Category Archives: Theology

What the Bible should have said #19

Posted on 18/12/2020 by Jon Garvey

1 Chronicles 21: Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census of Israel. So David said to Joab and the commanders of the troops, ‘Go and count the Israelites from Beersheba to Dan. Then report back to me so that I may know how many there are.’

Posted in Medicine, Politics and sociology, Theology | 1 Comment

Delegitimation: a force for anarchy and liberation

Posted on 15/12/2020 by Jon Garvey

Peter Boghossian is a US philosopher who has recently drawn attention to the post-modern phenomenon of “delegitimation.” Boghossian is a militant atheist, and no friend of Christianity, having worked on rather crass ways to “deprogram” believers in casual conversations, on the mistaken belief that we are captive to irrationality imposed by authority. But in these strange times, the champions of Enlightenment rationalism can sometimes be co-belligerents, simply because the Enlightenment grew out of Christianity’s commitment to truth, and we are now, without hyperbole, rushing into a post-truth society.

Posted in Philosophy, Politics and sociology, Science, Theology | Leave a comment

Considering an ancient Adam

Posted on 06/12/2020 by Jon Garvey

The Genealogical Adam and Eve paradigm, as described in my book and that of Joshua Swamidass, makes a recent Adam plausible in the context of the mainstream sciences. Some objectors to this “recent Adam” interpretation wants to put Adam and Eve much further back in the past (which is equally compatible with GAE), and their main reason is the status of the “people outside the garden” in our scenario.

Posted in Adam, Creation, Genealogical Adam, Science, Theology | 15 Comments

A not-so-tenuous connection

Posted on 27/11/2020 by Jon Garvey

Isn’t the internet wonderful? (Ans: Yes and No!) The hint of a memory, and I found a complete web-page about a Sci-Fi story I read in a tacky comic I bought in 1959.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Theology | Leave a comment

COVID Conspiracy theories are dangerous!

Posted on 24/11/2020 by Jon Garvey

All reputable journalists and scientists dealing with COVID-19 are quick to say, “I am no conspiracy theorist,” shortly before expressing sheer mystification over how things are being handled by the government, by official advisers, and by a fairly monolithic mainstream media.

Posted in History, Politics and sociology, Theology | 1 Comment

How the Great Deception could actually work

Posted on 13/11/2020 by Jon Garvey

In my e-book Seeing through Smoke, mainly written last year, I discussed how our times are really the first in history when the kind of final global deception, or “rebellion,” described in Scripture, might be able occur. This is because of the combination of global communications and institutions, and the sophisticated level of propaganda that has not only been understood, but comprehensively applied, over the last century. But I also wondered how such a delusion could gain the near-universal traction accorded it in Scripture, given the polarised nature of our political scene.

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

The marginalized centre

Posted on 07/11/2020 by Jon Garvey

There’s something rather special about you people, though not many Hump readers get to express that in comments. I get around 100,000 hits a year, and particularly in the last few months those have been visits to posts mainly expressing dissidence to the mainstream narrative on COVID, on social justice and on world politics generally.

Posted in Politics and sociology, Theology | 2 Comments

Cultural dementia

Posted on 05/11/2020 by Jon Garvey

Yesterday our MPs, deeply conflicted, but not sufficiently so to check out the data intelligently, voted through another national lockdown. This was despite the well-publicized de-bunking of the doomsday projections made to justify it, the data showing that infections and deaths have both peaked and appear to be on the way down, the latest excess deaths report that confirms we have average deaths for the time of year, and above all the clear evidence that no proper impact assessment has been done, let alone made available to parliament or public.

Posted in History, Politics and sociology, Prometheus, Theology | Leave a comment

Suffering and anguish

Posted on 30/10/2020 by Jon Garvey

David Snoke’s presentation at last week’s Christian Scientific Society webinar added a useful thought to my treatment of animal suffering in God’s Good Earth. This question plays a large part in the kind of theodicy tangles that Evolutionary theologies tend to get into, deep time being held to build up an immense “debt” of suffering for God to requite, and evolution itself (apparently) being grounded on senseless and wasteful suffering.

Posted in Creation, Medicine, Philosophy, Science, Theology of nature | Leave a comment

Still places at God’s Good Earth Webinar

Posted on 23/10/2020 by Jon Garvey

I’m just re-posting a reminder that I’m giving a presentation on my first book, God’s Good Earth Earth: the case for an unfallen creation at a Christian Scientific Society Webinar thos Saturday, 24th October, on natural evil. It’s in the morning, in the US, or the afternoon in Europe. If you’re an Australian reader, you’ll have to set your alarm clock. Speakers are Stuart Burgess from UK, and Fuz Rana, Scott Minnich and David Snoke from America, and the general tone of the others’ abstracts seems to be on “design” good or bad. It’s free, though they ask for a donation in the region of $20 for the logistics (not … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Philosophy, Science, Theology of nature | 2 Comments