Professor Franklin Harold of Colorado State University, described as "one of the world's most respected microbiologists" has included some fascinating observations in his book The Way of the Cell on the subject of abiogenesis. The mini-reviews on his book's back cover lend some credibility to the claim about Dr. Harold's professional credentials, one being written by renowned biologist Lynn Margulis, who said, "Witty and erudite, this scientific book hails as a literary achievement.Comprehensive and up to date, Franklin Harold traces the roots--historical, thermodynamic, and biochemical--of today's biological revolution." His chapter titled "Searching for the beginning" is so remarkable, it seems prudent to start at the beginning. Dr. Franklin writes, "Of all the unsolved mysteries remaining in science, the most consequential may be the origin of life. This opinion is bound to strike many readers as overblown, to put it mildly. Should we not rank the Big Bang, life in the cosmos, and the nature of consciousness on at least an equal plane? My reason for placing the origin of life at the top of the agenda is that resolution of this question is required in order to anchor living organisms securely in the real world of matter and energy, and thus relieve the lingering anxiety as to whether we have read nature's book correctly. Creation myths lie at the heart of all human cultures, and science is no exception; until we know where we come from, we do not know who we are. The origin of life is a stubborn problem, with no solution in sight. There is indeed a large and … [Read more...]
Evolutionary Creation is for suckers
A friend of mine sent me this link at Biologos to an article titled "Evolutionary Creation is for Everyone", probably knowing full well the sort of reaction that provocative title would get from me, a reaction of the knee-jerk variety. While I hold no animus toward the Biologos organization, this sort of nonsense is what happens when Christians try to compromise with secular beliefs. Darwin's theory of shapeshifting is actually a very poor explanation for the complexity of life, and yes, I'm about to explain why. The reason I say that evolutionary creation is an attempt to compromise Christian beliefs with atheistic ones is because I've read the books by popular (atheist) biologists such as Richard Dawkins, Jerry Coyne, and P. Z. Myers, and these "experts" all preach that creationism is nonsense, and evolution is truth. It is an attempt to compromise with people uninterested in compromise. These secular scientists will acknowledge that people like Francis Collins and Ken Miller are good scientists, but imply they are mentally unstable for being Catholic and claiming evolution and creation is both true. Are evolution and creation both true, or are they mutually exclusive beliefs? It seems to depend on whom one asks. Advocates of evolution prefer to make arguments from authority, and have written books considered academic works, yet bearing ludicrous titles such as Evolution and the Myth of Creation. Author/Professor Tim Berra became famous for committing what has come to be known as "Berra's Blunder" because he used an obvious example of intelligent design in a … [Read more...]
The implied beliefs of atheism
[AUTHOR'S NOTE: Hat tip to TC and Emily for serving as inspiration for this article.] Atheists typically don't like organized religion, and many will seize just about any excuse to attack the beliefs of theists. Only yesterday a friend of mine posted a political comment on social media that mentioned abortion, yet somehow an atheist lurking in the shadows managed to bring religion into the conversation by claiming the Bible doesn't condemn abortion. In my response I pointed out that Scripture doesn't mention nuclear war or space travel either, because those things also didn't exist when the Bible was written. Elective surgery by a medical doctor to kill an unborn child in the womb wasn't simply available when Jesus walked the Earth. 13 weeks into pregnancy His argument was weak, but my new atheist acquaintance was just getting warmed up. Next this particular religion critic boldly claimed the Bible was a work of fiction, which is an odd statement for an atheist to make. Most of my atheist friends realize the best strategy is to remain on offense and attack religion while carefully avoiding any knowledge claims they might have to defend. For example, most atheists will say something safe like "I believe the Bible is fiction" instead of "the Bible is fiction" because the former is merely stating an opinion, but the latter is a knowledge claim that will ultimately need to be defended with empirical evidence. Everyone is entitled to have an opinion, but not their own independent set of facts. And the fact of the matter is, the claim the Bible is a work of fiction … [Read more...]
Panspermia
The concept of panspermia was first introduced to me by National Lampoon in the form of a joke--one issue of the magazine contained a description of a new version of the video game Space Invaders in which players are encouraged to "knock down the invading sperm from space before they knock up your little sister." Well, I laughed. I don't apologize for my often bizarre sense of humor. In my opinion, one ought to be able to admit that the idea of extraterrestrial sperm coming from outer space to create life on Earth is pretty funny. What's even funnier is panspermia is actually a scientific hypothesis that mostly exists because of a mathematics problem, created by the foolish assumption of secular-minded scientists that creation can come to exist without a Creator. After DNA was discovered, calculations were performed to determine low long it would take "Nature" to produce a double helix without intelligent help. Even the most optimistic projections could not explain how life came to exist so quickly after the Earth was created (approximately 4 billion years ago). The same experts say that the earliest forms of life appeared on Earth 3.6 billion years ago, only 400 million years later. The mathematics problem associated with the origin of life on Earth stems from calculations of how long experts have estimated it would take for DNA to form by luck and random chance. The most optimistic estimates require a lot more time than four hundred million years. Because the universe is many billions of years older than Earth, by invoking panspermia and proclaiming the … [Read more...]
A Universe From Nothing
Pillars of creation photo: NASA, Jeff Hester, and Paul Scowen (Arizona State University) I keep telling myself that I've said all I needed to say in my first two nonfiction books (Divine Evolution and Counterargument for God) but then I realize that the issue still hasn't been resolved and so the debate isn't over. It's never going to be over, but that doesn't mean I'll be writing nonfiction books and articles rehashing the same points, over and over. When the spirit moves me (literally) I can't let it go. I think there's a third book in the works that will be titled God or Good Luck? Whether or not you understand that fact, those are really your only two choices. Nobel Laureate Werner Heisenberg famously made the most honest and truthful statement about atheism I've ever read: "The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but God is waiting for you at the bottom of the glass." What does that mean? It's actually pretty simple. I can speak from experience, because it happened to me. I had graduated from a "Christian" high school that provided a quality education that was careful not to conflict with any biblical teachings. As a result, the first time I ever heard the term "The Big Bang" to describe the origin of the universe was in college. I had not been taught that science believed humans and apes shared a common primate ancestor and had "evolved" from more primitive species as an indisputable fact...it was merely what some biologists believed. I had been taught from the perspective of Young Earth Creationism, and so college … [Read more...]
