Category Archives: Politics and sociology

Education as love

Posted on 27/03/2014 by Jon Garvey

The separation of science and religion has recently been discussed on BioLogos in the context of Ted Davis’s mention of Langdon Gilkey, who advocated the complete separation of science and religion. Pretty soon in that discussion Gilkey’s particular approach was compared to Stephen Jay Gould’s NOMA (Non-Overlapping Magisteria), in which science has to do with “facts” and religion with “values”.

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Dobbs on scientific freedom

Posted on 14/03/2014 by Jon Garvey

Further to my piece on the Incredible Hulk  a little while back, the author of an article I cited there, David Dobbs, has done a follow-up piece, together with comment articles from four scientists. One interesting and sobering thing is his reportage of the responses he had from the biological community and its followers to his original piece:

Posted in Politics and sociology, Science | 4 Comments

Cosmic conspiracy

Posted on 11/03/2014 by Jon Garvey

A year or so ago I watched a UK-produced TV series about the history of archaeology. Prominent in the first episode was a quite mythological claim that early antiquarians were courageous scientists battling against the opposition of a Church monolithically defending biblical literalism and the Flood. It entirely bypassed the fact that most of these guys were churchmen, even though it named some of them, apparently oblivious to the self-contradiction. I thought I’d beefed about it here, but I can’t find anything so no doubt I bottled it up and attributed it to local ignorance … though you’d expect that a series about the “History of…” would do some homework … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Philosophy, Politics and sociology, Science | 14 Comments

Erithacus rubecula in fact and fable

Posted on 10/03/2014 by Jon Garvey

How the human mind develops concepts is a wonderful thing. My mental schema for that most iconic of British birds, the robin, is built upon the foundation a song I learned from Miss Jerome (a wonderful teacher) for my first Christmas at school. Apart from an even more juvenile nursery rhyme involving cold north winds and what Robin does when they blow (poor thing), it was possibly my earliest exposure to the bird, maybe even pre-dating my seeing it in the feather.

Posted in Creation, History, Politics and sociology, Science | 5 Comments

Trade secrets

Posted on 12/02/2014 by Jon Garvey

The Biologos thread on the Ham-Nye debate has prompted good conversations there and in a few posts here – very few actually about creationism versus atheism, which is understandable enough as neither site is either creationist or atheist. One titbit was a very gentle dig at New Testament scholars by Ted Davis speaking as a historian, about the criteria they use to date the gospels: In the absence of hard evidence, I regard the date of the composition of the various gospels as highly conjectural, and if I were a biblical scholar (obviously I’m not), I would hesitate to be too dogmatic about such a theory-laden conclusion.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Theology | 2 Comments

Recognising cultural blinkers

Posted on 06/02/2014 by Jon Garvey

There is a current BioLogos thread on the recent debate between atheist Bill Nye and Young Earth Creationist Ken Ham. In it, our own Lou Jost continues to try and educate the benighted theists by responsing to John Walton’s affirmation of his shared belief (with Ham) in the inspiration of Genesis. Lou complains that Genesis “screams out ‘cultural document’”, and in a later post slips in the “nothing buttery” that C S Lewis noted as a hallmark of modern materialism by amending it to “just a cultural document.”

Posted in Philosophy, Politics and sociology, Science, Theology | 124 Comments

Evolutionism and the Fundamental Problem of Biology.

Posted on 29/11/2013 by Sy Garte

In 1853, a mere 6 years before the publication of Origin of Species, a minor textbook written for the education of the public was published with the title Library of Natural History, and the subtitle “containing scientific and popular descriptions of man, quadrupeds,  birds, fishes, reptiles, and insects, compiled from the works of…” and there follows a list of the most active and well known naturalists of the day. While most of the text is not very interesting, there are some remarkable aspects of this book, clearly meant to be an up to date summary of the field. First, the word biology is never used.

Posted in History, Politics and sociology, Science, Sy Garte | 14 Comments

Broadening the conversation

Posted on 25/10/2013 by Jon Garvey

I’ve commented here on the decreasing number of those contributing to discussions at BioLogos – majoring, of course, on the unwillingness of most of their own people to get involved. Well, now it seems the problem is to be solved by closing comments on most of their articles, following the controversial lead of Popular Science. People are to reply by e-mail, and the “best” will be put in a “Letters to the editor” section.

Posted in Politics and sociology | 13 Comments

On an unrelated subject

Posted on 04/10/2013 by Jon Garvey

Do you sometimes get the feeling that there’s a whole world of news Out There which, for some reason, the usual media won’t touch? The BBC Radio 4 news was this morning covering the terrible tragedy of the sinking of a boatload of refugees off Italy.

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Biologos – infinitesimal change or stasis?

Posted on 03/10/2013 by Jon Garvey

It seems to be rather quiet over at BioLogos recently. Two things to note, though, about themes that particularly interest me. On an apparently uncontroversial thread, the failure of those influential at BioLogos to engage with the questions raised by many of us, about its ongoing fudging of the issue of God’s involvement in evolution, was noted.

Posted in Creation, Politics and sociology, Science | 9 Comments