Today's age old argument is one that has only developed a stronger case over time. It is the Design Argument.
The Basic Idea
Look at these two pictures. In the first one, we see lines in the sand. I have one question for you about the first picture. How did the lines get there? Now look at the second picture. It is also a picture of lines in sand. How did these lines get there?
I would imagine most of you said that the lines in the first picture were formed by the wind blowing over the sand dunes. However, that explanation doesn't fit the second picture. We know just by looking at it that the wind did not form these lines. We know by looking at the second picture that an intelligent person drew these lines. But how do we know this? Were we there when the lines were formed? Aren't we just guessing?
We know this is true because the lines in the first picture are random. They lack any significant pattern that would denote complexity or intelligence. They're just random, meaningless lines. The second picture is anything but random. We see more than just simple patterns here. We see complexity that could only come from someone intelligent and not from the random blowing of the wind.
This is the thinking process that is at the core of the Design Argument.
The Age Old Design Argument
The line of reasoning for the Design Argument goes like this. 1) The universe is either a product of random chance or intelligent design. 2) The universe is orderly and incredibly complex. 3) Complexity and information do not arise from random chance. 4) Therefore, the universe is a product of intelligent design.
The first statement makes sense to us. Either somebody designed the universe or not. That makes sense. The third statement makes sense as well. This is the common sense that leads us to know that the first picture was probably the wind and the second picture was definitely caused by an intelligent designer. Its the second statement that we need to prove. Is the universe truly complex to the point that it is clear it could not just be random but must have been designed?
The natural world provides us with many examples of order and complexity that cannot have arisen from chance. The water cycle on earth is an amazing process that circulates water through the evaporation of large bodies of water, the movement of clouds, rainfall into lakes and rivers, and the eventual flow of rivers back into the large bodies of water. The "Circle of Life" as dubbed by Lion King is another example of order and complexity. Energy beams down on earth from the sun and gets absorbed and used by plants which are eaten by herbivores to fuel them which are eaten by carnivores to fuel them. All of them eventually die and their bodies are decomposed by insects and worms to fuel them and their nutrients and energy are left in the soil which is then absorbed by plants. What an orderly system!
Strong Support from Modern Science
With the constant growth of modern science, we have even more evidence for the complexity of the world and the universe. I'll just scratch the surface with two examples. Each cell in the human body contains DNA which contains approximately 358 Megabytes of information! I remember just a few years ago, a USB stick with just 100 Megabytes of storage the size of my thumb cost $50. Inside each and every cell, at microscopic levels, there is even more information stored than that! Now that is complexity that clearly points to an intelligent designer.
This picture shows a propellor on certain single-celled organisms called a flagella. It basically looks like a cell with a long tail. The cell uses this tail to swim around. That sounds pretty simple and was believed to be simple for some time. However, now that we can view these tiny cells with advanced microscopes we have learned that this flagella consists of many tiny complex parts and operates in a similar way to motors that we have developed for cars! Why then would we look at a car motor and say, "Obviously somebody smart built that," but look at a microscopic motor with a similar design and say, "Obviously that came from random chance"?
Conclusion
If we see something that is incredibly complex and filled with order, we know that it has been designed by an intelligent creator. The universe, this planet, and even our own bodies and cells are filled with undeniable complexity. Random chance over time and evolution could not have created such clear complexity. It seems clear and plain to me that this all had to have come from an intelligent designer. The Bible calls Him God.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. Psalm 139:14
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