In this final installment of investigating the claims of science, we arrive at a most under evaluated topic – the scientific method. Most textbooks in science such as chemistry and physics pay a kind of homage to the “scientific method” – though it is usually quite brief. The method is a very reliable route to discovery but is there more to the process?
(Picture: ‘Old Science Textbook’)
The artwork shown is somewhat strange looking. 
What is it trying to communicate? (see below) Scientists routinely deal with strange phenomenon and offer some kind of explanation for it. When a scientist makes a claim such as “science shows that God does not exist” alarms ought to go off. What explanation underlies such a claim? Explanations in science can be a tricky affair, which we shall explore in this post. Continue reading
Last time we looked at the claim “science shows that God does not exist”. The author perhaps implies that all of science or scientists agree but popular polls suggest otherwise. Why do many scientists in our modern-day still hang onto the “God hypothesis” if the objective scientific studies deny the God hypothesis? After all who can argue with scientific studies that underwrite the claim? Should the modern (non-scientist) observer beware? Continue reading
In the book, God: The Failed Hypothesis. How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist by Victor J Stenger a variety of findings are presented to support the title claim. If true, believers ought to run for cover for their faith has suffered an irrecoverable blow. In the series to follow I wish to expose the often underappreciated aspects of scientific claims and their origins for it is here that we discover it may not yet be time for believers to hang up the choir robes.(Picture) Continue reading
Last time we investigated chance formation of informational objects such as sentences from randomly selected words. The odds of making a meaningful sentence are quite low as calculations suggest. The lesson helps us to begin appraisal of the claim that life came from random (or chance) reactions of chemicals. It would seem that if sentence creation or making particular card hands is difficult than making other informational objects is potentially also difficult. Yet there is much more to consider. Continue reading
Can a sequence of symbols that carry a message be the product of chance? How random are rolls of dice (shown in the picture)? These are deep philosophical and mathematical questions. A general survey of these questions helps us to begin to appreciate the assertion that life is the product of undirected chemical and physical processes. Continue reading
According to the claims of several militant atheists God does not exist and more particularly God is not needed to account for the existence of the universe and all life. Continue reading
God is indeed in the crosshairs of a growing number of atheists. At least one concept that challenges the “God hypothesis” is philosophical materialism, which holds that nature alone and its chemical and physical processes produced life. A “Creator” is an unnecessary “adjunct” according to this narrative and in the opinion of atheist Richard Dawkins nothing else such as God needs to be “smuggled in”. He concedes that while life forming from non-life is highly improbable (metaphorically “mount improbable”) it is possible and did in fact happen. (Picture from Popular Science) Continue reading
Why do you believe what you believe about God? ‘Well, I just do’, some respond. Equally short answers follow the question; Does God exist? ‘Sure!’
P
erhaps there was a time when responses such as these might pacify the average inquisitor but they are becoming obsolete.
We underestimate our unbelieving neighbors and friends. We dismiss the possibility that, in their own way, they might actually be seriously seeking answers—ultimate answers about life, faith, and death. Often, it is our particular version of Christianity that is rejected or held in suspicion.
Christian sociologist Os Guinness writes that to the believer Christianity “was once life’s central mystery, its worship life’s most awesome experience, its faith life’s broadest canopy of meaning…” But, today, he laments, no matter how passionate or committed an individual believer may be, Christianity often amounts to little more than a private preference, a spare time hobby.
This modern version of Christianity is significant when we consider how non-believers view Christianity. For serious seekers, such spare-time faith is not a solution to their deepest needs. Christianity must be more than a cozy warm blanket, something more ultimate to raise one up above one’s needs.
Amid the glad tidings often associated with the well known Christmas story Continue reading
The Gospel Coalition
