Intelligent Design - stand up routine outline?

Let's get this straight from the off. I'm a man of science. Show me something that's true and actual, and everything will be satisfactual.

I'm not a man of faith. If you have faith, I'm happy for you. If you've found a God and a belief system that you can work with then kudos.

Just keep it to yourself will you? In particular, don't try to teach me that it's worth the same as or more than science.

One thing that gets me is the insistence that evolution isn't really how living things got to be like they are. Instead, everything was designed by God to be like this - by "intelligent design". No matter what evidence you might be able to throw at the ID crowd (not to be confused with the IT Crowd, or the 1D Crowd) - little things like the fossil record for example - they're not having it.

So let's examine how their claims stack up against The Bible shall we? Exactly how intelligent was their creator's "Design For Life"?

I'll even be generous. I'll assume that the first person on earth (let's call him Adam for sake of argument).was designed in his entirety by God. Not a great job mind, given God put his reproductive bits in an enormously perilous and uncomfortable position, stuck his brain on the very top where stuff could fall on it and his heart behind a protective "cage" with huge gaps in the middle.

So anyway, there we have Adam. The Bible then tells us that Adam got a wife from God, made out of one of his ribs. Now, we know about DNA. If you take a rib out of someone and use it to make someone else, that someone else is going to have the DNA of the rib donor. So they are going to be effectively identical twins. God, in his ultimate wisdom, created identical twins and made them breed.

Again - intelligent? If you're breeding endangered species you keep genetically similar ones apart, otherwise you get all sorts of health issues. Look at Norfolk for example.

Not God though. Oh no. His intelligent design knew much better. So Adam and the new girl (let's call her Eve) have kids. Now the Bible gets fuzzy here on how many and of what gender. Only three are named, and they are all boys, so it throws in a disclaimer to say that there are "other sons and daughters" in the mix too. Here's the thing though. They've all got the same parents, and they are supposed to be the root of the rest of mankind.

So we're not just talking two people committing incest here, we're talking about a whole family at it. Brothers and sisters, for generation after generation, doing the nasty and giving birth to more inbred offspring each time. Again, as a man of science, I would query the "intelligence" behind this idea. It's no wonder we're all 99 point whatever percent identical from a DNA perspective with that kind of background.

That's just the physical stuff. I haven't even touched on the fact we're wired to be competitive, malevolent, selfish scrotebags with a short temper and the capacity to build weapons of infinite capacity to deliver death and suffering. Way to go, big guy!

So that's people sorted. All in all, not a great report card so far for God. Must do better next time, see me. Although preferably not via a piece of toast, or a teatowel, or whatever way you keep manifesting yourself.

So what about the environment he gave us to work with. The playground where we, and all the other species he found time to create, including the stuff that will kill us given half the chance, are meant to thrive and prosper.

Well for a start, two-thirds of it is covered in the wet stuff. Most of the things that live in the wet stuff can't survive on the dry stuff, and most of the things that live on the dry stuff can't survive in the wet stuff. Not great planning that.

The bits at the top and bottom are so cold to be completely inhospitable to anything above a microbial level. There are bits around the middle which are so hot and dry that they support the odd few reptiles, insects and other stuff that doesn't need much of the wet stuff - did I mention that, the things that can't live in the wet stuff still need it to survive, only some of the wet stuff will kill them if they drink it while the other won't.

So assuming God made us all in his own image - and that must have been the plan all along - why did he bother building a planet where we can only actually live on twenty percent of it? Hardly an efficient use of time and resources, all that wasted carbon. Why make the moon and the stars and all the other guff in the universe that's so far away we'll never actually get to go there? Showing off? Why not put some of that hydrogen and helium to good use closer to home?

So that's people, and the planet on which we live, all designed by a supposedly hyper-intelligent supreme being. Frankly, if we ever have to start over we may as well just give the job to Kevin McLeod and let him get on with it. See if "Grand Intelligent Designs" makes a better job, it can hardly do any worse.

Its more an argument written down then anything else

Yep - it's not a stand up routine, it is an argument. (Which you confuse slightly - not every person who believes in Intelligent Design also believes in the literal truth of Adam and Eve. They are different issues.)

Anyway, argument and debate is important and fun, so keep going with it. But it's not comedy.

This would definitely not work in a standard comedy club night. I don't think the audience would put in the effort to listen. It might work as a spoken word performance piece at a poetry event and you would probably get some laughs if you perform it well.

For gods sake! get off your high horse, not everything that's written in the bible is Gospel you know!
Take a chill pill, so God never told us exactly why or how he made us, so what? the only thing we need to know is God is good and he created us!
all this bullshit about evolution and the so called evidence you offer does not compare to the blind faith I have in believing what I'm told without any real facts to back it up! so stop preaching the devils work, just because you have facts to back it up!! and start believing in my god! like the rest of us sociable God fearing people do! ok!!!!

Tend to agree with the comments above. It's a bit too broad an approach to work well as comedy - everyone's familiar with the evolution v 'intelligent design' argument, so it's not really an attention-grabber.

But... I really liked the idea of God manifesting Himself in a teatowel or a piece of toast - maybe if you started with an unexpected quirky detail like that & then tried fighting your way out of the cul de sac?

Clever, erudite and funny.I envy your writing skill.Chuck in a few ooh missuses and a couple of knob gags and you'll knock them bandy.Go for it.

Thanks for the comments.

Just as background, this is a blog piece I wrote. It's still very much in the same format as it was originally posted on the blog, so designed to be read rather than listened to.

When reading it back to myself during the editing process before posting it, I tend to read "out loud in my head" - if that makes sense? So I'm getting a feel for how it would sound if it were spoken rather than read.

That's what made me think it might work as a stand-up routine, albeit with some significant editing and in the hands of someone with the skill to deliver it properly in front of an audience as a comic rant or polemic.

I'd echo the comments about it being more of an argument than stand up. Seemed like a rant to me. I think the genitals on the outside bit has probably been overdone. It was amusing, but not laugh out loud funny in my view.

And as far as I can work out, God was a woman. If God had been a man there would have been no truck with that Sodom and Gomorrah business.

Quote: steve by any other name @ September 19 2013, 1:08 PM BST

And as far as I can work out, God was a woman. If God had been a man there would have been no truck with that Sodom and Gomorrah business.

View original

Decoy, innit?

Like God erasing his browser history before Mrs God borrows his laptop.

Quote: AndyGilder @ September 19 2013, 1:39 PM BST

Decoy, innit?

Like God erasing his browser history before Mrs God borrows his laptop.

View original

Didn't think of that... (Scurries off to erase browser history...)

Quote: AndyGilder @ September 19 2013, 1:39 PM BST

Decoy, innit?

Like God erasing his browser history before Mrs God borrows his laptop.

View original

FWIW This is a much funnier and more original line than the original post.

(I think the original piece works as a blog post. Or as a speech delivered to a secular society, or in a non-too-serious debate. As a piece of comedy it's far too predictable and sane to make a decent in-character rant, and doesn't have many actual jokes)

It might work with a big rewrite, more colloquial language, impressions and gags.
For example I had a quick go of the start.

Let's get this straight from the off. I'm not a man of faith. If you have faith, I'm happy for you. If you've found a God and a belief system that you can work with then kudos. Just keep the bible to yourself will you? Preferably on the top shelf next to Nuts in a brown paper bag.
In particular, don't try to teach me that religion is better than science. I hope you end up in Casualty on Sunday when there's no doctors but plenty of priests.

I'm a man of science not fiction.. not science fiction or religion which is the same thing really or maybe its just fantasy.

One thing that gets me is the Say No to evolution, "intelligent design" brigade. They just won't listen no matter what evidence you might be able to throw at them like fossils (preferably heavy tyrannosaurus bones).

So let's examine their claims for God as an INTELLIGENT designer shall we?
Imagine if God were to do a presentation of his design on Dragons Den.
GOD: Oh hi Dragons I'm God and I'm here to ask for 5000 hail marys and an Our father for 20 % of the Universe...
Duncan: Ive got a problem with that Adam, my two year old child could have created a better design than that. It won't last 5 minutes. He's got his naughty bits sticking out at the front, his brain exposed at the top and you've spent all your budget on a rib cage around his heart but left a hole right at the front. One poke with a stick and he's dead. Oh sorry about that.
Etc