Historic moments in the conversation about beginnings

Adventists and creation go together like jam and bread, but things were not always this way.

Nature and history acquire a grander perspective from the vantage point of the Bible, and Scripture becomes more colorful and alive with the help of natural revelation. Published on volume 26/2 of the Perspective Digest.

Several species of longwing butterflies are discovered to be hybrids.

The theory of evolution has pervaded most fields of knowledge. Therefore, it is important to know the fundamentals of this theory in order to understand how this ideology influences interpretations of data from nature and differs from the biblical creation model of the origin of life forms.

Ancient Near Eastern views should be considered part of the history of the idea of evolution. The biblical Creation account, in describing the divine actions through which God actually brought the cosmos into existence, was likely deconstructing the alternative theories or speculations of origins available in the Ancient Near East. Consequently, the biblical narrative can be used as well to deconstruct contemporary cosmogonies and evolution. This article was originally published on Perspective Digest, v.24/3.

A jumping spider has been discovered to produce a kind of milk to nourish its babies, in a manner similar to what mammals do.

Hybridization among wood warblers suggests “filling the earth” through dispersal, speciation and adaptation to local habitats.

Archaeopteryx is arguably the most famous fossil ever discovered. It has a mixture of bird-like and reptile-like traits, and was first reported only two years after Charles Darwin published his book, The Origin of Species. Since then, another eleven Archaeopteryx specimens have been recovered from the limestones near Solnhofen, Germany.

October 31, 2017 marked 500 years since Martin Luther strode through the crisp autumn air of Wittenberg’s streets, making his way toward the Castle Church. Clutched in his hand were nails, a hammer and a revolutionary document.

Published in Jiří Moskala, ed., Meeting with God on the Mountains: Essays in Honor of Richard M. Davidson (Berrien Springs, MI: Old Testament Department, Seventh-day Adventist Theological Society, Andrews University, 2016), 683-718.

In 1813, French geologist Alexandre Brongniart published a paper on the mineralogical classification of rocks where he introduced the new name “ophiolite” for a suite of dark rocks rich in the mineral serpentine. The name was coined from the Greek words for “snake” and “rock,” which seemed fitting, given the smooth dark green appearance of ophiolites, vaguely reminiscent of snake-skin.

This article was originally published as a chapter in the book “The Genesis Creation Account and Its Reverberations in the Old Testament."

This article was originally published as a chapter in the book “The Genesis Creation Account and Its Reverberations in the Old Testament."

Science is not a straight pathway to total reality and truth, but involves numerous tentative conclusions, reversals of opinion, and inherent uncertainty. Its utility is not that it is always true, but that it is useful and leads to further discovery.

Occasionally, the scientific community rejects an idea that was previously widely accepted and replaces it with a new idea, which becomes the current consensus. This rapid change in scientific opinion is known as a “scientific revolution.”

This second part of a series on Christianity and the Development of Science provides additional examples of well-known past scientists whose study of nature came from a desire to know the Creator better. Many of these men were active Christians and held administrative positions in the church. Their study of the Bible led them to view the world in a way that helped them understand nature.

Warfare and conflict are often what come to mind when thinking about the relationship between science and religion. Some of the best known examples are arguably (Gould) the flat earth, the church's resistance to Galileo and his heliocentric system, Darwinian evolution, and the Scope's trial in Dayton, Tennessee.

Biogeography is the study of the distributions of living organisms. Biogeographers seek to discover what historical and ecological factors explain why a species lives in one particular area but not in another area. This article examines how the flood might have influenced the present patterns of distributions of various types of living organisms.

Many kinds of animals appear designed for predation and violence, in contrast to what one would expect based on the biblical description of Edenic peace. It seems that animal species must have changed in major ways since the creation, but is this idea compatible with biblical teachings? Many people have asked this question, wondering whether changes in species point to evolution rather than creation.…