able to 'kick the can down the road." that is, if we end up finding a cause for the Big Bang that does not necessarily involve God, well then, what (or who) caused THAT cause?
Those who are so convinced that God does not exist will view every new discovery with a 'Fred Hoyle" eye...anything that they think theists MIGHT be able to use to say "God did that..." must be incorrect. Not because the science behind it is wrong, but because since God does NOT exist, then nothing that even seems to support that idea can possibly be true.
Fred Hoyle.
I suggest that you are being just as irrational in your insistence that there is no God, and because there cannot be one, nobody who believes in one should examine any part of the universe through science. I could say the same about those who insist that there cannot be a God; they are, in fact, more likely to screw up their data and the science than believers. Believers may leave God out of the science (as they should) but they are ALSO not likely to pull a Fred Hoyle. That level of atheist (the ones who are 'strong' atheists, claiming that there cannot be a God) is a lot more likely to get tunnel vision and to not accept data that messes with their world view.
I will say this...or rather, repeat this, since you seem to keep missing it in all my posts; Intelligent Design is a religious position. It belongs in church.
So does the idea that there cannot be a God. Neither idea belongs in astrophysics or geology or whatever field of science is under discussion, because one cannot prove either position empirically.
