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Bruce Gordon’s Article on Stephen Hawking


In a recent Washington Times article, written by the Discovery Institute’s polymath Bruce Gordon, Gordon discusses the soundness of Stephen Hawking’s argument made recently which states that the universe could have been brought into existence merely by the laws of nature.

Stephen Hawking‘s new book, “The Grand Design,” co-authored with Leonard Mlodinow, contends that God is not necessary to create the universe because the laws of physics can do it alone. The “new atheist” crowd will cheer this message, but their credulity is a matter more of fiery sentiment than of coolheaded logic.

Mr. Hawking asserts that “as recent advances in cosmology suggest, the laws of gravity and quantum theory allow universes to appear spontaneously from nothing. Spontaneous creation is the reason there is something rather than nothing, why the universe exists, why we exist. It is not necessary to invoke God to light the blue touch paper and set the universe going.” But “spontaneous creation” minus any cause illustrates the lack of an explanation rather than scientific comprehension. It also runs counter to a question Mr. Hawking voiced years ago: “What is it that breathes fire into the equations and makes a universe for them to describe?”

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ID in Japan?


Shrine gate at Itsukushima shrine, Hiroshima Prefecture, Japan. Photo by Dan Smith.

One of Paul Gauguin’s most famous paintings is entitled: “Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?” Historically, the world’s great civilizations have offered very different answers to these three questions. In this post, I’d like to draw readers’ attention to a fascinating lecture given by Kagefumi Ueno, entitled “Culture and Religiosity in Modern Japan.” Ueno is a “cultural thinker,” who has published several books and spoken at various congresses. Currently, he is Japan’s ambassador to the Holy See in Rome.

As someone who lives in Japan, I found Ueno’s talk deeply insightful and very perceptive. It’s a must-read for people who are interested in Intelligent Design: although Ueno focuses on the profound differences between Japanese religiosity and Christianity, the implications for ID are obvious. To explain why, I’d like to quote a short passage from Ueno’s speech:
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St. Thomas Aquinas and his Fifteen Smoking Guns (A five-part reply to Professor Tkacz)

For some time now, I’ve been threatening to publish an expose of the pretentious claims of self-styled “Thomists” who have argued that Intelligent Design is completely at odds with St. Thomas Aquinas’ philosophy. Well, this is it. The Big One. Get ready, and hold on to your hats. In today’s post, I’m going to comprehensively rebut a paper by a leading “Thomistic” critic of Intelligent Design, who contends that Thomists have nothing to fear from the scientific claims of Darwinism. I’m going to show that this ID critic actually contradicts what St. Thomas Aquinas wrote on the topic of origins, on no less than fifteen specific points (yes, fifteen!), which I shall call Aquinas’ “fifteen smoking guns.” I think my Read More ›

Dr. Alastair Noble

UK Centre For Intelligent Design Claims It Will Focus On Science, Not Religion

Dr Alastair Noble, director of the Center for Intelligent Design in Glasgow, says ID is ‘consistently misrepresented as a religious position’ and he’s ready to engage the debate on the grounds of actual evidence, according to this article at the UK’s Guardian.

Darwin proven wrong, again! Experimental Evolution Reveals Resistance to Change

Natural Selection is daily and hourly scrutinising, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting those that are bad, preserving and adding up all that are good. C.DARWIN sixth edition Origin of Species — Ch#4 Natural Selection NOT! Newly appearing good traits in a single individual will rarely get infused (or “fixed” ) into a population. To understand theoretically why this is false, visit: Gambler’s Ruin is Darwin’s Ruin. And now we have some poignant experimental confirmation of my theoretical prediction! In a paper published by the prestigious scientific journal Nature September 30,2010 we read: Our work provides a new perspective on the genetic basis of adaptation. Despite decades of sustained selection in relatively small, sexually reproducing laboratory populations, selection did Read More ›

Irony

In Foresight and Understanding (Indiana University Press, 1961), physicist and philosopher of science Stephen Toulmin rejected set “rules” for science. He argued that no single criterion (e.g., falsifiablity, prediction, etc.) encompasses the entire scientific endeavor. Toulmin advocated a Darwinian conception of science pursuant to which scientific theories succeed because they are better adapted at explaining the data than their rivals. How deliciously ironic it would be if Darwinism were dethroned as the paradigm of origins through a Darwinian process.

How Credulous Are Some Scientists? Very

 We have this report today about an earth sized planet orbiting a nearby star.  An excerpt:  An Earth-size planet has been spotted orbiting a nearby star at a distance that would makes it not too hot and not too cold — comfortable enough for life to exist, researchers announced Wednesday. If confirmed, the exoplanet, named Gliese 581g, would be the first Earth-like world found residing in a star’s habitable zone — a region where a planet’s temperature could sustain liquid water on its surface. And the planet’s discoverers are optimistic about the prospects for finding life there. “Personally, given the ubiquity and propensity of life to flourish wherever it can, I would say, my own personal feeling is that the Read More ›

The Reformed Objection to Natural Theology – by Michael Sudduth

I have recently come across the work of Michael Sudduth on Natural Theology. This very interesting book is published by Ashgate The Reformed Objection to Natural Theology http://www.ashgate.com/isbn/9780754661757 Looks like essential reading for those concerned about intelligent design and Reformed theology. Reviews by Richard Swinburne, Alister McGrath and Alvin Plantinga  (Although it is not cheap).

Sacrificial Reiss offered on the altar of ‘Science’

The Michael Reiss saga should not be quickly forgotten. His enforced resignation as the Royal Society’s Director of Education in September 2008 was a blot on the history of the Royal Society (see here and here). Yet, after two years, few changes are apparent: Reiss continues to publish his “worldview” perspective on handling creationism in science education (see here) and Royal Society Fellows have continued to talk about irresolvable conflicts at the science/religion interface. It is encouraging, therefore, to find Sylvia Baker formulating a coherent analysis of the conflict and proposing a research agenda to inform future discussion of the issues. “The controversy, resulting as it did in such serious consequences, raises many issues and concerns. This article will seek Read More ›

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A simple statistical test for the alleged “99% genetic identity” between humans and chimps


Typical figures published in the scientific literature for the percentage similarities between the genomes of human beings (Homo sapiens) and chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) range from 95% to 99%. However, in press releases intended for popular consumption, evolutionary biologists frequently claim that human and chimpanzee genomes are 99% identical. Skeptics of neo-Darwinian evolution have repeatedly punctured this”99% myth,” but unfortunately, it seems to have gained widespread credence, due to its being continually propagated by evolutionists! For instance, one often encounters statements like these in the literature:

“Because the chimpanzee lies at such a short evolutionary distance with respect to human, nearly all of the bases are identical by descent and sequences can be readily aligned” (The Chimpanzee Sequencing and Analysis Consortium, Initial sequence of the chimpanzee genome and comparison with the human genome, Vol. 437/1 September 2005/doi:10.1038/nature04072).

“The consortium [National Human Genome Research Institute] found that the chimp and human genomes are very similar and encode very similar proteins. The DNA sequence that can be directly compared between the two genomes is almost 99 percent identical.” (here.)

“The genetic codes of chimps and humans are 99 percent identical.” (here)

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Richard Dawkins and Ray Comfort

Richard Dawkins takes Ray Comfort out of context: Dawkins says he doesn’t debate Creationists, yet he debates what Creationists say quite often. Should Dawkins avoid debating Creationists when they are the subject of his lectures and speaking engagements?

The Fibonacci post has generated a longer comment thread than anything else I’ve written. I was just digging a little dirt and must have hit a power line. The question I tried to address, was “is there any physics in Fibonacci, or is it just a mathematician’s curiosity?” Here’s the physics that came back: a) AJ Meyer has looked at the galactic rotation curves, and pointed out that “rigid-body” rotation which is observed, can be obtained by having a mass which increases with radius. Now since we can look at galaxies from the side, and they don’t get thicker with radius,  it would seem that this increase in mass must be due to something else. Gallo argues that it could Read More ›

Have Glycine – but no life

Earlier this year, the work of Nir Goldman and colleagues was noted (here). Using sophisticated computer modeling tools, it was concluded that cometary impacts could generate C-N bonded oligomers that subsequently break apart to form a glycine-containing complex. This research has now been published in Nature Chemistry, resulting in a new flurry of discussion about the shock synthesis of life. It is known from Stanley Miller’s experiments that amino acids can be synthesized in a reducing atmosphere. However, the evidence for such an atmosphere has become less convincing with time – and even a neutral atmosphere means the Miller route for generating amino acids is unproductive. Cometary impacts, however, can make this point irrelevant, as is explained by John Timmer Read More ›

A Review of Why Us? by James Le Fanu

Many members of the ID community will no doubt have been relieved to see the back of 2009. The secular establishment took the opportunity provided by the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth, and the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species, to launch a defence of their hero’s largely discredited theory. The popular science bookshelves were crammed with the uncritical, credulous hagiography that is the hallmark of the evolutionary genre, with their hysterical denunciations of ID inadvertently providing a fascinating insight into life on the wrong end of a paradigm shift. However, a careful scrutiny of those bookshelves would also have revealed a slim volume by the British science journalist, James Le Fanu, entitled Why Us? Read More ›

Centre for Intelligent Design UK Website Now LIVE

In recent years, the development of Intelligent Design has been associated largely with the USA. This week marks the launch of the Centre for Intelligent Design UK (website here). The Centre brings ID back to its roots, which can be traced right to the early developments of science in the UK and wider Europe. Many of the early pioneers of modern science held the view that the natural world was intelligible because it was itself the product of a rational mind. The new Centre is set up by a network of volunteers across the UK, with a variety of areas of expertise and professional interests – as diverse as medicine, science, education, business, and law. It exists as a non-profit organisation and Read More ›