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The case for.... @ 05:41 pm
I'm not sure how many of you know who Lee Strobel and his books:
The Case for Christ
The Case for Faith
The Case for a Creator
The Case for Christmas
The Case for Easter
[and coming soon: The Case for Pentecost - j/k]
As well as a few books on evangelism, and oddly a book on "surviving a spiritual mismatch in a marriage."
What one book Strobel really needs to read is "The Case for a Clue." I have read The Case for a Creator: A Journalist Investigates Scientific Evidence That Points Toward God, I read it last year to please my mom (and because we had to read a 'scientific' book-- just something that had references in the back). There are several notable problems with the book.
First- the book starts with Strobel's personal "finding Jesus" story. It the typical a dime a dozen stories, he was raised religious, became skeptical, things in his life weren't going the way he wanted, so, he found Jesus again and now knows the truth. How that is scientific evidence is beyond me.
Moving on, the first chapter of the book is entitled: Doubts about Darwinism
To "prove" his points he brings in Dr. Jonathan Wells. If you clicked on the link on his name, you will find a website rebutting his book - Icons of Evolution in which he tears down so called "icons" of evolution. In The Case for a Creator Dr Wells attacks a couple "proofs" of evolution. Apparently, and this is news to me and my almost-finished biology degree, apparently archaeopteryx, embryo-morphology and "missing links" all prove evolution. Never-mind that fossils are not formed during every time period at every location. Ignore that we don't even have a complete database of all of the species that exist today. If we don't have "missing links" Darwinism [read evolution] is wrong.
The second chapter is titled: Where Science Meets Faith
This chapter is about how science and religion overlap, and therefore must be reconciled. In the first camp, there are the materialistic, secular, evil Darwinists; in the second camp there are the equally scientifically valid (excuse me while I die laughing here) "Intelligent Design"-ers. Their world view is healthy and God-filled. And, unlike creationism, it's "scientific" -- only not really. Oddly enough, one of the professors at a college I went to is always listed as one of the major supporters of it, but I'll get to him later.
The third chapter is: The Evidence of Cosmology: Beginning with a Bang
In this chapter Dr. Craig a philosopher. He brings up the age old argument of if it has a beginning it must have a creator. http://www.infidels.org/library/mod
The fourth chapter is entitled: The Evidence of Physics: The Cosmos on a Razor’s Edge
This chapter was when I started hitting my head against the wall. Basically the gist of this chapter was "what are the odds?" And it tried to weigh the odds of this world happening just by chance versus the odds of a creator. Basically life, and how nicely it works, was likened to a hiker finding stones arranged in such a way that it read "Hi hiker!" As in something that one would believe would never randomly occurs. I'm guessing he's always missed those news segments about someone seeing a holy-person or celebrity's face on a food product. Well, clearly there must be a world-class artist at the potato-chip manufacturing plant! When I read this chapter I really hoped that this was the height of Strobel's ad ignorem arguments. But then I started reading the next one.
The fifth chapter is: The Evidence from Astronomy: The Privileged Planet
This chapter can be summed up as "Earth is a rare planet because we've never found any other with life on it!" Basically, because our planet is the only that we've seen which is clearly capable of supporting human life it must have been especially made just for us. Ignore the idea that maybe we evolved the way we are because of how the planet is during this chapter. Also, ignore that we don't even know how many galaxies there are - it appears to be in the billions!
Yes the Earth is unique, but so are all the other planets. While the Earth seems to support carbon-based life forms, other planets may be suited for other types of life forms. Basically, he's rendering a verdict final on an issue the jury is still out on.
The sixth, and IMHO funnest chapter is: The Evidence of Biochemistry: The Complexity of Molecular Machines
This is the Behe chapter. Interestingly enough, Behe isn't that anti-evolution as people make him out to be, he merely believes that parts of the cell are irreducibly complex.
"By irreducible complexity I mean a single system which is composed of several interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, and where the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning. An irreducibly complex system cannot be produced gradually by slight, successive modifications of a precursor system, since any precursor to an irreducibly complex system is by definition nonfunctional."
The problem with that is that Behe is thinking inside the box. He is assuming that organisms evolved the most efficient way possible - never duplicating their DNA seemingly needlessly or having unused segments. The truth of the mater is that DNA is not as linear as you would think it to be, nor is it confined to only one possible use. He can't see how evolution can work, therefore it can't. I used to be guilty of thinking like that, when programming I would only go by the book and do things the one sure way and not think of how functions could be used in ways I wasn't taught to use them in class.
The seventh chapter is: The Evidence of Biological Information: The Challenge of DNA and the Origin of Life
In this chapter Stephen C. Meyer argues that DNA encodes too perfect of information, that it is too improbable that it would just naturally occur. This argument is similar to the planet argument except in reverse. Frankly this dull chapter proves another scientist can receive a PhD without realizing that if something happens, it happens the only way it can happen, with or without "intelligence."
The eighth chapter gets even more out there: The Evidence of Consciousness: The Enigma of the Mind
In this chapter J. P. Moreland states that the phenomena of consciousness cannot be explain, throwing in its evolution not being possible, and Near Death Experiences as a way to try and make consciousness appear to be separate from the brain and the body. This chapter, while I do find consciousness a fascinating topic, was a big case of "tornado come through valley, gods must be mad at valley." Yes we don't understand how the mind works at this point, but that does not mean its incomprehensible or unexplainable by science. The near death experiences were dull, it's the same old same old argument. Basically, yes weird stuff happens, people have visions when they almost die/die for a short time. Guess what? Your brain does weird stuff then, it's neurotransmitters aren't as perfectly controlled and it should be no surprise that you get vision, just like drug-addicts of some drugs get visions when they go on "trips."
In conclusion, the only way this book could convince anyone with a scientific background would be if they already had the faith to begin with. While this book was titled The Case for a Creator Strobel should've just been honest and titled it The Case for the Christian Faith
The Case for Christ
The Case for Faith
The Case for a Creator
The Case for Christmas
The Case for Easter
[and coming soon: The Case for Pentecost - j/k]
As well as a few books on evangelism, and oddly a book on "surviving a spiritual mismatch in a marriage."
What one book Strobel really needs to read is "The Case for a Clue." I have read The Case for a Creator: A Journalist Investigates Scientific Evidence That Points Toward God, I read it last year to please my mom (and because we had to read a 'scientific' book-- just something that had references in the back). There are several notable problems with the book.
First- the book starts with Strobel's personal "finding Jesus" story. It the typical a dime a dozen stories, he was raised religious, became skeptical, things in his life weren't going the way he wanted, so, he found Jesus again and now knows the truth. How that is scientific evidence is beyond me.
Moving on, the first chapter of the book is entitled: Doubts about Darwinism
To "prove" his points he brings in Dr. Jonathan Wells. If you clicked on the link on his name, you will find a website rebutting his book - Icons of Evolution in which he tears down so called "icons" of evolution. In The Case for a Creator Dr Wells attacks a couple "proofs" of evolution. Apparently, and this is news to me and my almost-finished biology degree, apparently archaeopteryx, embryo-morphology and "missing links" all prove evolution. Never-mind that fossils are not formed during every time period at every location. Ignore that we don't even have a complete database of all of the species that exist today. If we don't have "missing links" Darwinism [read evolution] is wrong.
The second chapter is titled: Where Science Meets Faith
This chapter is about how science and religion overlap, and therefore must be reconciled. In the first camp, there are the materialistic, secular, evil Darwinists; in the second camp there are the equally scientifically valid (excuse me while I die laughing here) "Intelligent Design"-ers. Their world view is healthy and God-filled. And, unlike creationism, it's "scientific" -- only not really. Oddly enough, one of the professors at a college I went to is always listed as one of the major supporters of it, but I'll get to him later.
The third chapter is: The Evidence of Cosmology: Beginning with a Bang
In this chapter Dr. Craig a philosopher. He brings up the age old argument of if it has a beginning it must have a creator. http://www.infidels.org/library/mod
The fourth chapter is entitled: The Evidence of Physics: The Cosmos on a Razor’s Edge
This chapter was when I started hitting my head against the wall. Basically the gist of this chapter was "what are the odds?" And it tried to weigh the odds of this world happening just by chance versus the odds of a creator. Basically life, and how nicely it works, was likened to a hiker finding stones arranged in such a way that it read "Hi hiker!" As in something that one would believe would never randomly occurs. I'm guessing he's always missed those news segments about someone seeing a holy-person or celebrity's face on a food product. Well, clearly there must be a world-class artist at the potato-chip manufacturing plant! When I read this chapter I really hoped that this was the height of Strobel's ad ignorem arguments. But then I started reading the next one.
The fifth chapter is: The Evidence from Astronomy: The Privileged Planet
This chapter can be summed up as "Earth is a rare planet because we've never found any other with life on it!" Basically, because our planet is the only that we've seen which is clearly capable of supporting human life it must have been especially made just for us. Ignore the idea that maybe we evolved the way we are because of how the planet is during this chapter. Also, ignore that we don't even know how many galaxies there are - it appears to be in the billions!
Yes the Earth is unique, but so are all the other planets. While the Earth seems to support carbon-based life forms, other planets may be suited for other types of life forms. Basically, he's rendering a verdict final on an issue the jury is still out on.
The sixth, and IMHO funnest chapter is: The Evidence of Biochemistry: The Complexity of Molecular Machines
This is the Behe chapter. Interestingly enough, Behe isn't that anti-evolution as people make him out to be, he merely believes that parts of the cell are irreducibly complex.
The problem with that is that Behe is thinking inside the box. He is assuming that organisms evolved the most efficient way possible - never duplicating their DNA seemingly needlessly or having unused segments. The truth of the mater is that DNA is not as linear as you would think it to be, nor is it confined to only one possible use. He can't see how evolution can work, therefore it can't. I used to be guilty of thinking like that, when programming I would only go by the book and do things the one sure way and not think of how functions could be used in ways I wasn't taught to use them in class.
The seventh chapter is: The Evidence of Biological Information: The Challenge of DNA and the Origin of Life
In this chapter Stephen C. Meyer argues that DNA encodes too perfect of information, that it is too improbable that it would just naturally occur. This argument is similar to the planet argument except in reverse. Frankly this dull chapter proves another scientist can receive a PhD without realizing that if something happens, it happens the only way it can happen, with or without "intelligence."
The eighth chapter gets even more out there: The Evidence of Consciousness: The Enigma of the Mind
In this chapter J. P. Moreland states that the phenomena of consciousness cannot be explain, throwing in its evolution not being possible, and Near Death Experiences as a way to try and make consciousness appear to be separate from the brain and the body. This chapter, while I do find consciousness a fascinating topic, was a big case of "tornado come through valley, gods must be mad at valley." Yes we don't understand how the mind works at this point, but that does not mean its incomprehensible or unexplainable by science. The near death experiences were dull, it's the same old same old argument. Basically, yes weird stuff happens, people have visions when they almost die/die for a short time. Guess what? Your brain does weird stuff then, it's neurotransmitters aren't as perfectly controlled and it should be no surprise that you get vision, just like drug-addicts of some drugs get visions when they go on "trips."
In conclusion, the only way this book could convince anyone with a scientific background would be if they already had the faith to begin with. While this book was titled The Case for a Creator Strobel should've just been honest and titled it The Case for the Christian Faith
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