RE: [asa] Dawkins new book

"Also, why do you think Christians will be forced to respond to Dawkins? Is there something special about his book that makes it different from Coyne's latest book?"

Because Dawkins is more of a celebrity, and no matter what they do they get attention.

In the past, Christians have came up with a rebuttal to his works.

His latest work is mostly on evolution. The response will likely have to be on the same topic. Crisis. Will the Christian response be anti-evolution? I suspect it will be mostly TE, and a shock to the 'man in the pew.' I also suspect the OEC's will be trying to promote Behe and some kind of God-guided design (they can't say 'evolution' yet, as in TE, because it is a dirty word). The YEC's will not change, and give the same old story (unlike the OEC's who I think are updating).

...Bernie

-----Original Message-----
From: Nucacids [mailto:nucacids@wowway.com]
Sent: Friday, October 23, 2009 6:16 PM
To: Dehler, Bernie; asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: [asa] Dawkins new book

Bernie: "So anyway, I think this new book is going to push Behe and ID
(God-guided evolution) more forward, as a general evangelical Christian
response in the USA."

So is ID God-guided evolution or is it Creationism in a Cheap Tuxedo? Also,
why do you think Christians will be forced to respond to Dawkins? Is there
something special about his book that makes it different from Coyne's latest
book?

Mike

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dehler, Bernie" <bernie.dehler@intel.com>
To: <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Friday, October 23, 2009 12:27 PM
Subject: [asa] Dawkins new book

> There's an atheist book club meetup that I will likely join, and they are
> reviewing Dawkin's latest book "The Greatest Show on Earth." I glanced at
> the book the other day. I think most of it looks like evidence for
> evolution (what's new?), but I did notice an interesting section on
> theodicy. (And yes, it looked like it may be shallow in not bringing
> forth and quoting the best arguments from the critics.)
>
> Anyways, Dawkins mentioned that for believers, there's a thing called 'the
> problem of evil.' He says 'they even have a name for it- theodicy.' At
> first I thought that was kind of patronizing to say 'they even have a name
> for it' then as I thought about it more I realized that theodicy was
> something only that God believers have to deal with. I know that is
> obvious, but it wasn't that clear in my mind before, esp. from seeing it
> from the other side now (not as a Christian).
>
> Anyway, I suspect this book will make a stir in the area of pushing
> evolution on to the American people. The Christians will be forced to
> make a response, unless they want to put their head in the ground. And so
> it will be interesting to see what the best/biggest home brands (William
> Lane Craig and Ravi Z.) in Christianity put forth... are they going to
> testify or deny evolution? The Bible Answer man is anti-evolution.
>
> Here's my forecast because I'm seeing hints already. There will be a
> louder ID response that is straddling the fence with accepting evolution.
> It is really a God-guided TE. Just like Denis Lamoureux is TE but
> invented a new name (Evolutionary Creation, along with his new ideas of
> hermeneutics), this newer ID is TE but goes by the name of ID (this is
> Behe with his IR and 'edge of evolution' ideas).
>
> Summary:
>
> Category: TE
>
> Group 1: Aka: Evolutionary Creation
> Leader: Denis Lamoureux
> Distinctive: Science/History/Theology distinctions; hermeneutics for
> 'incidental' science and history in scripture
>
> Group 2: ID (there are also ID definitions; ID in itself is vague like TE
> is vague)
> Leader: Michael Behe
> Distinctive: God-guided evolution, Irreducible Complexity, edge of
> evolution
>
> There are other groups- just noting this new ID TE group. They are "TE"
> but won't say it (because of their distaste for the term 'evolution' as
> atheistic).
>
> So anyway, I think this new book is going to push Behe and ID (God-guided
> evolution) more forward, as a general evangelical Christian response in
> the USA.
>
> ...Bernie
>
>
> To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
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Received on Mon Oct 26 12:46:42 2009