Predestination and Intelligent Design

The Free Dictionary begins its definition of predestination thus:

"The doctrine that God has foreordained all things, especially that God has elected certain souls to eternal salvation."

On April 19, 2009, the Wikipedia article on predestination says "Predestination: The Divine foreordaining of all that will happen; with regard to the salvation of some and not others. It has been particularly associated with the teachings of St. Augustine of Hippo and of John Calvin."

In Ephesians 1 and Romans 8, predestination is mentioned, in the above senses.

As I understand the doctrine, it holds that some individuals are fore-ordained to eternal salvation, and some are not. There are differences of opinion about the doctrine among theologians, which are not pertinent to this post.

I pose a question: If God is capable of planning and ordaining, in advance, that some persons will gain salvation, and some won't, wasn't God also capable of planning, and ordaining, in advance, that, say, the Big Bang would produce sub-atomic particles that He knew would spontaneously assemble themselves into atoms, then, molecules? Wasn't God also capable of making things such that natural selection, once living things appeared, would select for complex molecules, structures, and processes?

Sometimes, a belief in intelligent design seems to imply that somehow God didn't get things right in the first place.

God is able, of course, to use His own methods and timetable, but perhaps God's creative activity involved such planning and forethought that little or no further miraculous intervention would be necessary.

I am aware that suggesting such a creation, with extensive emergent properties, might involve considerable death and suffering. I refer to this web page, by Glenn R. Morton, where Morton argues, using scripture, that death and suffering might well have occurred before the Fall. David Snoke has also made such an argument, using scripture. See here and here.

Thanks for reading.