Recently over on this thread started by Barry we have been discussing one of the tired atheist arguments against God’s existence: bad design. The discussion has been primarily in the context of some of Carl Sagan’s remarks cited by john_a_designer, but Sagan is by no means unique in his failed efforts.
Commenter rvb8 had the audacity to claim that the faulty “bad design” line of argumentation is in fact a “well argued point,” warning in the same breath that we mustn’t question Sagan because, well, Sagan was an important science guy.
When pressed on the matter, rvb8 dug in his heels and reasserted that the bad design line of argumentation “is sound,” pointing out that God was tremendously wasteful.
Now I’ve heard a lot of bad design arguments in the past, including those that fault God for a lack of efficiency and spartan sensibilities, but I have to admit I hadn’t heard such claims with quite as much specificity and audacity regarding the Earth itself. Checking my calendar to confirm it wasn’t April Fool’s Day, I was forced to consider the possibility that rvb8 was earnest in his claims.
Gathering courage to tread where no logical mind has ever before trod, rvb8 offered up this gem of evidentiary support against God’s existence:
. . . this beautiful planet, so often given in evidence of God’s wonderful design is a nightmare of waste: 70% water, which his special creation, US, can’t live in; sporadic deserts, and two poles we have great difficulty in reaching, let alone utilizing; arid areas where only a meager existence can be rooted out; well done God.
There you have it folks. Evidence against God is all around us: difficult-to-reach polar areas, sparsely-inhabited arid regions, and elsewhere . . . too much ocean!
Finding evidence against God’s existence is easy. We can start alphabetically and before we even get out of the a’s we already have three “solid” pieces of evidence against the existence of God:
Antarctica
Arizona
Atlantic Ocean
. . .
I shudder to think what other powerful pieces of evidence might shake the foundations of theistic thought if we were to make it through the whole alphabet.