Category Archives: Science

Kew researcher vindicates the Hump of the Camel

Posted on 03/02/2018 by Jon Garvey

Over at post 449 of 462 on the BioLogos debate between Dennis Venema (BioLogos staff member) and Richard Buggs (chief researcher in Plant Health at Kew Botanical Gardens) on population genetics predictions about early man, Richard replied to, I think, my only previous contribution on the thread. In that post I had ventured a concern I addressed in more detail in a post here:

Posted in Politics and sociology, Science | 13 Comments

Credentialism and ignorance

Posted on 31/01/2018 by Jon Garvey

There’s an interesting, and rather long, podcast here in which philosopher Lydia McGrew calls out New Testament scholars, as an entire guild, on what she perceives as systemic errors in their basic methodology, and particularly in the field of what is called “redaction criticism”. I have to say I agree with most of what she says, but there has also been a backlash from evangelical NT scholars contradicting her, partly on the basis of credentialism, ie that since she herself is not a trained New Testament scholar, she has no warrant to criticize those who are.

Posted in Philosophy, Politics and sociology, Science, Theology | 2 Comments

Patristic (and later) use of Rom. 1:20 as natural theology

Posted on 19/01/2018 by Jon Garvey

Whilst natural theology is a hot topic at The Hump, Eddie Robinson’s recent pieces here  and here regarding the BioLogos thread mentioning natural theology, in connection with Lutheranism, prompted me to do a rapid, and of course, incomplete survey of the Church Fathers on this subject.

Posted in Creation, Science, Theology | 10 Comments

More on Natural Theology: A New Exchange with George Murphy

Posted on 18/01/2018 by Edward Robinson

Over on BioLogos, George Murphy has responded to my previous post here on the Hump. As I have no posting privileges at BioLogos, I will have to engage Dr. Murphy from my position here. This is an awkward arrangement, but it will serve for the moment. I add, however, that Dr. Murphy is free to sign up here on the Hump as a commenter and respond directly, free of charge, to this post or to any others in the future; I’m sure that his interests sufficiently overlap with the Hump’s that he would be a valuable addition to not just this but other conversations here.

Posted in Creation, Edward Robinson, Science, Theology | 2 Comments

Natural Theology, ID, and Lutherans: A Response to Davis, Murphy and Swamidass

Posted on 17/01/2018 by Edward Robinson

Over at BioLogos, Joshua Swamidass has started a new discussion, entitled “The Lutheran Option”. In it, Joshua makes the point that the Lutheran voice has rarely been heard in origins debates in the USA, and calls for a more balanced discussion in which characteristically Lutheran theological emphases are heard, alongside the more commonly heard Calvinist/Reformed and “Wesleyan” points of view.

Posted in Edward Robinson, Politics and sociology, Science, Theology | 17 Comments

I nearly meet a fossil

Posted on 16/01/2018 by Jon Garvey

You know that thing where you can claim to have all-but met someone because you met someone who has? In that way, I’ve met the Queen because my brother shook hands with her royal glove. Well, yesterday the wife and I met, in this indirect way, the celebrated David Attenborough – whose programmes I first watched back in in 1959 – via the intermediary of a new fossil Jurassic ichthyosaur, on which he has just had a documentary broadcast.

Posted in Creation, Science, Theology | 4 Comments

Function ≠ evolutionary explanation

Posted on 13/01/2018 by Jon Garvey

On two occasions in the last week, BBC radio scientific programmes have claimed to offer “evolutionary explanations” for observed human phenomena, though admittedly one might (memory is hazy) have been a food programme interviewing a scientist.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Science | 6 Comments

Rising to the occasion

Posted on 02/01/2018 by Jon Garvey

Early last year I did a couple of pieces (the most useful here) on a new formulation of the metaphysical position on divine action of occasionalism, called “divine compositionalism”, being developed primarily within the field of science. I liked it.

Posted in Creation, Philosophy, Science, Theology | 6 Comments

Etymology and truth

Posted on 30/12/2017 by Jon Garvey

Did you know that the etymology of “etymology” is the Greek etumon = “true”? That’s ironic because one of the basic Exegetical Fallacies Don Carson highlights to preachers in his excellent book of that name is the etymological fallacy. Etymologies often deceive because words, in fact, constantly change their meaning, as I began to discuss in relation to their inherent metaphoric nature here.

Posted in Science, Theology | Leave a comment

Science’s mediaeval assumption

Posted on 14/12/2017 by Jon Garvey

One interesting aspect of Dante’s Divine Comedy (around which to reading I’ve finally got…) is to see the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas being applied just a few decades after his death, when it was still new and controversial. Thomas actually makes an appearance in heaven, but spends the majority of his speech eulogising St Francis of Assisi, which is not improbable given the priority he put on faith over philosophyat the close of his life. One thing that Dante deals with is the Great Chain of Being, a key mediaeval idea which I wrote about here.

Posted in Creation, Philosophy, Science, Theology | 3 Comments