Physicist and theologian Willem Drees begins his book Creation: From Nothing Until Now (London: Routledge, 2002) with this poetic description of the creation of the world. (Note: while I have included the entire poem below, I have not reproduced the exact formatting.) Drees is a European Christian theologian and his poem is a creation narrative or cosmogony […]
science
Bill Nye: Science Guy: A Review
Where I grew up in south-central British Columbia in the 1980s, we had four channels from Seattle on our limited dial, including Kiro 7. As a result, my early Sunday evenings were spent watching Almost Live, a half-hour local Seattle show with aspirations to be a Pacific Northwest version of Saturday Night Live. One of […]
Is the biblical God ignorant about science?
In “Did the biblical concept of God evolve from polytheism?” I reprinted one of the opening statements from my 2013 debate book God or Godless authored with John Loftus. That was so much fun that I decided to add a second instalment. In chapter 14 Loftus’ debate resolution is “The biblical God is ignorant about science”. I’ve […]
Reflections on Astrophysics and Young Earth Creationism
Last week astrophysicist Aksel Hallin spoke at Taylor Seminary. Dr. Hallin is the Professor and Canada Research Chair for Astroparticle Physics at the University of Alberta. In this audio, I offer my layperson summary of Professor Hallin’s talk as well as some concluding reflections.
The Top Five Reasons I didn’t like the Young Earth Creationist on “Unbelievable”
This past week “Unbelievable” with Justin Brierley featured a young earth creationist named John Mackay in debate with theistic evolutionist Keith Fox. Professor Fox was congenial and no doubt is well informed on his topic of genetics. But he was not a great debater. And it became clear very quickly that Mr. Mackay was well […]
On Scientific (and Philosophical and Theological) Ignorance
Today I came across the following retweet courtesy of Secular Outpost. (I must say, Twitter is an endlessly fecund resource for blogging ideas.) https://twitter.com/mikejmartin/status/810746258424037376 While I might word things a little differently, I share the exasperation of this meme at those who opine on matters of which they are clearly not qualified. My only caveat […]
“There is no evidence for…” On the unqualified and indefensible claims of bad apologists
A few months ago I was approached by an individual after a speaking event. “Do you believe in evolution?” he asked. It was a surprising question given that it had nothing to do with my topic. I replied that on matters outside my area I defer to the consensus of experts unless I have a […]
Is there a better way to know than science?
A reader named “Oliver” posted the following questions in the thread to my article: “How the British Humanist Association undermines Humanism“: “Is there a better, more reliable, way of knowing what is and isn’t true than the scientific method? If so, can you describe it?” The first, relatively minor problem with the question is that […]
On God and Volcanoes
I’ve been fascinated by volcanoes since May, 1980. We were outside playing during recess when the late spring sky began to snow. Except it wasn’t snow, it was ash from the recently exploded Mt. St. Helens. (Living in south central British Columbia, we were a good day’s drive away from the volcano. But that was […]
Mystics, Skeptics, and Nothing Buttery
In The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat Oliver Sacks offers an interesting neurological account of the visions of the great mystic Hildegard of Bingen. Sacks recounts one of Hildegard’s writings titled “The Fall of the Angels” where she describes witnessing the fall of Satan and his minions: “I saw a great star most […]
Have a question about God? Ask the scientist!
Yesterday morning a reader posted the following comment on my article “Why I don’t take young earth creationism seriously (even though I do take young earth creationists seriously)“: “Most, if not all scientists will tell you that a virgin conveiving, [sic] a man being fully man and fully god, and a resurrection are impossible too.” […]
We’re not laying pipe! We’re talking about poetry.
There is a famous scene in “Dead Poet’s Society” where the teacher, Mr. Keating, deconstructs the introduction to his students’ poetry textbook. That introduction advises how to examine the worth of every poem mathematically by charting each poem on a graph relative to a set of objective, measurable properties. Mr. Keating balks at the very idea: […]
God, Science, and the Universe: A Debate between Krauss, Meyer, and Lamoureaux
This debate live-streamed on March 19th and features Lawrence Krauss (atheist), Stephen Meyer (intelligent design theorist), and Denis Lamoureux (theistic evolutionist).
Ted Cruz and Climate Change Denial
The documentary Merchants of Doubt provides an excellent primer explaining how spin doctors propagate misinformation. What is especially interesting is the close parallel between the methods of big tobacco and of big oil. For years, the former denied a link between tobacco and cancer. The latter has similarly denied a link between the burning of fossil […]
