the variety and evolution of reproduction methods over time.

...it seems clear that there is neither plan or design to reproduction ...

I don't think that conclusion can be drawn from the haphazard nature of reproduction. If the objective was to be profligate and try lots of new things then one could say that the whole shebang was carefully orchestrated and the results are flawless.

The best we can do, not being able to conclusively disprove the possibility of some designer, is to define the shape that he must take according to the evidence that we expose.

So what we can conclude about the nature of any potential designer based on how reproduction works is that they don't care too much about who you might be shaking hands and sharing holes with.

Hard to say what is working or not if we don't know what the goal is.

It is not a cop out but rather a logical restriction. You presume to know what the designer's objective might be.

Reproduction is what it is. You can't say that there is no designer because reproduction doesn't look like you think it should. Furthermore, you will find it difficult to argue that the observed aggregate of reproductive methods is anything but successful.

Finding out what doesn't work is very nearly as important as finding out what does work. Some things work for a while and then they don't. Perhaps all of these failed life forms were merely stepping stones on the way to some ultimate objective. Perhaps the variety is the objective.

I don't find that hard to argue at all. I simply look at the evidence. Almost every species that ever existed went extinct.

Yet I look from my window upon the splendor of it all.

Almost all potential reproductive events fails.

Still over population is a serious problem.

In a vast number of actual reproductive attempts that result in a new living creature the critter dies before it can reproduce.

Not every individual needs to reproduce for the species to continue.

The certainly can be described as unsuccessful.

Only after you make a bunch of assumptions regarding what the objective is.

Sorry but designers get graded on the results.

Do you really think that you are up to the task of assessing whether or not some potential GOD of the universe has done a good job of it.

Absolutely. And I even find support for that throughout the Bible.

What does the Bible say about the arrangement of the periodic table? Any adjustments recommended there?

And it takes no assumptions to conclude that a near 100% failure rate is reasonably described as a failure.

Unless you imagine for a moment what the world would look like if every potential reproductive event met with success.

No.. Evolution is not an entity trying to find a path or what works.

I agree with you about that but I am talking about the potential objectives of some hypothetical designer.

What catches my interest is the question of what we can infer about the designer from the design should either one exist.

Nice attempt to move goal posts, palm the pea, con the rubes, misdirect attention, change the subject.

We are assessing the performance of GOD. Don't you think that the arrangement of the periodic table is pertinent and also intimately related to the way that reproduction works?

If there was some designer she designed a system that could only succeed by being inept, inefficient, ignorant, ill thought out, and with all the characteristics of an unplanned system that is just barely good enough to get by.

And yet get by it does.

Here you sit on this wee speck, a mote upon a mote, casting aspersions. You should be smart enough to know that you don't know enough to decide how smart you are.

If you opened your eyes you might see that it is not I who is calling the hypothetical creator inept.

You, on the other hand, are a complete fucking idiot.

Aside from navel gazing, a designer does not follow and is not be needed or make sense in the bio chemical systems we observe here on earth.

I agree but jar made the point that no designer would design such a system. My point is that the notion of a designer can not be dismissed by some perceived inefficiency in the nature of reproduction. It just doesn't follow especially if you don't know what the design objective was.

I expect that there is no conscious entity behind the existence of the universe but not because I think that some potential GOD could have done a better job.

If you wish to imagine some designer then we can only judge that designer based on the evidence at hand.

I just take exception to the idea that we know what a properly designed universe would look like. I am fairly certain that I would strike out childhood cancer if I were GOD but I am also certain that if I were GOD then my perspective would be different.

In one moment you claim that no one can know the objectives of the designer, and then you turn around and propose what objectives the designer has. Go figure.

I was offering possible alternatives to jar's assumed design objectives. The point was that no one can know what those objectives might have been.

PT writes: We are assessing the performance of GOD. That seems to be a rather large and unevidenced assumption.

You are misreading the argument.

If we are contemplating the possibility that GOD exists then we should realize that we are not capable of critiquing anything that THEY might have done. You need a GOD's view to do that.

As I said, simply a cop out. Once you introduce the "Designer might have other plans" gambit then any reasoned discussion ceases.

Are you insisting that some hypothetical designer have the same design objectives that you would have? We make judgements based on our values. What makes you think that a prime mover would have the same values as you do?

We know what design looks like and we simply do not see anything being designed in nature.

We know what our designs look like. It is one thing to look at a piece of pottery on earth and say that it was designed but how do you assess a universe for elements of design? What would a designed universe look like?

If you see a bunch of boulders strewn across the landscape, don't you doubt that the arrangement was designed?

I certainly do but when I get to contemplating why there are boulders and landscapes the question is less clear.