Category: Culture
The End of Morality
Recently, David Brooks published a column titled “The End of Philosophy” in The New York Times (April 7, 2009). Brooks, long one of the most thoughtful writers in public life, addresses an ages-old tension over whether reason controls our moral intuitions and passions, or whether moral intuition/feeling is king and reason is only rationalization. In the latter view, Brooks says,
Texas Hold ‘Em Part III: Calling Ronald Wetherington’s Bluffs About Human Evolution in His January Texas State Board of Education Testimony
As a final installment in my “Texas Hold ‘Em” series calling the bluffs of Texas evolutionists, I’d like to highlight one section from Discovery Institute’s rebuttal to Ronald Wetherington’s Testimony before the Texas State Board of Education (TSBOE). Wetherington, who is a professor of anthropology at SMU, testified extensively to the TSBOE about human evolution, his area of expertise. Wetherington stated regarding human origins that we have “arguably the most complete sequence of fossil succession of any mammal in the world. No gaps. No lack of transitional fossils. … So when people talk about the lack of transitional fossils or gaps in the fossil record, it absolutely is not true.” But a close look at the evidence, as reported in Read More ›
Logic vs. Emotion: Discovery Institute Fellow William Lane Craig Debates Christopher Hitchens on “Does God Exist?”
On Saturday April 4th, I attended a debate between Discovery Institute fellow William Lane Craig and “new atheist” Christopher Hitchens on “Does God Exist?” As the debate venue was Biola University, the audience was partial towards Craig. But a sizeable number of Hitchens-fans turned out as well, though they probably weren’t energized by Hitchens’ admission during the debate that “there’s nothing new about the new atheists, it’s just that we’re recent.” Craig’s opening statement presented 5 arguments, but I will only recount two (maybe three) at present: the Cosmological Argument, the Teleological Argument, and the Moral Argument. As it turns out, Darwinian evolution and the “cruelty” of biological processes played a major role in Hitchens’ arguments against the proposition that Read More ›
Texas Hold ‘Em Part II: Calling David Hillis’ Bluffs About the Tree of Life in His January Texas State Board of Education Testimony
David Klinghoffer has recently posted some excellent (and entertaining) summaries of the highlights of Discovery Institute’s responses to the testimony of evolutionist experts David Hillis and Ronald Wetherington before the Texas State Board of Education (TSBOE) on January 21, 2009. (See also Ralph Seelke’s response to Hillis.) One part of the response to self-proclaimed tree of life “expert” David Hillis that should not be missed is Discovery’s response to his bluffs and misrepresentations regarding the congruence of molecular and morphological phylogenies within the tree of life. Specifically, Hillis told the board that there is “overwhelming agreement correspondence as you go from protein to protein, DNA sequence to DNA sequence” when reconstructing evolutionary history using biological molecules. But anyone accurately testifying Read More ›
Scientism Called on the Carpet For Blocking Debate on Evolution
There’s an interesting column in today’s Vancouver Sun, “‘Scientism’ infects Darwinian debates An unflinching belief that science can explain everything about evolution becomes its own ideology”. Interesting because it is rare to see sceintism called out and criticized, especially by someone who shows his own high level of faith in evolution. According to the author, Douglas Todd: There are two major obstacles to a rich public discussion on Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution and what it means to all of us. The most obvious obstacle is religious literalism, which leads to Creationism. It’s the belief the Bible or other ancient sacred texts offer the first and last word on how humans came into existence. The second major barrier to a Read More ›