More Light Shines in the Dark

Heard about a panel discussion on Origins at a Egyptian Coptic Church in my neighbourhood tonight. I was free so I thought I would go along.

On arrival I learned that there was to be one each of a Biblical Creationist, a Theistic Evolutionist, an Intelligent Design and an Atheist speaker on the panel. The priest of the church had organised the event as part of the Apologetics stream of church teaching and preparation for the English speaking young congregation. The priest was quite an articulate and most affable man. He announced that every effort to secure an Atheist speaker from the nearby university failed. However, six to ten Atheists (or at least Humanists) turned up to be part of the audience and ask questions. The biblical Creationist was from Creation Ministries International; the Theistic Evolutionist turned out to be skeptic of evolution (but no fan of Biblical Creationism) who taught evolution at a Catholic institution because the curriculum required it; the other speaker was, I think, a member of the Coptic Church who was a medical student, an Intelligent Design advocate and a little antagonistic toward the Biblical Creationist. My rough count put the audience number at eighty plus attendees.

Another member of the church gave a half hour run-down on the different views and laid down guidelines for the audience to watch out for by way of errors of logic in the position to be espoused by panel members.

Each panel member was given five minutes to state their belief then, after a ten minute break, we got into the panel discussion. Most questions were directed at the Biblical Creationist both from other panel members and the audience. He handled it all gently but a little softly for my hearing.

While the priest carefully guided order there was a little disjointedness about the questions asked and answers given. I thought too that some questions and answers were a little over the head of the audience.

One Atheist when asking a question made a preliminary statement observing that this was the friendliest church he had been to. I agree as to the friendliness of the church. I also considered the Atheists to be polite and orderly.

I later overheard the priest in conversation say that his intention of having such an event was to help the young people of the church hear just what the Biblical Creationist position because there had been some animosity toward them from within the young and it was the priest's desire that his young ought not rely on what their opponents say about them. This is commendable but I felt the format did not provide the best means for the Biblical Creationist to state his position with clarity and completeness.

After the event I went to the table in the foyer where the Biblical Creationist's helpers had a table with some of their wares for sale. Notwithstanding my reservations at the format for the event, as I looked at things I heard young members of the church on the way out expressing warm thanks to the Biblical Creationists for coming along. Just politeness or appreciation of what they heard? - I think I read it more the latter. What convinces me most of this were two Sisters/Nuns (in habit) who came to the table while I was there. They were aged in their twenties or thirties and they had a very gentle and earnest manner in desire for more information on the Biblical Creationist position. I listened with interest as they spoke to a helper searching for help. They said they didn't want literature too heavily scientific because they were just starting out exploring the subject. I detected most of all in them that they trusted God, they believed his Word and they had not heard before that there were good reasons to maintain this trust from observations of (empirical and philosophical) science. There was a simple desire to understand their Lord more and this was the highlight of the night for me but close behind that was observing from afar the Biblical Creationist and the Intelligent Design medical student in prolonged discussion after the formalities of the event and then the two going over to the table of wares and the Biblical Creationist handing a book to the Intelligent Design medical student with it being accepted with genuine reception. From antagonism to inquiry - this is information transfer.

May it be that our Lord waters the seeds sown tonight. I'm glad I went and I wish more power to Biblical Creationists in their endeavours in the Name of our Lord.

Sam Drucker

Darwin and Wallace

John, thanks for the link across to Nagel's award to Meyer's book.

A piece from the post on Science and Values deserves to be surfaced here:

Michael A. Flannery, in his book ‘Alfred Russel Wallace's Theory of Intelligent Evolution: How Wallace's World of Life Challenged Darwinism’, shows that Darwin's exclusion of God from any involvement in the development of life was well entrenched in his mind long before he wrote ‘Origin of Species’. In other words, his belief that evolution could happen all by itself was not a product of his science but his philosophical position.
After many years of research, Wallace, second only to Charles Darwin as the 19th century's most noted English naturalist, came to the conclusion that evolution could not have happened without being guided by a higher intelligence, whereas Darwin held to the concept of randomness in evolution.
Writing in Forbes magazine, Flannery explained: "Darwin's own theory could hardly be called objectively scientific. Early influences on Darwin's youth established his predisposition to materialism and a dogmatic methodological naturalism [the exclusion of supernatural explanations] long before his voyage on the Beagle.
"In short, Darwin's metaphysic compelled his science. Wallace, on the other hand, was a tireless investigator who increasingly discerned design in nature. Unlike Darwin, Wallace's science compelled his metaphysics."

A useful statement to bear in mind when we hear the usual doffing of hat and tugging of forelock in the direction of Darwin by our pals in the SAD, who are, of course, functioning at the intellectual level of gnats when it comes to creation and evolution.

And while we're on intellectual performance, have a look at the quote on Behe's blog from Joseph Thornton who has a very confused take on probabilistic calculus. On his line of argument, the probability of any event, or chain of events is so vanishingly small that nothing could have acutally happened. But we know that things do happen. Thornton I think takes actual events as inhabiting a probability density function, which in fact exists theoretically and prospectively. What actually happens is a different thing. So could we argue this way for evolution? Well, see below, but also we know the mechanism by which baseball teams win games. There is as yet no mechanism for 'grand scale' evolution, let alone the origin of life materialistically.

By way of contrast, have a look at On Probability and Systematics: Possibility, Probability, and Phylogenetic Inference Matthew H. Haber in Systematic Biology 2005 54(5):831-841

Expelled

Warwick alerted readers here to the film "Expelled" produced by Ben Stein. I had the opportunity to see it tonight.

It runs for about 90 mins and because the group of friends I was with had a lot of things to do on the night we decided we would watch 45 mins tonight and the remainder another night. However, so riveting was it that we watched it all the way through in one sitting.

Ben Stein is such a disarming interviewer he got opponents of Intelligent Design to expose their motives and the paucity of their explanation of evolution by natural selection as the means of the origin of life. It is clear that the paradigm is sustained by rhetoric and not evidence.

Of particular interest is the last few minutes of the film when Richard Dawkins, the guru of world atheism, is interviewed. I won't spoil it for those who haven't seen it yet, suffice to say that Richard Dawkins was interviewed in "From a Frog to a Prince" and "Expelled" and unwittingly does a hatchet job on the paradigm of evolution. All one has to do with this guy is ask the logical questions rather than ask "Dorothy Dixers!"

I thoroughly recommend "Expelled" for viewing.

Neil