Peregrinations

Response to Dinosaur Comments

2012-01-06T19:17:00.000-08:00

A few months ago, I posted here and on VIMEO a response to a question at church (during our Redux service) about the Bible and dinosaurs. On the Redux VIMEO page, I received two comments (from a Nate Tinner). Here's the first:

I should think that adding up the years of Bible characters (given the extensive genealogies provided in Scripture) would give a moderately accurate creation date. Sounds pretty explicit to me. The dinosaur issue is really a no-brainer, if dinosaurs are indeed animals created with the all the others...

In a previous post here, I tackled in depth the misconception among modern Christians about the Hebrew genealogies, and explained why Nate's claim here is naive and demonstrably false.

As for the "dinosaurs are indeed animals created with all the others," he seems to be misreading (he would say reading literally whereas I would say reading superficially) the relevant creation accounts. Genesis 1 does not portray all animals created at once (in a Narnian fashion) but rather carefully details a chronology of creative events. Moreover, that chronology--while specifically mentioning groups of modern animals--does not tell us even the chronology much less the timing of the creation of dinosaurs, and that for good reason. But perhaps here would be a good place to insert Nate's other comment:

And the Leviathan mentioned in the OT is quite simply a dinosaur (in the sense of "terrible lizard"), given its descriptions in Job (?and elsewhere?)...

I didn't really see that this guy even answered the question. He simply said the Bible doesn't teach about it (no scriptural support given, and his only argument implies that he is an evolutionist and the Bible can't speak to such a modern issue), despite the fact that a literal Genesis interpretation (I don't know or care who his 14 "scholars" are, Judaism has always aligned with a Young-Earth view as far as I know) speaks to the contrary on all points.

That leviathan is "quite simply a dinosaur" is news to me, and to virtually every other Bible commentator today or at any time in church (or Jewish) history. The interpretation of leviathan as referring to dinosaurs is a very modern form of eisegesis, a reading into the Bible a meaning that is not found there. And the reason no Bible reader (prior to the late 1800's) would have been guilty of this hermeneutic faux pas is because prior to that time no reader would have even had a notion of 'dinosaur' to wrongly insert here. Of the 35 centuries since the Hebrew word for leviathan first appeared in what we call the book of Job, only people living in the last two of those centuries (and not even all people living in those two centuries) were aware of the existence of such creatures. Because (and I hate to tear down Nate's little fantasy world here, but) dinosaurs and humans never coexisted; all that humans know of dinosaurs is of their fossil remains.

So readers of Job throughout roughly 93% of the time since Job was written would have had a couple of legitimate options... either leviathan is a largely symbolic creature (the literalness of its description, after all, breaks down at some point) or it refers to the crocodile, an animal that terrorized the people of Old Testament times (as it does to this day). I prefer the latter option, but am not dogmatic about this. What ought to be clear, however, is that the reason that no Bible commentator until recently interpreted leviathan as simplistically as does Nate is because dinosaurs were neither an explicit part of the creation account nor a part of the reality of Job's intended readership.

Nate's other comments are easily addressed. He clearly didn't listen well. I did not refer to 14 'scholars,' but rather to 14 interpretations of Genesis 1 that are held or have been held by Christians committed to the authority and inspiration of Scripture. Nate's young-earth creationism is just one of these 14 views, and one of only two views that lead to a young creation. All of the other 12 allow for or mandate an understanding in line with the evidence from creation itself (of a universe and Earth billions of years old).

I am not an evolutionist at all. Having studied biology all my life, it is plain that evolution is not supported by the evidence. Indeed, I would go so far as saying that the only thing evolutionism has going for it is the straw man option that Nate seems to believe. That is, if the only other option (for explaining the diversity of life on Earth) is the idea that God created everything essentially as it is a few thousands years ago and over the course of a six-day period, then suddenly evolution's intractable evidential problems seem somewhat insignificant. Everything about this universe and Earth testifies to much greater age than a few thousand years, and there is not one half acre of this planet whose geology is explained by a global flood a few thousand years ago.

Fortunately, young-earth creationism of the sort to which Nate ascribes is not a part of true Christianity. This flawed interpretive scheme arose only in the 17th century, and should long ago have been discarded by any serious student of the Bible.

The reliable record of nature reveals a God so much bigger than the puny idol created by young-earth creationism. The true and living God who tells us that "The heavens [reliably] declare His glory" created a marvelous universe that has been unfolding and being prepared for His crowning creation--human beings--for billions of years. He has throughout that time (though not Himself confined by time of any sort) been interacting with that creation, creating new life forms millions of times, even fashioning many of them to participate in the forming of Earth as a suitable place for humankind, which He created as a single pair, Adam and Eve, about 40-60,000 years ago. The Bible is miraculously accurate in its description of creation, even anticipating by millenia the scientific discoveries of the 20th century--including the basic fundamentals of big-bang cosmology, the transcendent beginning (out of nothing) and ongoing expansion of the universe and the discoveries of modern genetics (that all living humans are descended from a single male and a single female from the region of the Middle East).

The great thing about biblical Christianity is that it provides the uniquely accurate portrayal of the world in which we actually live. It is not merely a cultural myth or an evidence-and-reason-free belief system. It is the true understanding of reality, and passes every test of reason and evidence.

Unfortunately, many like Nate are being taught a lot of nonsense about how to interpret the early pages of Scripture. And far too many young people have confused young-earth creationism with what the Bible really teaches. When they come face to face with the varied, independent, and overwhelming evidence and reasons contrary to a thousands-of-years-old universe and a global flood, many of them throw out Christianity rather than merely discarding these modern caricatures of Christianity.

And hence the need for blogs like this one and VIMEOs like the one to which Nate responded.

I Thessalonians 5:21.

Harry Reasoner on Christmas

2011-12-24T21:12:00.000-08:00

At a Christmas Eve service we attended, the pastor shared this writing by Harry Reasoner (of 60 Minutes) from 1973. In it, Reasoner suggested three possible ways of approaching Christmas:

One is cynically—as a time to make money or endorse the making of it.

Another is graciously—the appropriate attitude for non-Christians who wish their fellow citizens all the joys to which their beliefs entitle them.

The third is reverently. If this is the anniversary of the appearance of the Lord of the universe in the form of a helpless babe, it is a very important day. It's a startling idea of course. My guess is that the whole story—that a virgin was selected by God to bear his Son as a way of showing his love and concern for man—in spite of all the lip service given to it, is not an idea that has been popular with theologians.

It's a somewhat illogical idea, and theologians like logic almost as much as they like God. It's so revolutionary a thought that it probably could only come from a God that is beyond logic and beyond theology.

It has a magnificent appeal. Almost nobody has seen God, and almost nobody has any real idea of what he is like. The truth is that among men the idea of seeing God suddenly and standing in a very bright light is not necessarily a completely comforting and appealing idea. But everyone has seen babies and most people like them. If God wanted to be loved as well as feared, he moved correctly. If he wanted to know his people as well as rule them, he moved correctly, for a baby growing up learns all about people. And if God wanted to be intimately a part of man he moved correctly here, too, for the experience of birth and family-hood is our most intimate and precious experience.

So it comes beyond logic. It is either all falsehood or it is the truest thing in the world. It is the story of the great innocence of God, the baby. God in the person of man has such a dramatic shock toward the heart, that if it is not true, for Christians nothing is true.

For all my readers who know firsthand that the Christmas story is true, have a Very Merry Christmas. And for those readers not yet certain, hang in there, and do your best to seek the truth in the year ahead.

Hell Unfair? (Part 3)

2011-12-01T08:36:00.000-08:00

I've been offering a Christian response to the claim that eternity in Hell seems an unfair penalty for the sins committed in 70 or 80 years in this life. In two previous posts, I supported each of the following:

1) There may be a category fallacy involved in the claim, since time is a part of this universe whereas Heaven and Hell are not.

2) In our own imperfect judicial systems, there is almost never a direct link or correlation between the time involved in committing the crime and the duration of appropriate punishment.

3) A factor that does matter (even in our judicial systems) is the person or authority against whom the crime is committed. Where the issue is eternal punishment in Hell, the authority against whom the crime has been committed is the supreme Authority--the Creator of all things, the all-powerful, Holy God who gives life in the first place. He is also the only Authority who can (and does) offer a pardon.

4) The claim of unfairness seems to imply that what gets people condemned to Hell are little sins, the breaking of somewhat arbitrary rules that God set up to keep people from having fun. Actually, according to the Bible, what gets people sent to Hell is utter and wholesale rejection of their Creator and of His loving authority in their lives.

5) The claim also seems to assume that the person who so rejects God will wish--once he finds himself in Hell--that he could change his mind. I find no reason--and certainly no evidence in Scripture--that this is the case. Rejection or acceptance of God in this life is done with eyes wide open, and is a decision foundational to who we are. The person who hates God in this life will rather remain in Hell for eternity than choose to love and worship Him after death.

This brings us to the last point I want to make (though there are undoubtedly other problems with the claim that Hell is unfair). For this one, I want to address a particular form of the claim, directly quoted from an email I received:

Eternal punishment seems a bit harsh for any sins committed in only 70-odd years on this confusing planet, especially the sin of disbelief.

This form surfaces two further, related misunderstandings shared by many who claim that the biblical doctrine of judgment is unfair.

In the first place, this claim mischaracterizes the crime as mere disbelief. This is not the Bible's portrayal. (Again, it's perfectly legitimate to allow the Bible to defend itself in this instance, since it is the biblical doctrine of Hell that is being argued against; it is the claimant who first brought the Bible into the discussion, not I.)

According to the Bible, eternal judgment comes because we reject our Creator and His authority over our lives, choosing instead to live according to our own inclinations (which choice leads to brokenness in all our relationships--with God, self, others, and creation), and then rejecting God's merciful, sacrificial offer of pardon. We hate God and run from Him, and Hell is simply the place reserved for those who want nothing to do with God.

Second, this claim depends upon pretending that there is insufficient evidence for believing in God. And while even we Christians sometimes act as though the evidence is worth quibbling about (with the professed atheist), the truth is far different.

According to the Bible (especially Romans 1:18-32), all men know there is a God. Further, the natural reaction of fallen humans is to suppress that knowledge, run from God, and delude ourselves into thinking we can pretend that He doesn't exist. In our day--where the fallacious rhetoric of the so-called New Atheists becomes best-selling books--we have an entire subculture of people who not only engage in such foolishness but communally approve and encourage such delusion in others.

To put it bluntly, the acquaintance who emailed me is not 'confused' about the evidence (as he claims); instead, he is in a state of open rebellion against God, which leads him to self-delusion about the evidence.

Throughout the history of human civilization--and certainly throughout western history for which we have the written records--as men have looked around them at the starry heavens, at other living things, at the planet on which they live, the logical conclusion to which they have come is that things are the way they are because they are designed. In our generation, the evidence available to us is exponentially greater than that available to previous generations. Our technology allows us to see the birth of gallaxies at the beginning of the universe some 13+ billion years ago. In the other direction (in terms of scale), we can now see the insides of cells and even of the molecules that make up cells. And as each scale of the universe becomes accessible to us, the overwhelming characteristic continues to be that of exquisite design, the evidence of an unimaginably powerful, wise, loving Designer behind it all.

In light of all this, the modern atheist/agnostic project is radically illogical. To see this exquisite design at every level and claim (as do Richard Dawkins, Francis Crick, and others in our day) that it is an illusion (only 'apparent') is absurd. To act as though the burden of proof ought to be on the people who (in keeping with the majority of people throughout history) see the design in the universe as real is bizarre. And to order one's life on the basis of this type of absurdity is mere self-delusion (of the type that Romans 1 describes).

The evidence for God is not confusing. The evidence for the careful design of this universe is not 50/50. The evidence for purpose and design is not even merely overwhelming. God's creation of this universe left no room for doubt. It is only our own stubborn, proud rejection of His authority in our lives that leads us to fool ourselves into thinking that we can feel justified in questioning His existence.

Thanksgiving 2011

2011-11-24T07:37:00.000-08:00

If you're reading this post, the chances are very good that (despite the current economic downturn) you live at a higher level of prosperity than 99% of the people who have ever lived. Although we still face many of the physical frailties common to all humankind, we have access to health care unimaginable to previous generations. The variety and quality of food available to us is astounding, and most of us can, if we want, travel to the other side of the world to visit friends or loved ones, or just to see new sights.

Along with improvements in health and nutrition, scientific and technological advances have also served to make our lives more comfortable, safe, and entertaining. Perhaps more importantly, the advance of scientific knowledge--from all fields from cosmology to genomics--has provided our generation with overwhelming evidence not available to our parents and grandparents of the great love and care God had in preparing all these good things for us. As we celebrate Thanksgiving Day this year, our gratitude should likewise be greater than that of previous times, while we share with folks of all generations heartfelt thanks for the supreme gift of relationship with our Maker through His death on the Cross that gave us forgiveness and abundant, eternal life.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hell Unfair? (Part 2)

2011-11-21T07:11:00.000-08:00

In the previous post I began a response to the claim that

It seems like an eternity spent in Hell is an unfair punishment for sins committed during 70 or 80 years in this life. The punishment doesn't seem to fit the crime.

In that post, I suggested that this claim involves several misunderstandings that render it fundamentally flawed, and identified three of those:

1) It may involve a category fallacy, since time is a created part of this universe, and eternity and Hell are portrayed as outside of this universe,

2) Even in our own judicial systems, we don't consider the time taken in committing a crime as having much to do with the appropriate duration of punishment, and

3) A factor that we do consider important is the authority or person against whom the crime is committed.

Regarding this third issue, we discussed the fact that the authority against whom our crimes are committed is the supreme Authority, the One who created all things (including the sinner himself) and the only One who could offer (and has offered) clemency. And this recognition surfaces another misunderstanding in the original claim...

4) The claim seems to imply that the crimes that send us to Hell are sins with a lower case 's,' minor indiscretions, in effect just having a little more fun than the next guy by breaking some rather arbitrary rules that God set up for unfathomable reasons of His own. That, of course, is a huge distortion of the Bible's portrayal.

[Note to reader: In many cases (when defending the Christian worldview) it is inappropriate to place much emphasis on what the Bible says. This is because the person to whom you're speaking likely doesn't consider the Bible to be authoritative. And because the Christian worldview is the uniquely accurate understanding of the universe in which we actually live, there will always be good reason and evidence available in its defense (and the Bible can be brought in later as corroborative evidence). In the case before us today (the unfairness of Hell), it is legitimate to bring in the Bible because the person against whom we're arguing did it first. That is, the idea of Hell that is being argued against comes from the Bible. It is the Christian and the biblical portrayal of Hell that the disputant finds unfair. And so it is perfectly justified for me to allow the Bible to defend itself, to demonstrate that the claim being made involves a misrepresentation of Scripture's full picture of eternal judgment.]

Instead, the biblical picture is that every human being is broken and fallen, that our crime is absolute rebellion against our Creator, and that this rebellion has led to our failing utterly to reflect His glory, the purpose for which He created us. We chronically reject His authority on our lives, we run from Him, we deny His existence, we do as we please, all of this with dire consequences for ourselves, for those around us, and for the rest of creation. Just as each individual lie that So-and-So offers is attributable to the fact that So-and-So is a chronic Liar, so our sins are attributable to the much larger fact that we are Sinners.

The crime for which people are condemned to eternity in Hell is not merely the collection of little-s sins that might bring a blush to their face if shared in public--instead, it is the bold, arrogant shaking-of-the-fist in God's face that says "I'll do it my own way; I neither thank you for creating me nor acknowledge your authority in my life!"

And this leads to the next misunderstanding...

5) The claim seems to imply that the person condemned to eternity in Hell will regret his decision, will wish he could change his mind, will himself find the punishment unfair. I see no reason or evidence--and certainly none in Scripture--that would suggest this to be the actual case.

All indications are that the person who rejects God in this life will continue to do so in the next. The person condemned by God to Hell will--despite the torments inherent there--rather remain there than to face an eternity of offering worship and praise to the God he detests.

God has already judged every human being, finding each guilty of treason and deserving of eternal punishment. But, in His great mercy, He has also offered a way of clemency, of forgiveness. He took upon Himself the punishment we deserve, and gave each of us--for all eternity--the opportunity to accept an everlasting pardon. We can either head to the eternal imprisonment we deserve, or we can walk away completely free, not to go 'back to the streets' as it were, but to a room in His house that He has specially prepared for us.

We either say to this merciful Judge "Thy will be done," and find ourselves eternally in Heaven, or He eventually says to us "Thy will be done," and we find ourselves eternally in Hell.

To put it simply, it's an everlasting fool who dares to shake his fist in the face of a Judge like that.

This brings us to a sixth, fatal misunderstanding associated with this claim that the eternality of Hell is unfair. But (since I'll have much to say about that one) I'll save it for another post.

Hell Unfair?

2011-11-13T14:28:00.000-08:00

I recently came across a challenge I had heard before about the Christian doctrine of Hell. The challenge goes like this...

It seems like an eternity spent in Hell is an unfair punishment for sins committed in 70 or 80 years in this life. The punishment doesn't seem to fit the crime.

How should a Christian respond to this? I would respond by pointing out several misunderstandings inherent in this claim that make it fundamentally flawed. (And that's just what I'll do, beginning with this post and running through the next couple...)

First (and this is a relatively minor point), the claim may involve a category fallacy. That is, it seems to treat of eternity as involving the same sort of time as we experience in this universe (only lots more of it). This is, of course, understandable, since as creatures currently confined to this half dimension of time, we have great difficulty imagining other temporal realities. But time--along with matter, energy, and space--is a created part of this universe. And Christian belief (and the biblical portrayal) is that God is transcendent--outside of, unconfined by--the dimensions of this universe. This understanding is powerfully supported by modern cosmology and astrophysics. (Christians have variously understood God either as timeless or time-full, having multiple dimensions of time at His disposal.) Additionally, Christian belief entails Heaven and Hell likewise existing outside the dimensionality of this universe.

So the temporal reality of Heaven and Hell may be completely unlike the time experienced in this life.

Second--and more practically--in our own judicial systems we do not tend to base the time associated with punishment upon the time associated with the crime.

I may go to my job as a cashier at the candy shop, and every other day for two entire years steal $1.00 worth of candy. At the end of that time (a long period of deliberate lawbreaking), I would be guilty only of a misdemeanor, and the punishment would include absolutely no jail time. By contrast, I could conceive of and carry out a heinous double murder in the space of ten minutes; if convicted of these crimes, I might face two consecutive life terms in prison, or worse.

So the claim seems to hinge upon a correlation between the temporality of crime and punishment, a correlation that doesn't even hold in our own imperfect judicial systems.

Third, a factor that does matter in our own systems is the person or authority against whom the crime is committed. If I betray a confidence entrusted to me by my wife, it may have ramifications for my marriage and our relationship; but I will not be convicted of any crime, nor will I serve any prison time. If, however, I betray a confidence entrusted to me by my federal government, the charge is treason and the punishment has historically been execution.

In the case before us--the issue of Hell--the authority against whom the crime is committed is the highest Authority possible, the Creator and Sustainer of the universe, the transcendent Lawgiver (the Source of the absolute moral code), and the Creator of the one sinning against Him. That same Authority is not only the one against whom the crime is committed but--as the supreme Authority--the only one who can offer (and has so offered) clemency.

Let's say I am lying on the soccer field. An opponent offers me a hand up, and I reject it. This is no big deal; maybe I believe he fouled me in the first place, there are plenty of other players who could help me up, and frankly, I can get up under my own power. But in the case at issue (in the claim we're addressing), I have fallen without hope; I am completely unable to save myself, and there is no one else who can help me... except the very Authority against whom I've sinned and who in His great mercy has offered me a single way of salvation. If I reject His gracious offer of a hand up, the consequences of that rejection are understandably severe.

In the next post, I'll identify additional ways in which this claim--that the eternality of Hell is unfair--is fundamentally flawed.

Evidence from Astronomy

2011-11-06T19:49:00.000-08:00

I handled the Q & A service at my home church, Antioch, last week. After several questions about biological evolution, someone asked me about the latest astronomical and cosmological research. Here's my answer...

Is there astronomical or astrophysical evidence for evolution? from :redux on Vimeo.

Problems with Scientism

2011-10-15T21:21:00.000-07:00

In the Critical Thinking class I'm teaching at Kilns College, we've discussed some bad epistemologies (flawed theories about truth and knowledge). One such bad idea--held by many in our culture--is scientism, the view that the only things we can really know are those things that have been shown to be true through scientific testing.

I come across this view frequently, especially in newspaper articles about science. (There seems to be a whole subculture within journalists of those who--while not scientists themselves--are sophisticated enough to agree wholeheartedly with everything scientists tell us.) The following articulation of scientism comes from an article in the L.A. Times, in which journalist Lori Kozlowski interviews Chris Mooney, coauthor of "Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future." The context and implication of the entire article is that whenever the public disbelieves or is skeptical of what scientists say, the public is wrong...

Q: What about the vaccine skeptic movement?

A: It bubbled up originally for legitimate reasons. The mercury preservative thimerosal probably shouldn't have been in vaccines. [Blogger's note: Ya think?] It was taken out for precautionary reasons. Since then, science has come in and we can't detect the correlation between a rise in autism diagnoses and use of childhood vaccines...

So, at some point you have to let go. But that hasn't happened. Instead, there's a conspiracy theory and people have appointed themselves as experts on this.

The people who try to avoid vaccination, who believe this, are not stupid. They're not disadvantaged... So the distrust of science--this is not something a better high school education would have saved them from. (ellipses in original article]

In other words, science tells us that there is no link between autism and childhood vaccinations, and that's the end of the story. People--that is parents--who don't believe science on this one are wrong (though not necessarily stupid). Even those parents who have personal, firsthand experience of their normal child suddenly displaying the behaviors of autism following their being vaccinated are wrong. Because, you see, on the view of scientism, no amount of eyewitness testimony can be brought to bear against science.

Mooney's view here is, of course, absurd, and I'll just give two reasons for now.

The first is that it is self-refuting. The claim "we can only know that which has been tested scientifically" is itself a knowledge claim, and one for which there is no scientific test. It's not a scientific claim at all, but a philosophical claim, and it falsifies itself. It is self-referentially absurd, and necessarily false. No amount of further discovery will make the claim of scientism true. (The people who make this claim--like Chris Mooney--are not stupid; they just don't think very clearly in certain areas. A better high school education--one that taught introductory logic, for example--might have saved them from this basic mistake.)

The second reason for rejecting scientism involves basic common sense. Just think about it--you know many, many things the evidence and reasons for which are not at all scientific. This includes a host of things for which you have firsthand (or even unique) knowledge; you were there and saw it happen. It includes many other things for which your justification for believing it (knowledge is "justified true belief") is sound. Do you know that George Washington was the first president of the United States, that we fought a war in VietNam, that the Romanian revolution took place in 1989? There's nothing scientific about any of that; so history involves a great deal of knowledge that refutes scientism. But so does geography, mathematics, your knowldege of current events. Indeed, unless you happen to be a scientist, most of the things you know how to do at work and at play you learned without scientific testing. Indeed, though there is increasingly DNA testing or other forensic science involved in criminal cases, most trials are decided primarily on eyewitness testimony and other non-scientific evidence and reasoning. I could go on and on, but have probably already belabored the point.

So Mooney's epistemology is demonstrably flawed, and it is this illogical epistemology that is at the heart of his conclusions about vaccination and autism. In other words, those parents who are skeptical of science's claim that there is no link are not involved in making conspiracy theories. Instead they are thinking more clearly about the issue--and with more at stake, since it's their kids' health on the line--than the scientists who have gotten involved. Though these parents may not consciously recognize the self-refutation involved in the scientist's claim, they are right to recognize that negative results from scientific testing do not serve to negate the abundant counter evidence from firsthand experience.

It is our right and duty as parents to carefully scrutinize the claims of science. This is especially true when the scientists involved betray their own failures in thinking clearly, as whenever they articulate the view described in this post as scientism.

(A version of this post originally appeared on this site on September 16, 2009.)

A Good Day at the Butte

2011-10-01T10:22:00.000-07:00

The breeze was westerly, and just enough to bring the hawks down the western edge of Surveyor's Ridge. I was at the southern end of that 35-mile-long ridge, at Bonney Butte, a place that concentrates southbound hawks, falcons, eagles, ospreys and vultures in fall. Hiding in a ridgetop blind that melded with the trees, I tried to capture as many of those migrating raptors as I could, banding and taking measurements of each before sending them back on their way.

I captured 17 hawks yesterday, including 9 Sharp-shinned Hawks, 5 Cooper's Hawks, and 2 Red-tailed Hawks. Many of them came in waves, and this kept me hopping, balancing the banding/measuring with trying to capture more at the same time.

The best bird of the day was the female Northern Goshawk (Accipiter gentilis) pictured above. She was a second-year bird with orange eyes (in her year of hatch she had yellow eyes, and as a full adult she'll have deep red ones). Her annual molt was nearly complete, with a few brown wing and tail feathers not yet replaced by the striking gray feathers that she'll sport for the remainder of her life. I was glad that Vince and Sarah, a couple from Portland, were there to watch the capture and to see at close hand and to briefly hold this beautiful wild creature.

Response to E____

2011-09-19T10:41:00.000-07:00

(Thought I'd share--because of its apologetic content that ought to be of general interest--an email I just sent to a young atheist with whom I share a mutual friend...)

Hi E____

I'm writing you at the request of K_____. She indicates that you consider yourself an atheist, either because you see no reason to believe in God, because in your experience God is a crutch for people with a need to believe in Him, or both. The perspective I will share with you is that of a biologist who is also a philosopher and historian of science.

As I see it, my need is not to believe in God, but to align my beliefs with reality. This is, of course, what is meant by truth--when things really are the way we believe them to be. Were there any reason to disbelieve in God (or to believe in some other god or gods), were there any evidence on the side of atheism or polytheism (or Buddhism, Hinduism, or Islam), I would pursue such reasons and evidence in search of the truth.

There is no question in my mind that the Christian worldview uniquely matches the reality of the universe in which we live. While I could take the time to identify fatal logical, scientific, or historical flaws in any of a number of other worldviews, I'll make the case that Christianity much better matches reality than does scientific naturalism/atheism. And I'll do this for two reasons, first because I suspect the latter is the view that you espouse (rather than, say, Hinduism), and second because it's the alternate worldview I've researched the most. It is, after all, the great cosmogenic myth of our time (though, despite its present popularity, its tenure among the great ideas is astonishingly short) and what was uncritically offered as indoctrination throughout much of my formal educational experience.

To repeat, as a scientist and philosopher of science, I see Christianity as the accurate understanding of the world in which we live, and far superior in its explanatory power to scientific naturalism. The issue is not at all close. That is, whereas you ask "How can any well-educated scientist believe in God?" I have exactly the opposite query: "How can any but the most superficially educated scientist embrace the belief that there is no God?"

In other words, while the content of our beliefs--yours and mine--are exactly opposite on this issue, the strength of our respective beliefs is equally great. The difference is that I have spent a lifetime (and much longer than your lifetime) examing the evidence for both sides of the argument. I have been intentional in reading the works of atheists (ancient and modern), and have critically examined the reasoning and evidence offered by them. Have you done the same for Christianity? Have you read, for example, The Case for a Creator (Strobel) or Mere Christianity (C.S. Lewis), The Creator and the Cosmos (Hugh Ross) or The Design of Life (Dembski and Wells)? I have read The God Delusion and The Greatest Show on Earth (both by Richard Dawkins), A Letter to a Christian Nation (Sam Harris), etc. (So flawed are some of the arguments therein that they provide abundant examples of both formal and informal fallacies for the college course I teach in Critical Thinking.) The point is, if you really want to understand a different worldview or belief system, read, comprehend, and wrestle with the very best books by proponents of that system.

Although I see a plethora of problems with scientific naturalism and the failed evolutionary theory that (for many) makes it plausible, I will have to limit my remarks to a few. (I'll be happy to interact with you, take questions or comments, and keep a dialogue going, but for an opening salvo I'll try not to be too lengthy. For one thing, the more I write, the more I run the danger of addressing a belief you don't actually hold. I'll address some misconceptions very common in our culture today, and you'll have to forgive me if you don't share some of these misconceptions.)

Most scientists spend all of their time studying phenomena within the ongoing processes of our world, and can happily do so without reference to God. But no matter how well we come to understand the movements of the starry heavens, the behavior of quarks, or the ecological relationships of a particular biome, there are bigger, more fundamental questions the answers to which science (if properly understood) can contribute. Of some 9 or 10 of these that come immediately to mind, let me briefly discuss two: the existence of the universe and the design of the universe for advanced life. (Other big questions include the existence of order in the universe, the origin of life, the diversity of life, the origin of the information in the genetic code, the origin of irreducibly complex biological systems, the existence of human consciousness...)

Note at the outset that theism (and particularly Christian theism) has been the default understanding--the view with adequate explanatory power--for each and all of these big questions throughout the history of Western thought. Note also that the very modern idea that atheism/scientific naturalism is somehow reaonable arose because Darwin offered a naturalistic explanation for just one of these big questions--the diversity of life. To put it another way, scientific naturalism has singularly failed to offer adequate explanations for these other big questions (and its attempts to do so lead to naturalism's most embarrassing errors in reasoning, ignoring of evidence, and such).

When we come to explaining the existence of the universe, we arrive at big problems both for naturalism generally and for evolutionary theory in particular. Darwin proposed his theory--which, according to Richard Dawkins, made it possible to be "an intellectually fulfilled atheist"--under the assumption that the universe itself was eternal (thus offering natural selection a nearly infinite amount of time to work its wonders). We now know this necessary assumption to be wrong; the universe had a beginning a mere 13.6 billion years ago, and the Cause of that beginning is outside the matter, energy, space, and time of the universe.

For statisticians and mathematicians, the realization that the universe had such a recent beginning is fatal not only for neo-Darwinism but for any naturalistic explanation for life's diversity. But more fundamentally, this 20th-century discovery represents powerful support for the Cosmological Argument for God's existence (that is, in philosophical terms, that the universe is contingent and its cause a necessary, eternal Being) and for the claims of Judeo-Christian scriptures written 3500 years ago. Indeed, general relativity and big bang cosmology are the most rigorously tested ideas in physics precisely because physicists and astronomers recognized (and found distastful) their theological implications and sought to refute them (through steady-state, oscillating-universe, and other alternate theories).

The past several decades have also yielded (primarily among physicists and astronomers) the discovery that the universe itself and our location in it are incredibly fine-tuned to allow for the existence of life and of intelligent life. This recognition has been dubbed the "Anthropic Principle," and rarely does a week go by without there being discovered yet another parameter of the entire universe or of a more local aspect of it whose value is set in the extremely narrow range (among the broad range of possible values) that makes human life possible. Ignoring for the time being the separate (huge) question of how life originated, the probability of even one life-support planet in the universe (even given the existence of 100 billion trillion stars and the possibility that there are planets associated with many of them) is zero. Astrophysicists Fred Hoyle and Chandra Wickramasinge put it this way:

The speculations of The Origin of Species turned out to be wrong... It is ironic that the scientific facts throw Darwin out but leave William Paley, a figure of fun to the scientific world for more than a century, still in the tournament with a chance of being the ultimate winner.

In the words of Stephen Hawking,

It would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun in just this way, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like us.

The currently popular way of trying to get around the clearly theistic implications of big bang cosmology and the anthropic principle is to postulate an infinite number of other universes, each with different parameter values, such that we just happened to have won the lottery to end all lotteries. Besides there being absolutely no evidence (and no possibility of there ever being evidence) for such a situation, this metaphysical view does not do away with the need for a Creator, but only pushes that problem up a level. Moreover, while such a view might address the fundamental anthropic parameters (those that apply to our universe as a whole), it does nothing to explain the much greater number of local fine-tuned parameters (the crafting of our galaxy and solar system for life support).

Again, I could address each of the other big questions of metaphysics in turn, and we would see that all of the latest scientific discoveries powerfully support the Christian worldview and leave the naturalistic worldview without explanations. But there are more basic--logical--problems for scientific naturalism.

Modern science--the continuous, progressive endeavor that has cured many diseases, landed humans on the moon, and mapped the human genome--arose only once in human history, and that from within a Christian worldview. And this is not merely an historical oddity. Rather, Christian theism provides the logical grounding that makes science a worthwhile endeavor. Scientific naturalism does not. To be sure, today's well-trained (but poorly-educated) atheist scientist can engage in scientific research, but he cannot logically justify it. Among some two dozen assumptions that logically ground science (which come from Judeo-Christianity and for which atheism cannot account), two of the most important are that the physical universe is orderly and that our senses and reasoning are reliable in discerning that order. Christian men of the 16th and 17th centuries found in Scripture that the universe is the product of the mind of the caring, transcendent Creator, and so expected that the universe would be ordered, reflecting God's intelligence and rationality. Similarly, they discovered in the Bible that we humans are created in God's image, which they took to include sharing at least in part in His rationality.

The naturalist scientist depends upon there being order in the universe, but can only accept it as a fortunate brute fact--he cannot offer an explanation for it. As for the reliability of human senses and reasoning (in discerning that order), the situation is even worse. If--as on the evolutionary view--the human brain is simply the end-product of a designless, purposeless evolutionary process, there is no reason to expect its beliefs to be reliable in discerning reality. As astronomer and popular science writer Paul Davies has it,

People take it for granted that the physical world is both ordered and intelligible. The underlying order in nature--the laws of physics--are simply accepted as given, as brute facts. Nobody asks where they came from; at least not in polite company. However, even the most atheistic scientist accepts as an act of faith that the universe is not absurd, that there is a rational basis to physical existence manifested as law-like order in nature that is at least partly comprehensible to us. So science can proceed only if the scientist adopts an essentially theological worldview.

The early evolutionist J.B.S. Haldane also saw the problem:

If my mental processes are determined wholly by the motions of the atoms in my brain, I have no reason to suppose that my beliefs are true... and hence I have no reason for supposing my brain to be composed of atoms.

Philosopher Alvin Plantinga sums it up thus,

Modern science was conceived, and born, and flourished in the matrix of Christian theism. Only liberal doses of self-deception and double-think, I believe, will permit it to flourish in the context of Darwinian naturalism.

C.S. Lewis made the analogy to dreaming and waking. While awake, we can account for our dreaming, but while dreaming, we cannot fit in the waking world.

The waking world is judged more real because it can thus contain the dreaming world. The dreaming world is judged less real because it cannot contain the waking one. For the same reason I am certain that in passing from the scientific points of view to the theological, I have passed from dream to waking. Christian theology can fit in science, art, morality, and the sub-Christian religions. The scientific point of view [here he has specifically in mind the evolutionary-based naturalism of the past several decades] cannot fit in any of these things, not even science itself. I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen, not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.

Why, as a scientist, do I believe in the God of Christianity? I have so far given only a very partial answer, but one I hope that addresses some of your most central issues. In part, I am a Christian because all of the scientific evidence (regarding the big-picture questions) falls squarely on the side of Christianity and is opposite the evidences required for the success of a naturalistic project. More basically, Christianity makes science a worthwhile endeavor, by providing the necessary logical grounding; naturalism can neither logically justify nor defend the scientific enterprise.*

My hope, E______, is that you are really open to the truth on this central question of human existence (otherwise I've wasted a good deal of my valuable time already). I realize that there is powerful motivation for seeking to deny the existence of God, since the idea of a transcendent, all-powerful, all-knowing, and holy God who might concern himself with our human affairs and behavior can be terrifying. But reality is impervious to our wishes, and so (at least for me) finding the truth trumps my desires.

If you are open to continued dialogue, I could share (in separate emails) any or all of the following:

How the scientific evidence supports the Christian worldview regarding the other big questions (that I alluded to earlier),

Why neo-Darwinian evolution is a dying theory that will no longer be defended by anyone once tenured dinosaurs like Richard Dawkins pass away, (how the fossil record, genetic evidence, etc. support the idea of creative interventions and refute evolutionary claims),

How Christianity grounds--and naturalism fails to logically justify--morality,

How archaeology vindicates the historical reliability of the Old and New Testaments,

How fulfilled prophecy points to the supernatural character of the Bible,

How the history of Western civilization and all of the available evidence powerfully support the historicity of the rising of Jesus of Nazareth from the grave,

etc.

Let me know...

Rick Gerhardt
Biologist and Christ-follower

* Two of the really ludicrous notions that in our day get much popular press out of the scientific community are 1) that scientists are the experts in defing science, and 2) that the definition of science involves an exclusive appeal to physical or natural laws and phenomenon. In truth, we scientists--unless we have embarked on intentional separate study--receive no education in the history and philosophy of science. It is, therefore, not scientists, but philosophers of science who are the experts in what science is. And philosophers of science are unanimous in declaring that no one has successfully defended the claim that science is restricted to material, physical, or natural explanations. To put it another way, to the extent that scientists artificially limit themselves to studying only natural phenomena, they have disqualified themselves from making any larger metaphysical claims (as about the non-existence of immaterial or supernatural things). So in yet another way, scientific naturalism can be seen as a grand effort in fallacious self-delusion.

New Semester

2011-09-13T08:02:00.000-07:00

A new semester starts this week at Kilns College (in Bend, Oregon), and the course I'll be teaching starts this evening. That course is Critical Thinking, and it's apparently full.

In Critical Thinking, I hope to be able to accomplish several things.

For one, we'll consider the biblical foundation for nurturing the life of the mind, and examine the historical union of Christian theology and the promotion of literacy, Christianity's founding of schools and universities and of modern science, and it's traditional role at the forefront of political and social discourse. We'll touch upon the less positive situation of the last 100 years, where evangelicalism largely abandoned its tradition of recognizing the importance of cultivating the mind.

We'll take a little time to talk about how to get the most out of reading.

And then the remainder of the course will serve as an introductory logic class, in which we'll discuss what constitutes a sound argument and how to recognize an unsound one. As we examine formal and informal logical fallacies, we'll use as our examples actual fallacious arguments that impinge upon issues that ought to be meaningful to anyone seeking to know the truth about the world in which we live.

While it's too late to get into this class, there are ten other courses being offered at Kilns this semester, and most of them still have room. But don't wait--it's already the last minute to sign up and start attending. Go here to check those classes out.

Stewards of the King

2011-09-07T13:58:00.000-07:00

Here's a Vimeo of the sermon I delivered at Antioch this past Sunday:

Rick Gerhardt :: Stewards of the King from Antioch Church on Vimeo.

Time Flying

2011-08-25T19:49:00.000-07:00

Our week here in Nicaragua is flying by. We've spent most of our time at the House of Hope. There we've played baseball with the kids, put on workshops for the ladies and another for the staff, sorted beads, created new card designs, made jewelry, finished tiling the cafeteria, played with the young kids, built shelving, and heard powerful stories of how God has worked and is working to transform lives. It's been a great privilege to encourage some of the dedicated and courageous people working here, and to come alongside (if only for awhile) the women and girls who have experienced so much personal tragedy and trauma.

Yesterday, we took a trip up into the mountains to Matagalpa. The purpose was two-fold--to see the ground where the next Nicaragua Christian School is to be built, and to visit the Nicaraguan Young Life camp and the coffee plantation that helps support it.

Tomorrow, my daughters and I will have the opportunity to visit the young girl we sponsor through Compassion International, something to which we've been looking forward ever since we decided to visit Nicaragua.

The only bummer has been that Jackie, our good friend and one of our hostesses here in Managua, was admitted to hospital with an infection in her leg; it required surgery and will continue to require intravenous antibiotics until after we've left on Saturday. So we have greatly missed Jackie and her mother, Marilyn, for the latter half of our stay.

It's been a fantastic experience, and I am so grateful for the wonderful team that God put together for this trip. We've worked together, cried together, played together, and laughed together. I know it's been life-changing for each of us, and that we will leave a part of our hearts here when we leave.

Lunes Nica Update

2011-08-22T18:36:00.000-07:00

We've had a couple of great days at the House of Hope. Sunday, after worshipping at the International Christian Fellowship (where our team led the church in an Antioch worship song, Our God Reigns by Justin Lavik), we went to the House of Hope where we played baseball with the kids and then had a pizza party.

Today we did a number of things there, bead sorting (for tomorrow's jewelry making), designing new greeting cards, and tiling the floor of the cafeteria. In the afternoon, part of the team led a workshop with the women and girls that live there, while others played with the little kids, children or grandchildren of some of the residents.

We saw an iguana in the yard this morning, enjoyed a warm rain shower in the afternoon, and are watching an awesome lightning storm (as well as rising lightning bugs) from the veranda this evening.

Eating well, working hard, loving life. Wish you were here.

In Managua

2011-08-20T22:07:00.000-07:00

Safe and uneventful trip for our team of eleven from Antioch. While waiting in line for Immigrations at the Managua Airport, all the lights went out. None of the locals seemed much concerned, and power was restored before too long. 80 degrees here at 9:00 in the evening, and not raining (as it has been off and on).

We're very comfortably billeted at the lovely home of the Loftsgard family, once hailing from Bend but now 13 years in Nicaragua. Looking forward tomorrow to a church service, tour of Managua (with mini history lesson), and a tour of House of Hope followed by a pickup baseball game and a pizza party there.

I'll blog about it here, but you can also follow this trip and the Antioch team in Cambodia by going to the Antioch Missions blog.

Regreso a Managua

2011-08-19T20:20:00.000-07:00

I'm headed back to Nicaragua manana. Going back (a year later) to visit my friends the Loftsgards and some of the ministries with which they're involved. This time I'm taking both my daughters, and looking forward to a great time. I'll keep you posted.

Genetic Similarity

2011-07-11T19:23:00.000-07:00

Today I want to point out another problem with the appeal to genetics as support for evolution. This part of the claim...

DNA profiles show evolutionary relationships among species.

involves circular reasoning. Genetic similarity is offered as proof for evolution, but only because the claimant assumes that any similarity must be due to evolution. This is, of course, fallacious.

The evidence, stated without bias, is that all living things share varying degrees of similarity, both in their biochemical composition and in their genetic make-up. The degree of similarity tends to increase within recognizable hierarchies, such that mammals are more similar to one another than any mammal is to birds, and primates are more similar to one another than any primate is to bats or whales. That this is true at the morphological level has been known for a long time. The ancient Greeks understood it (and, I dare say, so did most ancient peoples). It certainly was well-known prior to Darwin, as by his time comparative anatomy was a well-developed discipline.

As I shared in the last post, Darwinists expected this similarity NOT to be true at the molecular (biochemical level), and they were wrong. We now know that this hierarchy of similarity extends (generally) to the genetic level.

But again, this recognition utterly fails to distinguish among competing theories for the diversity of life. Specifically, the alternate view that has been held for the vast majority of the history of Western civilization--that there is a single Creator/Designer responsible for life--finds at least equal support from these findings from the latest genetic research. Indeed, the great similarity (on the levels of morphology and physiology, biochemistry, and genetics) between living things actually presents problems for Darwin's theory. This includes the highly-publicized finding that chimps and humans share 95% or more of the same genetic material.

You see, Darwin's theory was not an attempt to explain the similarities between living things. Rather, it was an attempt to explain the differences. Gradualistic evolution--with its vast number of hypothetical (and yet-undiscovered) transitional forms--was meant to explain how the differences (as between chimps and humans) came to be. And that explanation involved strictly material causes and effects. That is, if evolution is an accurate explanation for the diversity of life, we will discover differences (at some level, whether biochemical, genetic, embryological, or whatever) that represent sufficient causes for the morphological, physiological, and other obvious differences.

Instead, at each material level (first biochemistry, then genetics, now evo-devo) evolutionary scientists are surprised at how similar different organisms (like chimps and humans) are. In other words, we still cannot say--on strictly materialist terms--what accounts for the vast differences (especially on characteristics like intelligence, reasoning, imagination, and such) between us and chimps. The genetic evidence doesn't account for these differences--and so, far from supporting evolution (as is frequently claimed), that evidence further undermines naturalistic evolution as an adequate explanation.

To believe otherwise is simply to argue in a circle.

(This post first appeared here on 7 June 2008, but remains relevant today.)

As I've Been Saying...

2011-07-02T19:17:00.000-07:00

Check out this column: Darwinism is dead by Paul Benedict.

Regular readers of this blog will recognize in this column some of what I've been saying for the last few years. The column is well worth reading in its entirety, but here's a summary statement:

Although they can rally against Creationism in one voice and riot against colleagues who advocate Intelligent Design with an outrage worthy of religionists, the weird little secret is that science knows Darwinism is dead.

This fact about scientific consensus leads (for those aware of it) to a real frustration with the educational systems that continue to teach as certain a theory that was largely rejected by the science community decades ago.

Apologetically, it highlights two ironies, 1) that a new generation of nasty young atheists are being emboldened in that atheism by writers like Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett who remain blissfully unaware that the theory that supports their metaphysics is now recognized as naive and simplistic, and unsupported by all the available evidence, and 2) that numerous evangelical leaders are even now jumping on evolution's bandwagon at a time when it is no longer believed in by the critical members of this generation of scientists.

We live in interesting times.

Lifer Snake

2011-06-17T21:36:00.000-07:00

I recorded a 'lifer' snake last week, a species I'd never caught in my life before. It was a striped whipsnake that my son Nathan and I caught on a backroad in Wasco County.

I'd seen several before, both in the bush and on the road. But besides being the fastest snake in the area, they are both wary and elusive. In my experience, they were generally gone before I'd stopped the car or before the image had registered on my mind. Then, too, their habitat preferences are somewhat specialized, and they are one of the less common snakes around. This species had become sort of a nemesis for me, and I'd begun to wonder whether I'd ever catch one.

This landmark capture came toward the end of a good day all around, as we'd earlier successfully deployed a satellite transmitter on a nestling golden eagle, which is always a satisfying experience.

Here's a picture of the happy herpetologist. You can see the distinctive pink wash on the belly and tail (of the snake, not the herpetologist).

Dinosaurs and the Age of the Earth

2011-06-05T16:32:00.000-07:00

Here's another Vimeo from the Redux service at which I officiated a couple of weeks ago. The question was about what the Bible has to say about dinosaurs and the age of the Earth.

Dinosaurs and the Age of the Earth from :redux on Vimeo.

Redux Question on Prayer

2011-05-29T20:19:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity again to be the one answering questions at Antioch's Redux service. Redux is our chance to ask questions and raise challenges to and doubts about the Bible and Christianity. (We at Antioch believe that since Christianity is the uniquely accurate understanding of the world in which we live it is big enough to handle our doubts and challenges.)

This particular answer was in response to an email question,

Is it appropriate to pray directly to Jesus?

Can we pray to Jesus and the Holy Spirit or only to God the Father? from :redux on Vimeo.

The Real Difference

2011-05-18T18:33:00.000-07:00

So, I'm a soccer nut. And last Saturday, I watched a big game in the fierce rivalry between the Portland Timbers and the Seattle Sounders. The two have played each other some 75 times, but this is the first time in many years that both have been in the highest league in the U.S. (with Portland just this year being promoted to MLS).

Portlanders and Seattleites have much in common in terms of lifestyle, values, and such, and these two soccer clubs both have rabid fans, who fill their respective stadia, standing, chanting, and singing throughout the game (as is the case in England and elsewhere, but not so much in other U.S. cities). I was intrigued by one fan who, with a simple sign, put his finger on the real difference between Oregonians and Washingtonians. As the television cameras scanned thousands of supporters of the homestanding Seattle team, I caught a single placard that read,

Real Men Pump Their Own Gas

(Though the Timbers had the better play most of the first half, a defensive lapse led to a Seattle goal early in the second. But a goal off of a set piece eventually earned a draw for the team from the state with the strange gas laws. The rivalry will be renewed later in the summer, this time in Portland, where the Timbers have won each of their four games thus far.)

A Step of Trust

2011-05-15T21:21:00.001-07:00

In reading the "new atheists" Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, it is easy to see that they wholeheartedly accept the false understanding that Christian faith is an illogical leap taken contrary to evidence and reason. It's hard to blame them, perhaps, because even many Christians fail to recognize that the biblical portrayal is just the opposite, to wit, that a step of trust (in Jesus Christ) is the uniquely reasonable response to a right understanding of the evidence from reality.

The traditional Christian understanding of saving faith involves three aspects, notitia, assensus, and fiducia. Notitia means accurate knowledge, which comes through our senses, our reasoning, and revelation. Included in notitia, of course, is a right understanding of the human condition--created in the image of God and yet fallen--and of the unique solution in the incarnation, death, and resurrection of the Son of God. Assensus is the necessary agreement with that accurate knowledge. And yet, having both of these components--accurate information and agreement with those facts--is not enough. The third aspect, fiducia, means making the only reasonable response, committing one's life to that eternal Creator and personal Savior, Jesus Christ. Rather than a blind, irrational leap of faith, Christianity represents a logical step of trust, the only sensible personal response to the sum of the evidence and reason about the reality of our universe and existence.

Reason for Belief

2011-05-05T21:27:00.001-07:00

I'm pretty excited about a class I'm leading these days at my church, Antioch. It's a book study, in which we're using as a springboard the first seven chapters of Timothy Keller's book, The Reason for God: Belief in an Age of Skepticism. In each of these chapters, Keller responds to one of the common objections to believing in God (as defined by the Christian scriptures). In the first week, we discussed the charge that Christianity's claims are too exclusive to be true. This coming Sunday, we'll tackle the so-called problem of evil and suffering. I get fired up on this subject, since the Christian understanding is the only one that really does justice to the issue.

The Crux of History

2011-04-27T12:21:00.000-07:00

This week, people the world over celebrated the single event that more than any other changed history, changed the world. For folks on every continent and in every nation, the crux or crossroads of history is the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus, the Christ.

It is, of course, impossible to fully separate the incarnation (the coming of God in the flesh), the crucifixion (with all it accomplished and the multitude of theological ramifications), and the resurrection. And while each of these doctrines is central and necessary to the Christian faith, most of us (rightly) focus on the latter--resurrection--as we celebrate this week.

The bodily resurrection of Jesus was the incredible news that spread like wildfire through the first-century Roman Empire. It represented the vindication (on the part of God the Father) of Jesus' earthly teachings and of His claim of being one with the Father. It is what changed a ragtag group of uneducated Jewish outcasts--broken and demoralized by the humiliating execution of their leader--into a bold band of mission-minded evangelists, willing to spread their message of assured hope wherever they went and at whatever cost (including ignomious and excruciating martyrdom). His earliest disciples were quick to recognize that Jesus' bodily resurrection meant--because of His promises to that effect--that they too (and all for whom he died) would likewise be raised.

The evidences for the centrality (in human history) of the death and resurrection of Christ are many and varied. For now, let me just point out that much of our language testifies to that centrality. Words I have used in this short essay--'crux,' 'crossroads'--are used to describe centrality, to designate the heart of a matter. These words, of course, share their etymology--as does the word for horrible pain--'excruciating'--with the word for the method by which Jesus was killed, 'crucifixion.'

"Jesus lives!" The events referred to by those two simple words produced a fundamental, cataclysmic, unalterable change in the world. Two thousand years after those events, the power of the Resurrection of Jesus is still producing astonishing transformation in the lives of people, families, tribes, and nations.

For those first followers of Jesus and for millions of believers since, the events we celebrate this week were life-changing--indeed, world-changing. Whatever else may be going on, we now recognize that we live in a world visited by its creator, a world redeemed by his atoning sacrificial death, and a world in which death has been finally and ultimately conquered.

Creation Care and the Christian

2011-04-20T20:50:00.001-07:00

(an Earth Day post from a few years back...)

As Christians, we are called to be true environmentalists. That is, the rational link between the Judeo-Christian worldview and the call to care about and for the planet and its component parts is straightforward and clear.

According to the Scriptures, the universe, the planet Earth, and all of its inhabitants were created by God. Psalm 24 begins this way,

The earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof, the world and those who dwell therein, for he has founded it upon the seas and established it upon the rivers.

Moreover, God gave man (at the very beginning of human history and again later) dominion over the Earth and all of its other inhabitants. This "dominion mandate" is both descriptive and prescriptive. It accurately describes reality. Human beings, with their reasoning (an important aspect of the "image of God" with which they alone of all creatures are endowed by the Creator), do indeed have greater potential and actual impact on the global and local environment than does any other species. The biblical understanding is that this impact can be for good as well as for harm. (By contrast, some of today's most zealous environmentalists see the effect of humans on our planet as only harmful; they deny our potential for being good stewards or carrying out beneficial husbandry.)

The prescriptive aspect of the dominion mandate says that not only do humans have dominion over the planet but that they should take that dominion seriously. We are expected--and accountable to our Creator--to be good stewards of all that He has created.

While the Bible does not teach extensively on this issue (and is largely silent on the how of good stewardship), we can be certain that followers of the one true God are called by Him to care for the creation with which he has blessed us. And while being Christian does not automatically give one any expertise in environmental science, it nonetheless behooves us to be salt (a preserving influence) in our generation with regard to creation care. This means (among other things) being responsible with our individual and local resources (indeed, I would argue that we should be on the forefront of such responsibility) as well as educating ourselves so that we might offer and support reasonable, well-founded solutions to more widespread environmental issues.

There are at least three reasons that Christians need to be better (than we have been in recent generations) at creation care. The first is simply that we are to obey God in all things, and being good stewards is one of those things he has commanded us. Another is for the sake of the environment itself, for the future generations of humans and other creatures that will need its resources. Many of the decisions our generation faces have greater potential for long-term effects on the future livability of our planet than the decisions of any previous generation. (I am not here denying God's sovereignty over such things, but affirming that that sovereignty involves the free will of the humans he created.) Third, our failure to obey the dominion mandate--the fact that Christians have not maintained a position at the forefront of creation-care issues--represents, for many in our generation, a further barrier to their considering the claims of Christianity.

Stewardship of the Earth

2011-04-18T22:34:00.000-07:00

Besides being Good Friday on the Christian calendar, April 22nd is Earth Day (and also the birthday of our oldest, Nathan). So here's an appropriate quote written by another Christian thinker, J.R.R. Tolkien.

In The Return of The King, the wizard Gandalf is talking with Denethor, Steward of Gondor, who is despairing in the face of overwhelming odds arrayed against all that he has loved. (Shortly after this dialogue, Denethor takes his own life.)

I take Gandalf's words here to reflect Tolkien's understanding of what every individual is called to--by God--with respect to our care of creation. It certainly expresses my understanding well. Gandalf said...

...the rule of no realm is mine, neither of Gondor nor any other, great or small. But all worthy things that are in peril as the world now stands, these are my care. And for my part, I shall not wholly fail of my task, though Gondor should perish, if anything passes through this night that can still grow fair or bear fruit and flower again in days to come. For I also am a steward.

A Waste of Space?

2011-04-10T14:11:00.000-07:00

The movie Contact was not subtle in expressing its main theme. At least four times in the movie, the question is posed, "Do you think there's any other intelligent life out there?" The unvarying response is, "If not, it sure seems like an awful waste of space." The movie, of course, was adapted from Carl Sagan's novel by the same name, and offered a clear portrayal of his worldview, including the Principle of Mediocrity. Sagan was convinced by the sheer magnitude of the universe that life--and even intelligent life--must be everywhere abundant in it. We live in a culture that easily resonates with Sagan's views, where portrayals of such life are indeed everywhere. (You might prefer the original Star Trek series, but your wife likes The Next Generation, your brother is a Battlestar Gallactica fan, and your kids prefer sci-fi video games, but we can all find common ground somewhere in the Star Wars movie series, right?) But Sagan's conclusions in this regard had little to do with empirical science, and have become outdated by the accumulating evidence.

The second king of ancient Israel, the shepherd and psalmist David, likewise wondered at the immensity of the heavens, even though he could only see about 6,000 stars (the number that can be observed with the naked human eye).

When I consider the heavens, what is man that You [O Lord] are mindful of him?

Indeed, the vastness of the universe presents a challenge to folks of all metaphysical stances today. Mormon doctrine has the faithful populating planets throughout the cosmos. In a similar vein, the last book by the late Henry Morris, a young-Earth creationist, postulated that Christians would be given dominion over other planets in the age to come. These speculations on his part were largely fueled, apparently, by his inability to otherwise explain why there are so many stars if life on Earth was a primary purpose of creation.

As it turns out, however, the number of stars (approximately 100 billion trillion) is one of those many characteristics (along with associated parameters like the mass density of the universe and the relative masses of the neutron and proton) that must be just right for life to exist anywhere at any time in the universe. Given the chemistry and physics of the universe, the vast number of stars that exist are precisely what is required for life. Moreover, when the probabilities of such fine-tuning are considered, it becomes astronomically improbable that even one life-support planet exists (apart from a Designer). The question of the origin and existence of life is a separate, equally difficult problem for the naturalist, but that can wait for another post.

In the meantime, here're a couple of other quotes from scientists studying the fine-tuning of the universe. First, British astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle...

...a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology.

Likewise, theoretical physicist Tony Rothman wrote...

The medieval theologian who gazed at the night sky through the eyes of Aristotle and saw angels moving the spheres in harmony has become the modern cosmologist who gazes at the same sky through the eyes of Einstein and sees the hand of God not in angels but in the constants of nature.

Electron to Proton Ratio

2011-04-02T08:45:00.001-07:00

How about that for a snappy title? Makes you want to call all your friends into the room to check out this blog post, doesn't it?

In the last post, I began to talk about the anthropic principle, the recognition on the part of astronomers, physicists, and chemists that the universe is made with intelligent life as its goal. Today I want to help you begin to appreciate what proponents of this principle mean when they discuss "fine-tuning." The example I'll give you comes from astronomer Hugh Ross' book, The Creator and the Cosmos.

The number of electrons (in the universe) is equivalent to the number of protons to an accuracy of one part in 10 to the 37th power. If it were not so, galaxies, stars, and planets would never form (because electromagnetic forces would so overwhelm gravitational forces).

So what does one part in 10 to the 37th power look like? Ross asks us to imagine the entire North American continent covered in dimes, and that continent-wide pile of dimes reaching all the way to the moon. Now, consider a million such continent-wide, to-the-moon-high stacks of dimes, and among all those dimes a single one painted red. One part in 10 to the 37th power is like a blind-folded person successfully selecting that one red dime on the first try!

And the ratio of electrons to protons is just one of more than 93 characteristics of the universe (so far documented) that exhibit extreme fine-tuning for life. That's why the evidence for design in the universe has led so many astronomers and physicists to use theological language when discussing their results. Take astronomer George Greenspan, for example...

As we survey all the evidence, the thought insistently arises that some supernatural agency--or, rather, Agency--must be involved. Is it possible that suddenly, without intending to, we have stumbled upon scientific proof of the existence of a Supreme Being? Was it God who stepped in and so providentially crafted the cosmos for our benefit?

(A version of this post was originally published on this site on 18 March 2007.)

Copernican or Anthropic?

2011-03-25T16:51:00.000-07:00

The Polish astronomer Copernicus (1473-1543) is generally credited with establishing that the center of the solar system is the sun and not the Earth.* Subsequent astronomical research has shown that our sun is not at the center of our galaxy nor is our galaxy at the center of the universe. Add to this the modern recognition that the universe contains on the order of 100 billion trillion stars, and the result is the idea that the Earth is nothing special, location-wise, ontologically, or in its characteristics. This notion, popularized by the late astronomer Carl Sagan, is often referred to as the "Copernican Principle." This is a misnomer, of course, as Copernicus didn't share Sagan's religious views, and didn't overstate the physical evidence to support an unwarranted metaphysical claim. A better name for this idea--still popular among moderns (especially sci-fi fans who, like Sagan, consider it reasonable to think that the Cosmos is replete with planets hosting intelligent life forms)--is the "principle of mediocrity."

Today, however, anyone affirming the principle of mediocrity would be guilty--as was Sagan in his later years--of committing the fallacy of supressed evidence. During Sagan's lifetime and since, overwhelming evidence contrary to Sagan's view has been accumulating. General relativity has by now become the most rigorously tested theory in all of physics, and its logical product--big bang cosmology--has proved fatal for Sagan's view that "The Cosmos is all there is, or ever was, or ever will be." Moreover, astronomers, chemists, and physicists are continually identifying characteristics of the universe that are extremely fine-tuned to provide for human life. The current understanding--the anthropic principle--has turned the "Copernican" Principle on its head, and we now know (for example) that our sun's place within the galaxy and our galaxy's place within the galaxy cluster are (while not central) exactly what they need to be for life on Earth to be possible. According to astrophysicist Paul Davies...

There is for me powerful evidence that there is something going on behind it all… It seems as though somebody has fine-tuned nature’s numbers to make the Universe… The impression of design is overwhelming.

Stephen Hawking likewise expressed the latest understanding,

It would be very difficult to explain why the universe should have begun in just this way, except as the act of a God who intended to create beings like us.

In days to come, I'll be sharing just a few of the 93+ fine-tuned characteristics of the universe itself (fundamental fine-tuning)and the 154+ characteristics of the galaxy, solar system, and Earth (environmental fine-tuning) that fall within extremely narrow (life-permitting) ranges. If you want to learn more about this yourself, I recommend Hugh Ross' The Creator and the Cosmos, The Privileged Planet by Guillermo Gonzalez and Jay Richards, and the Reasons To Believe website (where updated lists of these characteristics can be found).

*Copernicus' immediate successors, Bruno and Galileo, played important roles in getting this understanding out. Moreover, there is some indication that even Ptolemy recognized ours as a heliocentric system. His system of concentric rings (that is to us moderns Ptolemy's legacy and which brands him as geocentric) may have been his best bet for predicting the locations of the planets given the rather undeveloped geometry of his day.

(I originally posted a version of this post on 16 March 2007.)

God of the Gaps

2011-03-12T09:08:00.000-08:00

[Besides entering my busiest time of year work-wise, I'm teaching one class at the Kilns and another two classes on the internet. What suffers is my time to write new blog posts. So the following is taken from a discussion thread in my internet class, in which I clarify what I take to be the issue with the God-of-the-gaps charge.]

I guess I have a slightly different take on the God-of-the-gaps issue. As I see it, this is not so much something of which Christians generally (and much less practicing scientists who are Christians) are really guilty. Rather, it is an illegitimate charge made against Christians by naturalists. And when naturalists raise this charge, they are generally guilty of several logical fallacies...

1) They are guilty of creating a straw man. While there may be some who easily claim "because God did it" too early in the search for explanations, this is an extreme position and not the one taken by the vast majority of Christians engaged in scientific discussion. When one addresses only the absurd, extreme articulations of his opponents (setting up a straw man that is easily knocked down) instead of addressing the thoughtful, difficult objections made by more moderate opponents, one is being academically disingenuous and logically fallacious.

2) They are guilty of the ad futurum fallacy. (I actually wanted to make up my own name for a fallacy, the "log-in-your-own-eye fallacy," but will stick with a well-recognized name.) But what I mean is that the naturalist is equally guilty (moreso, actually) of engaging in naturalism-of-the-gaps. The claim is that while we don't currently know the natural explanation, give us 75 years and we will. This is a faulty appeal to the future. In good reasoning, one is expected to find the best explanation for all the currently available evidence, rather than appeal to hypothetical future evidence.

3) More fundamentally, the naturalist is guilty of equivocation, wrongly using two significantly different definitions of the 'gaps' being addressed.

The naturalist likes to identify epistemological gaps (gaps of knowledge), and show that historically such gaps have closed. But the more interesting gaps--and those raised by the old-Earth creationist and the proponent of Intelligent Design--are ontological gaps (gaps of existence or being). The naturalist serves his own cause by conflating these two definitions or by ignoring this crucial distinction.

We could discuss (for example) the gap between the existence of a universe and the non-existence of a universe, or the gap between the Edicarean life forms and those of the Cambrian. These are fundamentally gaps of being, not merely gaps in our knowledge. And while the actual gaps involved are unchanging, the epistemological gaps (as we better understand the breadth and suddenness of the Cambrian explosion) are getting larger, not smaller. Perhaps the best example is that of the origin of life. The gap between non-living chemistry and the simplest life is now understood to be much larger than any evolutionary naturalist ever conceived.

So, it is rather uninteresting to note that we ought not be guilty of appealing to the supernatural prematurely, when there is still every indication that a natural (process) explanation will be found (for whatever phenomenon is being studied). But when we are studying origins* questions (rather than process questions), there is every reason to use abductive reasoning, and explanations that involve a supernatural being can reasonably be offered in such cases. This is especially true since only a theistic worldview logically grounds the assumptions that make science worthwhile (as discussed in another thread).

* Failure to differentiate between empirical (process) research and historical (origins) research also serves the scientific naturalist's cause. Whether this represents mere imprecision/naivete or disingenuity on their part I'm never quite sure.

The Peppered Moth Evidence

2011-03-05T07:43:00.000-08:00

From the archives again, the post with which I followed up "Green Toothpicks" about 4 years ago...

[In the last post], I shared about an artificial (and rather poor) illustration of natural selection in action ("Green Toothpicks"). The most famous (and much-cited) example of natural selection in the wild is the changes in coloration of the Peppered Moth, changes that occurred as a result of industrialization in Great Britain. These changes were noticed throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, as Peppered Moth populations went from being mostly white (with a few melanistic individuals) to mostly dark (with a few light individuals). In the 1950's, Bernard Kettlewell, a British biologist and physician, began a series of experiments that led him to believe that this change could be explained as a result of natural selection. He concluded that the moths were eaten by birds (visually-oriented predators) as they rested on tree trunks during the day. Kettlewell reasoned that before industrialization, light-colored moths were more prevalent because they were better camouflaged on the light-colored (and lichen-covered) tree trunks. But with increasing pollution, tree trunks became darker (and lichens died), light-colored moths were less camouflaged than darker ones, and the phenotype of the population became predominantly that of the dark individuals. This elegant example from the wild remains to this day the classic textbook example of natural selection at work.

Subsequent research has cast a great deal of doubt on this entire scenario. It turns out that Peppered Moths don't normally rest on tree trunks but in the crown of the trees, that researchers (including Kettlewell) released moths by day (even though they are a nocturnal species), that many (not including Kettlewell) in fact pinned dead moths to trunks rather than use live ones in their capture-recapture experiments. In addition, neither the distribution of the various color morphs nor that of the lichens fit the patterns predicted by pollution rates, either during the industrialization or following emission controls (when white moths made a comeback in some regions). The problems unearthed have been so serious that what had been called "Darwin's missing evidence" has been deemed invalid even by evolutionary scientists. (For a summary of these problems, the reader is referred to chapter 7 of Jonathan Wells' Icons of Evolution.) Nonetheless, since evidence for the evolutionary paradigm is so scant, this invalidated tale is still a prominent feature in most modern textbooks (with no mention of its problems).

But again, suppose we ignore (for the sake of argument) the fact that subsequent research has shown that the Kettlewell scenario does not provide the evidence for which Darwinists hope. Let us be generous and grant that perhaps further research will discover a mechanism (consistent with natural selection) that explains the change in Peppered Moths. Then, as evidence for macroevolution, we have the same problem here as we had with the green toothpicks. We have--at the end of the experiment--merely a different frequency of the same phenotypes already present at the beginning. Phillip Johnson has stated the problem well (in Darwin on Trial)...

Why do other people, including experts whose intelligence and intellectual integrity I respect, think that evidence of local population fluctuations confirms the hypothesis that natural selection has the capacity to work engineering marvels, to construct wonders like the eye and the wing? Everyone who studies evolution knows that Kettlewell’s peppered moth experiment is the classic demonstration of the power of natural selection, and that Darwinists had to wait almost a century to see even this modest confirmation of their central doctrine. Everyone who studies the experiment knows that it has nothing to do with the origin of any species, or even any variety, because dark and white moths were present throughout the experiment. Only the ratios of one variety to the other changed. How could intelligent people have been so gullible as to imagine that the Kettlewell experiment in any way supported the ambitious claims of Darwinism?

At least two pitfalls (obstacles to objective truth) can be seen in the Peppered Moth story. First, moth researchers used invalid methods and jumped to wrong conclusions primarily because of an inordinant desire to provide evidence for a popular--but evidentially-impoverished--theory. Second, had their conclusions not been spurious, these same researchers (and their popularizers, including textbook editors still today) have been guilty of failing to see the scalar limitations of their results. Evidence of natural selection working at the level of a species quite simply is irrelevant as evidence for macroevolution.

As a scientist, I only hope that the Peppered Moth may serve as a reminder to avoid these pitfalls long after it has been finally discarded as a significant piece of evidence for Darwinian evolution.

Green Toothpicks

2011-02-23T07:27:00.001-08:00

I'm pretty busy these days, catching eagles, writing reports, and doing quite a bit of teaching. So, with little time to blog, I've reached back into the archives for the following, originally posted 4 years ago today. It's called "Green Toothpicks."

I took an undergraduate biology class from Dr. "Mad Dog" Johnson, in which he tried to demonstrate natural selection in action. We went outside to a lush, uncut, well-fertilized portion of the campus lawn, where we strew a known number of toothpicks of different colors--red, yellow, blue, and green. We, the students, then acted as predators--the agents of natural selection--foraging through that patch of lawn, capturing as many toothpicks as we could find. As I recall, we found all of the yellow and red toothpicks, most of the blue ones, and almost none of the green, so well-camouflaged were they among the long blades of springtime grass. The lesson was that natural selection works just so on populations of living things.

There are at least a couple of serious problems with this experiment as an illustration of natural selection at work. If--as is claimed--natural selection acting on genetic variation is the mechanism by which evolutionary advance is made, what we demonstrated would seem to be just the opposite. Our toothpick population began with a much higher genetic diversity than it ended with. The population, which now consists almost entirely of green toothpicks, would seem to be much less able to adapt to a changing environment than when it contained the greater diversity of phenotypes. It has ever since seemed to me that we demonstrated that natural selection has a far greater capacity to tend toward extinction than to adaptation and advance.

Another problem with this illustration is just as important. Let us be unreasonably generous and grant that the resulting population of toothpicks is somehow better prepared to adapt to some future environmental change. That is, let us say--for the sake of argument--that what we witnessed was an instance of microevolution. Microevolution refers to the idea that species (and populations and such) are not static, but change over time in both their phenotype and genotype (their morphology and the genetic basis for their morphology, respectively). That microevolution occurs is a well-accepted, non-controversial idea. Let us say that the population of green toothpicks is a good example of something having undergone microevolution. The claim of neo-Darwinism is that it is this same mechanism--natural selection acting upon genetic variation (mutation)--that accounts for macroevolution. In other words, the diversity of all life is explainable by this sort of natural selection acting over vast time scales.

In the specific case of the toothpick illustration, we are to believe that if we waited long enough (as the toothpicks bred generation after generation) and continued preying on those toothpicks most easily spotted, eventually those toothpicks would give rise to species of dental floss, of toothbrushes, and even, eventually, of electric toothbrushes, all without the input of any sort of intelligence or designer.

That there have existed--over the course of Earth's history--different life forms is readily acknowledged. Macroevolutionary theory, as an explanation for how that record came to be, has yet to be substantiated by any evidence. Rare cases of microevolution have been documented, and then we are asked to make the unreasonable and unsupported extrapolation that such minor changes can be invoked to explain all of the advancing complexity witnessed in the fossil record. For me, Professor Johnson's toothpick demonstration has always served as a reminder of the absurdity of the grander claims of evolutionists.

Headin' to Ohio

2011-02-13T21:13:00.000-08:00

Looking forward to a weekend back where I grew up, Cincinnati, Ohio. Especially excited about speaking on various apologetics topics to a group of men at a weekend retreat across the border in Indiana. Science and Christianity, Reliability of the New Testament, Historicity of the Resurrection are among the topics I'll tackle.

Jasper and I will also be able to have some Skyline Chili while we're there, and hope to breakfast on goetta once or twice. When in Rome...

Hokma

2011-02-04T07:07:00.000-08:00

Time to promote yet another great blog. This one from another brilliant friend of mine, Brandon Groza, who studied ancient near-eastern languages and thus has fascinating insight into Bible passages that I--and most--miss. Check it out at Hokma, and make it one of your favorites. I have.

Archaeology and the Bible

2011-01-30T20:42:00.000-08:00

It is with great pleasure that I refer my readers to the web site of my friend Mike Caba, who researches and visits sites around the world where evidences that corroborate the Bible can be found. At this web site, you can find a host of archaeological discoveries that verify biblical accounts, from the New Testament all the way back to the time of David. Check it out here.

It was Mike who allowed me to tag along on his recent trip to Greece. Mike is also a professor and Dean of Faculty at Kilns College (where I teach). You can take his course in Archaeology and the Bible, or get him to come and give a lecture on a variety of related topics.

Justice Reprise

2011-01-24T15:01:00.001-08:00

So here's the Vimeo of a follow-up to the issue I addressed in the last post, about God's call to His people to care about injustice in the world:

Christians and Justice from :redux on Vimeo.

Why Justice?

2011-01-14T19:35:00.000-08:00

I had a chance again last week to answer questions at Redux, Antioch's Q & A service. Here's one of my answers, responding to the question of why Antioch (my church in Bend, Oregon) is so concerned about issues of justice.

Why the Justice Conference? from :redux on Vimeo.

Greek Peregrinations

2011-01-07T19:26:00.000-08:00

With my buddy, amateur archaeologist and Kilns College Dean of Faculty, Mike Caba, I spent the first week of the new year wandering around Greece. This beautiful country is, of course, full of wonderful examples of ancient art and architecture, and we explored as much of that as we could in the 4 1/2 days we were there. But Greece is also full of New Testament history, and Mike dragged me all over the country to see first-hand some of the evidences that verify places, people, and dates in the life of the apostle Paul and others. We rode subways, taxis, and buses--as well as walking across Athens several times over--to get to Ancient Corinth, Delphi, Marathon, and Elefsina (home of an ancient mystery religion). From time to time, I'll post a bit more about this whirlwind trip and what we saw. Here's a pic of Mike and me at a rather impressive edifice they call the Parthenon.

Eagle Trapping Season

2010-12-30T21:58:00.000-08:00

It's the time of year for trapping Golden Eagles, in this case for affixing a telemetry unit (which will use satellites to acquire information on the bird's hourly location). This adult male is one of many year-round residents in my area (there are at least 10 Golden Eagle territories within 10 miles of our home). The photo below shows a bit of the capture method and conditions.

It's tough work, but hey, someone's got to do it.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-25T16:57:00.000-08:00

Let me just take this opportunity to wish a very blessed Christmas to all my readers. Here in Central Oregon, we did have a white Christmas, but purists might point out that no new snow fell. Rather, we're still cold enough to retain the 8 or so inches that fell last weekend.

It was a cozy, comfortable day here, with lots of wonderful homemade gifts. My youngest daughter, Willow, has made a tradition of writing poetry and including it in gifts, and a number of homemade bracelets, necklaces, and hair barrettes were also acquired. Books, of course, and music, were also among the presents.

I'm always fascinated by the number of stores and folks at this time of year that do the "Happy Holiday" thing, not expressing the word 'Christmas' for fear they might offend someone. Statistics show that something like 96% of Americans celebrate Christmas, with 91% of them explicitly acknowledging it as the birth of Jesus. Now, I'm not so naive as to think that all such folk actually stop to pray to Him or to give thanks for the gift of that life (and death) 2000 years ago.

Nonetheless, I take comfort in the undeniable fact (testified to, in part, by the uniquely worldwide celebration of Christmas) that that gift remains the central event of all human history, the one that most radically changed the world for good. I only hope that you, my reader, have experienced the joy that comes from personally knowing that Prince of Peace, and that--through His redeeming Resurrection power--you too are a vehicle of goodwill to all men. Merry Christmas.

Laryngeal Nerve in Giraffes

2010-12-17T06:44:00.000-08:00

In the past couple of weeks, I received two requests to address Richard Dawkins' claim that the recurrent laryngeal nerve in the modern giraffe provides proof of evolution. To hear and see this claim, go to this YouTube video. The heart of Dawkins' argument is that the unnecessary length of the giraffe's recurrent laryngeal nerve is an example of an imperfection that is the sort of historical accident that one would expect if there is no intelligent Designer. Here's my response...

Since I don't know you, I can't simply respond to Dawkins' claim without first making sure that you understand the larger picture, which is the bankruptcy of Dawkins' overall view, neo-Darwinian evolution (NDE).

Twenty years from now, no one will seriously be defending the form of evolution in which Dawkins believes. His critics, whether theists or fellow-evolutionists, rightly accuse him of living still in the 19th century. Stephen Jay Gould (the leading paleontologist of the last several decades) said that "neo-Darwinism, as a theoretical paradigm, is effectively dead." Geneticist James Shapiro (like Gould, committed to some form of evolution) last year told a packed auditorium in Chicago that "Richard Dawkins is a man who lives in fantasy."

And the reason Dawkins' pet theory is dead is because there is no evidence supporting it. The fossil record was contrary to Darwin's theory when he proposed it, and years of looking for his predicted transitional intermediates have only made the situation worse (for evolution). The apparent heirarchical look of living things remains intact, despite efforts to turn it into a continuous tree. Every life form that has ever lived appeared in the fossil record fully formed, fully functional, and fully adapted to its time on earth and its role in the ecology into which it was created. Every life form has remained unchanged throughout its tenure in earth's history. The only ancestors of Dawkins' modern giraffe for which there is any evidence are modern parent giraffes.

The only other evidential argument for evolution--similarity among living things--suffers from a number of problems. For one thing, similarity among living things is equally well (or better) explained by the view that there is a single Creator (one who repeatedly uses efficient designs rather than make each living thing according to entirely new plans and with entirely different materials). Thus the evolutionist argument is viciously circular: its starting point--that similarity only arises from common ancestry--is the claim that is at issue, and cannot be assumed in order to prove itself.

There are numerous other modern discoveries that make evolution surpassingly implausible, but which are completely ignored by Dawkins. These include the discovery that the universe did indeed have a recent beginning (13.7 b.y., whereas Darwinism assumed an eternal universe, such that natural selection had a nearly infinite amount of time at its disposal), the vast complexity of even the simplest living cell (greatly increasing the gap between non-living chemistry and first life), the information content of DNA, the fine-tuning of the universe for life on this one planet, etc, etc.

It is therefore in the face of overwhelming contrary evidence that Dawkins offers the 'proof' of evolution in the form of the laryngeal nerve of the giraffe. Really?! Really?!?

This is an example of a class of arguments for evolution that involve identifying seemingly 'bad,' imperfect, or suboptimal designs. This line of reasoning is unconvincing--or even downright refuted--for several reasons.

1) It assumes a God-like understanding of the anatomy in question, an understanding that neither Dawkins nor anyone else possesses. Further research is likely to discover good reasons that the nerve in question does not take a more direct route between the brain and the larynx.

2) In all of the more well-known examples, this form of argumentation has indeed been seen to involve ignorance. For a long time, it was the inverted retina (in the human eye) that was lauded by evolutionists as poorly designed, until further research discovered the elegance of it. ("Oops, let's not use that example any more! Let's try the length of the giraffe's laryngeal nerve.")

3) There will never be empirical proof that such a design does not serve an elegant (albeit yet undiscovered) purpose. That is, this argument can never be more than a "seems-to-me" sort of argument. Good science is generally thought to be more rigorous and empirical than this.

4) Even if it could be proved that such a thing constituted a bad design, it is a non-sequitur to conclude that there was no design involved. There was a period during which the Ford Pinto had a rear-end fuel tank problem, which led to numerous explosions, lawsuits, and recalls. But no one concluded as a result that the Pinto arose naturally. The premise of poor design does not yield the conclusion of no design.

[As an aside, it is the obviously fallacious reasoning so frequently employed by Dawkins (as in this case) that causes even atheist philosophers to be embarrassed by him, his books, and his public appearances.]

5) At the outset, Dawkins begins with an statement that is oxymoronic. He says that evolution "would expect" or "would predict" such an arrangement. This involves a problematic mixing of tenses. Now if evolutionists had at a certain time predicted the discovery of such an arrangement, and that prediction was subsequently borne out, then there might be some scientific validity to such a claim. But that, of course, is not what happened. No, however Dawkins may try to spin it, he is not here documenting the predictive success of his theory but rather claiming after the fact (of discovery) that it was the sort of thing that evolution... what? "could have predicted?" "should have predicted?" "might have, but just never got around to predicting?" I trust you see the problem.

6) Again assuming for the sake of argument that the laryngeal nerve in the giraffe is either a poor design or even undesigned, the argument for evolution (and against a Creator) depends upon our believing that there is NO design in the universe. That is, if Dawkins is right, then not only the giraffe's laryngeal nerve but the giraffe, and not only that but all living things, life itself, Earth, the solar system, the universe, everything is undesigned. Indeed, on Dawkins' worldview, even the Ford Pinto was not truly designed because the engineers working on it were merely carrying out the completely deterministic programming of their evolutionarily-derived brains. And it is at this point that Dawkins' beliefs require far more faith than the contrary belief--the default belief of nearly everyone throughout Western history--that things appear so exquisitely designed because they are in fact designed. It is at this point that Dawkins' worldview is most readily seen as that of the Fool of Psalm 14:1.

I know that Dawkins' 'arguments' can seem well-packaged and present a superficial challenge when first encountered. But neither this nor any other of his alledged evidences for evolution can withstand even a little bit of serious scrutiny.

Atheist Pastors

2010-12-03T14:28:00.000-08:00

So, a couple of weeks ago, there was an article (here) about a couple of pastors who, despite having become atheists, remain in ministry because they don't know how else to make a living. Here's a lengthy excerpt from the article, including quotes from the men themselves

..."I spent the majority of my life believing and pursuing this religious faith, Christianity," Jack said. "And to get to this point in my life, I just don't feel like I believe anymore."

"The more I read the Bible, the more questions I had," Jack said. "The more things didn't make sense to me -- what it said -- and the more things didn't add up."

Jack said that 10 years ago, he started to feel his faith slipping away. He grew bothered by inconsistencies regarding the last days of Jesus' life, what he described as the improbability of stories like "Noah's Ark" and by attitudes expressed in the Bible regarding women and their place in the world.

"Reading the Bible is what led me not to believe in God," he said.

He said it was difficult to continue to work in ministry. "I just look at it as a job and do what I'm supposed to do," he said. "I've done it for years."

Adam said his initial doubts about God came as he read the work of the so-called New Atheists -- popular authors like the prominent scientist Richard Dawkins. He said the research was intended to help him defend his faith.

"My thinking was that God is big enough to handle any questions that I can come up with," he said but that did not happen.

"I realized that everything I'd been taught to believe was sort of sheltered," Adam said, "and never really looked at secular teaching or other philosophies. ... I thought, 'Oh my gosh. Am I believing the wrong things? Have I spent my entire life and my career promoting something that is not true?'

Where shall I begin? I guess with the last quote, "everything I'd been taught to believe..." I assume 'Adam' was taught what to believe both during his upbringing in the church and by his subsequent seminary education. It's pretty clear that he wasn't also taught (either at church or at seminary) how to think. Those 'new atheists' whose arguments he found so persuasive trade in logical fallacies, historical inaccuracies, and rhetoric that embarrasses real philosophers, even atheist ones. And it is very likely that Adam was taught a lot of nonsense that has nothing to do with historic Christianity. ('Jack' referred specifically to the 'story of Noah's ark.' Yes, as told by many modern evangelicals, that story is quite absurd, involving as it does a global flood and pairs of every species of animal that has ever lived. But that, of course, is not what the Bible teaches, but only a modern, superficial interpretation of the passage.)

Yes, many of our churches and seminaries are failing us, both by teaching bad hermeneutics and bad theology and by failing to teach people how to think. But there's a more basic problem that surfaces in this article. And it has to do with the nature of Christian belief.

For these men, belief in God and Christianity seems to be a weighing of the evidence, which is (apparently) only slightly tipped either in favor of or against the Christian worldview. These men of the cloth seem to accept the idea that belief in God is a purely academic exercise. In truth, Christianity claims that the Creator has revealed Himself to us throughout the creation, through history, through Scripture and His Son come to Earth, and in personal experience. That is, true believers are not those who merely weigh all the available evidence to see if God's existence is the slightly likelier option. Those of us who are followers of Christ are such because we have encountered--and fallen in love with--our Creator and Redeemer.

To be sure, saving Christian faith is reasonable and based in evidence. The evidence of God's existence, design, and love are all around us, and it is the task of the apologist to point these out. But may God save us from pastors who have never had a personal encounter with the living Lord, and who moreover don't have the critical thinking skills to spot the absurdity of the arguments of the likes of Richard Dawkins.*

*I understand that true followers of Christ can go through periods of doubt, times at which God seems far from them and they question for a period the reality of His presence in their lives. But when such times come upon pastors who have truly experienced a relationship with God, the response is not to carry on in secret but to go on sabbatical, having first honestly shared with and asked for prayer from one's elders and mentors. The cases of 'Jack' and 'Adam' are like those referred to in I John 2:19, "They went out from us, because they were not of us" except that, for reasons purely of self-interest, 'Jack' and 'Adam' have not gone out from us but shamefully remained as leaders of their congregations.

Hawking's Self-Refutation

2010-11-26T19:39:00.000-08:00

Regular readers will know by now that one of my favorite things is identifying when someone goes on record making a claim that is self-referentially absurd, or self-refuting. We have seen that scientism suffers from this fatal fallacy, we have had fun discussing the self-refuting claims of postmodernism, and we have dismissed the biblicism of young-earth creationism on the same grounds.

And now we find arguably the most brilliant mind of our lifetimes wallowing in self-refuting claims, and thereby making what may be his final book a testimony to the absurdity that results when one sets out to deny God.

I'm referring, of course, to Stephen Hawking, the iconic mathematician whose Brief History of Time was the best-selling science book of its era. His latest, coauthored by physicist Leonard Mlodinow, is titled The Grand Design, and was released in September. Its central claim--that the universe and its laws can be explained without reference to God--is indeed sweeping and grand, but the foundation required to buttress that claim is riddled with self-refuting arguments. Let's look at a couple of them.

Philosophy is dead. Philosophy has not kept up with modern developments in science, particularly physics. Scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge.

I'm sure that some of you see the problem here (even though Hawking, his coauthor, and his editors must have missed it): these and all related claims are not scientific claims but philosophical ones. And I'm not cherry-picking an isolated logical mistake here; fully a third of the book (and arguably a whole lot more) is a rambling, philosophical discourse, one that will cause any good philosopher to wince, laugh, or cry, depending upon his mood while reading. We scientists are notoriously poor philosophers, and if it does nothing else, Hawking's book serves as a stark reminder of this fact.

But scientific naturalists have even more reason for dismay. For many who would deny God's existence, Hawking offered the best hope, as he years ago devoted his brilliant mind to discovering a 'theory of everything.' This book would seem to be the culmination of that search, and yet it winds up dissolving into postmodern nonsense.

Hawking and Mlodinow devote a chapter to the question "What Is Reality?" And the conclusion to which they arrive is that

there is no picture- or theory-independent concept of reality... our perception is not direct, but rather shaped by a kind of lens, the interpretive structure of our human brains. [Therefore, no model of reality] can be said to be more real than any other.

What are we to do with such? If no view of reality can be said to be real, why bother interacting with Hawking's view of reality? If there is no theory-independent concept of reality, then this concept isn't. Like all self-refuting claims, these epistemological ones are necessarily false.

So where we expect to find piercing scientific argumentation, we are treated instead to sloppy, self-refuting philosophy (after first being told that philosophy is dead).

Others of the main claims of Hawking's new book likewise disqualify themselves, but perhaps I'll save those for another time. The bottom line is this... the Christian need not fear the fallacious arguments either of the scientific naturalist or the postmodernist (or, as in this case, someone who mixes both in bizarre ways). Even the most brilliant mind will end up stunningly in error, if he begins his search for truth with a denial of the Author of all truth.

Evolutionism vs Creationism

2010-11-20T15:31:00.000-08:00

Here's another vimeo of the Redux session I sat in on a few weeks back. I received a number of good questions that day, including

How would you respond to the debate between evolutionism and creationism?

The Debate Between Creationism and Evolution from :redux on Vimeo.

AIG Addendum

2010-11-15T16:16:00.000-08:00

As a follow-up to the last post, it needs to be said (since the situations are so parallel), that...

When Galileo used scientific evidence to correct the Roman Catholic church leadership's faulty interpretation of Scripture about the solar system, he wasn't attacking either the Word of God or the Son of God. We all recognize Galileo's interpretation to have been correct and the interpretation of the church (which, incidentally, was shared by both Luther and Calvin) to have been wrong.

In the same way, when William Lane Craig (or any of a host of other committed followers of Christ) uses the evidence from the creation to critique the hopelessly outdated Lightfoot/Ussher interpretation to which Ken Ham has anchored his ministry, he is not attacking the Word of God or the Son of God either.

I spend a good deal of my time discussing history and philosophy of science issues, showing how modern science uniquely arose from within the Christian worldview, and how science depends upon theistic assumptions for its logical grounding. Though it has been popular in the last 100 years to claim that Christianity and science have been opposed to one another, this claim could hardly be more false. In the history of the interaction between Christianity and modern science there has really only been that one case--the Galileo incident--in which church leadership seriously erred in their interpretation despite contrary scientific evidence. Unfortunately, the success of so-called Creation "Science" organizations in our day (like Answers in Genesis) has lent a great deal of credibility to those who would claim that Christianity opposes science. I can't wait for the day when we can look back on young-earth creationism as an amusing, aberrant, anti-intellectual interlude in recent church history.

The Illogical Basis of AIG

2010-11-14T17:10:00.000-08:00

A good deal of great material in the news lately, plenty of grist for an apologetics blogger (I just wish I knew one that had more time to respond to it all). A SETI anniversary experiment, pastors admitting that, despite their having become atheists, they stay in the ministry because they don't have any other way of making a living, and, of course, an aging Stephen Hawking lapsing into some of the silliest logic imaginable for arguably the most brilliant mind of our lifetimes. But let me start with Ken Ham, president of Answers in Genesis, who this week sunk to a new low as he articulated with unusual clarity the illogical basis of his entire ministry, career and life. Here's an excerpt:

When Christian leaders deliberately reinterpret God’s Word on the basis of man’s fallible ideas (taken from outside the Bible), not only are they undermining the Word of God, they are actually though unwittingly) conducting an attack on the Son of God! This is very serious. Yes, when you compromise the Word of God, it is also an attack on the Son of God, whose Word it is.

If you care to read more, the full article can be found here, but this quote gives us plenty to discuss.

Here's the first very basic fact that Ham seems completely unable to see... Everyone who interacts with God's Word is interpreting it, Ken Ham as well as William Lane Craig (the Christian leader against whom Ham's remarks are addressed). Thus, if Craig interprets God's Word differently than does Ham, it is Ham's interpretation that is being questioned, not the Word of God. It's just as simple as that. And the inability to grasp that, his blindness to the fact that his interpretation is not the "Word of God" but an interpretation of it, is foundational to the entire scheme of Ham's whole ministry.

Elsewhere, Ham (as well as others of his ilk, including the more well-respected Bible commentator, John MacArthur) insists that those who doubt [his interpretation of] the creation account, will invariably doubt the resurrection of Jesus.

Now, that Jesus rose from the dead in a glorified body is explicitly taught over and over again, in all four Gospels and in nearly all of the other New Testament books. But nowhere in Scripture is it explicitly taught that the Earth and universe are only 6,000 years old (as Ham believes) or that the 'days' of the creation in Genesis 1 are 24-hour days. Indeed, the more explicit Scripture passsages that deal with the age of creation state that the mountains are far, far older than human understanding. No, Ham's view about the age of creation is a complex theory that makes a number of interpretive decisions, each one of which is at best dubious and at worst demonstrably false. What's more, Ham's interpretation of Genesis is very recent in church history, as he could rightly be said to be following the interpretation that arose with Lightfoot and Ussher in the 17th century.

In his insightful book, The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, Christian historian/philosopher Mark Noll refers to Ham's position this way:

...a fatally flawed interpretive scheme of the sort that no responsible Christian teacher in the history of the church ever endorsed before this century [that has come] to dominate the minds of American evangelicals on scientific questions

Perhaps an even bigger problem in the thinking of AIG's leader is that whenever he examines the interpretations of others, he finds them fallible, and clearly implies that by contrast his own thinking, ideas, and conclusions are infallible. Now, he doesn't say this right out, of course, because it sounds so silly. He again hides behind "the Word of God." when what is really being compared is the fallible interpretations of those with whom he disagrees over against the fallible interpretations of Ken Ham. Until he confronts this glaring aspect of personal pride and bad reasoning, I'm afraid Ham will continue to be an embarrassment to the name of Christ and a barrier to belief for those more willing to make the most of the minds that God has given them as they seek to understand His precious written Word.

Science and Theology Redux

2010-11-04T21:15:00.000-07:00

I've decided to give you a break from reading my thoughts about how we know things are true, how we decide about things like the age of the creation. Instead, I'll let you listen to (and watch) me answer a couple of related questions. The forum is last Sunday's Redux (Q&A) service at my home church, Antioch. (I believe you can link to other Vimeo answers at the bottom.)

The Relationship of Science and Christianity from :redux on Vimeo.

Finding Truth

2010-10-24T18:24:00.000-07:00

In the last post, I claimed that there is value in Christians seeking to know the truth about the age of creation. In particular, I suggested that those who would be teachers (or pastors, evangelists, or apologists) ought to teach only that which they know to be true. So the question comes up, how do we know how old the universe and Earth are?

Let me first frame my answer in very general terms, not having in mind the age of creation but any question about which there are two dissenting views. In such a case, and before one is qualified to teach on the subject, one ought to...

1) Study as much of the relevant evidence as is necessary to have a full grasp of every facet of the issue.

2) Read widely on both sides of the issue, not just proponents of the view to which you are already inclined.

3) Where you remain dependent on the arguments of others, ascertain the qualifications of those sources to weigh in on the issues.

4) Examine the arguments made by proponents of both views (for validity, truth of premises, cogency).

5) Interact with the strongest (not the weakest) arguments of each side, particularly of the view with which you disagree.

6) Never mischaracterize the view of either side, particularly the one with which you disagree.

7) Treat those with whom you end up disagreeing with the utmost respect.

These steps are easily understood, and amount to nothing more than common sense. Basic courtesy, let alone Christian charity, would seem to dictate that we follow them.

And so, if either you or the friend with whom you disagree cannot honestly say that you have followed each of these steps, then a level of uncertainty and humility should characterize whatever discussions you have, and those discussions should definitely remain intramural. That is, neither of you should teach on such an issue until you can say that you have done the necessary research.

All that said, there's an even more basic issue that may need to be settled regarding the specific issue of the age of the creation. The steps discussed above apply to any case where there are different views or interpretations. Among Christians, such disagreements often (as in the age issue) involve differing interpretations of Scripture. But on this particular issue, it is common for proponents of the young-earth interpretation to pretend as though they are defending Scripture itself, rather than an interpretation of Scripture.

If (and now I'm speaking directly to the reader who posed this question) your friend cannot first acknowledge that his view is an interpretation (if , instead, he believes it is "what God's Word says"), then I submit that you will never help him to reach truth on this issue.

The Value of Discussing the Age Issue

2010-10-17T18:26:00.000-07:00

A reader asked

A friend of mine (who is a follower of Christ) and I have been debating the old earth vs young earth positions. He holds to a young earth and I hold to an old earth (and universe). Neither of us are experts or even scientifically minded. In our debates we find ourselves simply pulling out arguments from others in our respective camps. We have agreed that this issue is NOT a salvation issue.

Do you think there is any value in these types of discussions?

Sometimes it feels like we are dealing with a 'recess' issue and we should get to work strategizing and carrying out how we can better serve those in need and share our faith. On these issues we agree.

Here's my response...

You're absolutely right, it is not a salvation issue. That is, God redeems people through Christ's atoning death on the Cross when they recognize their need of a Savior and accept God's provision of forgiveness. Nothing in there depends upon how old the universe is, much less on how old the sinner in question believes it to be. Many will enter eternity with misunderstandings about the age question (and about a whole lot of other tangential issues).

That said, let me give a few reasons why there is value in mature, teachable Christians discussing (examining) the issue of when God created the universe and Earth. (I'll make the points without taking the time to support each. That will allow the reader to question the validity of each and may allow me to post support for each as necessary.)

1) Scripture makes it clear that God cares a good deal about truth.

2) The two opposing views on the age of the universe (6-10 thousand years or 13.7 billion years) cannot both be true. There is a right answer.

3) Christian theology deals not only with God, but also with the world. Christianity claims to be the accurate understanding of the real world, the one in which we actually live.

4) Although acceptance of the central truth claim of Christianity does not depend upon rightly understanding the age of the world, proclaiming (as Christian belief) falsehood about the age of creation can create an artificial barrier to even considering the central Christian claim.

Taken together, these points suggest that those Christians who would answer the call (of II Cor. 5:18-21) to be ambassadors for God--and that would include, at a minimum, pastors, teachers, evangelists, and apologists--should seek to know the truth about the age of creation. And here, Scripture itself offers a very relevant caution...

Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness. (James 3:1)

Of course, those who are called by God to teach--whether as preacher, evangelist, teacher, or apologist--should be all the more careful to teach only truth. And that realization raises the question, "how does one go about discovering truth about the age of the universe and Earth?"

Let's look at that question in the next post.

Knowledge of the Age of Creation

2010-10-09T11:27:00.000-07:00

In the last post, I discussed biblicism among pastors in the church today. If you read the footnote, I shared that my pastor was an exception, a throwback to the days when pastors were not just knowledgeable about Scripture but also about philosophy, history, literature, and science.

In the video below, my pastor (Ken Wytsma at Antioch) answers a question, which itself involved an undertone of biblicism (and that with regard to a question near to my apologetic heart, the age of creation). Check it out!

Can we come at Truth on questions like the age of the earth? from :redux on Vimeo.

Biblicism, a Reprise

2010-10-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

In the last post, I discussed the fact that biblicism--the claim that the Bible is the only reliable source of knowledge--is unbiblical, naive, and self-refuting (and thus illogical). And yet, the church in our day is filled with pastors and teachers who espouse this bizarre idea. Why?

Not all that long ago (say, 150 years), the pastor of the local church was often the best- and most widely-educated individual in the community. By this I mean not just the most knowledgeable about Scripture but also about history, great literature, philosophy, and the latest advances in science. Since that time, there has been an explosion of knowledge (especially in the sciences), and staying on the cutting edge in any discipline requires specializing. No modern pastor can be expected to be so versatile.

And yet, pastors are still looked up to by entire congregations as spiritual leaders and keepers of truth. In such a fix, the wise and humble servant of God would surround himself with committed Christian historians, philosophers, and scientists, counselors who could help him be "all things to all people." But how much easier it is to promote biblicism, to claim that one's own Bible knowledge trumps all these other sources of knowledge, that these others are, in fact, illegitimate ways to discover truth.

Now, I hope that sounds a bit silly to you, but that's what's been going on within many churches for the past 60 years or so. And I'm not saying that pastors are all self-important men giddy on the high esteem accorded them by their congregations and determined at all costs to keep that regard. Rather, in most cases they are simply a product of systems that we* have helped to create. We select our pastors from Bible schools and seminaries at some of which there is no learning offered apart from Bible, interpretation, and preaching methodology. Indeed, it is the church that has created such institutions, so fearful have we become of 'secular' knowledge or so unwilling to do the hard study necessary for responding to the challenges raised by secularists or by scientific materialists.

(Relevant to this discussion is the following fact... When Ronald Reagan was elected President, he asked advisers and Christian leaders for the names of Evangelical men and women who were top thinkers in the various fields of human endeavor, Christians that he could appoint to his cabinet. Only one man was deemed to fit that description, C. Everett Coop, who became Surgeon General.)

I'm not saying that Christian colleges are bad, but I will always strongly favor their offering a more well-rounded education than many do today. And I don't have a practical solution to the problem of biblicism among pastors and in the church. But I do know that biblicism does not serve the church well or further the Kingdom of God.

The Christian message, the biblical message, is one of hope for all people that applies to the real world in which we live. There is no knowledge--from science, history, philosophy, or any other discipline--that threatens the truth of Christianity. But attempting to insulate certain interpretations of Scripture by rejecting other valid sources of knowledge serves only to portray the gospel message as outdated and irrelevant.

*I'm using 'we' here simply as a way of identifying myself with the reader for empathy's sake. In actual fact, my own senior pastor is a throwback in this regard, having acquired a graduate degree in philosophy before his graduate degree in theology. He's as well-read as anyone I know, and an ardent student of history. Moreover, in areas in which he might feel a bit weak or unprepared, he is willing to seek wise counsel from individuals more knowledgeable than himself. I don't know how to ensure that church leadership is like this, but I'm sure that the solution includes not settling for biblicists who lack the humility and wisdom to surround themselves with competent, committed Christians who can provide the knowledge sets they themselves lack.

Biblicism

2010-09-24T10:13:00.000-07:00

A couple of posts ago ("Church Fathers and the Age of Creation"), I mentioned three problematic approaches used by modern proponents of a young Earth and universe to insulate their interpretation of Scripture from critique. At that time I alluded to the possibility of dissecting each of the three (fideism, biblicism, and creation with the false appearance of age) in future posts. So let me take a look today at biblicism.

Biblicism is the view that Scripture is the only reliable source of knowledge. It is often expressed as a rejection of other sources of knowledge, as here, by Henry Morris,

the direct [written] testimony from the Creator [is] the only way to know the age of the earth.

Morris, one of the fathers of "creation science" and young-earth creationism (as co-author of The Genesis Flood, released in 1961), seems blissfully unaware that science has historically helped to correct the church's misinterpretations of Scripture. It was the knowledge provided by astronomy that eventually led to acceptance of heliocentrism (though I understand there are still a few biblicist holdouts even on that one). And, of course, Christians used to believe that Scripture taught a flat Earth, and it was knowledge outside the Bible that helped correct that wrong interpretation as well. So there are clear historical examples that serve to refute such biblicism.

But more fundamentally, biblicism is self-refuting, or self-referentially absurd. I've addressed this problem before, generally as regards other flawed theories about knowledge, such as scientism, empiricism, or postmodern epistemological claims. A self-refuting statement is one that disqualifies itself, a truth claim that, when applied to itself, renders itself false. So, for example, scientism,

The only reliable knowledge is that which results from scientific testing

is self-refuting because there is no scientific test or set of tests that could be performed to yield that knowledge (the knowledge that only scientifically-derived knowledge is reliable).

Likewise, the postmodern claim that

There are no universal truths

presents itself as a universal truth. If I believed it, that would be reason to reject all universal truths, including that one.

Biblicism suffers the same problem. It has this in common with scientism and empiricism: each is a self-serving attempt to limit the range of knowledge to exclude other sources. All such artificial epistemologies will be self-refuting.

The biblicism of Morris, Ken Ham, and others is self-refuting in at least two ways.

First, the Bible itself never makes this claim. Rather, Scripture appeals throughout to other sources of knowledge, calling people to observe the created order for knowledge about God. In fact, according to Romans 1:18-21, all men have knowledge of God that comes from the creation (not Scripture) and it is rejection of this knowledge that is sufficient to condemn them.

Second, one simply must bring an entire set of knowledge to the task of understanding Scripture. The Bible does not teach the meaning of the words and grammar it uses (in Hebrew, Greek, or even English); instead, we must have such knowledge beforehand. Likewise, Scripture does not itself teach the laws of logic; rather it assumes them on every page. It is because we understand--by knowledge derived outside of Scripture--the law of non-contradiction that we are able to affirm that when Jesus said "No one comes to the Father but by me" He did not simultaneously mean "Many people come to the Father through other means."

The biblicist claim is thus seen to be almost incredibly naive and simplistic.

To the question, "How do we know there is a God?" the historical Christian answer has been "Because God has revealed Himself to us, and that both through the creation itself and through divinely-inspired Scripture." This historical Christian doctrine of dual revelation was especially important to several of the early church fathers (see the Augustine quote in the post mentioned at the outset) and to the Protestant reformers. But young-earth creationists (like Answers in Genesis) reject this historical doctrine* because evidence from astronomy, geology, physics, and such overwhelmingly refutes their superficial interpretation of Genesis.

*In addition to rejecting the historical doctrine of dual revelation, biblicists grossly distort another doctrine important to the Reformers, that of Sola Scriptura. This doctrine did not distinguish between Scripture and other God-given sources of knowledge. Instead, it elevated Scripture over church tradition, where the latter was (and is) seen as equally important by Roman Catholicism. Despite attempts by young-earth creationists to link their biblicism to Sola Scriptura, the Protestant Reformers would have found biblicism as unbiblical and illogical as I do.

The Argument from Similarity

2010-09-13T07:02:00.000-07:00

I frequently get asked about the argument for evolution from the similarities observed in the genetic makeup of living things. Recently, the specific question was what to make of Richard Dawkins' claim that the heirarchies of similarities in the genetic record of living things provide 'undeniable proof of evolution.' Below, in part, is my answer.

The heirarchy of similarity among living things is a neutral fact and not in any way supportive of evolution or common ancestry. The understanding that Darwin sought to replace was a view known as typology. Typology said that the heirarchies of similarities we see among living things (extant and extinct) are grounded in necessity. Bats and rodents (on one level) share a suite of (mammalian) characteristics that sets them apart from all birds. On another level, bats share a smaller suite of characteristics that sets them apart from rodents. And these distinctions are adaptive and holistic. What we expect to see when we look at each part of a bat (and not just anatomically but also physiologically, behaviorally, and such) is that each contributes to bat-hood, that the membranous wings, the echolocation ability, the reproductive strategy, and such are all part and parcel of what it means to be a bat. The creature is well-designed for its role and niche. Moreover (on this view--which still remains the most reasonable view), the reason we don't see creatures that are half bat and half rodent (Darwin's predicted but yet undiscovered transitional forms) is because such a creature is non-functional and nonsensical.

This typological (and design-oriented) view did (and does) a very good job of accounting for the various levels (heirarchies) of similarity among living things. Before Darwin, biologists recognized that all living things were made of the same elements. In fact, Scripture clealy claims this, indicating that humans (in Gen. 2:7) and other animals (in Gen. 2:19) are alike made of "the dust of the Earth." This would simply be the best way of conveying to the ancient Hebrew mind that the physical components (the elements) of which all living things are made are the same elements as are found in the abiotic portions of the Earth. So the discovery (since Darwin's time) of the further similarities among living things at the level of proteins and (more basically) DNA does not in any way distinguish between the competing alternatives of theistic design (typology) and naturalistic evolution. In this regard, it is (at best) disingenuous of modern evolutionists to appeal to similarities among living things as evidence for their view. And this is especially true since what evolution was meant to explain--but has singularly failed to explain--was not the similarities but the differences.

We now know, for example, that there is more similarity in the DNA of humans and chimps than even evolutionists expected. What does this tell us? It tells us that relatively minor differences in DNA do not explain why chimpanzees are (like every other species of life on Earth) naked animals surviving from day to day in loose extended family groups while humans are civilized, uber-intelligent animals able to exploit every aspect of the Earth and to explore even the distant reaches of the universe. In fact, these deep DNA similarities should lead us to recognize that no strictly materialist explanation will ever satisfactorally account for the vast differences between chimps and humans, that there is something non-material going on here, and that scientific naturalism is false.

But perhaps I should be more to the point. Richard Dawkins finds in the DNA heirarchies common ancestry and evolution. But he finds these things not in the fact of the heirarchies but in the interpretive assumptions that he brings to them. In this way, his argument is (as all arguments from similarity are) circular. He begins by (wrongly) assuming that any similarities can be construed as evidence for common ancestry, and then when he perceives similarities, he's proved his assumptions. This, as any logician could tell you, is a fallacious way of reasoning. Simply put, taken at face value (that is, without beginning with biased assumptions), the discovery that living things exhibit a heirarchy of DNA similarities is just as (or more) amenable to a common-design inference as to a common-ancestry conclusion.

This was (inadvertently) illustrated many years ago by evolutionist Tim Berry. Frustrated by creationists' inability to understand evolution's dogma of "descent with modification," he asked his readers to picture a series of Corvettes. We see that the '56 Corvette is slightly different than the '55, and that the '57 is slightly modified from the '56, and so on. Unfortunately (for him and other evolutionists) the illustration shows just the opposite of what he wanted it to show, because we all know that each of those Corvettes was separately designed and manufactured, that the differences between them did not arise through their passing on, one to the other, slight variations.

All arguments from similarity are fallacious because they involve arguing in a vicious circle. And yet, this is really all that can be offered as support for evolution, whether of the atheistic form of Richard Dawkins or the theistic version of Francis Collins and others,

Church Fathers and Age of Creation

2010-09-08T21:29:00.000-07:00

I received a question this week about whether any of the church fathers held that the Earth and universe were very old.

In some cases, where particular passages or topics of Scripture are interpreted in different ways, there may be value in assessing how other believers throughout church history dealt with that passage or topic. Often of special interest is how the early church fathers understood things (in part because these men were largely free from the religious traditions that arose within the next generations).

And so, it is not unnatural that the question would arise regarding the beliefs of the church fathers on a controversial issue in some Christian quarters today... Is the creation young (on the order of 6 to 10 thousand years) or old (13.7 billion years)?

Let me first give three reasons why what the church fathers thought on this issue is irrelevant to the issue of how old creation is. Then, let me give their answer to a more interesting and relevant question.

First, though some of the church fathers did speculate or even hold certain beliefs about how old the creation was, they did not appeal to Scripture as teaching clearly about this. (The first Christians to claim that Scripture does teach about the age of creation were James Ussher and John Lightfoot, and this was not until the 17th century. The impetus for this unprecedented claim was the translation of the Bible into the King James English. These two men made a number of assumptions and interpretive decisions, each of which is at best dubious and at worst demonstrably false, to arrive at a date for creation of 4004 BC.)

Second, the evidence for a very ancient Earth and universe--or more precisely the ability to measure the relevant evidence--did not become available until the 19th and 20th centuries.

These two facts are why a particular view on the age of creation is not a part of historic Christianity and cannot be found in any of the church's creeds.

Third, the church fathers were (along with virtually all of their contemporaries, Christian or otherwise) wrong about a number of scientific things. Some of them believed that the Earth was flat, and most or all of them believed that the Earth was the center of the universe. (Unlike the age issue, in both of these other cases Christians appealed to evidence from both the world around them and the Scriptures to maintain these wrong views.) Today, we recognize that the Earth is more or less spherical and that it is not the center of our solar system, let alone of the entire universe. And it was science that changed our understanding and science that caused us to revise our interpretation of Scripture on these issues.

For all these reasons, what the church fathers believed about the age of the creation is both uninteresting and irrelevant. What is interesting and relevant, however, is what they believed about the reliability of God's revelations to us.

You see, for most scientists today--Christian or otherwise--it would be easier to believe in a flat Earth than one that is only thousands of years old, so varied and powerful is the evidence. And so those Christians who still follow Lightfoot and Ussher's interpretation of Scripture invariably appeal to one (or more) of three unbiblical (and unhistorical) doctrines: 1) appearance of age (that God created everything with a false appearance of age), 2) fideism (that Christian faith is a blind leap, and somehow divorced from reason and evidence), and 3) biblicism (that the Bible is the only reliable source of knowledge).

In future posts, I may examine each of these wrong views in more depth. For now, however, let me close this post (by coming full circle) with a quote from arguably the most important church father, Augustine, in which he affirms the value of science in a way that directly attacks (albeit anticipating it by 16 centuries) the biblicism and fideism (as well as the dogmatism) of modern young-earth creationists...

Usually, even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world... and his knowledge he holds to as being certain from reason and experience. Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason? (from The Literal Meaning of Genesis)

Flyin' South

2010-09-02T20:05:00.000-07:00

Well, it's that time of year again. Birds are starting to fly south, and that means I get to trap a few raptors as they migrate down the ridge near Mt. Hood. Our catch today included Sharp-shinned Hawks, Cooper's Hawks, a Red-tailed Hawk, and an American Kestrel. Each gets a uniquely-numbered leg band (which will identify it if ever captured or found dead in the future), and is measured and weighed before being released to continue its journey. It is through projects like this that we have come to know so much about the migration of these raptors.

Watching and handling these beautiful predators is part of what helps me to lean into fall and the coming cold.

Here, my daughter Aurora holds a hatch-year female Cooper's Hawk.

Back from Managua

2010-08-29T20:05:00.000-07:00

Well, it seemed like a whirlwind trip, but we're back in Central Oregon after a week in Nicaragua. We learned a great deal, and saw some amazing things that God is doing, transforming people and communities through the local churches and some compassionate long-term missionaries.

As far as service, what we mostly did was help with a powerful ministry to girls being rescued out of prostitution, loved through the healing process, and taught to provide for themselves and their families. Many of these girls have been raped and betrayed into sex slavery at a very young age, and don't know love until they encounter the love of Christ through the women who run and volunteer at House of Hope.

But rather than duplicate effort unnecessarily, let me link you to the blog of my teammate Amanda Wingers, where you will find pictures of these young women and girls, and bit more of the story.

Genealogy Redux

2010-08-24T20:43:00.000-07:00

A couple of Sundays ago, I was the guest speaker at Redux, Antioch's Q&A service. Any question is fair game, but since I'm a scientist (as well as an elder at a Bible-believing church), the questions posed to me often deal with reconciling God's Word with God's work in creation. The first question that day had to do with whether the Hebrew genealogies recorded in Genesis 5 and 11 can be used to date the origin of the human race. Here's my answer..

The Genealogies In Genesis from :redux on Vimeo.

Managua

2010-08-23T19:43:00.000-07:00

With my son, Jasper, and a team of nine from Antioch, I woke up this morning in Managua. It rained a good bit during the night (and has been raining every day). It is the rainy season, but I guess the current frequency of rain is unusual for this, the western and drier part of the country (weather comes mostly east-to-west in Nicaragua).

I woke up early to the sound of bird calls, some familiar and some new. Great-tailed Grackles are common here, and obvious, and the next bird I identified was a Social Flycatcher. Parrots, parakeets, doves, and pigeons are numerous, but I haven’t had time to identify any to species yet. There’s a smallish hummingbird just outside the window, and a family of what I take to be ant-wrens foraging under the garden trees.

The goal of our week is to learn about how God is working here in Nicaragua. We'll hope to serve a bit, with a ministry called House of Hope, which rescues girls from the prostitution that's ubiquitous in this country. We've already learned quite a bit about the Nehemiah Center, which promotes transformational development, a holistic, community-healing approach to missiology.

It's a great team I'm here with, and a privilege to be getting to know them. And our host family, the Loftsgards, are really special, and have made us feel like we're long-time members. In some respects, it's just a week carved out from the normal hum of my life, but in others it promises to be life-changing.

Nicaragua

2010-08-14T14:45:00.000-07:00

A week from today, my son Jasper and I will be on our way to Nicaragua with a team from our home church, Antioch. There'll be just 9 of us, and our destination is Managua and a consortium of ministries together at the Nehemiah Center. These include House of Hope, which rescues women and young girls from a life of forced prostitution.

We'll have opportunities to serve the House of Hope and some of the other ministries there. But more importantly, we'll simply get to meet and hang out with Christians in Central America, and to observe firsthand what God is doing in this, the second poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

A big bonus for Jasper and me will be the chance to meet a little Nicaraguan girl that our family sponsors through Compassion International. I'm really looking forward to the trip, and will try to let you know how it goes.

Snake-Catching

2010-08-04T21:53:00.000-07:00

Well, it's August, which means that my son Nathan and I are deep into our annual head-to-head snake-capturing competition. We do this based on the calendar year, though the first points aren't usually scored until March. (This year, I caught my first snake--a Gopher Snake (Pituophis catenifer)--on the 2nd of that month.) Each snake caught scores 1 point, regardless of species, but they have to be caught and handled, not just seen.

We do have a couple of special rules, however. Baby rattlesnakes need only be touched, not actually picked up (but all other rattlesnakes must be captured to count). Garter snakes (of all sizes) need only be touched as well. In their case, this rule is due to their propensity to excude a nasty-smelling musk that stays with you for some time. Nathan is rather sensitive to smells, so we could call the garter snake rule the 'Nathan Rule.'

We have two competitions, really. One is total snakes caught for the year, and the other is number of different species caught. The last couple of years, I've won the total individuals category, while Nate's taken the species crown. Oregon doesn't have a wealth of snake species, so his mark of 8 each of the last couple of years has been pretty impressive.

As for this year's contest, we haven't compared notes lately, so I'm not sure how we stand. I've been leading in total snakes most of the season, and I suspect that I'm still ahead by a half dozen or so. My total is currently at 71. All of mine are captured in the course of my daily field work, but Nathan is not above going road-hunting at night just to find snakes and try to keep up with the old man. Should he read this post and discover my total, he's liable to head for a favorite snake road yet tonight.

I'm pretty sure we're tied at the moment in the species count, with the same 7 each. Those would be Gopher Snakes, Racers (Coluber constrictor), Western Rattlesnakes (Crotalus viridis), Rubber Boas (Charina bottae), Western Terrestrial Garters (Thamnophis elegans), Common Garters (Thamnophis sirtalis), and Night Snakes (Hypsiglena torquata). We've each seen one other species, the swift and elusive Striped Whipsnake (Masticophis taeniatus), and it could be that catching one of these could decide the species contest.

I trust you'll all be rooting for me... we wouldn't want Nate to get a big head.

Here's a photo he took of a Western Rattlesnake eating an Ord's Kangaroo Rat (Dipodomys ordii).

Confusing Legality and Justice

2010-07-29T18:54:00.000-07:00

One of the characteristics of the postmodern age in which we live is a great deal of confusion on the issues of morality, justice, right and wrong. This confusion has infiltrated the church, which is not surprising. And one facet of that larger confusion is a tendency to equate legality with justice (or right) and illegality with unjust (or wrong). It came up the other day--among Christians--in this way...

The issue was immigration reform, and the pastor was bringing our attention to the fact that God--in both the Old and New Testaments--seems to care about the alien, the stranger, the foreigner, the displaced person. The pastor shared several passages--and could have shared many more--in which God called/calls His people to speak up for and have compassion upon this group of people. The response by more than one Christian listener was, in effect,

But don't you see, these people are illegal aliens--they are breaking the law.

Now, there are a number of problems with this naive, insensitive, simplistic response, but my point in this post is to point out only one. And that one is that it is a mistake to equate legality with right (moral, or just) and likewise a mistake to equate illegality with wrong (immoral, or unjust).

With a Christian, my response to such a question might be to say, "Oh, so you are in favor of abortions, huh?" Now, most followers of Christ who rightly understand that issue find it morally reprehensible to kill human persons just because they are still in the womb and we're bigger than they are. So I would hope that the Christian to whom I am talking would be taken aback by my assuming that he favors abortion. But my assuming that is my way of granting him consistency in his approach to morality. Because if he deals with the issue of immigration simply by asking himself "What does the law say?" then why wouldn't he do the same with other moral issues, like abortion? In the latter case, the law says that abortion is okay.

No, the reason we think abortion is wrong is because morality, righteousness, and justice are grounded in a higher standard--an absolute standard residing in the mind of the Creator of the universe. As Christians, we speak out against Roe v. Wade because we believe that the resulting human law is at odds with God's law regarding the sanctity of every human life.

And whether one believes in a Creator or not, the fact is that the entire legislative process seems to assume that the law as now written may be inadequate, may be in need of tweaking or improving. The reason we elect legislators is because we believe that there need to be changes made to reflect more closely still what is really right. (Of course, this is one of those areas in which street-level postmodernism is most clearly seen to be absurd. If there is no transcendent standard--no absolute morality found in God or elsewhere--then one cannot carry out legal or moral reform. One can claim to have changed the law, but one cannot claim to have improved the law.)

Immigration is an extremely complex issue, and most Americans recognize that comprehensive reform is much-needed. What bothers me is that the "Christian" voices heard most loudly on this issue seem to be simplistic and unthinking, and not at all in line with the teachings of Christ and the Bible. If there is a uniquely Judeo-Christian perspective that needs to be insinuated into this discussion, it likely has little to do with a sort of political party-line of tightening the laws, and much to do with the image of God found in every human being, including the alien about whom God so clearly reveals His concern in His Word to us.

In Memoriam

2010-07-13T15:59:00.001-07:00

Last week, my mom (Ruth Moak Gerhardt) cast off her earthly body and began to live life more fully than ever before. I had the privilege of addressing nearly 400 of her family and friends, giving them a glimpse at the perspective of her son. On behalf of my two brothers, I shared a few stories and some of her bits of wisdom, just a fraction of the things that have served to mold us into the men we have become.

The three of us boys were blessed in that Mom and Dad adopted a model--common in that day but since fallen into disfavor--in which he worked (in service to other young families as a pediatrician), while she made a home. And in that homemaking, she saw it as job 1 to raise the next generation to be men of character. As I examine my brothers, I see that her hard work was well-rewarded.

I shared three specific things about Mom that made a lasting impression on me. The first was a love of God's creation, the stars, the Earth, the plants and animals. It was through her (and her father) that my brothers and I learned a love of the outdoors, of birds and insects, mammals, and snakes, of mountains and rivers and forests and deserts. (I shared the story of the summer garden party that was interrupted by the discovery that one of the snakes she had allowed me to bring home had given birth, as evidenced by the more than 60 3-inch-long snakelings making their way across the patio and yard.)

Secondly, her love of reading. She modeled reading for pleasure and reading for instruction, and counted among her treasury both a veritable library of P.G. Wodehouse books and a collection of classic (and deep) theological works. The latter she read over and over, underlining, highlighting, and parsing arguments, and indicating on the end pages the dates of each reading and the new insights gained. (As part of the college course that I teach on critical thinking, I share principles from Mortimer Adler's How to Read a Book. These principles for getting the most out of reading were modeled in my own life by my mother.)

The third thing about which I shared--needlessly perhaps, since it was obvious to anyone who knew her at all--was the centrality to her life of a very real and vibrant personal relationship with her Lord and Savior. This, too, provided a model that has become a fundamental part of who I am. And in deciding to invest in her spiritual life, Mom did the right thing. Now, the earthly body that had so betrayed her in recent years has been discarded, and she--the soul in which her eternal person resides--is no longer encumbered by a body and brain that no longer served her well.

I know that it has become sophisticated to deny the existence of the soul. This is because many modern scientists adopt--without logical or scientific justification--the reductionist metaphysical view known as scientific materialism. Nonetheless, evidence and reason overwhelmingly support the view (also laid out in Scripture) that we are souls who have (during our tenure on Earth) bodies. The existence of the human soul as an entity that transcends our bodies and brains is supported by common sense (and the total human experience), by a variety of logical/philosophical arguments, and by the relevant evidence from science. The strongest of the latter comes from experiments and anecdotal evidence in the field of neurophysiology and from near-death experiences. Near-death experiences include numerous well-documented cases in which a person's heart and brain have ceased working (and they are declared clinically dead), they have been brought back to life, and can accurately describe in great detail independently verifiable events (elsewhere than the hospital room) that their soul witnessed during the interval in which their body and brain were dead.

In latter years, my mother's body no longer enabled her to get around and do things, and the strokes that had ravaged her brain kept her from focussing to read, from communicating or even thinking as clearly as she had in the past. When her earthly body breathed its last, Mom--the soul that is most truly her--was suddenly freed from the debilitations associated with that body and brain, and she is more truly living than she has ever lived before.

And so her friends and family celebrated her earthly life, but those of us who understand this life aright have even more cause to celebrate--the firm knowledge that her release from this life was to a better and an eternal life, purchased for her by her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

The Goodness of God

2010-07-02T20:15:00.000-07:00

It seems as though everywhere I turn, I find people either arguing against the existence of an all-loving God or trying to defend the goodness of God in bizarre ways. Darwin's theory was esentially a theodicy, an attempt to distance God the Creator from those things in nature that Darwin saw as bad or evil. Modern atheists likewise use bad theological arguments--appeals to 'bad design' or to suffering and death in nature--in attempts to deny the existence of the God of the Bible. Some Christian evolutionists (like Kenneth Miller and Francis Ayala) believe that by postulating God as having designed the evolutionary process--but then allowing it to work without His subsequent intervention--they are absolving God of having created things like parasitism and predatory behavior, and of creatures whose design they consider suboptimal. On the other end of the spectrum, many young-earth creationists deny the vast majority of scientific findings because they, too, cannot reconcile millions of years of animal death and suffering with an all-loving God.

Recently, the issue came up as a discussion thread on a list of which I'm a member. And this is a group of science-minded Christian apologists, men and women who recognize that the Earth and universe are billions of years old and who also largely or entirely reject macroevolutionary theory, recognizing it as based not on evidence but upon philosophical preference. Even some of these (otherwise clear-thinking) folks seem to feel the need to defend God from responsibility for creating 'bad' things.

It began, apparently, with a YouTube video arguing against the existence of a good God, in which the the author appealed to one of the Intelligent Design camp's main evidences for a Designer:

If God created the bacterial flagellum then he cannot be a good God. Why? The flagellum of many types of bacteria allows them to wreak havoc upon the human body. These bacteria cause, among other things, typhoid, cholera, and stomach cancer.

In response to this argument, my apologist friends offered a number of good scientific points in rebuttal. These included the facts that...

Microbes, including bacteria, play and have played key roles in the ecosystem. Given the physics of this creation, it required billions of years of bacterial activity to transform the Earth's atmosphere and oceans to make human life possible, as well as to convert toxic metals into ore deposits that are accessible and useful to humans.

Bacteria play key roles in maintaining human health. As just one example, it is now known that lack of exposure to certain microbes early in life may lead to an increased risk of both autoimmune disorders and cardiovascular disease.

Pathogenic bacteria comprise an extremely small percentage of all known species, the vast majority of which are beneficial or necessary.

Some of the human pathogenic microbes have resulted from host-jumping (e.g., HIV) or from micro-evolutionary changes.

But it seems to me that all of this misses a more important point, which is that the argument itself fails. That is, the argument does not establish a logical link between the existence of disease-causing bacteria and the existence of an all-loving God. Indeed, it seems that the person making this argument has to first assume God-like knowledge of the entire issue, and can thus assert the missing premise, that "there is no possible reason for an all-loving Creator to have included pathogenic bacteria in His creation."

What is really going on here is captured in a passage by C.S. Lewis in his essay "God in the Dock"...

The ancient man approached God (or even the gods) as the accused person approaches his judge. For the modern man the roles are reversed. He is the judge: God is in the dock. He is quite a kindly judge: if God should have a reasonable defence for being the god who permits war, poverty, and disease, he is ready to listen to it. The trial may even end in God's acquittal. But the important thing is that Man is on the Bench and God in the Dock.

To put it a slightly different way, the God who has revealed Himself in the Judeo-Christian Scriptures (and in His creation) is far bigger than our petty likes and dislikes. He declares Himself to be the Creator of all things, and unapologetically claims responsibility for predatory behavior in the animal kingdom (as in Ps. 104:21, 27-30; Job 38:39-41; 39:26-30) and for diseases, famines, and calamities (e.g., Is. 45:7).

The existence of the all-powerful, all-loving God of Christianity is supported by overwhelming evidence wherever we look, and that God calls us to seek a deeper understanding of Him and His ways. But complete understanding by our finite, contingent minds of His infinite, necessary one is not to be expected (Is. 55:8-9). It is human pride that seeks to reverse the roles and make the infinite Creator of the universe answerable to the relatively ignorant rantings of the dependent creature. Those rantings seem reasonable only to those who begin by denying or remaining largely ignorant of most of what Scripture and the creation reveal about the nature and majesty of God.

World Cup Favorites

2010-06-24T21:16:00.000-07:00

Regular readers visit this blog expecting to find thoughtful apologetics, evidence and reason demonstrating that the world we live in really is the one most accurately described by the Christian worldview. But the World Cup is currently taking place, and so what you'll get today is another (likewise thoughtful) post about soccer.

I've followed a good deal of the coverage (mostly on the radio, but some on the telly), and listened to a variety of wags discussing the favorites. Many named European teams like England, Spain, the Dutch and the Portuguese, Germany, and even France and Italy. Brazil and Argentina have been in the conversation, of course, but not usually given the nod as the favorites.

Nearing the end of the first stage (group play), France and Italy are headed home, Spain is still on the bubble, and Germany and England have barely made it to the next round. Of the European teams, only the Netherlands have won all three of their games, while Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay have impressed, and Chile and Paraguay are also undefeated. So the talk has turned to the unexpected bad play of European nations and the unlooked-for success of teams from South America.

In all of this coverage, I have not heard a single expert mention the one historical fact with which I began my understanding of this year's World Cup...

The World Cup has been held 18 times previously, half of them in Europe and half of them outside of Europe. No European team has ever won the World Cup when it has been held outside of Europe. If held in South America, the Cup has invariably been won by a South American nation. If held in Mexico, the United States, Japan/South Korea, it has been a South American team and not one of the European powerhouses that has lifted the Jules Rimet Trophy*. And in my lifetime, or (let's put it this way instead) in the past five decades, the nation winning the Cup when held outside of Europe has been either Brazil or Argentina.

So, regardless of what kind of squad Spain or the Netherlands or Germany can put on the field in South Africa this year, it seems that history dictates that the conversation about the front-runner to win the Cup begin with Brazil and Argentina. And so far, the person picking these two as the favorites is looking pretty good.

Now, I realize that this situation will not last forever, that some year (perhaps even this) a European team will break through for the win on a foreign continent. After all, four teams will make it to the semifinals, and it is highly unlikely that Europe will be shut out of the final four. And anyone who follows the world's most popular sport will know that in a given game, anything can happen.

Nonetheless, what we can say at this point is that up until now, European nations have not travelled well, at least not well enough to lift the Cup. Add to that the strength of this year's teams from Brazil, Argentina, and even Uruguay--and the weaknesses of the best European teams (Spain's history of under-achieving, Germany's relative inexperience, the aging of England's stars)--and one should not be surprised to find a South American team celebrating the victory on July 11.

* What they're actually playing for now is called the FIFA World Cup Trophy. When, in 1970, Brazil became the first 3-time winners, they got to take the original trophy, the Jules Rimet, home for good. It was, however, stolen in 1983, and has never been recovered.

Barriers to U.S. Soccer Prowess

2010-06-18T07:07:00.000-07:00

Today at the World Cup, the nation with the smallest population of those who qualified for the tournament is playing against the nation with the largest population. And yet the Slovenian team will undoubtedly give the United States a tough battle, and could win. What's more, more American kids play soccer than play any other sport. So why is it that the U.S. men's national team is not more competitive, or even dominant, in international soccer?

There are, of course, more answers to this question than I have time or space to enumerate, so I'll limit this post to mentioning a few that I find either interesting or under-appreciated. The approach I'll take is to consider the talent pool--those millions of American kids playing the sport--and how it dwindles, eventually to become no better than that of a small eastern European country.

1) The best American athletes, those with the athleticism that suggests the potential to play sport at the professional level, are (usually by the time they reach high school) shunted away from soccer and into football, basketball, or baseball, sports that not only receive more attention at the high school but which are much more lucrative at the professional level.

2) Ironically, while soccer is less lucrative at the American professional level, it has become primarily a rich-kid's sport at the youth level. Playing competitively with a club team requires that a child's family invest a good deal of money each season (and there are seasons year-round) for state and league costs, team fees, uniforms, coaching, and travel and hotel costs. One result of this is that many of those kids whose families care about no other sport (in my part of the country this would include especially second-generation Mexican immigrants) are closed out from that part of the talent pool that has the best chance of improving (through good coaching and good competition).

3) So the total potential talent pool has dwindled by the time it gets to college, having excluded most poor kids (including many for whom soccer is the only sport they want to play) and having lost many of the most athletic to the three more American sports. Nonetheless, there is still a good deal of excellent soccer being played at the college level. But at this point, the best college players have a decision to make. Do they opt to play in the MLS, the only domestic league, and one in which only the few elite players make the sort of money usually associated with professional sport? Or do they commit to spending their twenties and thirties in Europe, either playing in England or in a country on the continent where they speak a different language? Many of the best American college soccer players at this point decide instead to go to medical school or law school or to start a business or otherwise establish a career with the training they have obtained in college. This, of course, further dilutes the pool of talent available to the National Team.

4) At the professional level, the American men playing soccer are now spread over the world, some playing (or riding the bench) for first-division European clubs, others starring (or at least playing) for MLS teams. It is extremely difficult to assess the relative merits of players in these diverse situations. Everyone recognizes that the MLS is an inferior league, but is it comparable to the English second-tier league or their third? Does playing part-time for a first-division European team signify a better player than one who starts and even excels in the MLS? How one answers these questions has had a huge role in determining the make-up of the National Team, and whether the powers that be have generally answered them correctly is quite debatable.

5) And this is because assessing the best players in soccer is much more speculative and subjective than in most (if not all) other sports. In baseball, every individual can be assessed rather equally based on the percentage of times they have gotten a hit or been walked in a large volume of at-bats. Football try-outs involve extensive tests of speed, strength, and specific skills. Basketball, too, involves a whole set of skills and performance histories that can be assessed rather objectively, with little room for substituting subjective opinion. By contrast, the value of a given soccer player often has very little to do with easily-assessed parameters, and only a few players (like the goalkeeper and strikers) can be adequately assessed by their staistics (goals allowed or goals scored). So the final selection of the National Team involves very subjective decisions, and deserving players are invariably left off the team and players that are truly unable to compete at that high level end up playing key roles in the most important international tournament.

Again, there are many other things that could be discussed, but those are a few of the reasons that Slovenia can give the United States a game in the World Cup.

Final score: 2-2

Bad Theology, Too

2010-05-30T19:31:00.000-07:00

I guess I feel the need for one more post before leaving the issue of Noah's flood and modern misunderstandings about it. We have seen that belief in a global flood a few thousand years ago involves bad hermeneutics. That is, the dating of the flood as occurring approximately 5,000 years ago is based upon imposing a false modern understanding of the role of genealogies upon Hebrew genealogies in Scripture that were never meant to play such a role. Likewise, understanding the flood as covering the entire planet is also anachronistic, and depends upon prefering a superficial reading of the text to one that does justice to the intent and context of the passage.

But there's perhaps a more basic problem at the back of 'flood geology' and modern attempts to insist that a recent global flood can account for all the geology, paleontology, and biology of Earth's history. This position begins and ends with bad theology, a view of God that is both unbiblical and unsupportable.

Let me, before quoting some folks who ascribe to this bad theology, first paraphrase it...

An all-powerful, all-loving, all-knowing God would not have created a universe in which animal suffering and death occurred for millions of years. God could have no place or purpose for such suffering.

Now here's the really interesting thing about this view of God. Those who hold or have held this view include not only young-earth creationists but also Darwin and his modern defenders. That is, both Darwin (and Darwinists) and global-flood advocates cannot in their minds reconcile their view of God with millions of years of animal suffering. Of course, the two groups explain the problem away differently: Darwinists acknowledge the millions of years of animal death attested to in the record of nature, and choose to deny the existence of God, whereas young-earth creationists acknowledge God's existence but deny the millions of years.

Darwin's theory was, in essence, a theodicy, an attempt to deal with the so-called problem of evil and suffering.* In On the Origin of Species, he offered a great deal of very speculative theorizing, almost nothing in the way of evidential support, and a good smattering of bad theological arguments. The following comes from his autobiography:

Suffering is quite compatible with the belief in Natural Selection, which is not perfect in its action, but tends only to render each species as successful as possible in the battle for life with other species, in wonderfully complex and changing circumstances.

That there is much suffering in the world no one disputes. Some have attempted to explain it in reference to human beings, imagining that it serves their moral improvement. But the number of people in the world is nothing compared with the numbers of all other sentient beings, and these often suffer greatly without any moral improvement. A being so powerful and so full of knowledge as a God who could create the universe is to our finite minds omnipotent and omniscient. It revolts our understanding to suppose that his benevolence is not unbounded, for what advantage can there be in the sufferings of millions of lower animals throughout almost endless time? This very old argument from the existence of suffering against the existence of an intelligent First Cause seems to me a strong one; and the abundant presence of suffering agrees well with the view that all organic beings have been developed through variation and natural selection.

As you see here--and throughout Darwin's writings, the appeal is made not to evidence supporting his theory but to his how his particular view of God argues against that God existing. Now here's a sample from Henry Morris, co-author of The Genesis Flood and late president of The Institute for Creation Research:

What conceivable purpose could God have had in interposing a billion years of suffering and death in the animal kingdom prior to implementing His great plan of salvation for lost men and women? He is neither cruel nor capricious, and would never be guilty of such pointless sadism.

James Stambaugh, also of the Institute for Creation Research, echoes Morris' theology:

If God created a world in which the creatures that inhabit it must suffer from evil (at least physical and emotional), then this evil has been present from the very beginning. This means that God is either powerless to do away with this kind of world or that He enjoys seeing His creatures suffer. A god who could create the world "subjected to vanity and corruption" is exactly like all the other gods of the ancient world--cruel, vicious, and capricious. In short, this god is not the God of the Bible.

Morris again:

One of the hardest things to understand is how anyone who claims to believe in a God of love can also believe in the geological ages, with their supposed record of billions of years of suffering and death before sin came into the world. This seems clearly to make God a God of waste and cruelty rather than a God of wisdom and power and love.

There's a great deal that could be said against this view, and a host of Scriptures that argue against it. And then the Darwin quote above has enough misunderstandings, mischaracterizations, and bad reasoning to take up a couple of blog posts. Indeed, I could take several posts answering the question Darwin (and Morris) asked, 'What reasons could there be for God's allowing billions of years of death?'

But for now let me just drive home what these men have in common... They have placed themselves in judgment over God, rather than allow Him the sovereignty He claims in Scripture.

Wherever animal death and predatory behavior are mentioned in Scripture (as in God's dialogue with Job and in Psalm 104), God unapologetically claims responsibility for it. Likewise, throughout the Bible, God claims responsibility for the natural disasters that cause so much human and animal calamity, floods, earthquakes, and tornadoes. And nowhere does Scripture suggest that this is a response on God's part to Adam's sin, a sort of cosmic Plan B. Instead, the God of Scripture claims to be unwavering in His purpose:

I am God, and there is no other, I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, 'My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose, calling a bird of prey from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country. I have spoken, and I will bring it to pass; I have purposed, and I will do it.' (Is. 46:9-11)

In the final analysis, the inaccurate theology of Morris and other young-earth creationists begins with the declaration that 'the God whom I worship could have no place for such suffering!' But this is exactly the claim for which the Lord Himself rebuked Peter (in Matthew 16). Peter had rightly acknowledged that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God, and for this affirmation had received the Lord's blessing. But immediately after this, Jesus reveals that He will go up to Jerusalem to suffer and die. Peter's response to this is "Far be it from you, Lord!" In other words, "My understanding of God cannot be reconciled with the suffering you (Lord) just described."

Whether we like it or not, whether we understand it completely or not, the God of the Bible has purposes for allowing suffering in this creation (though He promises another, better one in which suffering will have no part). Indeed, the central event in all of cosmic history is at the same time the quintessential example of suffering, that of God Himself upon a Roman cross.

Young-earth creationism and global flood geology begin with a distortion of God's revelation to us with regard to His perfect purposes in allowing suffering in this creation. We would do better to conform our theology to Scripture than to interpret Scripture in ways that conform to our pet theologies.**

*The works of Cornelius Hunter (Darwin's God and Darwin's Proof) explore in depth the theological nature of the original arguments of Darwin and of the arguments made by his modern admirers.

**An outstanding treatment of the theology behind young-earth creationism is Mark Whorton's Peril in Paradise. It's a great read!

Scope of the Flood (Part 3)

2010-05-23T18:22:00.000-07:00

We've seen that the hermeneutic principle used by some today to conclude that the flood described in Genesis 6-8 must be understood as covering the entire planet is too subjective to be useful. We have further seen that a number of absurd ideas are offered as necessary support for such a belief. We have traced the history of the global flood idea to its recent source, the founder of Seventh Day Adventism in the late 1800's. Finally, we have discussed more foundational and well-accepted interpretive principles, including the one that says that

The context establishes limits on the scope of a passage.

What's left is to look at how this principle is applied to a number of Scripture passages, including the flood account. In fact, let's begin with the flood account, to remind us how the all-encompassing verbiage can tempt a modern, globally-oriented person to wrongly attribute to the passage a planet-wide scope.

The flood continued forty days on the earth. The waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high above the earth. The waters prevailed and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the face of the waters. And the waters prevailed so mightily on the earth that all the high mountains under the whole heaven were covered. The waters prevailed above the mountains, covering them fifteen cubits deep. And all flesh died that moved on the earth, birds, livestock, beasts, all swarming creatures that swarm on the earth, and all mankind. Everything on the dry land in whose nostrils was the breath of life died. He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the ground, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens. They were blotted out from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those who were with him in the ark. (Gen. 7:17-23)

It's pretty easy to see that the language in this passage can--when read superficially--lead to understanding the flood as global. But no ancient would have understood it that way, and to read it aright we must allow the context--all humanity--to establish limits on the scope. We do this very naturally with a host of other Scripture passages that have similar all-encompassing language. Here are a few examples.

Right after greeting the Christians at Rome, Paul writes (in Rom. 1:8),

First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world.

No scholar or commentator interprets Paul here as including far-flung people groups such as the Maoris of New Zealand or the Inuits of North America. Instead, they (and we) unconciously recognize the context of Paul's letter as constraining the scope to the known world of Paul and his readers, the Roman Empire. As another example, here's what we read in I Kings 10:24,

And the whole earth sought the presence of Solomon to hear his wisdom, which God had put into his mind.

In reading this, do you envision pilgrims coming from Machu Pichu to check out Solomon's kingdom and question him? Of course not. You recognize that the context establishes the scope to be the region surrounding the Israel of Solomon's day.

How about an example from the same book of the Bible in which the flood account is recorded? In Genesis 41:57, we find,

Moreover, all the earth came to Egypt to Joseph to buy grain, because the famine was severe over all the earth.

Note that this is the exact same language that in Genesis 7 causes modern readers to see the flood as global. But no one that I know would spend any time trying to defend the interpretation that the famine of Joseph's day was planet-wide. What's the difference? With regard to the famine, we rightly allow the context to establish the scope. And we must do the same with the flood if we are to avoid the absurdities that arise out of a global flood view.

Many of us, of course, bring to the flood account other issues. We retain in our mind visual images of the ark containing pairs of animals of all kinds, including kangaroos and penguins, elephants and aardvarks, animals that most certainly would not have been a part of Noah's scope. Moreover, the people who taught us the story of Noah's ark when we were children were probably some of the nicest, most well-meaning Christians we have known. None of this changes the fact that if we are to take the Bible seriously we must give up childish ways and apply to it the common sense and well-established interpretive principles that will prevent us from coming to inaccurate conclusions.

If you're still struggling with understanding the flood as encompassing all humanity but nonetheless inundating only the Mesopotamian Plain, here're a few tips...

1) Where the word 'earth' appears (in the Gen. 7 passage at the start of the post), substitute the word 'land' or 'ground.' Each is an appropriate translation of the Hebrew word erets. Part of the problem is that when we today read the word 'earth,' we tend to think of the 'third planet in our solar system' whereas that picture of a planet would never have occurred to any ancient hearers/readers. Erets is interchangeably translated as 'ground,' 'land,' or 'earth' (and can also be used to refer to a plot of ground or even to the soil), but translating it here as 'earth' unnecessarily conjures up (for us) images of a planet.

2) In reading the passage, keep in mind not God's (omnipresent) perspective but that of Noah and all of the humanity experiencing the deluge. For them--as the passage very graphically portrays--there was water everywhere, with no ground in sight (not even the highest mountains of that inhabited region), and no creature remaining alive in all the affected region. In this context, so sudden and widespread was that flood judgment that there was no escape for man nor beast.

One more Scripture passage may suffice to drive the point home, as it comes from the flood account itself. In Genesis 8, we read the same descriptive words, but now applying not to water but to lack of water:

So Noah knew that the waters had subsided from the earth... In the six hundred and first year, in the first month, the first day of the month, the waters were dried from off the earth. ...and behold, the face of the earth was dry. In the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth had dried out. (Gen. 8:11-14)

It is illegitimate to insist upon a global interpretation of the flood waters in chapter 7 and then not to apply the same hermeneutic to the lack of water in chapter 8. Yet is it not obvious that the 'the earth had dried out' cannot intend to convey that the entire planet was now dry? The correct understanding, and the one that covers both the flood and the subsequent subsiding of the waters, is that a particular area is in view, the area inhabited by humanity at the time of the flood judgment.

The flood of Noah's day was universal--applying to all humanity. But understanding it as also being global involves logical absurdities and bad hermeneutics. Insisting upon a global flood interpretation is to place artificial barriers between educated people and the actual claims of true, historic Christianity.

Scope of the Flood (Part 2)

2010-05-18T07:02:00.000-07:00

(This is about the 6th post in a series on modern misunderstandings--especially among evangelical Christians--about the flood of Noah's day. The series was motivated by a recent claim of the discovery of Noah's ark. The new reader would do well to scroll down and read the series in order to better understand this post.)

Unlike the subjective hermeneutic principle of John MacArthur ("If the plain sense makes sense, seek no other"), the two interpretive principles I want to discuss today are well-accepted by Bible scholars and fundamental to understanding any passage of Scripture. We will apply them to the flood account of Genesis 6-8, specifically with regard to the scope of the flood. These principles apply not only to understanding the Bible, but should be used with any written document (the Constitution of the United States, Moby Dick, or whatever). These two principles are closely related, so closely, in fact, that I will state them as one:

At the outset, establish the intent and the context of the passage in question.

So, arguably the first thing one should ask about Genesis 6-8 is a series of questions like, "What's it there for? Why did the ancient author include this account? (How does it fit with the author's larger project and purpose?) What is it about?" These are questions of intent, and if we ignore or miss the author's intent, we are much more likely to miss his meaning, which is what we ought to be after.

The intent of the flood account is to describe God's judgment on sinful humanity. I won't spend time supporting this claim, since it is so well-recognized by such a broad spectrum of serious Bible scholars. That is, if there is a more central purpose (intent) to this passage, the burden of proof would seem to lie with the proponent of that other purpose. What I will take the time to point out is what the intent of this passage is not.

It is not a hydrological treatise. Though it mentions water a great deal, and says some things about where the flood waters came from and departed to, its intent is to describe God's judgment on sinful humanity.

It is not a geological or paleontological explanation. Finding in Genesis 6-8 (as Ellen G. White, Henry Morris, John Whitcomb, and others have found) a way of explaining away the record from creation itself (the fossil and geological records) is completely ad hoc and foreign to the purposes of the ancient author.

It is not a biological treatise. It was not meant to explain the diversity of life on Earth as seen at present. Nor was its intent to offer instructions on captive breeding, animal husbandry, or other aspects of conservation biology. Its purpose was to describe God's judgment on sinful humanity.

The second thing that needs to be established is the context. The context, in a very real sense, flows out of the intent, and in this case (as in many others) the context and scope will be seen to be very similar.

The flood account claims to deal with God's judgment of sinful humanity, and the scope and context of that judgment is made very clear. The context is all humanity. All humans living at the time of Noah (with the exception of the 8 members of his immediate family) were judged by God to be exceedingly wicked, and were destroyed in the flood described here.

Given the context of all humanity, the question of scope then becomes,

Does the passage necessarily describe a global flood--one that somehow covered the entire planet--as modern readers are tempted to assume, or does it describe a more localized flood, but one which encompassed all humanity of that time?

There is a good deal to be said on behalf a local flood. Considering the larger context (including the passages of the Bible that precede and follow the flood account) reveals the following:

1) The exceeding wickedness of the humanity of that day included murder and the failure to obey the dominion mandate (to multiply and fill the earth).

2) Humanity had not spread far from its place of origin. (There are no place names given in the run-up to the flood account that refer to locations outside of Mesopotamia.) Indeed, humanity's spread to other parts of the planet is described by Scripture as taking place only after the Tower of Babel incident, which follows the flood. (The latest archeological and genetic evidence fit very nicely with the Bible's, so long as one does not impose an unsupportable, recent date on them. According to those evidences, the spread of humans to Europe and Asia did not occur until a mere 30-40 thousand years ago, with the spread of people into the Americas happening about 11-13 thousand years ago.)

In addition, a local flood (but one that was nonetheless universal to all humanity) fits all of the available evidence (both from Scripture and from the creation itself) very well. A global flood, on the other hand, runs into all sorts of evidential problems, so much so that proponents of a global flood (young-earth creationists) end up promalgating a host of bizarre doctrines, each of which is ad hoc and not found in Scripture. These include the idea that the Earth was almost entirely flat prior to the flood and that all of the plate tectonics evident to geologists and paleogeologists occurred during the flood.

They include the doctrine that there were far fewer species at that time and that what we see today is the result of extremely rapid adaptation that occurred after the ark came to rest. Meant to account for the obvious lack of space on the ark for the millions of terrestrial species that have inhabited the Earth, this young-earth doctrine involves a rate of evolution that exceeds by orders of magnitude that in which the staunchest evolutionist would believe.

Similarly, the young-earth and global flood view seems to depend upon the ideas that there were only representative "kinds" of dinosaurs on the ark, that these were probably "teenage" or young dinosaurs (not fully grown Brachiosaurus), which subsequently evolved at extremely rapid rates to account for the much greater number of dinosaur species found in the fossil record.

Another, related bizarre doctrine used to defend the global flood position is the idea that all animals were created as vegetarians. I'm not making this stuff up. Ken Ham and other "creation scientists" insist that lions and eagles were originally plant-eaters, though everything about the physiology and anatomy of these creatures is perfectly designed for capturing, consuming, and digesting other animals.

Now, as a Christian you may choose to believe such nonsense, but it is not "plainly taught" by Scripture, even though the most important reason offered for holding this view is that it is the plain sense of the flood account. In the next post, we'll look at the parts of the passage that make modern readers overlook the context and jump to the conclusion that the entire planet was involved. We'll look at other Bible passages that have similar all-inclusive language but for which we all recognize the context as limiting or narrowing the scope.

In the meantime, I urge you not to promote a global flood as a part of Christian belief. It is not, and never has been. Indeed, it is belief that the Bible teaches such silliness that keeps many unbelievers from considering Christianity's true claims and leads many young people raised in the church to abandon Christian belief when they finally come to reason through this issue and to become aware of the overwhelming contrary evidence.

Scope of the Flood

2010-05-11T21:25:00.000-07:00

Well, I got pretty busy for a few days, but I think I promised in the last post to address another huge misunderstanding about the flood of Noah's day, the one recorded in Genesis 6-8. This misunderstanding exists especially among conservative (Bible-believing) English-speaking Christians, but its popularity among such Christians has led many unbelievers to assume that it is what the Bible teaches. That is, this misunderstanding presents a significant barrier among educated people to considering the central claims of Christianity, like the deity, substitutionary atonement, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. I'm talking, of course, about the idea that the flood encompassed the entire planet.

Where did this idea come from? Well, it came (and comes) from a particular interpretation of Genesis 6-8, but one that didn't gain any traction until the late 1800's. Throughout church history up until that time, no one seriously claimed for this passage a global scope. But by the late 19th century, a couple of things began to change. For one thing, people came increasingly to see the world in global terms, as crossing from one side of the planet to the other became realistic. It was perhaps inevitable that modern readers would begin to interpret this passage from a global perspective that would have been completely foreign to previous generations. In addition, a host of evidence from the sciences--particularly from geology and paleontology--began to call in to question another interpretation held dear by many Christians of that time, that the earth and universe were created in six 24-hour days only some 6,000 years ago.

The first person recorded as claiming that the flood of Noah's day covered the entire planet and could be used to explain (away) the geologic and fossil records was Ellen G. White, the prophetess and founder of Seventh Day Adventism. She claimed to receive revelations directly from God in her frequent trance-like visions, and her followers considered the resulting pronouncements to be on an authoritative par with the Bible itself. According to historian Ronald L. Numbers (The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific Creationism)

Because of their distinctive Sabbath doctrine, Adventists adamantly opposed any scientific theory that proposed interpreting the days of creation symbolically. To follow "infidel geologists" in supposing that the events described in Genesis 1 "required seven vast, indefinite periods for their accomplishment, strikes directly at the foundation of the Sabbath of the fourth commandment," argued White. "It makes indefinite and obscure that which God has made very plain."

One of White's disciples was an amateur geologist named George McCready Price, and in 1923 he authored a geology textbook, The New Geology, whose main thesis was that the flood was the central geological event of Earth's history. In part because of his Adventist roots and his lack of credentials, Price's book received little attention. But in 1961, theologian John Whitcomb and hydrology engineer Henry Morris resurrected Price's ideas in The Genesis Flood, a heavy tome with all the trappings of a scientific publication. This book garnered a much wider readership, at least among conservative Christians desperate for an argument against evolution and scientific naturalism but unable to reason through the arguments and evidence for themselves. Indeed, for a particular group of people--conservative American evangelicals--this book was so influential that it led to the proliferation of so-called creation science organizations, groups dedicated not to doing good science but to filtering all scientific evidence through the very fine filter of their modern interpretation of Genesis. Their starting point was and remains that the Earth and universe are only thousands of years old and that the flood of Noah's day was global (and thus explains away all of the scientific evidence that seems to show a much older Earth).

Interestingly, the hermeneutic grounding of this position remains very similar to Ellen G. White's personal, subjective approach. John MacArthur, for example, who without any scientific understanding maintains a young-earth and global flood view, grounds those in the hermeneutic dictum

If the plain sense makes sense, seek no other.

The first significant problem with this principle is that it is subjective. To whom must the plain sense make sense? Let's acknowledge (for the sake of argument) that a plain sense reading of Genesis 6-8 might include a global scope for the flood. That sense didn't make sense to any readers of this passage until very recently, when we began to see the world in global terms. More importantly, it doesn't make sense to me, or to anyone else with a modicum of understanding about the planet on which we actually live. It doesn't make sense to geologists or hydrologists or anyone who takes seriously the idea that God has faithfully revealed Himself both through Scripture and through the creation. In short. MacArthur's principle is too subjective to be valid.

In addition, this principle is not a well-recognized one among Bible scholars, but seems to be an ad hoc principle, one established in order to support dubious interpretations like that of a global flood. There are other hermeneutic principles that are both more important and more universally accepted that would seem to make MacArthur's unnecessary and ineffectual.

In the next post, I'll discuss two such principles as they relate to the flood, considering the intent of the passage and considering the context of the passage. I hope to show that ignoring both of these very basic interpretive principles is fundamental to arriving at the conclusion that Noah's flood encompassed the entire planet.

I hope you'll hang with me, even though these posts are lengthy.

Hebrew Genealogies

2010-05-07T20:39:00.000-07:00

One of the most important rules of Biblical hermeneutics is that the modern reader must not place on the ancient text modern or cultural standards that didn't apply in the time of the writing. The writers of the gospels, when retelling an account of a dialogue or teaching of Jesus, frequently disagree in the exact wording attributed to Him. In our day and culture, this would be considered misquoting, and could even be grounds for a lawsuit. But the standards of Jesus' day were different, and in 'quoting' someone else the goal was to be faithful to their meaning, not to their exact wording.

Those today who use the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 to attempt to date the people and events of pre-Abrahamic history (including Noah's flood) are guilty of the same sort of thing--placing an inappropriate modern expectation on an ancient account.

Today, when we compile a genealogy, the goal is completeness; we attempt to fill in a name to account for every generation from whenever that list begins right down to our generation. And so the temptation, when reading the genealogies presented in Scripture, is to expect that their goal was the same. But it was not. Moreover, because we tend to get glassy-eyed when we come to those portions of Scripture devoted to genealogies, we don't bother to study them, to compare them, or to try to understand them.

If we did take the time to study them, we would find that the genealogies presented in the Bible are not and were never intended to be complete, exhaustive lists of ancestry. Instead, they were meant to establish lineage by highlighting key figures linking one individual with another. The genealogies found in Scripture are commonly--if not invariably--telescoped, a process in which some names are included and others are omitted for brevity's sake or as unnecessary for establishing the particular claim being made (whether that claim has primarily familial, religious, or political purpose).

Key to understanding this telescoping of the genealogies is the recognition that the Hebrew words generally translated 'father,' 'son,' and 'begat' (or 'became the father of') and their Greek New Testament counterparts have much broader meaning than the precise ones the English words have. The Hebrew ab covers not only father but also grandfather or ancestor; ben means not only son but grandson or descendent; yalad does not mean precisely 'gave birth to,' but rather 'became the ancestor of' or 'gave rise to the line of.'

Interestingly, we accept (at least subconsciously) the concept of telescoping even in English, as when we read the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew 1:1,

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

This is a typical Hebrew genealogy. It takes the identical form as that of genealogies throughout Scripture. It is not meant to convey the number of generations between Abraham and Jesus, but merely to establish ancestry. In this case, it is so obvious even to the modern reader that we are not even tempted to apply to it our own expectations of genealogies. But when we turn to a longer Hebrew genealogy, we may be tempted to treat it as an exhaustive list.

We must avoid this temptation. In almost every case (or perhaps all cases) where there is enough other biblical evidence to assess the completeness of a genealogy recorded in Scripture, we discover that telescoping has occurred. In addition, no clues are ever given as to whether or not a particular genealogy is complete (in modern terms) or telescoped. And the amount of telescoping can be quite significant in terms of generations omitted. Nonetheless, comparison among genealogies and assessing other historical evidence from Scripture leads to the conclusion (by conservative Bible scholars) that biblical genealogies are generally not less than 10% complete.*

There really is no longer any debate among serious Bible scholars about the fact that most Biblical genealogies are telescoped. Nonetheless, proponents of a young Earth (and of a global flood 4,800 years ago) insist that the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 are special, that they really are intended to be exhaustive. In part, this is naivete or ignorance about what I have discussed above. Henry Morris, for example, writes

The record [of Genesis 5] is perfectly natural and straightforward and is obviously intended to give both the necessary genealogical data to denote the promised lineage and also the only reliable chronological framework we have for the antediluvian period of history.

Morris here presumes that these genealogies are complete; he does not provide any reason for believing it. As we have seen, understanding Biblical genealogies makes it anything but "natural," "straightforward," or "obvious" that Morris' interpretation is correct. Indeed, comparison of the Genesis 11 genealogy with the one in Luke 3 demonstrates that the former is telescoped, since it omits (at least) the name Cainan (between Shelad and Arphaxad).

One thing sets the genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11 apart from most, the addition (to the normal formula) of information about the age at fatherhood and the age at death of the people listed. Neither this nor anything else in the text necessitates understanding these genealogies as complete. As in other places in Scripture, the inclusion of these ages is done only because they are exceptional, and because the Hebrew culture recognized both old age and old fatherhood as signs of blessedness. The four different genealogies of Moses, Aaron, and Miriam (Ex. 6:16-20, Num. 26:57-59, I Chron. 6:1-3, and 23:6, 12-13) likewise include personal details like age at death, yet these genealogies can be shown to be only 20 to 40 percent complete (highly telescoped).

The claims of Morris and others notwithstanding, Scripture does not enable us to date the creation, the flood of Noah's day, or any other pre-Abrahamic events. Evidence from the creation itself (God's other revelation to us) does allow us to set some limits on these events. And a date of 4,800 years ago for the flood (that claimed by those who alledgedly discovered the ark) is way outside those limits.

In the next post in this fun series, I'll revisit the misconception that the flood of Noah's day should be understood as global in its scope.

* Bible scholars that recognize that Hebrew genealogies are telescoped place the date for the creation of Adam at between 30,000 and 60,000 years ago, a date that matches well with the relevant evidence from archaeology, anthropology, genetics, and other fields.

Wrong Date, Too

2010-05-04T07:12:00.001-07:00

Okay, I'll cut straight to the chase today. The next main reason for doubting the recent claims of having found Noah's ark is that

Just as the location of the alledged ark discovery, so, too, the dating of the ark is wrong--fitting perfectly with expectations that arise from a (popular, widespread) misinterpretation of Scripture rather than what would be expected by archaeologists and serious students of the Bible.

While the Bible lends itself to verification and falsification by specifying historical people and places, it never gives dates. The calendar dates by which we order our lives (B.C. and A.D.) are very recently derived, and would, of course, have been unavailable to the human authors of the various books that make up the Bible. The closest Scripture comes to specifying dates is to fix an event in a particular year of the reign of some well-known ruler. And this sort of date fixing didn't become feasible until the point at which humanity had begun to order itself into kingdoms, which was a rather later development. The point is that the Genesis accounts--including the account of the flood--do not attempt to fix dates for the events they describe.

This is not to say that we cannot arrive at dates for some of the events recorded in Genesis. Historical, archaeological, and anthropological evidence can, in some cases, be aligned with the Bible's accounts to estimate the timing of certain events and people. There remains, to be sure, some controversy about the exact date of the exodus (of Moses and the Israelites from Egyptian captivity), but the two dates at issue are not all that far apart. And most Bible scholars and archaeologists accept that the "Ur of the Chaldeans" from which Abraham was called by God to move is the important city in southern Mesopotamia that flourished from about 3000 to 1900 B.C. But dating any events or people described in Scripture prior to Abraham can only be done in very general terms, that is, within very broad limits.

And even though the chronological limits placed on the flood are necessarily broad, they do not include a date as recent as only 4,800 years ago. A host of evidence from archaeology, anthropology, and even (now) genetics, places the spread of humanity that occurred not only post-flood but post-Babel at between 9,000 and 40,000 years ago. So, if neither Scripture itself nor the available corroborating evidence provides a date for Noah of 4,800 years ago, where does that date come from? Well, if you're tracking with this series of posts, you'll have by now guessed that it comes from a rather modern (but popular) misinterpretation or superficial reading of Scripture.

Ask many conservative evangelical Christians how they come to the conclusion that the Earth and universe are only thousands of years old--and that, therefore, the flood of Noah's day dates to about 4,800 years ago--and an important part of their answer will be the idea that the names and ages in the Hebrew genealogies (of Scripture generally and of Gen. 5 and Gen. 11 in particular) can be set end-to-end and summed to arrive at such dates. As I will flesh out in the next post, this idea involves a misassumption about Hebrew genealogies and is demonstrably false. It persists in modern circles, however, because studying and testing it involves greater effort than does reading the text superficially.

But by now you can understand why I immediately dismiss the recent reports of an ark that dates to 4,800 years ago on Mt. Ararat. Both the date and the place match perfectly with popular expectations but miss by miles and thousands of years the place and date that a careful study of Scripture and the relevant evidence predict.

Ark in the Wrong Place

2010-05-02T20:01:00.000-07:00

In the last post, I claimed that it was highly improbable that remains of Noah's ark had been found. The only reason I gave was that such a find would be unexpected based simply on the fact that it would be from a much earlier period than any other of the many biblical artifacts so far discovered. I suggested that it was the sensation that such a find would represent--not its likelihood--that causes people to search for it and make claims of having discovered it.

I should perhaps have added that I find it highly unlikely that the sturdy wood used to build it would have been left unused throughout the intervening millenia. If we take the Bible's account as true (which I do), we will know that God promised Noah that He would never again use a flood to wipe out humanity. There was, therefore, no need to keep a large boat lying around, and I expect that the timbers were reused for more practical purposes almost immediately by the survivors of the flood. Moreover, since the ark came to rest in the mountains, it is also unlikely that sands would have buried it, which is the case for most buildlings, stellae, and other artifacts from Bible times that are being discovered by modern archaeologists. But this is a relatively minor point, and not one of my main reasons for discounting the recent claims of a discovery of the ark.

So here's my next main reason...

The place of the alleged discovery of the ark--Mt. Ararat--is not where the Bible claims that Noah's ark came to rest.

I realize that many people have come somehow to believe that Noah's ark ran aground on Mt. Ararat. It did not, at least according to Scripture. What the Bible actually says (in Gen. 8:4) is that

the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. (italics mine)

The mountains of Ararat are a rather vast range that occupies a large portion of present-day Turkey and Armenia. This large range includes Mt. Ararat itself, but the biblical account--rather than specifying "on Mt. Ararat," which the Hebrew of the time was certainly capable of doing--only asserts that the boat came to rest somewhere in a much larger geographical area.

Now, I don't know how so many people who would claim to be serious students of the Bible can be so superficial in their reading of it as to miss this plain fact. Perhaps part of it is that well-meaning Sunday school teachers "dumb down" such Bible stories for easy consumption by the children they are charged with teaching. Then, perhaps, we tend to remember the stories as taught us rather than ever reading them aright for ourselves. At any rate, I strongly believe that we--like the apostle Paul--should at some point "give up childish ways" and take Scripture seriously enough to read it truly.

Here's the point for this post, though. For whatever reason or reasons, a misconception about where Noah's ark landed has become very popular. When, then, I hear that the ark has been found not where it should be but rather where popular misconception would place it, I have every reason to suspect that something fishy is going on.

But the problem is worse than this, as I'll hope to share in the next post or two. Thanks for reading!

Thoughts on Noah's Ark

2010-05-02T07:01:00.000-07:00

In case you hadn't heard, news reports in the last week have covered the claim that a team of Chinese and Turkish archaeologists have discovered the remains of Noah's ark on Mt. Ararat and that carbon-dating of the wood yields a result of 4,800 years old.

A friend of mine who keeps a close watch on the latest discoveries in archaeology in the Middle East emailed several Christian friends (including me) to warn them to be very cautious about believing these reports. My response to him was that it never once crossed my mind that the reports of finding the ark on Mt. Ararat could be legitimate. So, perhaps it would be worthwhile for me to explain why. But first, a word about biblical archeology (from a non-expert)...

The Bible--unique among the world's "Holy Books"--presents itself as historically true. It is filled with specific names of people and places, and opens itself to verification or falsification. Many of the Bible's historical claims ought to be accessible to the archeologist, including the places, people, and events of Jesus' day and those of the thousand years or more preceeding the time of Jesus.

How has the Bible fared with regard to archaeological evidence? There have, of course, been periods of time in which verification of the events, people, and places recorded in the Bible has been lacking, or slow in coming. And during such periods, bold claims have been made by skeptics, that the Old Testament is mainly myth, that people like Moses, David, and Solomon never existed, that Israel didn't achieve the level of culture ('kingdom' level, as it were) claimed for it, and on and on.

Such claims have always been unwise, for the very simple reason that "absence of evidence does not prove evidence of absence." And, in the case of biblical archaeology, the makers of such claims have had to eat crow time and time again. The history of archaeology in the lands mentioned in the Bible is a continual record of verification, and this has been especially true of the past 100 years of digging.

It used to be believed that David and Solomon never existed. But that skeptical view was disproved by the discovery in 1993 of a stela on Tel Dan that refers to King David.

So, okay, it seems pretty clear now that David (and probably, therefore, Solomon) existed. The skeptical response (of not all that long ago) was that while these men existed, claims of their having established kingdoms are greatly exaggerated. Several independent recent discoveries are proving the skeptics wrong and verifying the Bible's portrayal of Israel's existence as a thriving, far-reaching kingdom in David's day.

In short, archaeology has provided no falsification of any biblical account and has incrementally, progressively provided verification of more and more of the people, places, and events recorded in the Christian and Jewish Scriptures. To be sure, there still has been no archeological evidence uncovered to verify the existence of Moses or the Exodus (though many will be aware of one archaeologist's claims--never independently confirmed--of discovering chariot wheels at the bottom of the Red Sea). The history of research in this field would suggest that thereby claiming that Moses didn't exist would be folly. But this leads into my first reason for dismissing the recent claims about the discovery of Noah's ark...

In terms of historical time, the discovery of Noah's ark would be a complete outlier (a much earlier event than any other verified biblical events) and therefore not anticipated by any serious archaeologists (Jewish, Christian, or otherwise).

This is not my most important reason for rejecting these claims, but it is significant. For one thing, it suggests that the claim may have less to do with likelihood and more to do with perceived apologetic value. That is, while finding Noah's ark would be highly improbable, it would nonetheless be sensational and striking in its implications for verifying the historicity of the Old Testament. This is a first clue that one ought to be suspicious of this claim.

But we can't confuse improbability with impossibility. It's possible that some remains of the ark could one day be found. So in the next post, I'll offer more compelling reasons why 'this ain't it.'

A Voice at the Table

2010-04-29T20:50:00.000-07:00

So, I owe you one last statement about the global warming issue (and then it looks like I'll have to post a bit about Noah's ark). Here it is, and it flows out of the statements that have gone before...

Christians ought to be speaking into the discourse.

Here's my reasoning. I have shared that the entire discussion is taking place within an inaccurate metaphysic, that the universe is all there is, that there is no God. Those of us who know better ought to bring our perspective to bear on the issues. In particular, that the atmosphere and Earth are well-designed to maintain life-support temperatures has special importance to the problem, and research and solutions that take this into account are essential.

But also, I have shared that this is a justice issue, that billions of people stand to be affected by the decisions made and the solutions chosen. The potential for injustice is great, and those whose welfare is most likely to be overlooked are the world's poor and voiceless. As such, Christians need to be the ones to stand up for them, ensuring that they have a voice and that their vulnerability is not ignored in favor of the comfort of those in wealthy nations.

In turn, the reason Christians need to care that justice is done in this issue is quite simply because God cares and has always cared about justice. His heart is ever for the most vulnerable, and He has always demanded that His people care about justice. Through the prophet Micah, He proclaimed,

He has told you, O man, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? (Micah 6:8).

Likewise, Jesus cared about our response to the plight of the poor. In His 'Great Commission,' He tells His closest friends to make disciples in all the nations and to teach them to observe "all that I have commanded you." Interestingly, as recorded in Matthew's gospel, the last teaching that Jesus had given them was that the sheep would be separated from the goats (the ones to eternal life and the others to banishment) on the basis of whether they had fed the poor, clothed the needy, welcomed the stranger, cared for the sick, and visited the prisoner (Matthew 25:21-46).

As in Old Testament times, and as in Jesus' day, it is God's people who are expected to have a heart for the voiceless and to see justice done. For this reason, Christians of all professions--scientists, economists, politicians, statesmen--need to do their best to understand the complex issues surrounding anthropogenic global warming and speak into the weighty decisions that are being made.

It's a Justice Issue

2010-04-26T19:47:00.000-07:00

The fifth statement that I can make with confidence about the controversial issue of global warming is this...

There is a justice component to the anthropogenic global warming issue.

By this I mean that there is the potential for human suffering, either if global warming is real and continues at dangerous rates, as a result of the implementation of some of the proposed solutions, or both. And if widespread human suffering is a possible consequence of whatever decisions are made, then there is the potential that widespread injustices will take place, that the health and welfare of some will be overlooked in favor of that of others, that some will have no voice.

A Particular Metaphysic

2010-04-22T21:59:00.001-07:00

So far, I've posted three statements about anthropogenic global warming (AGW) about which I have a good deal of certainty. They were 1) Despite what much of the media say, there is a good deal of disagreement among scientists about the validity of claims about AGW, 2) The issue is primarily a political--not a scientific--debate, and 3) the Earth is remarkable in its ability to maintain life-friendly surface temperatures throughout life's history and despite huge changes in the amount of solar energy reaching it.

The next (and, I think, last) three statements I'll make on the subject are quite interrelated, so much so that it is difficult to decide which should come first. Here's what I came up with...

The anthropogenic global warming debate is being carried out almost entirely within a particular metaphysical perspective, that of naturalism.

Now, regular readers will realize that I frequently blog about the issue of scientific naturalism. I have argued that there is neither historical, philosophical, or practical justification for adopting a naturalistic approach to doing science, and I have shown that all of the latest important scientific discoveries have undermined a naturalistic understanding of the world in which we live and supported a theistic one. I have even argued that naturalism cannot logically ground either the scientific enterprise or the reliability of human reasoning.

My goal here is not to advance or defend those arguments again. Rather, it is simply to point out that in this important debate about anthropogenic global warming, its possible consequences and those of proposed solutions, we continue to act as though nature is the whole show despite overwhelming evidence and reason to the contrary.

Is this important? I suggest it is. If either AGW or its proposed solutions are as significant as people and the media seem to think, then it only makes sense that we begin our search for truth from within a metaphysically accurate worldview rather than from within a worldview that excludes the accurate answers. Let me illustrate this with just one practical example by referring back to yesterday's post.

The default position throughout the history of Western thought has been to acknowledge that things that appear to be designed--like the universe itself and living things and their components--are designed. It has only been very recently that scientists and others have kidded themselves into thinking that the design apparent in everything we see in the world around us is, in fact, only apparent. Let's see where these two very different approaches lead with regard to the thermal regulatory efficiency of the Earth and its atmosphere (discussed yesterday).

If the Earth's remarkable efficiency at maintaining life-friendly surface temperatures is designed (as the evidence would suggest), then we would do well to understand it better in order to work with that design to prevent future failure. If, on the other hand, we rule out design with regard to the atmosphere (and crust and plate tectonics and life and all the other interrelated factors mentioned yesterday), we are likely to miss important cues that would help to solve whatever real problems arise.

But what is actually going on is a worse option. And that is that the idea that the universe and life are designed has become so unpalatable to so many moderns--for reasons having to do with the theological and moral implications--that the features and efficiency of the Earth's thermoregulating mechanisms are not merely dismissed as only apparent but are in fact ignored altogether. I trust that you can understand that this is not the way to go about arriving at an accurate understanding of these important issues. Just as the relatively recent discoveries of the roles and purposes of the human tonsils and appendix required that researchers be open to their being designed (and eschewing the naturalistic conclusion that they were the useless byproducts of an evolutionary process), so, too, breakthrough discoveries about the threat of AGW likely require an openness to the design of the entire system, design attested to by all of the evidence available from life's long history on Earth.

Efficiently Regulated

2010-04-21T22:14:00.000-07:00

Here's my third statement about global warming...

The Earth is truly remarkable in its ability to maintain life-friendly surface temperatures for billions of years despite drastic changes in the amount of solar energy reaching it. The mechanisms in place for this thermal regulation have always been (apparently) extremely efficient.

The complexity of the thermal regulation about which I'm talking is mind-boggling, so I'll try to keep it simple. During the tenure of life on Earth (some 3.86 billion years), the solar energy reaching Earth has increased by 30 percent. And yet, the Earth's surface temperatures have stayed within a very narrow life-friendly range.*

If you've read much about the global warming issue, you're undoubtedly familiar with some of the factors that go into determining the Earth's surface temperature. A short list includes the atmosphere and its make-up (amounts and proportions of greenhouse gasses and such), the amount of energy coming from the sun (natch), and the Earth's albedo (read 'reflectivity'). But besides the obvious factors that play into these things, a host of other factors have played a role in maintaining this delicate balance throughout life's history. These include the amounts and forms of life on Earth, the timing and extent of extinction events, the varying rate at which once-living material has been stored in the Earth's crust and mantle, the timing of the re-release of such carbon deposits to the atmosphere,** and more.

As scientists continue to research these things, more factors are added to this list. The point is that all of these very different things act--and always have acted--in concert to keep Earth at a life-supporting temperature even though the energy input has varied drastically through time.

Now it is possible that the humans alive today have the capacity to throw this efficient, time-tested thermal regulatory mechanism out of whack. It should be noted, however, that some historical occurrences would seem to have involved perturbations to this system that would have dwarfed--in terms of abruptness and magnitude--even the sum of current human perturbations. (As just one example, think of Chicxulub, the meteorite that wiped out the last of the dinosaurs when it struck the coast of the Yucatan, sending debris 3000 miles in every direction and blotting out the sun for two years or more.) It is also noteworthy that every once in awhile (though with seemingly less fanfare than the dire predictions receive), a scientist will go on record as being amazed by the unexpected resiliency of the atmosphere (explaining, in part, why the predictions made by the models have failed to actualize).

Again, what I have shared in this latest certain and confident statement does not prove that anthropogenic global warming is false, nor does it mean that it's true. It seems, however, that it should play a part in the search for the truth on this issue, but it just doesn't seem to come up much; perhaps it's another of those 'inconvenient truths.'

* There have been periods--though not while humans were alive--when the Earth was quite a bit warmer than today, but no so warm as to preclude the flourishing of living things.

** You'll notice that these last two factors have to do with plate tectonics and the resulting earthquakes and volcanoes. This is yet another aspect of the Earth that is necessary for life's existence, and one that is believed to be unique to Earth (among other identified planets both in our solar system and outside it).

Political, Not Scientific

2010-04-20T18:49:00.000-07:00

I'm up and running on a promised series of posts each of which is a confident and certain statement about the threat of anthropogenic global warming. This confidence and certainty are all the more startling because of my first claim (in yesterday's post), which had to do with the fact that this issue involves a great deal of debate and controversy. It is precisely because there is such a diversity of opinion--even among the appropriate scientists--about human-caused global warming that my claim to be able to make several statements with certainty should be at least provocative.

I'll trust that my first statement passed muster, that no one is really willing to argue logically and evidentially (as by a willingness to hear from every scientist) that no scientist doubts or harbors skepticism about the idea that human-caused warming is occurring at an unprecedented and dangerous rate. My second certain statement is a corollary of the first...

The global warming alarm as cast in the various media is not primarily scientific but political.

This statement likewise seems so obvious as to require little support. The issue became part of our collective awareness through a politician, not through a scientist. The issue is kept before us by politicians and by political journalists. Indeed, the only confusion on this point likely stems from the frequency with which those politicians appeal to science--"all scientists agree that anthropogenic global warming is occurring at a dangerous rate." This claim we know is untrue, and so can see it as a mere ploy, an attempt to disguise a primarily political discussion as a scientific one.

I hope that even those of you who are not scientists can as readily (as those of us who are) see that though scientific evidences ought to ground our conclusions about the validity of anthropogenic global warming, such evidences have become a minimal part of the rhetoric associated with this issue.

No Debate?

2010-04-19T20:49:00.000-07:00

I promised to offer half a dozen statements about global warming that I can assert with confidence and certainty. Here’s the first one…

Despite vehement claims to the contrary, there is a good deal of disagreement among scientists in the relevant disciplines as to whether the central claims about anthropogenic global warming are true.

Let’s unpack this a bit. The central claims of the global warming alarmists I take to be… 1) The Earth is warming at an unprecedented and dangerous rate, and 2) the primary cause of this warming is human development and resource use. My purpose in this post is not to address (at least directly) whether these two statements are true or not. I’m not an expert in meteorology, climatology, paleo-climatology, or the like. Both statements may be true, or both may be basically false. The first might be true and the second one false. Each may be partly true and partly false. But while I won’t tell you what to conclude about the veracity of these twin statements, I can tell you a good deal about how such claims should be supported.

These statements are truth claims, statements purported to describe the way things are. Moreover, because they deal with atmospheric, planetary, and solar physics and chemistry, they would rightly be considered scientific truth claims. Now, the credibility of such claims should rest upon evidence and reason. That is, if they are to be believed by reasonable people, the preponderance of the relevant evidence should be such that these conclusions are strongly warranted. If contrary evidence exists, it should be acknowledged appropriately, and good reasons should be given why such evidence does not undercut the conclusion. All of this evidence should be dealt with within a logically sound format. Premises (that deal accurately with the evidence) should be strung together in a sound deductive argument that leads to a sure conclusion or in a strong inductive argument that yields a very high degree of probability.

Is this what we see regarding global warming? No indeed. Instead, very early in the argument, what we are told is,

There is no debate among scientists with regard to anthropogenic global warming.

Really? No, seriously? Is that all you can say?

This happens to be a claim about which I am sufficiently expert to draw a conclusion. It is thoroughly false. There is a heated and vigorous debate among scientists about the truth value of statements 1 and 2. And not only is there wide disagreement about these general claims, there is also deep disagreement about more particular claims. For example, a third claim is that carbon dioxide is a significant and controllable component of this (alleged) human-induced warming. This, too, is very much contested. And this is important because much of the proposed solution (to the problem which may or may not be actual) involves curbing our collective ‘carbon footprint.’ This, in turn, brings us to a fourth claim, that the solution to the problem is ___________ (The Kyoto Protocol or other political legislation).

If you’re tracking with me at all, you probably realize right away that, even among those scientists who generally agree with the other three claims, there is no consensus—but rather wide disagreement—about the correct solution.

We have come to give scientists a much greater level of authority and credence than they (we) deserve. At the same time, we have chosen to abdicate our right to assess a set of scientific evidence and argumentation, choosing instead to allow others to tell us what to think. And far too often, these twin failings have been exploited by those who would sell us a bad bill of goods.

Again, it may very well be that anthropogenic global warming is a real threat. If so, it’s quite problematic that in lieu of a careful treatment of all of the relevant evidence in a sound, reasonable argument, we are—early and vehemently—assured that “all scientists agree…”, an assurance that is easily demonstrated to be false.

Earth Warming

2010-04-18T20:58:00.000-07:00

Later this week is the day designated Earth Day. Each year I like to take the opportunity that Earth Day affords to blog a bit about environmentalism. There's at least a couple of reasons for this. For one, Christians have the most reason to care about the Earth, since we recognize it as the Lord's and because God has commanded us to be good stewards of it. Nonetheless, stewardship of the environment is one of those areas in which some of those Christians who take the Bible most seriously are guilty of some of the shoddiest thinking or are guilty of ignoring the issue completely. On the other side, those most concerned about the environment are frequently those who--because of an innacurate worldview (one other than the Judeo-Christian understanding)--are incapable of arriving at right conclusions about either the problems or the solutions on environmental issues.

But this week I thought I'd address the issue that most people get emotional about when the environment is mentioned--global warming. And so my goal will be to offer about a half dozen statements about which I can be very certain with regard to the complex and controversial issue of global warming. I hope you'll read along this week.

My Friend Shelby

2010-04-13T18:36:00.000-07:00

I hope you're all reading along with the month-long series "Why Is Christianity True?" at Apologetics315. Today's post is by my good friend Shelby Cade, and deals with the evidence from Jesus' fulfillment of prophecy and the Resurrection. Check it out and then link from there to his apologetics blog.

Advice from a NT Textual Expert

2010-04-10T21:07:00.000-07:00

My last post was about the fixation on end times prophecy and current events in which many American evangelicals get caught up. It brings to mind something that stuck with me that was said by Daniel Wallace, the New Testament textual critic that gave a keynote address at our recent Central Oregon apologetics conference.

He said that we have the most textual evidence for (copies of) the gospels, followed by the epistles, and that Revelation comes in a distant last. He took this to reflect the amount of study spent on the different New Testament books by the early church, and believes that theirs would be a good practice to follow.

Yet many evangelicals spend far too much time speculating--nay, asserting--that their understanding of Revelation gives them warrant to declare its fulfillment in modern world events. (If only they knew their history as well, they might approach the topic of prophecy more humbly.)

Prophecy Event

2010-04-06T09:51:00.000-07:00

[Be sure to check out--each weekday this month--the essay posted at apologetics315 in the series, Why is Christianity True? (My contribution will be published there at noon on Wednesday, April 7)]

I was somewhat disappointed to read in The Bend Bulletin this morning that Tim LaHaye and like-minded evangelicals will be bringing their "message of biblical prophecy" to Central Oregon this month. LaHaye is the author of the "Left Behind" series of fictional end-times novels so popular among evangelical Christians today.

My take on this issue is similar to that expressed by Mark Noll in his book The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, which calls out the modern American church for its anti-intellectualism.

Paul Boyer's When Time Shall Be No More: Prophecy Belief in Modern American Culture (Harvard University Press, 1992) documents the remarkable popularity among American Bible-believing Christians--again mostly evangelicals and fundamentalists--of radical apocalyptic speculation. Boyer concludes that Christian fascination with the end of the world has existed for a very long time, but also that recent evangelical fixation on such matters--where contemporary events are labeled with great self-confidence as the fulfillment of biblical prophecies heralding the End of Time--has been particularly intense.

Referring to the deluge of books like this that came out in the weeks following the start of the Gulf War, Noll writes,

The books came to various conclusions, but they all shared the disconcerting conviction that the best way of providing moral judgment about what was happening in the Middle East was not to study carefully what was going on in the Middle East. Rather, they featured a kind of Bible study that drew attention away from careful analysis of the complexities of Middle Eastern culture or the tangled twentieth-century history of the region toward speculation about some of the most esoteric and widely debated passages of the Bible. Moreover, that speculation was carried on with only slight attention to the central themes of the Bible (like the divine standard of justice applied in all human situations), which are crystal clear and about which there is wide agreement among evangelicals and other theologically conservative Christians. How did the evangelical public respond to these books? It responded by immediately vaulting several of these titles to the top of religious best-seller lists.

I lament with Noll how an

unsound hermeneutic has been used with wanton abandon to dominate twentieth-century evangelical thinking about world affairs.

An so, Tim LaHaye is coming to Bend, where, according to The Bulletin,

The prophecy conference... is being sponsored by more than 50 churches in the greater Central Oregon area.

That means nearly every nearby Bible-believing church (excluding at least my own, Antioch) is perpetuating this problem, and thereby helping to make the true message of Christianity even more inaccessible to the reasonable people in need of it.

An Empty Tomb

2010-04-04T18:14:00.001-07:00

The 5th historical fact that needs explaining is that

The tomb was empty.

Unlike the other facts we have discussed, this one is not accepted by virtually all scholars. Nonetheless, there is powerful evidence for it, and about 75% of the scholars who study the subject accept it. Habermas and Licona lay out three sets of evidence. The first is what they call the Jerusalem factor. By this is meant that the preaching of the resurrection of Jesus took place immediately after the events in the same area where the events occurred. Those who desired to deny the claim of Jesus' resurrection--and there were many, both among the Jews and the Romans--needed only to provide a corpse, the verifiable proof that Jesus was still dead. There is no evidence that this was ever done. Habermas and Licona...

We certainly would expect to have heard from Celsus, the second-century critic of Christianity, if Jesus' corpse had been produced. When he wrote against Jesus' resurrection, it would have been to his advantage to include this damaging information, had it been available. In short, if a body of any sort was discovered in the tomb, the Christian message of an empty sepulcher would have been falsified. Anything but an empty tomb would have been devastating to the Resurrection account.

A second set of evidence for the empty tomb is enemy attestation. Several independent sources attest to the fact that early critics of the Resurrection accused the disciples of stealing Jesus' body. If the body were still in the tomb, there would have been no need to account for its absence.

When the boy tells his teacher that the dog ate his homework, this is an indirect admission that his homework is unavailable for assessment. Likewise, the earliest Jewish claim reported regarding Jesus' resurrection was to accuse the disciples of stealing the body, an indirect admission that the body was unavailable for public display. This is the only early opposing theory we know of that was offered by Jesus' enemies.

A third set of evidence for the empty tomb is the testimony of women. In those days, women were seen as untrustworthy witnesses, and their testimony was not even admissible in legal cases. If the empty tomb story were fabricated by the early Christians, it would not serve their case--in such a culture--to have women as the first and most frequent witnesses to the fact. Yet all four gospel accounts have it that way, and two gospels never have men at the empty tomb. The best explanation for this quirk in the accounts is that this is what actually occurred, that the gospels record no more nor less than what truly happened.

For all these reasons,

The empty tomb is, therefore, well evidenced for historical certainty. Former Oxford University church historian William Wand writes, "All the strictly historical evidence we have is in favor of [the empty tomb], and those scholars who reject it ought to recognize that they do so on some other ground than that of scientific history." (Wand, 1972, Christianity: A Historical Religion?)

So we have five historical facts, each supported by multiple independent attestations and each accepted by most scholars who study the issue (and the first four facts by virtually all such scholars). Together, these facts provide powerful support for the bodily resurrection of Jesus. And--here's the main point of the 'minimal facts' argument--any alternate theory must adequately account for each and all of these. And, as the remaining chapters of Habermas and Licona's book demonstrates, they do not. No explanation yet produced accounts for these five historical facts as does the Christian one--that Jesus really did rise from the dead. And the implications are rather obvious:

If the tomb was empty because Jesus rose from the dead, then God exists and eternal life is both possible and available.

Good news indeed, even 2,000 years later.

(All quotes from Habermas and Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus)

Skeptic, Enemy Attest Resurrection

2010-04-03T21:08:00.000-07:00

I'm sharing the 'minimal facts' argument for the actual bodily resurrection of Jesus as found in Habermas and Licona's book. We've already discussed two historical facts, each with multiple lines of evidence supporting them and each enjoying the agreement of virtually all scholars that study the issue. These were:

1) Jesus of Nazareth was executed by Roman cucifixion

and

2) His disciples claimed--and believed--that he had appeared to them bodily risen from the dead.

Today, I'll share two more historical facts. These are:

3) Saul of Tarsus (better known as the apostle Paul), a persecutor of early Chistians, became a follower of Jesus after he experienced what he thought was a resurrection appearance,

and

4) James, Jesus' brother and a skeptic throughout Jesus' life, believed that he, too, saw the risen Jesus and subsequently became a leader of the church at Jerusalem.

Again, these two facts enjoy a multiplicity of independent attestations and are accepted by virtually all scholars.

Regarding Paul's conversion from enemy to follower, the evidence includes Paul's own testimony, that of Luke, and that of the church in Galatia. Regarding his believing in the resurrection to the point of being willing to suffer and experience martyrdom, these same three witnesses are augmented by the testimony of Clement of Rome, Polycarp, Tertullian, Dionysius of Corinth and Origen (the latter two preserved in Eusebius).

There is less information available to us regarding James' life before the death of Jesus. Nonetheless, the gospels report that Jesus' brothers didn't believe his message, the early creed imbedded in I Corinthians 15:3-8 reports the appearance of the risen Jesus to James, and Paul and Luke identify this same James as a leader in the early church. There is independent evidence as well for James' martyrdom, these including Josephus, Hegesippus, and Clement of Alexandria. It is true that the appearance of the risen Jesus to James is only recorded once (in the I Cor. passage of the New Testament), but Habermas and Licona argue that it enjoys early church tradition and acceptance of the vast majority of modern scholars...

Further, critical scholar Reginald Fuller explains that [the evidence] is sufficient. Even without it, "we should have to invent" such an appearance in order to account for two things: James' conversion from skepticism and his elevation to the pastorate of the church in Jerusalem, the center of ancient Christianity.

Here are 4 historical facts, then, that need explaining. Belief that Jesus appeared alive after being horribly crucified was taught by his disciples and held to even in the face of the threat of persecution and death. And while some skeptics argue that it was their collective desire that led them to hallucinate a risen friend, that theory cannot account for the conversion and belief of Paul, an enemy, or James, a skeptic.

But there's one more such historical fact to be addressed... in the next post.

Why is Christianity True?

2010-04-01T20:13:00.000-07:00

Beginning today, my fellow apologist Brian Auten is doing a series in which apologists from across the web weigh in on the question "Why is Christianity True?" It includes audio presentations of each of our essays and links to the authors' blog sites. A new essay will be published each week day throughout April, and my contribution is due to be posted on Wednesday, April 7.

Go to apologetics315 to check out today's installment, which includes both a foreword and an introduction. Then be sure to check out Brian's site each weekday for another reason for concluding that Christianity is true.

(Back to the "minimal facts" argument in the next post)

The Disciples Believed

2010-03-30T18:25:00.000-07:00

So, I'm sharing the 'minimal facts' argument taken from Habermas and Licona's The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus. The first historical fact, discussed in the last post, is that Jesus was executed by Roman crucifixion. Here's the second fact:

Jesus' close followers--his disciples--claimed and believed that he rose bodily from the dead and appeared to them.

Again, this is a fact of history, one that enjoys multiple independent sources of attestation and that, as a result, is accepted by virtually all scholars who study the issue. Habermas and Licona identify nine independent sources attesting to the statement that the disciples claimed from the very beginning that Jesus rose from the dead. These sources fall into three categories--the testimony of Paul, the testimony of oral tradition, and the testimony of written documents.

But not only is it historical fact that the disciples claimed resurrection--it is also historical fact that they believed it, that they truly thought that Jesus had appeared to them following his crucifixion. Habermas and Licona identify seven independent sources that attest to the willingness of the disciples to suffer persecution and even martyrdom rather than deny the resurrection. Habermas conducted a study of more than 1,400 sources published since 1975 about the resurrection, and concluded

perhaps no fact is more widely recognized than that early Christian believers had real experiences that they thought were appearances of the risen Jesus. A critic may claim that what they saw were hallucinations or visions, but he does not deny that they actually experienced something.

As just one example, the atheist New Testament scholar Gerd Ludemann writes,

It may be taken as historically certain that Peter and the disciples had experiences after Jesus' death in which Jesus appeared to them as the risen Christ.

So we now have two historical facts upon which our argument builds: 1) Jesus died by Roman crucifixion, and 2) His disciples believed that he rose from the dead and appeared to them.

Jesus was Crucified

2010-03-29T09:19:00.000-07:00

So in the run-up to Easter, I'm sharing the "minimal-facts" argument for the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. It comes from Gary Habermas, and the version I'm using this week comes from the book he coauthored with Michael Licona titled The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus. It does not depend upon proving the reliability of the Bible, but instead uses only historical facts, events that virtually all scholars agree occurred.* Here's how Habermas and Licona put it:

This approach considers only those data that are so strongly attested historically that they are granted by nearly every scholar who studies the subject, even the rather skeptical ones... Most facts we use meet two criteria: They are well evidenced and nearly every scholar accepts them.

Seems reasonable, eh? So here's the first fact:

Jesus of Nazareth died by Roman crucifixion.

This historical event enjoys plenty of attestation, so much so that John Dominic Crossan, who has made a name for himself by denying the claims of Christianity, can write

That he was crucified is as sure as anything historical can ever be.

The crucifixion of Jesus is, of course, recorded in all four gospels. Non-biblical sources that confirm this as an historical event include the Jewish historian Josephus, the Greek Lucian, and Mara Bar-Serapion.

The Talmud includes the statement that "on the eve of Passover Yeshu was hanged" (a Jewish way of referring to crucifixion). And while the Talmud was written long enough after the fact as to rely upon other earlier sources, no early Jewish source denies Jesus' existence, his working of miracles, or his death by crucifixion.

The Roman historian Tacitus renders it this way:

Nero fastened the guilt [for Rome's burning] and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus.

So the first historical event that goes into this argument is that Jesus died by crucifixion. Interestingly, the centrality of this event to all of human history is attested to by the language we use. When we seek to describe something as of central importance, we use words like "crucial" and "crux," which, as you might guess, take their etymology from the same word as "crucifixion," that is, the Latin word for torture. The life and death of Jesus of Nazareth are so central and important that the Western world sets its calendars by them. And so to say that the crucufixion--the atoning death of Jesus on a Roman cross--is the crux of all human history (or the most crucial event in history) is, in a very real way, to be guilty of redundancy.

In the next post, I'll share the second historical fact in the "minimal facts" argument.

* Complete unanimity is not a reasonable goal in historical research; you can find folks today who seriously insist that things like the Holocaust or mankind walking on the moon never actually happened.

Argument for the Resurrection

2010-03-27T21:27:00.000-07:00

I spend a good deal of time chatting with Christians and Christian apologists who are scientists or science-minded. I'm talking astronomers, physicists, geologists, and biologists who recognize that all of the most significant scientific discoveries of the last 100 years support the Christian understanding of the world in which we live. But some of these folks spend so much of their time making a case for the truth of Christianity from science that they are less well-versed on some of the other--historical and philosophical--arguments for Christianity. For example, one of my science apologist friends recently asked,

Doesn't any argument for the historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus depend upon the reliability of the Bible?

It is true, of course, that a very compelling argument can be made that way. It's a somewhat long argument, relying upon the internal cohesion of Scripture, fulfillment of prophecy in Scripture, the historical accuracy of the Bible, the amazing scientific credibility of early books of the Bible (written thousands of years ago, validated by the latest modern science), and such. Once it can be established that the Bible is reliable, the argument can then be made that the Resurrection occurred.

But my friend was wrong--there are compelling arguments for the bodily resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth that do not depend upon first demonstrating that the Bible is reliable (much less inerrant). My favorite is known as the 'minimal facts' argument, and is put forth by Gary Habermas (in his book The Risen Jesus and Future Hope and in another he wrote with Mike Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus).

As a run-up to Easter, I'll share the 'minimal facts' argument here in a series of posts.

The Conservative Nature of Natural Selection

2010-02-24T20:35:00.001-08:00

In the class on the History and Philosophy of Atheism I'm taking this semester at Kilns College, I had the opportunity last night to guest-lecture on naturalism and evolution. I mentioned that we now know--150 years after Darwin--that the mechanism of natural selection that he endowed with incredible creative potential instead acts only in conservative and degenerative ways. Time, however, prevented me from sharing one of my favorite illustrations of this, the "green toothpick" illustration. So I'll share it here.

I took an undergraduate biology class from Dr. M.D. "Mad Dog" Johnson, in which he tried to demonstrate natural selection in action. We went outside to a lush, uncut, well-fertilized portion of the campus lawn, where we scattered a known number of toothpicks of different colors--red, yellow, blue, and green. We, the students, then acted as predators--the agents of natural selection--foraging through that patch of lawn capturing as many toothpicks as we could find. As I recall, we found all of the yellow and red toothpicks, most of the blue ones, and almost none of the green, so well-camouflaged were they among the long blades of grass. The lesson was that natural selection works just so on populations of living things.

There are at least a couple of serious problems with this experiment as an illustration of natural selection at work. If--as is claimed--natural selection acting on genetic variation is the mechanism by which evolutionary advance is made, what we demonstrated would seem to be just the opposite. Our toothpick population began with a much higher genetic diversity than it had by the end. The population, which now consists almost entirely of green toothpicks, would seem to be much less able to adapt to a changing environment than when it contained the greater diversity of phenotypes. It has ever since seemed to me that we demonstrated that natural selection has a far greater capacity to tend toward extinction than to adaptation and advance.

Another problem with this illustration is just as important. Let us be unreasonably generous and grant that the resulting population of toothpicks is somehow better prepared to adapt to some future environmental change. That is, let us say--for the sake of argument--that what we witnessed was an instance of microevolution. Microevolution refers to the idea that species (and populations and such) are not static, but change over time in both their phenotype and genotype (their form and the genetic basis for that form, respectively).

That microevolution occurs is a well-accepted, non-controversial idea. But granting that the population of green toothpicks is a good example of something having undergone microevolution provides no support for the claim of neo-Darwinism, which is that this same mechanism--natural selection acting upon genetic variation (mutation)--can account for macroevolution. In other words, the diversity of all life is explainable by this sort of natural selection acting over vast time scales. In the specific case of the toothpick illustration, we are to believe that if we waited long enough (as the toothpicks bred generation after generation), continued natural selection (predation on those toothpicks most easily spotted) would eventually cause those toothpicks to give rise to species of dental floss, of toothbrushes, and even, eventually, of electric toothbrushes, all without the input of any sort of intelligence or designer.

The fossil record shows that there have existed--over the course of Earth's history--different life forms. But macroevolutionary theory, as an explanation for how that record came to be, has yet to be substantiated by any evidence. Rare cases of microevolution have been documented, and then we are asked to make the unreasonable and unsupported extrapolation that such minor changes can be invoked to explain all of the advancing complexity witnessed in the fossil record. For me, Professor Johnson's toothpick demonstration has always served as a reminder of the absurdity of the grander claims of evolutionists.

(A version of this post originally appeared on 26 Feb 2007.)

Spring's Near

2010-02-17T19:31:00.000-08:00

The annual return of spring is a gradual development marked by innumerable minor events, changes in the behavior of wildlife, and (perhaps more obvious) alterations in the vegetation (greening of the grass, the appearance of the first crocus). Being more of a zoologist than botanist, I'm more attuned to the faunal than the floral changes, and yet invariably I wrestle with identifying which changes to imbue with the greatest significance.

This year, for example, I have long been aware of increasing territoriality and 'breediness' among some of the raptors that I spend time watching. Golden Eagles, Prairie Falcons, and Northern Harriers began back in January the undulating flight displays that serve to both establish their claim on a breeding locale and advertise their readiness to begin the courtship process. But though those January days were clear and blue and beginnning to lengthen, it still most definitely felt like there was a good bit of winter still to be endured.

Not long ago, the grassland birds (especially up in the Columbia Plateau) began to dramatically alter their behavior. The Horned Larks, which had been covorting for long months in large flocks, have begun pairing up, and they will, accordingly, be one of the first songbirds to nest (and some of them will successfully produce 3 broods this year). In Western Meadowlarks, the behavioral change is even more significant. They have also flocked up for the winter, but throughout that season remained almost unobserved, staying on the ground, silent, flying seldom, and not even bothering to post a sentinel. In recent weeks, they've suddenly 'popped up,' with males especially (though you can't tell the gender by looking at them) now spending most of their day perched high and singing lustily.

The medium-sized ground squirrels (Washington, Belding's, Merriam's, and such) have--within the past week or ten days--ended their long period of estivation-followed-by-hibernation that began last July as the shrub-steppe and grassland habitats they occupied dried up and quit producing the grasses and forbs on which they feed. Their reemergence causes movements of hawks and even eagles, and the annual population levels of these squirrels has a significant effect on the productivity of some raptors, notably Ferruginous Hawks and Prairie Falcons.

There are many spring milestones yet to occur--the arrival of the first Osprey (from wintering grounds in southern Mexico, Central America, and northern South America), the first Turkey Vulture, and the first Western Kingbird (to name a few). But yesterday I experienced another notable spring first, one that reminds me of the inevitable progression of the seasons. I saw my first nesting Great-horned Owl of the year, a female in Morrow County sitting on eggs on a stick-nest (originally built by Red-tailed Hawks). As a member of one of the first bird species to nest each year, this female will undoubtedly sit tight through many days of winter-like weather still to come, but by the time her young are beginning to flex their flight muscles, spring will be back in all its cacophanous, riotous glory.

Apologetics Conference Here

2010-02-15T14:29:00.000-08:00

The second annual Bend (Oregon) area Apologetics Conference is less than a week away. Go here to check out a Vimeo promotional of the event. The theme of the conference is The Reliability of the New Testament, and we have two of the leading New Testament scholars coming to give plenary talks.

I'll be speaking during two of the breakout seesions, once on "Biblical Miracles in a Modern Scientific Age" and once on "A New Testament Textual Criticism Primer." I hope to see you there.

Lucretius and Naturalism

2010-02-08T21:30:00.000-08:00

Did I mention that I'm in a class on the History and Philosophy of Atheism (at Kilns College)? Well, I am, and today I want to post about the first reading. Our text for the course is The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Nonbeliever. These essential readings are selected and introduced by New Atheist Christopher Hitchens, and promise to provide good fodder for any Christian apologist-blogger. In today's post, I'll identify two sets of problems, one in the reading (by Lucretius) and one in Hitchens' introduction to it.

Lucretius was an ancient Greek naturalist; he lived in the early 1st century BC and (following Leucippus) promoted atomism, the view that in our day would be called naturalism. He rejected the pantheism of the Greek and Roman worlds of his day, pointing out that what those pagans credited to the acts of the gods could be better explained as the result of natural laws.

I find Hitchens' inclusion of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura intriguing for at least three reasons.

First, the entire project of the ancient atomists depended upon our universe being infinite as regards both space and time, a claim that Lucretius is at pains to make (though not to support). This idea was likewise foundational to Darwin's 19th-century theory and remains (logically) foundational to modern atheism. Unfortunately--for Hitchens and his ilk (Richard Dawkins admits that his opponents have accused him of being stuck in 19th-century science and further admits that he doesn't know what they're talking about)--20th century science has convincingly refuted this foundational assumption. For most scientists, philosophers of science, and historians of science, the greatest discovery of the last 100 years was the recognition that all of the matter, energy, space, and time of the universe had a beginning a finite time ago. The universe began--it is finite with regard to both space and time. Lucretius and Epicurus were wrong on this basic score, as were Kant and Darwin. I am left wondering whether Hitchens and Dawkins fail to realize the implications (for metaphysical naturalism) or are simply in denial of the evidence.

Second, Lucretius also makes clear that living things reproduce after their kind, that there is a continuity of reproduction. This idea--known to the ancient Greeks--passed out of knowledge in the Western world, and throughout the Middle Ages, educated people believed (what Homer, writing in the 8th century BC, knew to be false) that life was spontaneously generated (as maggots from rotten meat). Some would argue that modern biology began when Francesco Redi disproved spontaneous generation (at least with regard to worms in meat). Geneticist Giuseppi Sermonti, discussing the later refutation of spontaneous generation by Pasteur (with regard to bacteria), writes

Biology has advanced in status with every new refutation of the spontaneous generation thesis.

And yet, modern disciples of Darwin (like Hitchens and Dawkins) continue--contrary to all the evidence and reason--to steadfastly maintain the spontaneous generation of life from non-life.

The third problem has to do with the history of science, and seems to betray a further weakness in Hitchens' understanding. I take it that Hitchens approves of Lucretius' essay as an ancient articulation of the superiority of a reasoned appeal to natural law over a superstitious appeal to acts of the gods. But while Lucretius was right in this particular, this stands as an argument against polytheism and pantheism, but not against Christian monotheism. That is, if Hitchens' book is meant to be an argument for atheism as over against Christianity, then De Rerum Natura misses the point. More importantly, however, it was Christians--not atheists--who agreed with Lucretius, saw the world as following natural laws, and thus established (in the 16th and 17th centuries) modern science.

As glaring as are these problems in De Rerum Natura itself, there's an arguably bigger problem with Hitchens' introduction to it. Having established that Lucretius' atomism was a superior, more reasoned understanding of the world (than the religious superstitions of that day), he writes,

Atomism was viciously persecuted as heresy throughout the early Christian era, and only one printed manuscript of De Rerum Naturum survived the flames.

What is one to make of such a statement? Is it revisionist history foisted on us by someone for whom the ends (turning readers into unbelievers) justifies the means (making up history)? To be sure, atomism didn't carry the day, and the Greeks and Romans continued to worship their pantheons of gods. But there was no persecution of the ancient Greek naturalists. (Lucretius may have committed suicide, but if so it appears to be a direct consequence of his disbelief in an afterlife, and not because of any contemporary reaction against his views.) There is no evidence that atomist books were burned; the reason such books did not survive is because they were written on papyrus or animal skins, and the same fate faced every ancient writing regardless of its metaphysical claims.

But more importantly, why does Hitchens refer to the 'early Christian era' if not to wrongfully impugn Christians? Throughout the early Christian era, Christians were too busy being persecuted themselves to persecute others. They were themselves being burned at the stake and not burning obscure books about natural philosophy. Even when--much later in church history--Christians did turn their attention to the subjects of orthodoxy and heresy, the issues that captured their attention for several centuries had to do with the nature of the trinity and the deity/humanity of Christ, not what a minor sector of dead Greek poets had written.

Coming as it does in the introduction to the very first selection in his book, this statement by Hitchens raises a bright red flag. At best, it highlights either gross ignorance about or willing gullibility regarding the issues about which he writes. At worst, it stamps him at the outset as disingenuous or downright deceiving and his book as a skewed polemic rather than an honest search for truth.

rUFOs

2010-02-05T20:42:00.001-08:00

This is the 3rd (and final) part of the answer to a question I received about extra-terrestrials. In the first part, I discussed how the latest evidence from astronomy and physics have demonstrated the extreme unlikelihood (on naturalistic terms) of even one planet in the universe supporting intelligent life. In the second part, I asserted that the laws of physics prohibit the travel of any hypothetical extra-terrestrial beings across the distances involved in reaching us from anywhere else in the universe. It remains in this post to address the issue of how to explain the UFO sightings and the tales of encounters with and even abductions by beings from outer space.

The majority of all alien encounters can be explained as tricks of lighting, as illusions, or as identifiable physical phenomena. But not all reports fit any of these categories, and researchers conclude that there remains a category of UFO sightings that are unexplainable by appealing to physical law. This category--dubbed rUFOs for 'residual UFOs'--is, of course, the most interesting type.

This being the case, a good deal of research has been centered on rUFOs, and such research is made easy by the very wealth of available information and evidence. If you're at all interested in the findings of such research, I can do no better than recommend a comprehensive treatment of the issue (which remains, nonetheless, an easy read), Lights in the Sky and Little Green Men. But here, in a nutshell, is what can be known about rUFOs.

rUFOs are capable of producing physical effects but are not themselves physical. The physical effects produced by them include physical trauma (to soil, plants, animals, humans, and machines). Physical symptoms most commonly reported by humans who claim to have seen rUfOs include nausea, headache, blindness, paralysis, numbness, and recurring nightmares. Other observers have experienced serious injury or even death.

But while causing these and other physical effects, rUFOs are not themselves physical. They defy well-known laws of physics, they leave behind no physical artifacts (even when they have crashed to earth), they disintegrate and reintegrate, and make physically impossible turns and stops. Importantly, they are not seen most often by people who spend most of the night hours outside or watching the skies, and they appear most often to single individuals or very small groups, at 3:00 am (more often than earlier or later), and in rural rather than populated settings.

In short, rUFOs are real, but they are not physical. And to the modern scientific naturalist, this is nonsensical. But (as I have been at great pains to express in numerous other posts) scientific naturalism does not itself make adequate sense of the real world in which we live, and so we may reasonably continue this discussion.

Many scientists who have studied this phenomenon have come to the same conclusion, that rUFOs are demonic in nature. This conclusion is supported by a number of facts, including the following... They appear to a select few, and make repeat visits to the same individuals; they appear to be alive; they cause disturbing emotions and bodily and psychological harm; and they deceive their human contacts. Interestingly, throughout history, rUFOs have stayed just ahead of human technology in their appearance and claims, though these claims are clearly false to scientists of that day or of the next generation. Most importantly, those involved in encountering rUFOs invariably have a link in their lives to occult phenomena (participating in seances, astrology, ouija boards, channeling, and such).

The connection between rUFOs and occultism is especially clear with regard to encounters of the fourth and fifth kinds--abductions and contacts. Abduction is generally a negative experience ("ya think?"), with abductees suffering long-term emotional and psychological trauma, and often seeking professional therapy.

Contactees are those who claim to serve as human mouthpieces for alien 'masters' whom they perceive as wise and benificent. The most extreme and charismatic of these contactees become the founders of UFO cults, new religions that mix occult practices and UFOlogy. Some of the most famous of these are the Raelians and Heaven's Gate, the latter of which committed mass suicide in 1997 in order to catch a ride with the alien spaceship they believed was traveling with the Hale-Bopp comet.

With regard to contactees and their cults, researcher John Saliba writes,

Many UFO groups have borrowed heavily from both spiritualism and Theosophy. They have incorporated in their ideology the concepts of cosmic wisdom and cosmic masters who exist on other planets. Their leaders often channel, or communicate with, these masters through some psychic means (such as telepathy) or by entering into a trance-like state.*

So there you have it. If extra-terrestrials existed, they would face insurmountable barriers--based in the laws of physics--to making contact with us. But modern astronomy and physics have demonstrated that Earth is uniquely designed for supporting intelligent life, and that it is astronomically unlikely that any other intelligent life exists in the entire universe. And those UFO sightings that cannot be explained by appealing to identifiable physical phenomena invariably involve people with a link to occult practices in their lives.

rUFOs are neither more nor less than demonic manifestations to those who have willingly opened their lives to such influences.

* Saliba, J.A. "Religious Dimensions of UFO Phenomena" in Gods have Landed. Cited in Ross, H, K. Samples, and M. Clark, Lights in the Sky and Little Green Men.

On Space Travel

2010-01-31T19:34:00.000-08:00

In the last post, we saw that from a scientific perspective, the odds are astronomic against there being even one life-support planet in this universe without supernatural design.* In this post, I will nonetheless pretend that intelligent life might exist out there, and discuss the difficulties in our ever encountering it.

For ET-believers like Carl Sagan, the sheer number of stars suggests that there are many civilizations out there, some of them more intelligent than we, and some of them much older and farther along (technologically) than we. It is these assumptions that for such believers justify scouring space for their communications (as in the SETI Project).

But realistically there are fatal problems to any hypothetical advanced civilization in physically contacting us. And these problems have nothing to do with level of technology (as is generally assumed), and everything to do with the physical laws of the universe.

As is discussed in much more depth in the book Lights in the Sky and Little Green Men, there are physical limits to space travel speeds that make crossing the distances between stars in our universe physically impossible (or, at least, an endeavor necessarily spanning the lifetimes of many generations of the ETs in question). I know this is hard to hear for those of us raised on Star Trek and Star Wars, but I was asked here for scientific thoughts, not fictional stories.

Moreover, as astronomers continue to look for potential life-support planets outside our solar system, they are systematically eliminating all systems within any remotely reasonable distance from Earth.

So, the latest scientific discoveries have demonstrated the extreme unlikelihood of life anywhere else in the universe. In addition, the physics of the universe are such that travel across space is prohibitive for even a hypothetical advanced being. All of this, then, begs the question

What of all the sightings--of UFOs and ETs--and reports of actual encounters with and abductions by aliens?

I'll focus on that question in the next post.

*If God made other life-support planets and then created life on them, He has chosen not to reveal that to us. Part of C.S. Lewis' motivation in writing his Space Trilogy was to show that extra-terrestrial life would not be inconsistent with Christianity.

Extra-terrestrials

2010-01-30T05:04:00.000-08:00

I had a question texted in while I was handling Q&A at Redux last Sunday. It read,

What are your thoughts on Aliens, scientifically and scripturally?

I'm going to assume that the questioner had in mind extra-terrestrials, as opposed to immigrants with or without legal standing. (I have thoughts about that, too, but will save those for another time.)

I guess this question encompasses several others. Is there intelligent life on other planets? If so, can it contact us? If so, has it? If not, what do we make of the reported UFO sightings and even those of actual encounters, including claims of having been inside of alien spaceships?

Let me begin my answer with a physics/astronomy tutorial. Some of the most fascinating (and relevant) research of the past several decades can be summed up in the idea known as the 'anthropic principle.' It was not all that long ago that astronomer and science popularizer Carl Sagan told millions of TV viewers as often as he could that there were probably billions of planets out there capable of supporting advanced life. And to generations of Americans who grew up with Star Trek, and then Battlestar Galactica, Star Wars, Star Trek the Next Generation, and such, this idea of a universe teeming with life seemed to resonate.

But a whole lot of better science has since told us that it's just not so. (This research was going on in Sagan's day, but by that period of his life, his metaphysical and scientific views had formed; his beliefs took on a religious fervor, and he was no longer open to new research developments. Sagan is not alone among scientists who become close-minded later in life.)

For the past 3 decades and more, astronomers and physicists have discovered that the universe itself, our galaxy, and our solar system are incredibly fine-tuned to make human life on Earth possible. That is, the characteristics and measurements of the physical constants of our universe, the nature and age of our galaxy, the position within our galaxy of our sun, and everything about our solar system fall within extremely narrow ranges (among the large theoretical ranges) that allow for life on just a single planet, this one. The list of such fine-tuned characteristics is now nearly 200, but still the best place I know for a partial list is the book by astronomer Hugh Ross, The Creator and the Cosmos.

Combining all of these characteristics and their improbabilities yields a single likelihood--a one-in-a-[large number] chance of finding life anywhere in the universe. (I could insert that large number, but it grows weekly as new design characteristics are identified. Suffice it to say that...) The odds against there being even a single life support planet in the whole universe are astronomical, and this takes into account the fact that so impressed Sagan, that there are billions and billions of stars and galaxies out there. Even so, it is beyond the realm of statistical likelihood that even one planet contains life.*

So the first answer is that it is extremely unlikely that any other life support planets exist, that indeed the ability of even our planet to support life requires a supernatural explanation. In the next post I'll pretend nonetheless that such life does exist, and explain why it is extremely improbable that such life would ever find us.

* This doesn't even address the problem of the origin of life, The anthropic principle has as its referrent the ability of the universe to support life, with the origin of life being an additional and independent problem.

Redux

2010-01-26T07:37:00.000-08:00

A couple of months ago at my church, Antioch, we started a second service, which we call Redux. There is no sermon in Redux, but the meat of the service is a question-and-answer period. The point is to restore the conversation, to make it okay to ask questions and raise doubts and even criticisms. We do this confident in the knowledge that the Christian world- and life-view really do represent the uniquely accurate understanding of the world in which we live.

At any rate, I was given the opportunity last Sunday of fielding the questions, which spanned a range of subjects that included biblical inerrancy, the age of the earth and universe, the Sabbath, and anti-intellectualism in the church. You can go here to watch a vimeo of my answer to the latter question.

At Redux, we take questions directly from the audience, but we also allow folks to use text messaging to ask questions or offer challenges. At the end of the service, there were several text questions that I hadn't had time to address, so in the next post or two, I'll offer responses to one or more of those, including one about the existence of extra-terrestrials.

Apologetics Conference

2010-01-18T11:51:00.000-08:00

We're hosting the second annual Apologetics Conference here in Bend, Oregon, February 19th and 20th. The theme is the reliability of the New Testament, and guest lecturers Craig Blomberg, Daniel Wallace, and Craig Hazen are coming in for this outstanding event. I'll be delivering a couple of talks during breakout sessions, one on the credibility of biblical miracles in the age of modern science and the other a New Testament textual criticism primer.

If there's any way you can make it to Bend for this Friday evening and all-day Saturday event, it will be well worth your while. Go here to register.

Transitional Forms

2010-01-05T21:01:00.000-08:00

Not infrequently I come across the question, “What about the evidence for transitional forms? Hasn’t science proved that transitional forms exist, thereby validating Darwinian evolution?”

I understand why people might believe this to be the case. The claim that science has found transitional intermediates in the fossil record is taught in schools and universities throughout the land, and is made frequently and loudly by scientists and by the media, seemingly with the authority of evidence behind them.

But this claim has no basis in evidence, but instead is made solely because it is a fundamental and necessary prediction of Darwinian evolution.

To understand the issue, let’s take a big-picture, historical look at it. The real conflict is between two explanations for the diversity of life on Earth. The Darwinian view (or its modern synthesis, generally known as neo-Darwinism) is one. The other—the one held by all the biologists, anatomists, physiologists, and paleontologists of Darwin’s day, and the one Darwin intended to replace—I’ll call typology. Typology sought to explain—and did a very good job of explaining—the two most important characteristics of living things, which are their similarities and their differences. Biologists long knew that all life shared certain similarities, and that different groups of living things shared even more similarities with one another than with species outside their group. The typological explanation for the similarities among living things was (and is) that all things were created—and designed to fulfill their role—by the same Creator.*

But groups of living things exhibit stark differences as well. Indeed, the life forms (extant and extinct) identified by Darwin’s time fell rather neatly into groupings—“types”—that were separated, in many cases by rather large gaps. Thus, mammals all share characteristics that set them apart from birds or reptiles, and bats all share characteristics that set them apart from rodents. Typology said (and says) that gaps exist because the hypothetical things in-between (the half-reptile, half bird or the half-rodent, half bat) are nonsensical and non-functional.

Darwin, on the other hand, postulated that those gaps have been populated throughout life’s history by other living things—transitional intermediates. And on his view, there would have to have been not just one or two such forms bridging the apparent gaps, but that

the number of intermediate and transitional links, between all living and extinct species, must have been inconceivably great.

He knew that no such transitional forms were known at that time, but then paleontology was a relatively young discipline in Darwin’s day. He wrote that the fossil record was

the most obvious and gravest objection which can be urged against my theory [and the reason] all the most eminent paleontologists… and all our greatest geologists… have unanimously, often vehemently, maintained the immutability of species.

So a prediction central to the verification of his theory was that further fossil digging would uncover a great many of these “inconceivably great” number of transitional forms.

For the ensuing 150 years, the history of paleontology has been primarily a search to find these forms predicted by Darwin, the evidence that would validate his theory. What has been the result? Scientists have uncovered hundreds of millions of new fossil forms. Unfortunately (for Darwin’s theory), they have invariably fallen into one of two categories—they have either fit into a type already known to science, or they have represented yet a new type, one not transitional to known types, but rather requiring yet another exceedingly vast number of transitional forms to link that type to other known ones.

Contrary to the educational and media misrepresentation, here’s the true situation as described by arguably the preeminent paleontologist of our generation. Harvard’s late Stephen Jay Gould called

the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record… the trade secret of paleontology.

His colleague, Niles Eldredge, concurred:

We paleontologists have said that the history of life supports [the story of gradual adaptive change], all the while really knowing that it does not.

Stephen Stanley, commenting on research from Wyoming’s Bighorn Basin—where a continuous record of deposits covering millions of years led paleontologists to expect evidence for transitional forms—wrote that

the fossil record does not convincingly document a single transition from one species to another.

So the central evidentially-based prediction made by Darwin has roundly failed. That it continues to be claimed today that science has documented transitional forms has nothing to do with evidence and everything to do with the centrality of these forms to the theory. It’s really nothing more than a group wish-fulfillment exercise on the part of those who want Darwinism to be true.

* I’ll discuss in one of the next posts why typology still does a better job than neo-Darwinism of explaining the similarities among living things.