If the argument is that design can be detected scientifically, then you have to circumscribe design to some extent. If any design could be chosen, then design could be chosen to be random and capricious. If the argument is that design needs to be intelligent, you need further to show that the design is in fact intelligent.
The problem with that point of view is that, at root, it validates the idea that a designer is a viable explanation for what we see, even if it's only to claim for yourself the mantle of "better engineer."
It's viable only if you throw out Occam's razor and empiricism. Sure, we might all have been created by a substandard engineer; we might have been breathed into life by the Thunder Bird; we might have come about in an infinity of ways. They're all viable, in the sense that we can come up with ad hoc stories of how they could have come about. The problem with 'designer' based origins is that, as best we can tell, one needs an incredibly powerful and intelligent designer who made many many idiotic choices. Is that likely?
Can you describe for us the means by which scientists could detect human fingerprints on the splicing of jellyfish genes onto monkey DNA?
By reading the journals?
If we had no prior knowledge of the gene splicing experiment, and found a monkey with a jellyfish gene in the wild - it would indeed pose a problem for evolution. It's indeed telling that we haven't found anything of the sort. We know how this gene got there, and we also know of no other example where a similarly discordant gene is present in a primate. At least, I know of none. Do you?
It is not valid to use one's own ignorance as an argument against design.
I'm not using my own ignorance. On the contrary, I'm saying, I know quite a bit about design, and what I look at in nature doesn't fulfill many of the criteria of intelligent design; efficiency, parsimony, etc.. If you're claiming that is because I'm in some way ignorant, then you had better show how.
Your opinion ignores, however, the undeniable fact that humans are even now engaged in Intelligent Design. And, given that Intelligent Design is quite obviously possible, how can you possibly state that there is no way it played any role in life on Earth?
So you're claiming that I need to show that this creature we created in our own image - we design, therefore we posit something else did - does not exist? Sorry, that's not how science works. Before you create a new entity, show that entity is necessary. The burden of proof is not on me to disprove the existence of a designer, it is on you to show one must have existed, or at least provides a more useful and predictive explanation of the world than evolution. The problem is it doesn't - in fact, you've drawn attention to the very uselessness of ID by claiming that my criticism of the design hypothesis is the fruit of ignorance. If we can't deduce anything from the nature of the design, what good is it? Once you start introducing an unfathomable higher being, you've relegated the explanatory power of your theory to zero.
I know of no evidence that requires or even favors design playing a role in a theory of origins. The arguments of the proponents of said design I have found singularly unconvincing.
You don't know whether "we've" found purposely manipulated genes or not. The going-in assumption is that a genetic characteristic (whatever it might be) occurred as a result of random mutation. That might be a valid assumption, or it might not -- but the incoming bias would automatically exclude the possibility of a purposeful genetic manipulation. Still, we know that humans do genetic manipulation all the time, so it is not scientifically sound to a priori exclude the possibility.
I'm not using my own ignorance. On the contrary, I'm saying, I know quite a bit about design, and what I look at in nature doesn't fulfill many of the criteria of intelligent design; efficiency, parsimony, etc.. If you're claiming that is because I'm in some way ignorant, then you had better show how.
You've argued against design on two bases. First, by criticism of design choices; and second, that what you see doesn't make sense to you. Arguments from "efficiency, parsimony," etc. are merely variations on these two themes, and they presuppose you have the knowledge to understand the design in place (if such a "design" were actually to exist). They do not address the question of design; rather, they address only your (or my) inadequacy in recognizing and understanding a design.
It's viable only if you throw out Occam's razor and empiricism..... The problem with 'designer' based origins is that, as best we can tell, one needs an incredibly powerful and intelligent designer who made many many idiotic choices. Is that likely?
Although at first glance this has the appearance of a powerful argument, in fact it reduces to silliness. On the one hand, you cite the need for an incredibly powerful and intelligent designer; and then you're apparently claiming that the same results could have occurred as a result of random mutations, with no intelligent interaction. So it's simultaneously an incredibly difficult, and an incredibly simple problem.
And, once again, we see that your argument has reduced to the same two claims: you'd do it differently ("many many idiotic choices); and "I'm not smart enough" ("incredibly powerful and intelligent").
Once again: these are not arguments against a designer. They're simply an admission that you are not adequate to the task of being a designer. (Nor am I, but I'm not trying to argue against a designer.)