Metanexus: Views 2001.12.28 3771 words What is theology? And what does theology have to say to us? Is it truly thescience of God, in the way that physics might be considered the science ofmaterial objects and their interactions or biology viewed as the science ofthe lifeworld or of living objects? What, then, would be the…
Bernard d’Abrera’s concise atlas of the world’s butterflies is a beautifully produced book with the most stunning photographs of butterflies that I’ve ever seen. Though not intended as a coffee-table book, it could eminently serve that purpose. D’Abrera himself is a world-renowned butterfly and moth expert at the BritishMuseum(Natural History) in London. Over the years…
Metanexus: Views 2001.12.17 2435 words “Humans have told each other stories for thousands of years. At campfiresand in courts and temples, humans told stories about the origin of theirworld, of the hunting grounds of their tribe, of women and men, of thediscovery of wheat and of fire, of the sun and the moon. Creation storiesexpressed…
Metanexus:Views 2001.11.07 3185 words One of the most wonderfully curious turns of phrase that I ever stumbledupon in science was the delightful title of Rita Levi-Montalcini’s 1988autobiography. Levi-Montalcini, a neurobiologist, was the fourth woman toreceive the Nobel Prize in Medicine, which she received in 1986, along withStanley Cohen, for the discovery of nerve growth factor….
Part 3. Design by Elimination The defects in Sober’s likelihood approach are, in my view, so grave that it cannot provide an adequate account of how design hypotheses are inferred. [18] The question remains, however, whether specified complexity can instead provide an adequate account for how design hypotheses are inferred. The worry here centers on…
Let me paint the picture more starkly. Consider an elementary event E. Suppose initially we see no pattern that gives us reason to expect an intelligent agent produced it. But then, rummaging through our background knowledge, we suddenly see a pattern that signifies design in E. Under a likelihood analysis, the probability of E given…
1. Overview of the Design Inference Darwinbegan his Origin of Species with the commonsense recognition that artificial selection in animal and plant breeding experiments is capable of directing organismal variation. A design-theoretic research program likewise begins with a commonsense recognition, in this case that humans draw design inferences routinely in ordinary life, explaining some things…
Metanexus:Views 2001.09.17 2989 words Today’s columnist, Michael Lotti, asks us to think about intelligent designby first picturing the following uncomplicated image: “I am walking on the beach when I see a watch lying on the sand. Uponseeing the watch, I can, say the ID theorists, infer that it isintelligently designed. This is, of course, true….
Metanexus: VIEWS 2001.08.31 3088 words Raymond E. Grizzle, a Research Scientist at the Jackson Estuarine Laboratoryat the University of New Hampshire tells us that when he “began to explore the relationship between science (particularly biology,which is my major area of study) and theology, I quickly encountered thewritings of “young-earth creationists” who insisted there were only…
A Response to Scott Gilbert’s essay “Finding a Mate for Evolution” Scott Gilbert’s ” young, lonesome stud ‘Evolution’ –‘Evo’ to his friends–who is in search of a mate of suitable temperament” offers a definitechallenge for a matchmaker. Evo must understand his limitations and berealistic about who will be suitable for him. If he desires a…