Ronald E. Osborn. Death Before the Fall: Biblical Literalism and the Problem of Animal Suffering. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2014. This book suffers from a serious identity crisis. On the face (that is, the cover) of it, the book purports to provide an in-depth theological analysis of the problem of natural evil generally and animal […]
evolution
An Evolving Evangelical Debate: A review of “Four Views on The Historical Adam”
Barrett, Matthew and Ardel B. Caneday, eds. Four Views on the Historical Adam (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2013), 288 pp. Fifteen years ago Zondervan published Three Views on Creation and Evolution, a lively exchange between two young earth creationists (Paul Nelson and John Mark Reynolds), an old earth creationist (Robert C. Newman), and a theistic evolutionist (Howard Van Til). Since that […]
God? Science? Evolution? Historical Adam? Explore the issues with Denis Lamoureux
Great news for those of you interested in the discussion of Christianity and science generally, and evolution and Christianity in particular. My friend, Professor Denis Lamoureux (whom I interviewed on my podcast here), is going to be hosting a two hour online free webinar for those interested in the discussion on April 14th. Professor Lamoureux […]
A defense of Ken Ham’s fake Noah’s Ark
Ken Ham, that Australian-accented l’enfant terrible of North American fundamentalist Protestant 6-day young earth creationist Christianity, has achieved his goal of raising the first $14 million to begin construction on an ambitious life-size replica of Noah’s Ark for the people of Kentucky and indeed the citizens of the world. (Whew! That’s quite the opening sentence!) […]
Liar, Liar, soul on fire!
My podcast interview with Peter Enns elicited some interesting responses. One of the more memorable came from one very disgruntled bloke who commented at Pete’s blog: “In he [sic] interview you claim to believe God and the Bible but your following words contradict your claims. YOU ARE A LIAR. You do NOT believe God or the […]
Snapshots from Baltimore (Part 3): The evolution of theology
There are not many places you can go in the Academy to find an ongoing debate on whether the earth might be merely thousands of years old. But the Evangelical Theological Society is one of the last bastions. (Of course, depending on who you ask, the debate may only exist in the minds of young […]
The Darwinian Fundamentalists
A couple weeks ago I picked up Jerry Fodor and Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini’s What Darwin Got Wrong (New York: Picador, 2010, 2011). Both Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini (henceforth F&P) are atheists. They deny that any intelligence was involved in the formation of life on earth. And they accept the common origin of all life forms. What they […]
Evolution debunked in sixteen minutes!
A friend of mine just emailed this to me. (Thanks Bruce!) Apparently Ray Comfort “completely debunks” evolution in 16 minutes. Rumor has it that the sequel debunks global warming in four minutes and the germ theory of disease in 39 seconds flat! (However, I’m not sure about the reviewer who said Dawkins would have a […]
Thoughts on Evolution: A response to Stephen J. Bedard
Yesterday blogger Stephen J. Bedard at the “Hope’s Reason” blog posted a review of my book You’re not as Crazy as I Think. Bedard enjoyed the book and gave it a very positive review. (And he notes in the review that The Atheist Missionary, a regular reader at my blog, had recommended the book. As a […]
Is Christian-atheist dialogue worthwhile? A commentary on the Dawkins-Kenny-Williams debate (Part 1)
Last year Oxford University sponsored what was billed as a “debate” (though it really was a collegial dialogue) between Richard Dawkins and the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams. The discussion spanned a range of topics concerning the uniqueness of human beings, the existence of God, and the meaning of life. In addition it was moderated by […]
William Lane Craig, God and Evolution
Earlier this week T’sinadree asked me to respond to William Lane Craig’s response to a question about evolution at “Reasonable Faith.” You can read the question and Craig’s response here. The question comes in the form of a challenge from Michel of Germany who argues that God would not have created through evolutionary processes. Michel’s […]
Would it be wrong to resurrect the Neanderthals?
Over the holidays many people indulge in drink or sweets. Like a true nerd, I indulge in reading all the books I couldn’t get to during the semester. Among those books was anthropologist Chris Stringer’s Lone Survivors (Henry Holt, 2012). The book presents Stringer’s Recent Out of Africa (ROA) theory according to which homo sapiens […]
Darwin was wrong (and why intelligent design theorists are not necessarily happy about the fact)
Yes, Darwin was wrong. In a quote much beloved of intelligent design theorists Darwin famously declared: “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would break down.” This quote appears in Michael Behe’s Darwin’s Black Box (Touchstone, 1998), 39. […]
Bill Nye the Science Guy gives very strange commentary and bad advice to creationists
Over the last few days Bill Nye the Science Guy’s two minute video of advice to creationists has gone viral. I must say I have a soft spot for Bill Nye since I watched his science guy schtick on Seattle’s “Almost Live” (which was broadcast in Southern British Columbia) back in the eighties when I […]
