Category Archives: Science

The non-presentation of self in everyday life

Posted on 17/03/2016 by Jon Garvey

The title of this piece is based on a once influential social psychology book by Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. In around 250 pages, the author fully covers the ground of his subject, just like it says on the cover, writing (as one reviewer said) not only about Vogue models, clergymen and the dead, but also about Shetland crofters, Canadian Army dentists, dukes, beauticians, rajahs and a range of characters.

Posted in Creation, Science | 2 Comments

Monotheism and automata

Posted on 13/03/2016 by Jon Garvey

In my last post I suggested that failure to deal adequately with the implications of monotheism itself leads directly to many erroneous ideas in both theology as such and in understanding the relationship of God to creation, including evolution.

Posted in Creation, Philosophy, Science, Theology | 65 Comments

Our 5th birthday – Happy Birthday

Posted on 27/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

It’s actually five years ago today that I started this blog, The Hump of the Camel. That’s quite a decent lifespan for a blog, and it’s time to reflect on what, if anything, we’ve achieved.

Posted in Creation, Science, Theology | 57 Comments

A metaphor for an abstraction

Posted on 26/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

Mike Flynn (aka The O’Floinn) links to a short piece from last year by James Chastek pointing out how even Richard Dawkins, championing materialism in the “selfish gene” concept, cannot avoid the hated idea of final causation. Food for thought, indeed.

Posted in Philosophy, Science | Leave a comment

The right time isn’t always now

Posted on 23/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

“You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.” Romans 5.6. Doing a teaching series currently overviewing the narrative thrust of the whole Bible, one thing that struck me was the issue of God’s timing. It’s always slower than we might wish, though again Peter says “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness.”

Posted in History, Science, Theology | 1 Comment

Denton’s Book and Biologos

Posted on 22/02/2016 by Sy Garte

Since Jon is busy with his new band, I thought I might sneak in here and fill a space. I haven’t asked him, so I hope he doesnt mind. Jon has already mentioned and linked to my book review of Michael Denton’s new book Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis. I wanted to post here some of my observations, not about the book, that is what the review is for, but about the reception of the review.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Science, Sy Garte, Theology | 11 Comments

Reclaiming origins science for Christianity

Posted on 16/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

I apologise that posts are a bit thin on the ground at the moment, but that’s partly because I am forming a new band, with a mountain of arrangements and recording to do, and also because our granddaughter is staying with us this week. Today we took a trip to Lyme Regis, which although a seaside holiday resort was also the place where palaeontology became a serious occupation in the early nineteenth century. Accordingly it has both a dinosaur museum (where one could get quite a serious education in palaeontological concerns) and a town museum with an entire room devoted to Mary Anning, the first professional fossil hunter.

Posted in Creation, History, Science | 2 Comments

Paradigm shifts and long spoons

Posted on 11/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

I’ve nearly finished Suzan Mazur’s book, The Paradigm Shifters, which consists of a number of interviews with new thinkers in evolutionary science, mainly members of the Third Way group, about which I’ve written here and here.

Posted in Creation, Science, Theology | 12 Comments

God would not violate his own laws

Posted on 04/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

It is still a remarkably common objection to miracles, or to other than excessively-rare miracles, that God would not violate the laws of nature that he himself commanded. Not uncommonly, to allow for miracles arguments are made that show that God need not actually break the laws to do them.

Posted in Philosophy, Science, Theology | Leave a comment

Sufficient means

Posted on 02/02/2016 by Jon Garvey

A while ago biologist Francisco Ayala, in discussion with William Lane Craig, made a rather fatuous argument against ID proponent William Dembski’s “Universal Probability Bound.”

Posted in Creation, Science, Theology | 6 Comments