Wow. I just read this entire thread. I must say, I'm a little disappointed at the level of "understanding" of evolution. Not to mention the amount of anthropomorphic thinking. As if man were the ultimate product of evolution. Well, that's neither here nor there. Let me try to make a couple of contributions to this thread, maybe a few tidbits that haven't been discussed yet.
First of all, evolution is supposed to occur at many levels. In terms of the fundamental factors and forces in the universe, the history of biology is the story of gradually increasing complexity. Not to say that humans are the most complex life form, just that if you take the billion-year view, the complexity of biological systems tends to increase over time. At the level of energy and entropy and atoms and such, you're looking at certain combinations of molecules being more "successful" than others. Really that's what we're saying, when we're talking about evolution, right?
And, as many have mentioned, it has to be the right "kind" of complexity. The possible number of stable combinations of atoms and molecules is enormous, but only a few of those will turn into successful biological systems. If you accept that natural selection occurs (and as far as I can tell, the evidence for that would be largely irrefutable), then what's "successful" is determined by the environment. There are many cases of leftover features and capabilities, for example one of the most frequently cited is sickle cell anemia. That used to be good for something, biologically speaking. But it no longer is, yet the trait continues. Because, that's the way the genes work.
Then, at the level of today's biological systems, evolution is "mostly" about DNA. It's entirely untrue that "most of the human DNA is unused and serves no purpose". That may have been the theory-du-jour twenty years ago, but it has lost favor since then. In fact, the "marker segments" are now known to serve at least one very useful purpose. But yes, it's certainly true that the types of capabilities that living organisms need, to survive in the earth's environment, will be common based on the common environment.
But again, we're talking at the level of "molecules". Genes turn themselves on and off in a very complex "sequence". The same gene that codes for blue eyes at birth may also code for Parkinson's disease later in life. Gene products can "combine" in different ways (due to either pre-processing or post-processing), and at different times. Simply knowing the complete DNA sequence of a human being is "not enough". One also has to know how the resulting products feed back into the expression mechanism. Living systems are dynamic. All of them.
Now, let's take a step back from the molecular view. ln the same way that there's "entropy" in the universe, which is related to randomness, there's also a set of natural symmetries that create "order" in the universe. Those symmetries are expressed at all levels of the physical world, from the lowliest fundamental particles to the most complex biological systems. If you look at the range of dynamics that can occur in competitive/cooperative systems (i.e. ones in which there are two opposing forces that interact in a structured manner), you'll be able to explain 100% of the odd phenomena associated with evolution, including the chaotic events and the "punctuated equilibrium" (which I've also heard referred to as "saltatory" evolution).
The real question about ID is, where do the symmetries come from? To the casual human observer, there would seem to be "too much order in the universe", and that observation would be incompatible with a philosophy that says the universe evolved from nothing and leads nowhere. People who believe in God (or let's say, an "intelligent designer") should really be trying their best to answer this question. To most of those people, the answer is mainly a matter of faith. In other words, the observation is sufficient in and of itself.
Unfortunately, that's not "science". Any first year psychology student will tell you that perceptions lie, and feelings lie. Or, as Castaneda would say, "whatever you believe to be true, is true". As people have mentioned, the scientific method involves rigorous public scrutiny. It has to do with the repeated verification of the experimental results, by many independent observers, and at many different times. Every scientist knows that today's theory is exactly that: the theory-du-jour. In most cases, it's only a matter of time before someone comes up with an exception, that leads to a whole new theory. Viz Newton's universe relative to Einstein's, and etc.
Rather than saying "prove evolution", though, one should be asking for evidence that it isn't a viable theory. That's how science works. People come up with experiments designed to test (and possibly disprove) the theory-du-jour. For example, in the world of physics there's things like Bell's Paradox, and quantum entanglement and the like. Those are some "real" mysteries. Compared to that, there's nothing really mysterious about evolution. And, as people have mentioned, there's nothing necessarily incompatible between evolution and intelligent design.
I will make the observation, though, that it's extremely arrogant and anthropmorphic to consider that evolution occurs at the "human" level. It may occur on a "social" level, but that would be "within the micro-system consisting of human beings". In other words, concepts like the rule of law probably caught on because they're "operational". My guess would be, that similar concepts would be naturally selected in all social systems of sufficient complexity. We just can't have people running around killing each other all thet time. That would make life painful and unpleasant.
Let me pose this question to y'all: is there anything in the biological universe that "can't" be explained by evolution? Is there any empirical evidence to disprove the theory? If so, is it reproducible by independent experimentation? If you can find something like that, you should probably publish it, 'cause you'll undoubedtly win the Nobel prize.
