Follow the Evidence
Literature Review A review of the book By Design or By Chance? The Growing Controversy on the Origins of Life in the Universe. Published in Origins n. 58.
Literature Review A review of the book By Design or By Chance? The Growing Controversy on the Origins of Life in the Universe. Published in Origins n. 58.
Design in nature can be detected using criteria similar to those for searching for extraterrestrial life, such as purpose, extreme improbability, or specification. Published in Origins n. 56..
When all is said and done we are forced to answer the question that Yahweh posed to Job, “Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?." We are forced to admit that when it comes to origins, the entire human race is ignorant. The only way to pacify our ignorance is by exercising faith. The question is, “In what will you place your faith?”
In this discussion I propose to present a scientific and a biblical model of origins and explore how these can be brought into harmony with each other. I also hope to show that the differences between the statements made by these two disciplines are largely a result of differing interpretations based on different paradigms.
The concept of a monotheistic God, who is the same yesterday, today and forever, not a plurality of capricious gods, suggested the universality, consistency and coherence of His creation. Among the contingently created beings were humans created in God's own image. This led to "the idea that we lesser rational beings might, by virtue of that Godlike rationality, be able to decipher the laws of nature."
The claim that religion always gives way before the authority of science is discussed and challenged. Published in Origins n. 55.
Darwin's God: Evolution and the Problem of Evil. Published in Origins n. 55.
Creationism is a robust paradigm, fully capable of undergirding the scientific enterprise in the new millennium. Wider acceptance of creationism by the scientific community in the future will depend, in part, on how well theologians can convince scientists of the priceless value of revealed information.
Engineers have the distinguished legacy of following in their Creator's footsteps, thinking God's creative and analytical thoughts after Him. Should we not spend some time reflecting on the Master Engineer as we train engineers to work responsibly in this world?
Review of the book, Annie's Box: Charles Darwin, His Daughter, and Human Evolution. Published in Origins n. 53.
In two recent publications, Alister McGrath cites John Calvin in support of divine accommodation in a theory of origins. In order to evaluate the validity of McGrath's use of Calvin, it is necessary, first, to look briefly at the concept of divine accommodation and its use as a hermeneutical tool.
Literature Review
A review of Summer for the Gods. Published in Origins n. 51.
Historians of science have suggested that the Judea-Christian environment of western Europe and the belief in a monotheistic God were responsible for the development of modem science in that culture. Today students can still see that Christianity and physics are compatible and that similar assumptions underlie both.
The integration of Bible and science is an uphill work that requires careful reading of both the Bible and of scientific data. Because no other natural science has traveled so great a distance down an anti-biblical road, no other science requires this corrective procedure more than biology.
There has been a long and arduous search for a plausible evolutionary mechanism that would produce complex organized life. We shall look briefly at the past two centuries of this search.
Science and Scripture are built, according to Boyle, on the same epistemological features of revelation, reason, and experience but with different relative contributions from each.
Could not God have used the process of natural selection to create living organisms? What evidence might one use to answer that question? Published in Origins v. 25, n. 2.
A review of the book, Mere Creation: Science, Faith & Intelligent Design. Published in Origins v. 25, n. 2.
This editorial is the Forward for the article, Life: An Evidence of Creation. Published in Origins v. 25, n. 1.
Chapter 5 in the article, Life: An Evidence for Creation. 1. Everyday experience teaches us that manufactured goods with new functions are made from pre-designed components. 2. Successively more complex levels of our reality with new functions are based on the interactions of simpler forms of matter. This suggests that our complex reality is designed. Published in Origins, v. 25, n. 1.