evolution

Bye Bye, Google Reader Sidebar (Hello Free Bible Versions and The Center for Unintelligent Design)

October 31, 2011 By James F. McGrath 9 Comments

Google Reader has changed, and since one can no longer share items from Google Reader to a sidebar widget, that feature has been removed from this blog. I’m sorry to see it go. I will continue to share items of interest via Google+, Facebook and Twitter, so please do connect with me in one of [...]

Filed Under: evolution, Intelligent Design Tagged With: app, Bible, Darwin, evolution, Google Reader, Intelligent Design, iPad, iPhone, Michelle Bachmann, sidebar, Unintelligent Design, YouVersion 9 Comments

Can Creationism Be Disproven?

October 22, 2011 By James F. McGrath 270 Comments

The ideal in science is to come up with testable hypotheses that can be confirmed or proved wrong by evidence, at least in principle. It seems to me that the various forms of pseudoscientific creationisms (young-earth creationism and intelligent design) are inherently unfalsifiable. No evidence is allowed to count against them. If one sees evidence [...]

Filed Under: Bible, evolution, fundamentalism, inerrancy, Intelligent Design, pseudoscience, theology, young-earth creationism Tagged With: biology, creationism, evidence, Intelligent Design, science, theology, unfalsifiable, young-earth 270 Comments

Prayers for Parking Spaces and the Problem of Evil

October 16, 2011 By James F. McGrath 12 Comments

A post at imago*futura got me thinking about just how reprehensible American Christians make God out to be when they attribute their finding of a parking spot to answered prayer (and this post on the topic from about a month ago by Randal Rauser). The belief that God micromanages the universe for the benefit of [...]

Filed Under: evolution, Intelligent Design, religion, science, theodicy Tagged With: evolution, famine, hunger, miracles, parking, problem of evil, providence, religion, science, starvation, theodicy 12 Comments

Pete Enns on the Inconsistent Literalism of alleged “Biblical Literalists”

October 14, 2011 By James F. McGrath 1 Comment

Pete Enns’ blog has moved to Patheos, as regular readers of it will know. Take this opportunity to update your subscriptions if you haven’t already, and check out his latest post, which points out the inconsistency of Al Mohler’s “apparent age” approach to dealing with issues at the intersection of Bible and science. Here’s the [...]

Filed Under: Christianity, evolution, fundamentalism, Genesis, inerrancy, science, young-earth creationism Tagged With: Al Mohler, Baptist, Christian, evolution, fundamentalism, Genesis, literal, literalism, metaphor, Peter Enns, science 1 Comment

Evolution and Creationism around the Blogosphere

September 28, 2011 By James F. McGrath 1 Comment

Several posts related to the bogus claims of proponents of young earth creationism and intelligent design have appeared in the blogosphere over the past 24 hours or so… Karl Giberson asked why Evangelicals prefer to get their information from the discredited Ken Ham rather than an actual Evangelical scientist like Francis Collins. Darrell Falk responded [...]

Filed Under: education, evolution, fundamentalism, Intelligent Design, young-earth creationism Tagged With: creationism, education, evolution, human, ID, Intelligent Design, science, species, young-earth 1 Comment

Antievolutionism in the Classroom and around the Blogosphere

September 21, 2011 By James F. McGrath 1 Comment

My freshman “Faith, Doubt and Reason” class yesterday took an unexpected turn, as a discussion of Paul Tillich’s treatment of symbols in his Dynamics of Faith raised the issue of whether faith is necessary in the natural sciences, which led some students (the vast majority, at least of those who spoke) to express a “lack [...]

Filed Under: Bible, Christianity, education, evolution, fundamentalism, humor, Intelligent Design, Judaism, pseudoscience, science fiction, young-earth creationism Tagged With: antievolutionism, biology, Christian, Christianity, Christians, creation, creationism, Darwin, education, evolution, Intelligent Design, science 1 Comment

No Dinosaurs in Heaven

August 27, 2011 By James F. McGrath Leave a Comment

Here’s the trailer for a new movie focused on the attempt of religious fundamentalists to hijack science education. The film is called “No Dinosaurs in Heaven.”