Morning Scepticism: Teleological

The Galileo story is one used to highlight the incompatibility between science and religion, or used to show that scientific ideas eventually get adopted into a religious framework over time - depending on your perspective on things. But the dethroning the Earth from the centre of the Cosmos is nothing compared to dethroning our species as the pinnacle of Creation. 150 years after Darwin published his work on the matter and there's still little acceptance of evolution via natural selection in religious circles, at least according to surveys (In the US, the majority see evolution as "God-guided"). Where we are might have challenged Biblical authority, but how we came to be challenges the very role of God. A creator with nothing to do is not really worthy of the title.

But I think another lesson can be taken away from this cultural controversy. The teleological argument is a very powerful argument indeed, and its no wonder that intelligent theists have shifted from the intricacy of the eye to the relative strength of the strong nuclear force.