Re: [asa] Van Till

Howard can speak for himself. I just want to say that ID proponents may be pleased to claim that someone active in the science/religion dialogue is not a Christian (e.g., Paul Nelson about Arthur Peacocke) if they think that will help their cause in casting doubt among Christians on anyone who accepts biological evolution.

It is no surprise that Dembski and his associates might cast doubts upon Howard as he has been one of the most trenchent critics of ID, in particular of Dembski's own arguments. See, for example, his review of The Creation Hypothesis in PSCF: "Special Creationism in Designer Clothing": http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/essayreviews/PSCF6-95VanTill.html. Also see his critique of Dembski's "No Free Lunch" in his essay "E Coli at the No Free Lunchroom: Bacteria Flagella and Dembski's Case for Intelligent Design" at the AAAS DoSER site: http://www.aaas.org/spp/dser/03_Areas/evolution/perspectives/vantillecoli_2002.pdf.

Unfortunately, I no longer have a current email for Howard to pass along your query.

Bob Schneider
  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Iain Strachan
  To: ASA
  Sent: Tuesday, January 30, 2007 12:42 PM
  Subject: [asa] Van Till

  There have been posts to the Christians In Science newsgroup to suggest that Howard Van Till is no longer a Christian, based on the talk referenced on Dembski's weblog here:

  http://www.uncommondescent.com/archives/1358

  However, on reading Van Till's article, albeit given to a "freethought" conference, I was unable to say whether he was or was not a Christian - it is clear that his views have altered recently, but I'm not sure how radical the change is. I consider it extremely bad form to question someone else's faith unless they have explicitly denied they have that faith. Can anyone else comment on how radical a change this is. If he has indeed rejected Christianity, from having been a leading spokesman for Theistic Evolution, then it is going to give the ID people quite a bit of propaganda among Christian circles, sadly.

  What is also clear from the article is the abysmally shoddy way Van Till was treated by his Christian associates, who tended to respond with "knee-jerk" reactions.

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  After the game, the King and the pawn go back in the same box.

  - Italian Proverb
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Received on Tue Jan 30 14:46:28 2007