William Dembski

According to Jerry Coyne, atheistic evolutionists and ID proponents have at least this in common — they can expect no bribes from the Templeton Foundation. Read Coyne’s post on the topic here.

I’m trying to determine which Christian faculty would be regarded as absolutely tops in their respective disciplines but which would also be completely up front about their Christian worldview. Who would be on your top ten list? Of those on the list, how many would be supporters of or at least sympathetic to ID? Please think objectively about these questions. ID is a hot button topic. Leave aside UD’s bias in favor of ID. Please limit your candidates to English-speaking countries. Thanks.

Discovery Institute Announces the 2010 Summer Seminars on Intelligent Design Click here to listen. This episode of ID the Future features a special announcement from Discovery Institute announcing the 2010 Summer Seminars on Intelligent Design.  Discovery Institute has two intensive summer seminars on intelligent design, science, and culture from July 9-17, 2010 in Seattle. The first seminar is for students in the natural sciences and philosophy of science; the second seminar is for students in the social sciences and humanities (including politics, law, journalism, and theology). These seminars are designed for highly-motivated college students who seek a deeper understanding of science and its implications for society. The seminar focusing on ID in the natural sciences will explore the scientific issues in greater technical detail and Read More ›

A famous theism-vs.-atheism debate between William Lane Craig and Frank Zindler took place in 1993 at Willow Creek Church and was published as a video by Zondervan in 1996 (under the title Atheism vs. Christianity). The debate is available on YouTube here (in 15 parts). It is available in full here. In that debate, Zindler, taking the atheist side, made the following remark:

The most devastating thing, though, that biology did to Christianity was the discovery of biological evolution. Now that we know that Adam and Eve never were real people, the central myth of Christianity is destroyed. If there never was an Adam and Eve, there never was an original sin. If there never was an original sin, there is no need of salvation. If there is no need of salvation, there is no need of a savior. And I submit that puts Jesus, historical or otherwise, into the ranks of the unemployed. I think that evolution is absolutely the death knell of Christianity.

I’ve addressed Zindler’s objection to Original Sin and the Fall in my book The End of Christianity: Finding a Good God in an Evil World (check out the book as well as a $5,000 video contest promoting the book at www.godornot.com). What interests me here, though, is the logic that’s suppoed to take one from evolution to the death of Christianity — and presumably also to the death of any other brand of theism. Accordingly, evolution — a Darwinian, materialistic form of it — is supposed to imply no God and thus atheism. Simply put, (DARWINIAN) EVOLUTION implies ATHEISM. This implication seems widely touted by atheists. Will Provine, for instance, will call evolution an “engine for atheism,” suggesting that the path from evolution to atheism is inescapable.

Now this implication, though perhaps underscoring a sociological phenomenon (people exposed to Darwinism frequently become atheistic or agnostic), is logically unsound. Theistic evolutionists like Francis Collins, Denis Alexander, and Kenneth Miller provide a clear counterexample, Read More ›

The “Oasis for Clear-Thinking,” otherwise known as RichardDawkins.net, still exists but seems to have dried up. For details, read the following lament by Peter Harrison: Death of the Dawkins forum – The world’s busiest atheist forum closes February 23, 2010 in Atheism | Tags: andrew chalkley, forum, josh timonen, rdfrs, richard dawkins, wankery of the most fulminating order Yesterday, I was celebrating…. I was on a high all day…. But by the end of the day, I was brought back down to Earth as I discovered that the world’s busiest atheist forum was being closed down, and that the disgusting evening was to be filled with lies, censorship and cowardice…. MORE

This just in from the Templeton Foundation. They’re convinced that all informed scientific criticism of evolutionary theory died long ago. Check out especially the following link: www.templeton.org/evolution. Does evolution explain human nature? Three distinguished scholars explored this Big Question during a recent discussion sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation, Yale University, and Discover magazine. The panel featured Kenneth Miller, professor of biology at Brown University; Laurie Santos, a Yale psychologist and primate specialist; and David Sloan Wilson, an evolutionary theorist at Binghamton University. The discussion was moderated by Corey Powell, editor and chief of Discover, and was based on a recent JTF Big Questions essay series, which can be found online at www.templeton.org/evolution. Video clips from the discussion are now Read More ›

Mathematician Granville Sewell on Common Design   On this episode of  Dr. Sewell’s new book, In the Beginning: And Other Essays on Intelligent Design, is published by Discovery Institute Press. Click here to listen.ID the Future, pro-ID mathematician Granville Sewell explains his views on common design and how the second law of thermodynamics challenges materialism. Listen in as Sewell and Luskin explore an expanse of important topics, such as the origin of human consciousness, scientism, education policy, and the problem of evil. www.idthefuture.com

Jeffrey Dahmer: “If it all happens naturalistically, what’s the need for a God? Can’t I set my own rules? Who owns me? I own myself.” [Biography, “Jeffrey Dahmer: The Monster Within,” A&E, 1996.] Naturalists like to stress that you don’t need God or religion to be good. Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins even suggest that leaving God out of the equation actually allows one to be more moral because then our moral acts are authentic, motivated by deep conviction rather than by having a divine gun to our heads. Even so, Dahmer’s logic is compelling. We need some external reference point — God — to justify being good. And that justification is significant in its own right. Without it, we can still Read More ›

Michael Ruse is not happy with Jerry Fodor’s new book (described here at UD). As Ruse begins his review in the Boston Globe: “What Darwin Got Wrong is an intensely irritating book….” . Here is the conclusion of Ruse’s review: The Darwinian does not want to say that the world is designed. That is what the Intelligent Design crew argues. The Darwinian is using a metaphor to understand the material nonthinking world. We treat that world as if it were an object of design, because doing so is tremendously valuable heuristically. And the use of metaphor is a commonplace in science. Why then do we have these arguments? The clue is given at the end, when the authors start to Read More ›

Justin Brierley asked me to publicize this. If you’re near London on the 27th, please attend. Premier Christian Radio invites you to “Expelled” the Movie. Due to popular demand an additional screening of the controversial Intelligent Design film “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” and a debate to follow will take place on Saturday 27th February 6.30pm at Imperial College London, South Kensington. The event will be hosted by Justin Brierley of Premier Christian Radio’s faith discussion programme “Unbelievable?” For details and booking for this significant event visit www.premier.org.uk/expelled. The post screening debate and Q&A time will include: Dr. Alastair Noble (Former Inspector of Schools) and Dr. Vij Sodera (Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons) who advocate intelligent design and Prof. Read More ›

Steve Barr and I used to be friends. I’m not sure he would consider me one any longer. According to his latest posting at First Things (go here), “Religion has a significant number of friends (and potential friends) in the scientific world. The ID movement is not creating new ones.” And since creating new friends for religion among his scientific colleagues seems to have become Barr’s overriding concern, that presumably makes me and the ID movement the enemy.

I first learned of Barr back in 1992 through a friend of mine from the University of Chicago doing a postdoc at Caltech. Knowing my interest in the science-religion discussion, he told me about a talk he had heard at Caltech from a U. of Del. physicist named Stephen Barr. My friend sent me a typescript of the talk and I was intrigued. Barr quoted the Church Father Minucius Felix: “If upon entering some home you saw that everything there was well-tended, neat and decorative, you would believe that some master was in charge of it, and that he was himself much superior to those good things. So too in the home of this world, when you see providence, order and law in the heavens and on earth, believe that there is a Lord and Author of the universe, more beatiful than the stars and the various parts of the whole world.”

I called Barr and we had a nice chat. He indicated an openness to design in biology but felt that the better design arguments were to be made at the level physical law (God having designed the laws of the universe). Fair enough. In that first conversation back in 1992, I urged Barr to write a book on his law-based approach to design and thoughts about science and religion — he seemed to have an enthusiasm for the subject and the smarts to pull it off. As a research scientist, he stressed how busy he was and at the time dismissed my proposal out of hand. In following years Barr and I kept in touch. I had him invited to the MERE CREATION conference held at Biola in 1996, which he attended and at which he was a valuable participant.

Then, in 2003, ten years after our first conversation, he published a fine book titled Modern Physics and Ancient Faith (I like to think, and believe evidence supports it, that I was part of the causal chain in its production). In an email with subject header “Can you help me out,” he asked me to help promote the book, asked me to write a blurb for it, and even asked me to direct him to others who might write blurbs for it (the blurb on the back cover by Peter van Inwagen was probably at my instance). In any case, I was happy to give him the following blurb: “Stephen Barr has an exceptionally clear style and a gift for illustrating complex ideas and making them understandable. More significantly, here is a free mind joyfully relating the physics he loves to the faith that sustains him, unconcerned about the reaction of the ‘professionals’.” I meant the blurb at the time and still think it’s a fine book (indeed, I’ve used it in some of my seminary classes).

But I’m not sure I can honestly say that Barr is unconcerned about the reaction of his colleagues any longer. Indeed, given his First Things piece, he seems overly concerned to distance himself from his past ID connections and to score points with a more socially acceptable community of scholars. He protests too much. A colleague of mine, reading his First Things post, reacted this way: Read More ›

 Jerry Fodor has been a critic of Darwinism for a few years now (see this article he wrote against it). Here is his latest in book form (go here to purchase). Amazon.com includes the following description:

From Publishers Weekly
The authors of this scattershot treatise believe in evolution, but think that the Darwinian model of adaptationism—that random genetic mutations, filtered by natural selection, produce traits that enhance fitness for a particular biological niche—is fatally flawed. Philosopher Fodor and molecular-biologist-turned-cognitive-scientist Piattelli-Palmarini, at the University of Arizona, launch a three-pronged attack (which drew fire when Fodor presented their ideas in the London Review of Books in 2007). For one thing, according to the authors, natural selection contains a logical fallacy by linking two irreconcilable claims: first, that creatures with adaptive traits are selected, and second, that creatures are selected for their adaptive traits. The authors present an ill-digested assortment of scientific studies suggesting there are forces other than adaptation (some even Lamarckian) that drive changes in genes and organisms. Then they advance a densely technical argument that natural selection can’t coherently distinguish between adaptive traits and irrelevant ones. Their most persuasive, and engaging, criticism is that evolutionary theory is just tautological truisms and historical narratives of how creatures came to be. Overall, the scientific evidence and philosophical analyses the authors proffer are murky and underwhelming. Worse, their highly technical treatment renders their argument virtually incomprehensible to lay readers. (Feb.) Read More ›

Check it out here. Scientific hubris, especially with Climategate and evolution, has reached a breaking point. I expect the corruption of science will find increasing exposure in coming days. ———————————————- Issue highlights include: “What do scientists know?” by Joseph Farah, on the difference between a scientific consensus and a political one “History of climate gets ‘erased’ online” by Chelsea Schilling, exposing the scientist who has altered more than 5,000 Wikipedia entries to hype the global-warming agenda “Politicizing science” by Thomas Sowell, who warns that when government gets involved, “do not expect the disinterested search for truth” “Science bulletin: ‘Sun heats Earth!’” by Jerome R. Corsi, who profiles the Russian scientist whose research forecasts global cooling “We’ve been had!” by Walter Read More ›

Stephen Meyer’s interview of David Berlinski — go here. Full podcast — go here.

Whenever I hear the phrase “overwhelming evidence” or “overwhelming scientific evidence,” my antennae go up and I know that someone is trying to sell me something. Last night, if you were watching the networks, you heard the following remark: I know that there are those who disagree with the overwhelming scientific evidence on climate change. But even if you doubt the evidence, providing incentives for energy efficiency and clean energy are the right thing to do for our future — because the nation that leads the clean energy economy will be the nation that leads the global economy. I’d like to encourage people to post in the comments to this thread other examples where the phrase “overwhelming [scientific] evidence” is Read More ›