Re: [asa] AAAS President Keynote Address

Thank you; yes, I meant it rules out such a belief.

On 2/21/07, George Murphy <gmurphy@raex.com> wrote:
>
> Do you mean to say that the statement that the universe is
> "intelligible" *rules out* "some kind of eastern-new age belief that life
> is nothing but an illusion"? The claim that it "implies" that makes no
> sense.
>
> Shalom
> George
> http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> *From:* David Opderbeck <dopderbeck@gmail.com>
> *To:* Rich Blinne <rich.blinne@gmail.com>
> *Cc:* Janice Matchett <janmatch@earthlink.net> ; asa@calvin.edu
> *Sent:* Wednesday, February 21, 2007 10:59 AM
> *Subject:* Re: [asa] AAAS President Keynote Address
>
>
> *We believe that in creating and preserving the universe God has endowed
> it
> > with contingent order and intelligibility, the basis of scientific
> > investigation.....
>
> This strikes against the fideism Janice
> > expressed above.*
>
> I'd really hate to subject the ASA statement re: "contingent order and
> intelligibility" to the kind of surgical parsing and exclusionary purpose
> that, say, the Evangelical Theological Society seems to want to do with
> "inerrancy." "Intelligibility," in particular, has to be a highly relative
> and nuanced term, and shouldn't IMHO imply any particular epistemology,
> except perhaps some kind of eastern-new age belief that life is nothing but
> an illusion.
>
>
> On 2/21/07, Rich Blinne <rich.blinne@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> > On Feb 20, 2007, at 8:08 PM, Janice Matchett wrote:
> >
> > At 10:43 PM 2/19/2007, Rich Blinne wrote:
> >
> > President Holdren's address ... drew a standing ovation when he called
> on
> > them to "tithe" 10% of their time to "to working to increase the
> benefits of
> > science and technology for the human condition and to decrease the
> > liabilities."
> > @
> > http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1787818/posts?page=2#2
> >
> >
> > ~ Janice :)
> >
> >
> > On the web site Janice said:
> >
> >
> >
> > Eden, the fall of man, the loss of grace, the coming doomsday---these
> are
> > deeply held mythic structures. They are profoundly conservative beliefs.
>
> > They may even be hard-wired in the brain, for all I know. I certainly
> don't
> > want to talk anybody out of them, as I don't want to talk anybody out of
> a
> > belief that Jesus Christ is the son of God who rose from the dead. But
> the
> > reason I don't want to talk anybody out of these beliefs is that I know
> that
> > I can't talk anybody out of them. These are not facts that can be
> argued.
> > These are issues of faith.
> >
> >
> > And so it is, sadly, with environmentalism. Increasingly it seems facts
> > aren't necessary, because the tenets of environmentalism are all about
> > belief. It's about whether you are going to be a sinner, or saved.
> Whether
> > you are going to be one of the people on the side of salvation, or on
> the
> > side of doom. Whether you are going to be one of us, or one of them.
> > This puts her at variance with the ASA statement of faith. The first two
>
> > points Janice would have no problem with:
> >
> >
> > We accept the divine inspiration, trustworthiness and authority of the
> Bible
> > in matters of faith and conduct.
> > We confess the Triune God affirmed in the Nicene and Apostles' creeds
> which
> > we accept as brief, faithful statements of Christian doctrine based upon
> > Scripture.
> > It's the next two, however:
> >
> > We recognize our responsibility, as stewards of God's creation, to use
> > science and technology for the good of humanity and the whole world.
> >
> >
> >
> > The second one sounds surprisingly like AAAS challenge, no? It's the
> first
> > one I want to examine, however. This strikes against the fideism Janice
> > expressed above. I use the term fideism advisedly because it is
> sometimes
> > falsely used against presuppositional apologetics. But,
> presuppositionalism
> > has evidence that comes in a confirming rather than a preceding fashion
> so
> > it is not truly fideistic. We all argue about many things like ID vs.
> TE,
> > concordism vs. accomodationism, etc. But, we all share the Augustinian
> > concept as expressed above that all truth meets at the top because God
> is
> > the author of all truth both natural and revealed. But, Janice
> apparently
> > does not share this common ground with us because she denies there are
> > doctrinal facts to be argued and thus betrays an absolute fideism. More
> > importantly, she also imputes her fideism to others when they are not
> being
> > fideistic.
> >
> > Why should I care if she does not share common ground with a voluntary
> > organization? It's because not only does she not agree with us, she
> truly
> > does not understand us. She does not understand how evidence-based we
> are.
> > Because of this misperception of us -- and even other scientists who do
> not
> > share our Christian faith -- that is at the root of her constant false
> > accusations. This causes us great difficulties in reaching our
> colleagues
> > for Christ. They might wrongly believe that Christians do not believe in
> the
> > truth either in the sense of being evidenced-based or in the sense of
> > preserving the good names of others. Many have asked me privately why I
> go
> > on with Janice. It is because of one other phrase in our statement of
> faith:
> >
> >
> >
> > As an organization, the ASA does not take a position when there is
> honest
> > disagreement between Christians on an issue. We are committed to
> providing
> > an open forum where controversies can be discussed without fear of
> unjust
> > condemnation. Legitimate differences of opinion among Christians who
> have
> > studied both the Bible and science are freely expressed within the
> > Affiliation in a context of Christian love and concern for truth.
>
>
>

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Received on Wed Feb 21 11:32:52 2007