Hunter, Cornelius G. Science's Blind Spot: The Unseen Religion of Scientific Naturalism. Grand Rapids, Mich: Brazos Press, 2007. $14.99.
This book is an excellent "thinker." I often had to re-read portions so that I could more fully understand and I found myself, my assumptions, challenged in a very positive way. I urge anyone interested in science, an aspect of science, to read this book. Below, I will first try to deal with Hunter's arguments and then go one step further in some analysis of my own.
Hunter's thesis is that, by requiring that science can only ever provide natural/material explanations, it has created a blind spot such that, if the data ever pointed to a non-material explanation it would be missed. Nowhere in the book does Hunter try to prove that non-material explanations are necessarily present, but he does argue that science should reject the adoption of a priori assumptions, such as the requirement that all explanations be material, in favor of following the date wherever it leads.
To illustrate his point, Hunter shows the difference between empirical science (fact-based, experimentation, repeatable) and rational science (theory-based, not repeatable or experimental, dogmatic). His clear example is of two biologists, one studying how nerve cells work and the other studying the evolutionary descent of some animal species. The one involves lab experiments all over the world, while the other involves historical fiction and supposition based on thin data collected from paleontology and similarities between organisms. It is clear that these two types of science are vastly different, the rational sort not conforming well at all to common definitions of science.
Interestingly, Hunter does not blame this intellectual requirement that all explanations be material on atheism, as I've often thought. He calls that a bad mistake committed by many Christians in scientific debates. Rather, he argues that naturalism (what he calls theological naturalism) arose during the Enlightenment because of theological concerns. These relate to the problem of evil, human freedom issues, and a disbelief in an intervening God, not from a disbelief in any god at all. Theologians and scientists looked at the world, its suffering and apparent lack of meaning, and felt that God could not be responsible for all of this. This group, many of whom were deists (names include Burnet, Kant, Leibniz, Darwin, etc.), therefore, posited that God does not intervene in the world but has created natural laws sufficient to explain all that exists. Thus, science should only ever look for natural/material explanations because, according to their theology and not any sort of science, that was all there could be. Essentially, they felt the need to get God off the hook for evil.
This has great bearing on the Intelligent Design debate, since ID scientists argue that the date points to a designer while evolutionists argue that it points to purely material causes. According to Hunter, it may be that evolutionists can't see the design implications because they have decided before examining any data that it can't exist.
Hunter definitely holds to the principle of parsimony, which is that when a natural/simple explanation fits the data it is unnecessary and undesirable to look for a more complex, non-material one. However, when material explanations fail to fit the data, non-material ones can and should be considered. He argues that, in the case of evolution, the material explanation fails in key ways to adequately explain the data.
As my own contribution, I would like to point out that theological liberalism, like that which opened the door to deism and theological naturalism, leads people to reject the God of the Bible in favor of some other god derived from philosophy and human reason. When this occurs, it should be no surprise that concepts based off of the nature of this new god do not work well in the real world. This is why the doctrines of the inspiration and authority of the Bible as so important. Interestingly, if people are worried about the problem of evil, the Bible actually addresses that subject already in a way that shows that God bears no taint of evil but is actually at work to redeem those who brought it into creation.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
War Since 1945
Black, Jeremy. War Since 1945. Contemporary Worlds. London: Reaktion, 2004. $24.95.
I have read Black's Eighteenth-Century Europe, so I should have been warned about his style and the sorts of conclusions he comes up with. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that his book was the driest and most difficult of those I read for my Christianity in the Enlightenment class.
Black's goal in this book is to remind the reader that there was much else going on in this period (1945-present) than just the Cold War. Additionally, he wants the reader to see that most of the conflict has been non-Western, more specifically non-American, in order to warn us off of any Euro- or Ameri-centric understanding of warfare. He makes the cogent point that, if the USA is to be considered the foremost military power, then all others must be fundamentally different, making study only of American military forms and methods inadequate and misleading.
Much like the other book of his that I've read (he's written many more), this book, at less than 200 pages, is far too short to cover such a broad topic in anything more than surface facts. This serves to marginally inform the reader but detracts considerably from the book's readability.
The most interesting fact I learned from the book is that there was actually a war fought in Central America over a soccer match (the Football War of 1969 between Honduras and El Salvador)! Of course, it was really more complicated than that, but come on!
I have read Black's Eighteenth-Century Europe, so I should have been warned about his style and the sorts of conclusions he comes up with. Unfortunately, I had forgotten that his book was the driest and most difficult of those I read for my Christianity in the Enlightenment class.
Black's goal in this book is to remind the reader that there was much else going on in this period (1945-present) than just the Cold War. Additionally, he wants the reader to see that most of the conflict has been non-Western, more specifically non-American, in order to warn us off of any Euro- or Ameri-centric understanding of warfare. He makes the cogent point that, if the USA is to be considered the foremost military power, then all others must be fundamentally different, making study only of American military forms and methods inadequate and misleading.
Much like the other book of his that I've read (he's written many more), this book, at less than 200 pages, is far too short to cover such a broad topic in anything more than surface facts. This serves to marginally inform the reader but detracts considerably from the book's readability.
The most interesting fact I learned from the book is that there was actually a war fought in Central America over a soccer match (the Football War of 1969 between Honduras and El Salvador)! Of course, it was really more complicated than that, but come on!
Friday, January 09, 2009
The Children of Húrin
Tolkien, J.R.R., Christopher Tolkien, and Alan Lee. Narn I Chîn Húrin: The Tale of the Children of Húrin. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2007. $15.99.
This delightful journey through early Middle Earth was light years from the difficulties of The Silmarillion, Tolkien's great work that covers the entire history of Middle Earth from its creation to the end of the Third Age, and helped make clear many of the references to older times found in The Lord of the Rings. Christopher Tolkien (J.R.R.'s youngest son and the protector of his literary work) has taken various writings that his father had left unfinished and, with some editing and a few instances of gap filling, provided us with a whole tale from the First Age of Middle Earth.
This story is not a happy one, but is a tragedy of the highest degree. It bears some similarities to other well-known, ancient tragic works. As such, while the story is satisfying in itself, I am glad that it is coupled with Tolkien's happier works of Middle Earth.
For one only familiar with the LOTR and The Hobbit, the biggest characters have already been introduced. Morgoth is the great enemy, and Túrin, son of Húrin, is the tragic hero. These are each in direct, though distant, relation to the great characters of the LOTR, such as Elrond and the elven lords, Aragorn, as well as Sauron.
Much like The Return of the King, this book has several helpful appendices. The most interesting, especially for those interested in literature, is Christopher Tolkien's explanation of how the present book descended from various prose and poetry of his father.
On the negative side, it is easy to feel the uncompleted nature of J.R.R. Tolkien's original work. Unlike The Hobbit of the LOTR, the details here are often spare. One doesn't get a good mental picture of the land or cities that Túrin visits, which was never a problem with his other works. Also, at times, the story seems to run on too quickly. I believe that the tale, had it been completed by Tolkien himself, could easily have been 2 books of much greater length than this one. That said, the story is still quite good.
While the tragedy contained in this book is the work of Morgoth, the lesson of humility can still be learned from what happens to Húrin's family.
This delightful journey through early Middle Earth was light years from the difficulties of The Silmarillion, Tolkien's great work that covers the entire history of Middle Earth from its creation to the end of the Third Age, and helped make clear many of the references to older times found in The Lord of the Rings. Christopher Tolkien (J.R.R.'s youngest son and the protector of his literary work) has taken various writings that his father had left unfinished and, with some editing and a few instances of gap filling, provided us with a whole tale from the First Age of Middle Earth.
This story is not a happy one, but is a tragedy of the highest degree. It bears some similarities to other well-known, ancient tragic works. As such, while the story is satisfying in itself, I am glad that it is coupled with Tolkien's happier works of Middle Earth.
For one only familiar with the LOTR and The Hobbit, the biggest characters have already been introduced. Morgoth is the great enemy, and Túrin, son of Húrin, is the tragic hero. These are each in direct, though distant, relation to the great characters of the LOTR, such as Elrond and the elven lords, Aragorn, as well as Sauron.
Much like The Return of the King, this book has several helpful appendices. The most interesting, especially for those interested in literature, is Christopher Tolkien's explanation of how the present book descended from various prose and poetry of his father.
On the negative side, it is easy to feel the uncompleted nature of J.R.R. Tolkien's original work. Unlike The Hobbit of the LOTR, the details here are often spare. One doesn't get a good mental picture of the land or cities that Túrin visits, which was never a problem with his other works. Also, at times, the story seems to run on too quickly. I believe that the tale, had it been completed by Tolkien himself, could easily have been 2 books of much greater length than this one. That said, the story is still quite good.
While the tragedy contained in this book is the work of Morgoth, the lesson of humility can still be learned from what happens to Húrin's family.
Understanding Intelligent Design
Dembski, William A., and Sean McDowell. Understanding Intelligent Design. Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2008. $13.99.
I must confess a previous general dislike for scientific things. This was not really driven by my religious convictions but is more complicated. Some of the contributing factors include: a high school chemistry teacher who taught nothing, another high school teacher (this time physics) who knew so little math that his students routinely had to correct his grading mistakes, my resulting ignorance of many scientific concepts, my love and study of history (probably a right-brain versus left-brain issue), as well as the feeling that much of the "truths" that I, and all of society along with me, was being fed were in fact incompatible with biblical Christianity and the realities of the world.
That said, I am now engaging myself in reading designed to catch myself up on science related to the Intelligent Design debate. I saw the movie "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" last year, and I've been in some interesting discussions on the issue. I have an inner conviction about the truth, but I've lacked the scientific knowledge to be effective in debate. So, this book, as the title might suggest, is the first step for me. I realize that my book choices are biases, but I have not yet found any book that tries to take seriously the claims of ID and defeat them with scientific evidence. If such a book exists or is written, I will read it. As it stands, the establishment scientific community is making a concerted effort to simply ignore ID in the hopes that it will just disappear.
On to the book...
Dembski (a major light in the ID movement) and McDowell are trying to make accessible to the average reader the aspects of the ID debate and present, in basic, understandable form, the evidence for ID and against Darwinian evolution. They make clear early on that they have no issue with natural selection or evolution as the means to explain variation within the population of a species. The problem is with natural selection-driven evolution as the explanation of the origin of life or as the mechanism for one species coming from another. They also show that ID is not some neo-fundamentalist attempt to subvert science in order to establish a theocracy (a common claim) but is actually a big-tent movement, including Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and agnostics and with room for everything from young-earth creationists to people who believe in divinely guided evolution.
The central problem seems to be that, given what we now know about the cell and DNA, no material process is know to exist that can explain (with a reasonable mathematical probability, which Dembski very conservatively puts at no less than 1 in 10 to the 150th power - the universal probability bound) the information necessary to give rise to even the most simple of life forms. Thus, since we can detect design (forensic science and the SETI program are just two of many such examples), this book states that ID provides scientific proof, mainly in the fields of probability and information sciences but related to biology, geology, cosmology, physics, chemistry, and other major areas of study, that is best understood to point to an outside super designer.
There are also many proofs given for ID and against evolution. These are quite convincing, especially the many examples of the tricks pro-evolution scientists have had to pull to maintain their theory. I won't catalogue them here, but you should definitely take a look.
The book is well-written and achieves its goal of providing a basis for general understanding of the subject. It also points to further resources for study in one of its appendices. At only a little over 200 pages, it is a quick read. The drawback of this is that it is clear that further reading is necessary to graduate to anything more than a casual discussion of ID.
Finally, I would like to point out what the authors also emphasize in their first chapter. This debate really is important to the larger worldview debate. If Darwinian evolution, based on naturalism, is true, then Christianity is necessarily false. That simple fact makes this subject something truly important for Christians to study, understand, and speak up about.
I must confess a previous general dislike for scientific things. This was not really driven by my religious convictions but is more complicated. Some of the contributing factors include: a high school chemistry teacher who taught nothing, another high school teacher (this time physics) who knew so little math that his students routinely had to correct his grading mistakes, my resulting ignorance of many scientific concepts, my love and study of history (probably a right-brain versus left-brain issue), as well as the feeling that much of the "truths" that I, and all of society along with me, was being fed were in fact incompatible with biblical Christianity and the realities of the world.
That said, I am now engaging myself in reading designed to catch myself up on science related to the Intelligent Design debate. I saw the movie "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" last year, and I've been in some interesting discussions on the issue. I have an inner conviction about the truth, but I've lacked the scientific knowledge to be effective in debate. So, this book, as the title might suggest, is the first step for me. I realize that my book choices are biases, but I have not yet found any book that tries to take seriously the claims of ID and defeat them with scientific evidence. If such a book exists or is written, I will read it. As it stands, the establishment scientific community is making a concerted effort to simply ignore ID in the hopes that it will just disappear.
On to the book...
Dembski (a major light in the ID movement) and McDowell are trying to make accessible to the average reader the aspects of the ID debate and present, in basic, understandable form, the evidence for ID and against Darwinian evolution. They make clear early on that they have no issue with natural selection or evolution as the means to explain variation within the population of a species. The problem is with natural selection-driven evolution as the explanation of the origin of life or as the mechanism for one species coming from another. They also show that ID is not some neo-fundamentalist attempt to subvert science in order to establish a theocracy (a common claim) but is actually a big-tent movement, including Christians, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and agnostics and with room for everything from young-earth creationists to people who believe in divinely guided evolution.
The central problem seems to be that, given what we now know about the cell and DNA, no material process is know to exist that can explain (with a reasonable mathematical probability, which Dembski very conservatively puts at no less than 1 in 10 to the 150th power - the universal probability bound) the information necessary to give rise to even the most simple of life forms. Thus, since we can detect design (forensic science and the SETI program are just two of many such examples), this book states that ID provides scientific proof, mainly in the fields of probability and information sciences but related to biology, geology, cosmology, physics, chemistry, and other major areas of study, that is best understood to point to an outside super designer.
There are also many proofs given for ID and against evolution. These are quite convincing, especially the many examples of the tricks pro-evolution scientists have had to pull to maintain their theory. I won't catalogue them here, but you should definitely take a look.
The book is well-written and achieves its goal of providing a basis for general understanding of the subject. It also points to further resources for study in one of its appendices. At only a little over 200 pages, it is a quick read. The drawback of this is that it is clear that further reading is necessary to graduate to anything more than a casual discussion of ID.
Finally, I would like to point out what the authors also emphasize in their first chapter. This debate really is important to the larger worldview debate. If Darwinian evolution, based on naturalism, is true, then Christianity is necessarily false. That simple fact makes this subject something truly important for Christians to study, understand, and speak up about.
Sunday, January 04, 2009
The Rise and Fall of the British Empire
James, Lawrence. The Rise and Fall of the British Empire. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996. $21.95.
I bought this book while researching for a paper for my Christianity in the Enlightenment class (the paper was very successful and was read before the editorial board of BaptistTheology.org). The book includes a terrific chapter on the early Raj, or British government of India, which was very useful for the paper. However, after finishing the paper and my other class work, and graduating, I chose to come back to this book as my first post-seminary read.
James' goal in writing was to present the British Empire as it developed and not merely as it is seen today, in hindsight. This is important because, as he says, "History cannot be unwritten or written in the subjunctive." So often today, history studies are about what should have been, based upon our current values, and not what really was. This aspect provides James' book with a balance and reality that sometimes was difficult to read but, I believe, hit very close to the truth.
James does an excellent job of showing the effects, other at odds with one another, of empire on the people of Britain. The Empire bred a certain superiority complex among the British that lent itself to racism and an overbearing political propensity to interfere where unwanted. The Empire simultaneously helped cause the development of evangelical missionary efforts, liberal political trends toward democracy in Britain and elsewhere, and a rise in efforts to provide social justice. James does a great job of laying out all of this evidence but allowing the reader to weigh it and come to his/her own conclusions about the British Empire.
As a historian interested in military events, this book was often disappointing to me. James is not writing about the battles and wars of the Empire but about the political/economic developments that brought them about. This should appeal to many others not interested in the military side.
All in all, the book was a very good read. It does not get bogged down by the two world wars, like most such books do. James is a good writer, in addition to making good choices about what to concentrate upon. I would strongly suggest it for anyone interested in world history over the past 400 years and especially for those whose interest has been piqued by the current claims and counter-claims concerning American imperialism.
I bought this book while researching for a paper for my Christianity in the Enlightenment class (the paper was very successful and was read before the editorial board of BaptistTheology.org). The book includes a terrific chapter on the early Raj, or British government of India, which was very useful for the paper. However, after finishing the paper and my other class work, and graduating, I chose to come back to this book as my first post-seminary read.
James' goal in writing was to present the British Empire as it developed and not merely as it is seen today, in hindsight. This is important because, as he says, "History cannot be unwritten or written in the subjunctive." So often today, history studies are about what should have been, based upon our current values, and not what really was. This aspect provides James' book with a balance and reality that sometimes was difficult to read but, I believe, hit very close to the truth.
James does an excellent job of showing the effects, other at odds with one another, of empire on the people of Britain. The Empire bred a certain superiority complex among the British that lent itself to racism and an overbearing political propensity to interfere where unwanted. The Empire simultaneously helped cause the development of evangelical missionary efforts, liberal political trends toward democracy in Britain and elsewhere, and a rise in efforts to provide social justice. James does a great job of laying out all of this evidence but allowing the reader to weigh it and come to his/her own conclusions about the British Empire.
As a historian interested in military events, this book was often disappointing to me. James is not writing about the battles and wars of the Empire but about the political/economic developments that brought them about. This should appeal to many others not interested in the military side.
All in all, the book was a very good read. It does not get bogged down by the two world wars, like most such books do. James is a good writer, in addition to making good choices about what to concentrate upon. I would strongly suggest it for anyone interested in world history over the past 400 years and especially for those whose interest has been piqued by the current claims and counter-claims concerning American imperialism.
A Little Free Time and a Huge Reading List!
Well, I've just finished my master degree. I hope to get another one (history this time), followed by a PhD in the same field, but that's for another day. For now, I'm going to enjoy work, time with my new baby boy, and reading books that I choose for myself. I'm also going to blog more. I hope to mix in some book reviews, as I finish books, with my other thoughts. The first review will follow shortly.
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