We can launch ourselves from the atmosphere, control particles to our whims, and capture the universe in a picture, a far cry from even the most impressive feats of the animal kingdom. — Jerry

We can do all these things because of the use of tools. Some animals use tools, just like the ancestors of humans did. We have gone further than other animals in terms of technology because the survival of our species depends on it. Had we encountered a problem that couldn't be fixed with technology we'd probably be long gone by now, so from our standpoint we've been lucky(if such a thing exists), and luck often runs out.

Also the universe will keep creating stars, therefore potential for life, for 10^14 years and we're currently at 1.4x10^10 so I wouldn't draw conclusions about our uniqueness just yet.

There are other and sufficiently good explanations to man's outstanding intellect beside the god theory.

But if you want to believe the god theory, no philosopher ought to stand in your way, Original Poster.

However, you must not claim that the god theory is the only sufficiently good explanation of man's stellar superior intellect compared to other things' intellect in this world.

The god theory includes that god is omnipotent.
Therefore he can do anything. Not anything he wants to do; but anything.

He does not have to do everything, but he must be capable of doing anything.

There are things that are impossible to do. And there are things that are very easy to do, but in combination with one or more easy thing to do, they form an impossible task.

If you read the above carefully, do you suppose there is any entity, such as god, that can perform impossible things? by way of performing possible things, which together form an impossible task.

I'm agnostic on the existence of a deity for reasons this thread will elucidate. But while previously I was rather agnostic about merely a creative force behind our existence, I am now somewhat interested in a teleological reason for our existence, one that derives from a "creator". — Jerry

You may not get a lot of sympathy, on this forum, for your apostasy from atheism to deism. But I too, went from a Theistic childhood, to an Agnostic adolescence, and finally to a Deistic senescence. I don't have any divine revelations to rely on, but I do have some rational reasoning to support the idea that an Aristotelian First Cause, of some kind. is necessary to explain the contingent existence of our universe, and its questioning creatures. :smile: