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In Writing for Lay and Scientific Readers, Stephen Meyer Dances at Two Weddings

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Image source: Discovery Institute.

Return of the God Hypothesis gets a really nice review from Tom Gilson at The Stream. He calls it “ambitious, complete, yet readable.” I particularly like his point that in the book Steve Meyer speaks both to the lay reader and the scientist. That feat — dancing at two weddings, as the Yiddish proverb has it — is not easy to pull off:

Meyer lays out that increasing knowledge deftly. It’s a work for the well-read layman, and it’s immensely readable on that level, as all Meyer’s works have been. So it’s not written primarily for specialists. Still, though, you can see that in the back of his mind he’s always interacting with them, meeting them on their level and ours at the same time, with real grace and yet with considerable power. He’s studied the specialists. If they have an objection, he knows it already, and he answers it. It’s that same completeness, again.

It’s an ambitious work Meyer undertakes here. Its scope is mind-boggling. The God hypothesis seemed gone for decades, if not centuries, as far as mainstream science was concerned. Some scientists still give it nothing but ridicule. Meyer stands up against all that, with courage and with real competence.

The God hypothesis is back, back where it belongs, back where was in science’s beginnings. It’s come full circle. Completely.

If the experts “have an objection,” says Gilson, Meyer “knows it already, and he answers it.” That is true, including on the book’s new and innovative arguments from physics and cosmology which are really the key to Meyer’s case for a personal God. I’m not sure that anyone has attempted to rebut those. Read the rest at The Stream.

David Klinghoffer

Senior Fellow and Editor, Evolution News
David Klinghoffer is a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute and the editor of Evolution News & Science Today, the daily voice of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture, reporting on intelligent design, evolution, and the intersection of science and culture. Klinghoffer is also the author of six books, a former senior editor and literary editor at National Review magazine, and has written for the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Seattle Times, Commentary, and other publications. Born in Santa Monica, California, he graduated from Brown University in 1987 with an A.B. magna cum laude in comparative literature and religious studies. David lives near Seattle, Washington, with his wife and children.

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cosmologyexpertslaymenphysicsReturn of the God HypothesisscientistsspecialistsStephen MeyerThe StreamTom GilsonweddingsYiddish