Seventy years ago, the most visible religion/science person from the
conservative church was Harry Rimmer: his books, pamphlets, and thousands of
public appearances reached millions with his message. Why was he so
popular?
Answers:
(1) He had great command of humor and understood how people in the pew (who
typically lack both scientific and theological sophistication) think. ie,
he met them where they live.
(2) He shared their "commonsense" view of science as organized, classified,
proven facts, rather than speculative, abstract hypotheses such as
evolution. ie, he presented a false vision of real science as it is
practiced today; but he could be understood and appeared to make sense.
(3) As Bernie Ramm said about GM Price, another fundamentalist "scientist"
from the same period, he was "popular because he strode forth like David to
meet the Goliath of modern uniformitarian geology and that even though the
giant has not fallen Price has been slinging his smooth stones for more than
forty years." ie he didn't give a darn what real geologists thought: he
cared strongly for his vision of truth.
(4) He sure as heck appeared to be biblical, even though the original
author(s) of Genesis probably wouldn't have recognized him as one of their
own. The attraction of a "biblical science," as vs a biblical VIEW of
science, is almost too hard for many Christians to resist.
So, if we in ASA are to have comparable influence, we need to find ways to
do (1) without doing (2), (3) and (4). Any suggestions?
Ted Davis