The Fallacies of Intelligent Design Theory
Summary
Answering "God did it" to questions about the origin of the universe, the origin of life, or anything else, is really not an answer. It doesn't have any explanatory power. Let the advocates of this position explain how the designer did it, how he made the process work, and why it works a particular way and not another. Science attempts to tell how natural events occurred, in what time frame, and the sequence of events. The explanation may not always be perfect, but it is an explanation supported by a body of evidence.
Skeptics recognize that they cannot prove a negative (in this case, the nonexistence of a designer). They simply argue that a universe without a creator is the most economical premise consistent with all the data. An uncaused, un-designed emergence of the universe from nothing violates no principle of physics. The total energy of the universe appears to be zero, so no miracle of energy created from "nothing" was required to produce it. Similarly, no miracle was needed for the appearance of order. Order can and does occur spontaneously in physical systems.
References
Stenger, Victor J. Intelligent Design: The New Stealth Creationism. (2001). http://spot.colorado.edu/~vstenger
Stenger, Victor J. The Unconscious Quantum: Metaphysics in Modern Physics and Cosmology. Amherst: Prometheous Books, 1995.
The Case for Design Based on the Anthropic Coincidences: Pages 1, 2, 3, 4, (5)
