Is Intelligent Design Harmful to Science?
Three claims have been made that, if true, might suggest that scientists should be wary of intelligent design.... What is the status of these claims? Published in Origins n. 59.
Three claims have been made that, if true, might suggest that scientists should be wary of intelligent design.... What is the status of these claims? Published in Origins n. 59.
This article explores the usefulness of the idea of intelligent design in the context of modern (scientific) efforts to understand nature. Among the questions to be considered are whether intelligent design is a necessary inference from the properties of nature, and whether its incorporation into science would improve our ability to explore and understand nature.
Review of Why Intelligent Design Fails: A Scientific Critique of the New Creationism. Published in Origins n. 58.
Review of the book, Thinking About God: First Steps in Philosophy. Published in Origins n. 58.
THE RAINBOW IS ALL IN YOUR HEAD by Leonard Brand and Ernest SchwabLoma Linda University If a tree falls in the forest and there is no one there to hear it, does it make any sound? This question can be the basis of humorous arguments, perhaps just for the sake of arguing! But when we bring an understanding of the physiology of the human brain and sense organs into the picture, the question becomes…
The argument to design is that nature shows evidence of design but does not attempt to identify the designer. The argument from design is that the design seen in nature is best explained as the result of a specific designer, most often the Christian God. Published in Origins n. 57.
Many models have been proposed that tend to blur some of the contrasts between the biblical and naturalistic theories. A number of attempts have been made to develop intermediate models in which elements of the biblical story of creation are mixed with elements of the scientific story of origins. All of these models share the biblical idea that nature is the result of divine purpose and the “scientific” idea of long ages of time, but all suffer from serious scientific problems or are entirely ad hoc and conjectural.
Literature Review A review of the book By Design or By Chance? The Growing Controversy on the Origins of Life in the Universe. Published in Origins n. 58.
Design in nature can be detected using criteria similar to those for searching for extraterrestrial life, such as purpose, extreme improbability, or specification. Published in Origins n. 56..
There is more to design than complexity. I am proposing that it is time to advance beyond an analysis of complexity, fruitful though that has been. We are able to expand the scope of design arguments to include the existence of beauty, which points to design of a different kind.
In this discussion I propose to present a scientific and a biblical model of origins and explore how these can be brought into harmony with each other. I also hope to show that the differences between the statements made by these two disciplines are largely a result of differing interpretations based on different paradigms.
A review of the book, Finding Darwin's God: A Scientist's Search for Common Ground Between God and Evolution. Published in Origins n. 55.
While Christians may be convinced that design in nature points to a Creator-God, the general scientific community has not been persuaded. Perhaps more scientifically respectable work on intelligent design of the kind done by Behe and Dembski will encourage evolutionary scientists to look beyond purely naturalistic mechanisms to explain the complexity and meaning of life.
The molecules of life suggest no need for Christians to become sycophants to materialistic philosophy posing as science. On the contrary, science liberated from the artificial constraints of materialism provides an elegant mechanism for study of the creation and logically points to a wonderful Creator.
The Intelligent Design movement is crucially important for all Adventist educators, especially for those in science, in the integration of faith and learning in their classrooms.
Engineers have the distinguished legacy of following in their Creator's footsteps, thinking God's creative and analytical thoughts after Him. Should we not spend some time reflecting on the Master Engineer as we train engineers to work responsibly in this world?
Trilobites are complex, elaborately segmented forms with jointed appendages and swimmerets, antennae, compound eyes, and cephalized, or head-to-tail, nervous systems.
Origins may sometimes be a contentious issue in science and faith because of differing presuppositions about God's relationship to nature. An argument has been presented here that it is eminently reasonable to believe that direct supernatural action was involved in the origins of the universe, life, and humanity, and that a scientific process restricted to observable physical mechanisms is inadequate to discover and explain our origins.
Seventh-day Adventist schools and colleges were founded by a church concerned to provide an education that did not alienate its children from their Biblical beliefs and Christian worldview. I believe that Adventist educators must become evangelists for Biblical theism.
Zoology and genetics are required courses for biology majors. Both subjects are usually structured around the theme of the theory of evolution. A careful examination of the scientific basis of these disciplines shows that the evolutionary framework doesn't fit with a lot of their fundamental aspects, however. Some of these topics even constitute strong evidence in favor of intelligent design.