Talk:Argument from poor design

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• It appears the merger has been completed. Can I removed this tag? Kerowyn 03:50, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Merge 2 Logical fallacy 3 Watchmaker analogy has examples 4 Arguments against 5 As an argument regarding God 6 Weasel words 7 A version of this argument 8 Examples 9 NPOV tag 10 Accuracy Tag 11 Criticism. 12 original reasearch 13 Subluxations? 14 Prostate Gland 15 Criticism section 16 WikiProject class rating 17 Appendix 18 perfection or imperfection 19 Argument from poor design is anti-god or anti-intelligent design? 20 Is this a Book? 21 Panda's Thumb 22 DNA self repair 23 WP:V

[edit] Merge

As suggested by User:duncharris, I have merged the article "poor design" into this one. Except for additional creationist arguments, most of the text was redundant, and except for the blind-spot example, all of the examples were, in my understanding of the argument, not apropos:

• Overproduction of estrogen and testosterone is not a species-wide design feature, as are all examples typically considered to be "bad design."
• Elbow caps, limb regrowth, and infinite life would seem to be part of the "argument from lack of infinitely-perfect design," not the "argument from bad (or poor) design."--Johnstone 01:59, 7 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Isn't that what the prefix "omni-" means? The argument is that an omniscient, omnipotent creator wouldn't make mistakes. ANY mistakes, not just mistakes you think are important. --Llewdor 19:42, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

And Swift would argue that infinite life is poor design. 213.48.182.7 22:09, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Logical fallacy

We need to point out that this argument is fallacious, although a humourous repost to argument from design, otherwise it implies that the argument from design is logical, which it isn't. Dunc_Harris|☺ 20:15, 12 Sep 2004 (UTC)

What's not logical about it? Philip J. Rayment 17:18, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Barbara Shack 14:30, 8 December 2005 (UTC)Looks like the logical fallacly has been pointed out. It seems to me the article is now neutral.

The argument is logically valid.

If X then Y

~Y

Ergo: ~X

It is a basic Modus tollens. X = All Powerful, Perfect, Creator God. Y = Make Perfect Design.

It seems to be a perfectly sound argument that contradicts the core of the argument from design. If this argument is correct it means that the argument from design is automatically false. Thus, it does not suggest the argument from design is logical, rather it necessitates that it is flawed. Tat 11:18, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Watchmaker analogy has examples

Watchmaker analogy has some examples of "bad design" better than the ones already here. I'm not sure which would be appropriate, however. --AySz88^-^ 00:09, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Arguments against

I have removed the following text as an argument against:

Finally, it is a bit incongruous to argue that life is imperfectly designed, when humans create only imperfect works.

I think it is a bit of a non-sequiteur as humans are perfect, whereas the general conception of God is that of a perfect being. There are certainly better arguments against already listed. I make mention of it here because I may have missed the point, and if somebody wants to reinstate it, I would reqeust that they reword it. Conrad Leviston 02:57, 21 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] As an argument regarding God

Almost half of what is under this header on the article page looks as if it belongs higher up in the article (thus proving poor design does not indicate no designer, rather design by committee :) ). I think this article needs major structural changes, but as I am a little bemused by some of the distinctions and arguments made on this page I am probably not the person to do it. What do others think?

[edit] Weasel words

Suggest that contributors wishing to insert a "Weasel words" template in the article should make a case, since I don't think it belongs. --Vjam 16:48, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

"Some creationists respond that the argument is non sequitur, because it is comparable to arguing that the poor design of the Ford Pinto means that the Pinto was not designed."

"Some creationists" is an instance of weasel words, because the creationists who are making these claims are not attributed. For all we know, "some creationists" may refer to the next-door neighbors of whoever wrote that into the article. There are other examples throughout the article, you are free to seek them out yourself.—jiy (talk) 16:54, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

Hi Jiy. I've removed the reference to "some creationists". I'd agree that the section isn't written in the best NPOV style available. However, on balance, I would be more concerned that adding a weasel words tag here might look like poisoning the well, given the potentially controversial nature of the topic.

I'd suggest that the tag should not be used without a talk item identifying alleged weasel words to they can be removed or otherwise dealt with as appropriate.

Please note that weasel words are not generally considered to have occurred (please don't ask me to cite authors ;)) where a point is uncontroversial, where the belief in question is what is under discussion (likely to be the case in a section entitled "criticism"), or (where quantification is the issue) where the number of opinion- holders is too numerous to quantify. See Wikipedia: Avoid weasel words.

Thanks --Vjam 17:20, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] A version of this argument

I heard a version of this argument a long time ago used to refute benevolent God. It went something like this (IIRC):

1. Omnipotent God could create perfect organisms

2. Organisms, including human, are not perfect (eg. organisms can die, trip, fall ill, fight with each other, etc...)

3. Therefore God is not benevolent.

- G3, 04:57, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

This argument is not valid or sound. An omnipotent god could create imperfect organisms. If you can do anything you can add flaws to something. Premise two is correct. The conclusion is a non sequitur. For example, God could be impotent. This would resolve the issues with the argument. Furthermore, there is no reason to assume that humans were created by this god. The argument would need to be tweaked to actually fit: An omnipotent benevolent creator god (who created us) would create us to be perfect. Organisms, including humans, are not perfect. Therefore, God is not omnipotent, benevolent, or did not create us. -- If sound, the conclusion follows. One could argue against soundness, that the first or second premises don't follow. That a benevolent omnipotent creator god wouldn't create perfect things; I'm not sure what this argument would look like but it would make the argument unsound. Second, somebody could say that organisms are perfect. This would be pretty nutty, but it would also resolve the argument by removing soundness. These resolutions, reject premise 1, reject premise 2 -- If neither premise is rejected then God is either not-omnipotent, not-benevolent, or not-creator. One should also note that this fixed argument is the argument given in the article, these are *all* of the proper resolutions to the given argument. In short, your version is crap. Tat 11:38, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Examples

Maybe someone should remove the argument about "Junk"-DNA, since it is still much unknown about this feature of life. There are some indications that noncoding DNA really is of most importance to many organisms, especially in regulating mechanisms. And it certainly is a source of new genes by random mutation. Though I think ID-people wont like this reason to remove the argument:)

Arguments are listed because they are made, not because they are valid. And please sign your contributions. -- Jibal 08:43, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

If an arguement is invalid, then it should say so, or else the article is conveying false information. This is an encyclopedia. It should have true information, no matter what. RJRocket53 (talk) 19:16, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Noncoding != Junk. Junk != Noncoding. [1] Tat 11:40, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NPOV tag

I think the NPOV tag was added due to use of 'weasel words' and I've made some related edits. At root the problem is a lack of sources which leads to the fallback 'some critics say' wording so I've added a {{unreferenced|date=August 2006}} tag instead. As a passing note, I suggest using the NPOV tag rather than just the category since readers of the article deserve to know up front if there is potential bias in the article. Antonrojo 00:21, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Accuracy Tag

Some background on this would be helpful. The tag was added with the comment 'adding "factual accuracy" tag: the 'argument from poor design' is usually a counterargument to an argument FOR God, not itself a general-use argument AGAINST God, per se'. In what context is this 'usually' the case? Antonrojo 02:38, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

All contexts. The argument from poor design is a specific response to the argument from design (i.e., the teleological argument), and thus a counterargument to an argument for God; that's not the same thing as an "argument against God", and can only be considered one in the loosest possible sense. "Argument from poor design" is no more an "argument against God" than a refutation or criticism of Pascal's wager is an "argument against God"; it might deconstruct certain people's rationales for believing in God, but it's not an attempt to show that "Deities can't exist if life is poorly-designed", as the current article repeatedly claims (a non sequitur, since only certain conceptions of God or gods require that the Creation be optimal: hence "argument from poor design" is only functional as an anti-teleological argument, not a general-usage "there can't be a God" argument). Someone could fully accept the examples of "poorly-designed" entities while still being a theist, just as one could accept the counter-arguments for the ontological argument without renouncing God. -Silence 02:53, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Criticism.

There is a major problem in the criticism section.

"Greater energy efficiency in plants would result in damaging chemical reactions" is critical to the comment that "Photosynthetic plants that reflect green light, even though the sun's peak output is at this wavelength. A more optimal system of photosynthesis would use the entire solar spectrum, thus resulting in black plants." -- It's not true. There is no reason at all to assume that this would result in damaging chemical reactions, it would result in more sugar. I looked around for a while to see if anybody ever argued this and came up with nothing. This comment seems to be pulled out of somebody's ass. In fact, a number of comments in that little paragraph were just invented, and the rest are stock creationist argument.

If a creationist argument is factually flawed should it still be given, or given and refuted? What about the other criticisms which are non-sequiturs themselves? Is it an honest criticism that the argument makes an assumption, when it states the fact that it assumed these in an assumptions section?

Does an argument which fails to even understand the argument and invents an incorrect conclusion and calls the argument a straw man (the irony!) really qualify as a criticism? It doesn't argue that there is no design, it argues that, if design exists, it's really poor.

And from the other side, we can't delete the entire criticism section because it's all extremely weak, misguided, and factually inaccurate. Can we? Tat 11:04, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

"If a creationist argument is factually flawed should it still be given, or given and refuted?" - It should be given if it is a noteworthy creationist argument from a valid source. It should be refuted if there is a noteworthy refutation of it from a valid source. WP:NOR forbids us from contributing to the debate ourselves, no matter how good our ideas may be; we can only report on the ongoing discussion as a tertiary source. It is our job to provide readers with the facts and let them decide what to believe or not; it is not our job to judge the various arguments on our own, though we can certainly report on noteworthy sources that have done so. -Silence 11:17, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

This would work out well for the arguments which are stock creationist arguments. I could actually dig up cites for those, as well as refutations. The thin air comments would need to just be deleted. Tat 11:46, 4 July 2006 (UTC)

criticisms should be to the point. There should not be a whole essay on a criticism. If one finds a flaw in critique, then it is either changed, kept, or deleted. An added paragraph is not nessesary. Somerset219 21:18, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] original reasearch

this article is mostly original research, which is agianst policy, either citations are put into place or in 3 days i will put this page up for deletion -ishmaelblues

A lot of the assertions are a bit dodgy (mainly the list of supposedly 'poor designs', but the correct course of action would be to clean it up (e.g. move the ones you feel are original research to the talk page). Deletion is only for articles where there is a question with the notability of an article, not just articles that are needing work in a certain area. Richard001 21:27, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Subluxations?

Forgive my ignorance, but do we want a reference to vertebral subluxations as an example here? I thought this was pure chiropractic stuff, but spinal conditions aren't really my strong point. Rat 21:47, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Prostate Gland

"In the human male, a portion of the urethra is surrounded by the prostate gland. If the prostate gland is enlarged for any reason, the urethra becomes impassable, making urination difficult and painful and in extreme cases impossible. Prior to modern surgical techniques, inability to urinate usually resulted in death."

I've removed this. While it is true that the urethra travels through the prostate, this is biologically useful. I'll summarise (mostly from here[2] but feel free to do your own research. The prostate: 1. surrounds the urethra which allows the prostate smooth muscle to control the normal flow of urine 2. secretes seminal fluid/semen into the urethra (to then mix with sperm) during orgasm. 3. also secretes fluid rich in chemicals and nutrients to help sperm survive in the female reproductive tract 4. forms a muscular sphincter at the neck of the bladder which tightens and closes, preventing urine from passing into the urethra during intercourse.

It's not logical to say that its bad design if it doesn't work when something goes wrong. You could equally say that the airway shouldn't go through the neck because if the neck/airway became enlarged for any reason, the airway could become blocked and the person would die. Tsumo^@ 10:55, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

But then in all fairness, our airways are also used for swallowing. An accident waiting to happen. Not to mention that an omnipotent being should be capable of a third possibility, in which neither danger is present. --THobern 01:55, 10 April 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by THobern (talk • contribs)

[edit] Criticism section

It is very strange to see that all the criticisms are answered. In neutral articles, arguments are in the article and criticisms are in the criticism section, which contains criticisms (not criticism-refusal constructions). What it happens is that the points of this section mainly refute the examples. This is strange and should be avoided: wrong examples should be deleted, wrong criticisms too.

I propose to rename this section to something like 'criticism of the examples above', and write a proper Criticism section containing criticism to the argument from poor design, in particular, to statements 1. and 2. (which in fact are controversial).Oriolpont 20:11, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] WikiProject class rating

This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 03:46, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Appendix

Recent research has shown that it maybe not entirely useless, but nonetheless still suboptimal. --Deleet 22:53, 2 December 2007 (UTC)

That should be in the article, where's the citation? RJRocket53 (talk) 19:15, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

There are some here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermiform_appendix#Latest_Interpretation:_Maintaining_gut_flora --Deleet (talk) 22:41, 8 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] perfection or imperfection

what means perfection? perfection means nor lack or surplus, means "balance" or union of the two opposites, if god created us only to live and not to death then that must be unballanced and then imperfect, life is just a side of the coin and death is the other side, a coin cannot have only 1 side, nothing can only have 1 side because all the entire universe is ruled by dualistic laws, even the atom is madded of opposite particles, therefore union cant exist without opposite things complementing each other, two males cant reproduce because they are same, they need the opposite, when you eat you need to defecate because it needs opposite, if exist day exist night, all is a circle and the mid point is called perfection. comment added by --mashaj 03:18, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Argument from poor design is anti-god or anti-intelligent design?

i would assume the poor design attacks intelligent design and not the existence of god. for the reasons that god can exist even if it is not part of the creation of human life from other organism. it could also attack religions that suggest the direct creation of human by god. but religion is not god itself, people needs to correct their understanding of god; things like the crusade, holy war doesn't exist in modern european society because their understanding has change, i hope the hardline church can one day understand that science is not capable of attacking god, just the church for their misguided believes on what is truely important. Akinkhoo (talk) 15:22, 16 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Is this a Book?

Is this a book? Or is it just a list of anti-God arguments. I know that wikipedia discourages lists of, reasons why...... Saksjn (talk) 14:35, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Panda's Thumb

I do not think Stephen J. Gould uses Panda's Thumb as an example for poor design, he rather uses it to demonstrate the indirectness of evolution. He does state in his original essay that panda's thumb does its job very well. It is creationists who reframe Gould's argument as an argument of poor design, so that they can use it as a strawman, since panda's thumb indeed does its job very well, and is not suboptimal in that sense. Therefore, I think that panda's thumb should be removed from the list of examples for poor design. Heapify (talk) 05:39, 9 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] DNA self repair

If an x-ray photon strikes a DNA strand or ionises a local molecule causing a break in DNA it can self repair. Indeed unless DNA is broken in such a method within 4 base pairs it can self repair ergo whoever included DNA's inability to self repair needs to take a good look at themselves Barryferguson6 (talk) 10:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] WP:V

Can anyone provide a reference identifying the concept of "argument from poor design"? I get the impression that this article is created of, by, and for Wikipedians, in response to the "argument from design" of intelligent design. I note that a google search for "argument from poor design" turns up no reliable sources discussing the topic. If this article does indeed violate WP:V, I intend to propose it for WP:AFD. Gnixon (talk) 05:27, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Added prod tag. Gnixon (talk) 15:38, 6 June 2008 (UTC)