Religion

Recently, we posted a link to  Ken Francis’s item at New English Review, which addresses, in part, the question of whether angels exist: The atheist philosopher, David Hume, said if rational people have a choice to believe more than one explanation of an event, they should choose to believe that explanation which is most probable. Hume would argue that such a supernatural event of an angelic encounter, by definition, is unbelievable. For Hume, an encounter with an angel would be a violation of the laws of nature. In An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, he writes: “There must, therefore, be a uniform experience against every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit that appellation. And as a uniform experience amounts Read More ›

Suzan Mazur, author of Public Evolution Summit, writes at HuffPost that the principals of the Dutch Origins Center have pledged that with respect to involvement in theology, “We will not make the mistake NASA made.” … Several days later in Amsterdam, Origins Center coordinator Jan-Willem Mantel confirmed that theology is not part of the Dutch initiative. Over a million US dollars were squandered by the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI) for a two-year program (2015-2017) to find out, among other things, how the religious community would respond to the discovery of extraterrestrial life—-a story I reported here, which Jerry Coyne picked up a few days later followed by the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) filing a Freedom of Information Act request. The Read More ›

From theoretical physicist Sabine Hossenfelder at her blog Back(reaction): On the one hand, I understand the concerns about breaking with centuries of tradition. We used to followed up each hypothesis with experimental test, and the longer the delay between hypothesis and test, the easier for pseudoscience to take foothold. On the other hand, I agree that speculation is a necessary part of science and new problems sometimes require new methods. Insisting on ideals of the past might mean getting stuck, maybe forever. Even more important, I think it’s a grave mistake to let anyone define what we mean by doing science. Because who gets to decide what’s the right thing to do? Should we listen to Helge Kragh? Peter Woit? Read More ›

The question is knottier than it might at first appear. Ken Francis, journalist and author of The Little Book of God, Mind, Cosmos and Truth, writes at New English Review: The beginning of the universe was a supernatural event, as only something that transcends time, space and matter could cause it to happen. Secondly, if the supernatural is real, then the existence of disembodied spirits is possible. If we are not our physical bodies, then a spiritual realm is more probable than improbable. And it’s more likely this realm filled with spiritual entities would be created by an Intelligent Designer sans/universe and before the creation of earthly creatures. As human beings, despite our many follies, we are also extremely intelligent creatures. Our Read More ›

Hmmm. In practice, that depends in part on what people would consider evidence and whether or not they would be convinced by the evidence offered. Here: Planet Earth formed around 4.5 billion years ago. The first primitive forms of life appeared about 4 billion years ago. Natural selection did the rest, giving rise to species increasingly better adapted to their environment. Evidence, as they say, is overwhelming. Or is it? Imagine planet Earth began its existence a mere 10,000 years ago, with all fossil records in place and carbon-14 well into decaying. From there on, however, evolution proceeded as scientists tell us. How’d you prove this story wrong? You can’t. I know it hurts. But hang on there, band aid follows Read More ›

  From Michael Chaberek, OP, in Aquinas and Evolution: When a scientist discovers the material or the efficient cause while not finding any other, it does not follow that no other causes exist. It simply means that the scientific explanation does not include those other causes. This is not reductionism, because drawing more abstract and general conclusions about living beings as separate substances (or nature as a whole) is outside of science. Reductionism begins not when scientists speak about material and efficient causes alone, but when they (or anyone else) claim that scientific knowledge is the only possible type of knowledge, or that science explains everything, including the mystery of life. And this is not what the proponents of intelligent Read More ›

Ask a scholar. From David Klinghoffer at Evolution News & Views, introducing a podcast with German history scholar Richard Weikart, author of Hitler’s Religion In an ID the Future conversation with Todd Butterfield, Professor Weikart reveals the complexity of his topic — Hitler’s true religious views, which are so often subjected to, yes, simplistic caricature. Sometimes you’ll see Hitler portrayed as a Christian, other times as an occultist. Neither is true. You could call him a pantheist. More. Podcast here: On this episode of ID The Future, Tod Butterfield talks with CSC Senior Fellow Dr. Richard Weikart about his recently published book Hitler’s Religion: The Twisted Beliefs that Drove the Third Reich. In particular, Weikart explores Hitler’s pantheism and his Read More ›

Readers may recall the recent flap about Canada’s governor-general ridiculing anyone who thinks that life did not originate randomly, to which Canadian biophysicist Kirk Durston responded, among other things: The third problem with the Governor General’s example of unquestioning faith in science is the corruption that has reached crises proportions in certain areas of science itself, with a special nod to the biological sciences. In 2012 the journal Nature published an exposé which found that 89% of “landmark” papers in the field of cancer research, could not be reproduced. More. This is not a good time to be gung-ho for scientism but anyway, Durston notes: that other astronauts do not agree with Payette: On two different occasions, I spent time Read More ›

  A new book critiquing theistic evolution is hitting the shelves. But meanwhile, a Catholic book along the same lines, Aquinas and Evolution by Michael Chaberek, OP, is performing a much-needed service: Helping people understand that Catholicism is not a branch of naturalist atheism. To listen to some Catholic evolutionists, we might find it hard to distinguish. Brief excerpt from Chaberek: Thomistic critics of ID reject ID for “philosophical reasons” and adopt the Darwinian explanations for the “scientific reasons.” But this means that they fight the alleged mechanistic reductionism of intelligent design and, at the same time, they accept the real and quite blatant reductionism of the Darwinian theory. Indeed, there is no greater misunderstanding of life and no greater reductionism in biology Read More ›

David Snoke has announced a meeting on “natural evil” organized by the Christian Scientific Society at Biola U, January 26-27: On Friday night, we will have a debate between David Snoke (me) and Mike Keas on “Are predatory animals a result of the Fall?” (Mike: yes; David: no). Saturday afternoon, we will have four speakers addressing issues on the general topic of natural evil: 1:00 PM. Non-Empirical Influences on Evolutionary Theory and the Principle of Plenitude.” Dr. Cornelius Hunter, author of Darwin’s God: Evolution and the Problem of Evil; Darwin’s Proof, and Science’s Blind Spot. 2:00 PM. “The Human Genome: ENCODED by Design.” Dr. Fazale Rana, Vice President of Research and Apologetics, Reasons to Believe 3:00 PM. “The Tragic History Read More ›

From Tyler O’Neil at PJ Media: A former executive at Google has filed paperwork with the IRS to establish an official religion of technology. This religion doesn’t just worship scientific progress, but artificial intelligence itself, with the goal of creating a godhead. The new church of AI will aim “to develop and promote the realization of a Godhead based on artificial intelligence and through understanding and worship of the Godhead [to] contribute to the betterment of society,” according to IRS documents. The non-profit religious organization would be called “Way of the Future” (WOTF). More. Making a god is actually not a new idea. Cf The Golden Calf. You can easily find out what your god is up to and control Read More ›

From Denyse O’Leary (O’Leary for News) at Evolution News & Views: State religion? You, reader, object (of course): That scenario is not plausible! The theories are not believable! No? In the 20th century, Marxist economic theories became a state religion. These theories were propounded and enforced for decades, and dissenters were punished, despite the fact that mass starvation was a common outcome. Hunger was predictable, predicted, and widely known. Thinkers naturally assumed that evidence and reason would prevail over enforcement and dogma. But when evidence is rejected, reason has little to work with. Eventually, reason does prevail but much else prevails meanwhile. And in that particular case, great scientists such as Einstein, Godel, and Lakatos were surprisingly complicit, knowingly or Read More ›

The last round was Adam, Eve, Richard Buggs, and Dennis Venema: Could Adam and Eve have existed?, where Dennis Venema (no) replied to Richard Buggs (yes). Now, Richard Buggs replies, Now to look in more detail at the points you raise about allelic diversity. This is where I think your argument is strongest, so I would like to examine it in some detail. To do this full justice, I want to start with what you say about this in your book chapter. One of your most explicit statements about this in your book chapter is as follows: …scientists have many other methods at their disposal to measure just how large our population has been over time. One simple way is Read More ›

Closing our scheduled religion coverage for the week, we note, re Reason to Hope: We regret to advise that the 2018 Global Atheist Convention, Reason to Hope , has been cancelled. If you are a ticket holder, you are entitled to a refund (including fees) and we will be in touch with you directly. More. Apparently, Ayaan Hirsi Ali pulled out. Richard Dawkins and Salman Rushdie were expected, as were other atheist luminaries. The cited reason was poor ticket sales. Poor ticket sales don’t just happen. Is it possible that the public is losing interest in “bad boy” atheism, whether it is represented by profane Darwinian bloggers or high class hatemongers (religion as a “virus of the mind,” etc.)? Apart from professional obligations, Read More ›

At his blog: Recently I was interviewed by Matt Fradd for his Pints with Aquinas podcast. We talk a bit about Five Proofs of the Existence of God, but our main topic is Richard Dawkins’s critique of Aquinas’s Five Ways in The God Delusion. We work through each of the objections Dawkins raises and discuss where they go wrong. Matt is posting the interview in two parts, and the first part has now been posted. (podcast) If you think that anyone born after the invention of the Bomb must be smarter than the Angelic Doctor (Aquinas,1225–1274), fetch a mug and sit down and listen. Note: Aquinas points to ponder. See also: How naturalism rots science from the head down