If someone asks you to debate Evolution over Intelligent Design, scientifically – don’t.
If you lose on technical grounds, then you probably shouldn’t be out unsupervised, and if you win you will get some variant of this:
“You are too scientific and rational, one day you’ll understand the true nature of the importance of being spiritual”.
The counter argument to this, makes a much better opening move:
Believer: “If evolution is true and birds are descended from dinosaurs, can you tell me why there was a maintenance of hepatic-piston diaphragmatic lung ventilation in theropods throughout the Mesozoic?”
Atheist: “No”.
Atheist: “Why do the insides of evangelical churches look like Donald Trump’s bathroom?”
Believer: “Its what happens in a religious building that matters, not the architecture, think of all the music”.
Atheist: “What, like the Osmonds, all the stuff Cat Stephens did when he converted to Islam or Uncle Harry’s Bar Mitzvah Band?”
Believer: “No – like gospel”.
Atheist: “Ray Charles improved gospel no end – when he took it out of the church.”
Believer: “See, you can only make fun of things, is nothing sacred?”
Atheist: “No, nothing at all is sacred, I like it that way, fundamentalist stand up comics are not what they used to be.”
Believer: “Unless you believe you will never be able to appreciate the beauty of things”.
Atheist: “I specifically don’t need something to be believable for it to be beautiful, when I read Orwell’s 1984, I don’t like what he describes, I don’t literally think it happened, but its a work of art. If I read Harry Potter, I don’t have to convert to paganism, I don’t think its a great work of art, but its a good read. When I read the Bible I see a bunch of stories that contradict each other but that’s not a problem, I just think, who edited this?”
Believer: “The bible is the ultimate beauty, because it is the truth”.
Atheist: “You are too scientific, you cannot appreciate the bible on its artistic merits without believing it to be fact”.