Religions, Presuppositions and Biases
A perusal of articles and comments at blogs, and in books, newspapers, and magazines reveals the biases of individuals who feel they have no biases. Unfortunately, that can't be true.
Scientists cannot be excluded from this discussion. Scientific method implies that scientists cooly and rationally develop hypotheses and go about testing them without the slightest concern about how it all turns out. Not so! Give a scientist at one of our universities the government funding to supply a lab towards discovering causation between cancer and bacteria and it is no surprise to see favorable results. This is not to say cynically that microbiologists and others are in the pocket of those who endow them, but it acknowledges human nature.
Same for us Christians. We approach science as something originated by a creating and sustaining God. Some of us even believe, according to scripture, that He takes a very lively interest in everything we do. "In Him we live and move and have our being." What could state our bias more than that? And why shouldn't we have the right to take what we believe into every area of human endeavor? We believe that a person's eternal destiny has to do with whether people will admit their sins before a loving and righteous God, will believe Jesus Christ came to save from eternal death whomsoever will have Him,and will commit him or herself to serving Christ.
Some of us will opt to share God's Word full strength as it comes from the Bible. This is, of course, opposed on every hand. It seems that many of our courts, public education and other institutions such as the ACLU take a dim view of this God-given right to free speech and freedom of religion. They deny they are also religious. That is a shame because this replaces one religion, one which has a foundation in God's Word, with one that has a foundation built on a past filled with dead things--the presumption of unbiased evolution.
What we really have are competing religions. One can't simply use the authority appeal and say, "Evolution is not a religion." Try proving that! No-one but God was around to see what He spoke into existence, but evolutionists will spill out their millions and billions of years in nice round numbers without an eyeblink. We say, "But you weren't there." They will say,"Science proves it," or "Carbon dating proves it." No it doesn't. We cannot use the scientific method on things that have occured in the past. We don't know how these dating methods operate back through time through different environmental conditions, not can we say God didn't create things with varying radiation levels. After all, he made Adam and Eve fully grown and capable of producing children. Same goes for the light emanating from distant stars. 186,000 miles per second, the current speed of light, is only a scientific given, not a sacred one.
The evolutionist may say, "But look at all our science; look at all our great men and women of science and think about all they have discovered. Problem is they have not discovered anything to support evolution: absolutely no transitional forms, no evidence to contradict the second law of thermodynamics etc. All the evolutionists have discovered is the same complexity in nature that creationists and intelligent design scientists have discovered.
So we have the same evidence and differing pre-suppositions. All three types of scientists are working with what is at hand. All three types have strong underlying convictions that guide their research.
I believe that creation science is a better choice than evolution or intelligent design. I believe it because I trust in a God Who is not only Creator, but One Who sustains all He made. Why shouldn't we use the Word of Him who created everything that scientists investigates? Holding the Christian perspective doesn't stifle science. If we discover apparent chaos we will pursue the question to find out why, or we will discover God's ways are higher than our ways.
Let me interject a homely commonplace evidence for an intelligent Creator. Only a fool should say the acorn is an accident of nature. That little nut wears a cap to shed water off its head. If we plant it in the ground it can produce--ultimately-- upon successive seeding, all the forests of the world. That means all the furniture, all the building materials, all the oak we need. You might call this a solid fact.
Where did it all come from? Just an accident, you say? Nuts! Multiply that little acorn by all the lifeforms in existence and add the ones which are extinct back through the ages since the "cambrian" explosion of creation (said to be over 90% more than we have today) and you will begin to get a handle on God's provision for his people. We don't even need to know "science" to see God's care for us.
Einstein was not a Christian or even a deist, according to the two biographies I've read, but he was disposed to believe God didn't play dice with the universe. Despite this, many of our evolutionary gurus of the Darwinian or Dawkins stamp use random processes as a key tenet of their faith, hence the millions and billions of years for chance to make things. Ongoing discovery of complexity at the micro and macro levels is scuttling their religion, however. Trillions of years will not make inanimate stuff form all that we can perceive through our senses and ever improving tools. Many of us have more faith in our intelligent Creator than we do in stuff begetting stuff. We haven't observed it in our closed-system laboratories and we haven't observed it in nature. No. It takes a deep faith to believe in integration and synthesis of inanimate material devoid of a plan or purpose. No wonder the highest wisdom of man is utter foolishness to God. The blueprint was in His head and He called it forth.
For those Christians buying into evolution, does God sanction you leaving Him out of your studies? God is not dead, nor does He sleep. His love and care is in the present. Denying Him and His agency in all you do must finally play into the enemy's hands. Remember. As Christians we believe God goes before us in all we do. If we deny that we are biased in favor of Him, that He is our most cherished father and best friend, where will His blessing be. I know some may say that they are to be "wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove" in their dealing with humankind so that God's work will be best forwarded, but to be ashamed of the Gospel in anything we do, to not acknowledge him in all our ways, is to deny His help. Denying God as the catalyst of true science means science will continue to be degraded.
The challenge of this blogsite is to embrace Christ in all we say and do. Christ is for us, so who can stand against us. We know who wins in the end. In truth we are already winners if we honor God in all we do. People are watching to see if we dilute our witness. Some of them will realize our Master has dominion over the universe. We are the witnesses sent throughout the earth. We need to speak with the authority God gives us. God says . . . "Fear not little children. I have overcome the world."
A perusal of articles and comments at blogs, and in books, newspapers, and magazines reveals the biases of individuals who feel they have no biases. Unfortunately, that can't be true.
Scientists cannot be excluded from this discussion. Scientific method implies that scientists cooly and rationally develop hypotheses and go about testing them without the slightest concern about how it all turns out. Not so! Give a scientist at one of our universities the government funding to supply a lab towards discovering causation between cancer and bacteria and it is no surprise to see favorable results. This is not to say cynically that microbiologists and others are in the pocket of those who endow them, but it acknowledges human nature.
Same for us Christians. We approach science as something originated by a creating and sustaining God. Some of us even believe, according to scripture, that He takes a very lively interest in everything we do. "In Him we live and move and have our being." What could state our bias more than that? And why shouldn't we have the right to take what we believe into every area of human endeavor? We believe that a person's eternal destiny has to do with whether people will admit their sins before a loving and righteous God, will believe Jesus Christ came to save from eternal death whomsoever will have Him,and will commit him or herself to serving Christ.
Some of us will opt to share God's Word full strength as it comes from the Bible. This is, of course, opposed on every hand. It seems that many of our courts, public education and other institutions such as the ACLU take a dim view of this God-given right to free speech and freedom of religion. They deny they are also religious. That is a shame because this replaces one religion, one which has a foundation in God's Word, with one that has a foundation built on a past filled with dead things--the presumption of unbiased evolution.
What we really have are competing religions. One can't simply use the authority appeal and say, "Evolution is not a religion." Try proving that! No-one but God was around to see what He spoke into existence, but evolutionists will spill out their millions and billions of years in nice round numbers without an eyeblink. We say, "But you weren't there." They will say,"Science proves it," or "Carbon dating proves it." No it doesn't. We cannot use the scientific method on things that have occured in the past. We don't know how these dating methods operate back through time through different environmental conditions, not can we say God didn't create things with varying radiation levels. After all, he made Adam and Eve fully grown and capable of producing children. Same goes for the light emanating from distant stars. 186,000 miles per second, the current speed of light, is only a scientific given, not a sacred one.
The evolutionist may say, "But look at all our science; look at all our great men and women of science and think about all they have discovered. Problem is they have not discovered anything to support evolution: absolutely no transitional forms, no evidence to contradict the second law of thermodynamics etc. All the evolutionists have discovered is the same complexity in nature that creationists and intelligent design scientists have discovered.
So we have the same evidence and differing pre-suppositions. All three types of scientists are working with what is at hand. All three types have strong underlying convictions that guide their research.
I believe that creation science is a better choice than evolution or intelligent design. I believe it because I trust in a God Who is not only Creator, but One Who sustains all He made. Why shouldn't we use the Word of Him who created everything that scientists investigates? Holding the Christian perspective doesn't stifle science. If we discover apparent chaos we will pursue the question to find out why, or we will discover God's ways are higher than our ways.
Let me interject a homely commonplace evidence for an intelligent Creator. Only a fool should say the acorn is an accident of nature. That little nut wears a cap to shed water off its head. If we plant it in the ground it can produce--ultimately-- upon successive seeding, all the forests of the world. That means all the furniture, all the building materials, all the oak we need. You might call this a solid fact.
Where did it all come from? Just an accident, you say? Nuts! Multiply that little acorn by all the lifeforms in existence and add the ones which are extinct back through the ages since the "cambrian" explosion of creation (said to be over 90% more than we have today) and you will begin to get a handle on God's provision for his people. We don't even need to know "science" to see God's care for us.
Einstein was not a Christian or even a deist, according to the two biographies I've read, but he was disposed to believe God didn't play dice with the universe. Despite this, many of our evolutionary gurus of the Darwinian or Dawkins stamp use random processes as a key tenet of their faith, hence the millions and billions of years for chance to make things. Ongoing discovery of complexity at the micro and macro levels is scuttling their religion, however. Trillions of years will not make inanimate stuff form all that we can perceive through our senses and ever improving tools. Many of us have more faith in our intelligent Creator than we do in stuff begetting stuff. We haven't observed it in our closed-system laboratories and we haven't observed it in nature. No. It takes a deep faith to believe in integration and synthesis of inanimate material devoid of a plan or purpose. No wonder the highest wisdom of man is utter foolishness to God. The blueprint was in His head and He called it forth.
For those Christians buying into evolution, does God sanction you leaving Him out of your studies? God is not dead, nor does He sleep. His love and care is in the present. Denying Him and His agency in all you do must finally play into the enemy's hands. Remember. As Christians we believe God goes before us in all we do. If we deny that we are biased in favor of Him, that He is our most cherished father and best friend, where will His blessing be. I know some may say that they are to be "wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove" in their dealing with humankind so that God's work will be best forwarded, but to be ashamed of the Gospel in anything we do, to not acknowledge him in all our ways, is to deny His help. Denying God as the catalyst of true science means science will continue to be degraded.
The challenge of this blogsite is to embrace Christ in all we say and do. Christ is for us, so who can stand against us. We know who wins in the end. In truth we are already winners if we honor God in all we do. People are watching to see if we dilute our witness. Some of them will realize our Master has dominion over the universe. We are the witnesses sent throughout the earth. We need to speak with the authority God gives us. God says . . . "Fear not little children. I have overcome the world."
posted by Don Daniels at
7:43 AM
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