[asa] Fw: November Newsletter from Reasonable Faith

Craig - Ayala debate recap: I won, he lost, send money.   ----- Forwarded Message ---- From: William Lane Craig <c+rf@trusted-sender.convio.net> To: john_walley@yahoo.com Sent: Wed, November 11, 2009 4:46:37 PM Subject: November Newsletter from Reasonable Faith Dear Friends of Reasonable Faith, As I write this letter, I'm on my way home from my debate last night at Indiana University on "Is Intelligent Design Viable?" My opponent was Francisco Ayala, an eminent and highly decorated evolutionary biologist who, judging by his lengthy resumé, has as many medals as an Argentine general! I had heard Ayala lecture on Intelligent Design last year in China and was dismayed by the caricatures and misrepresentations he gave to the Chinese students. So even though I had never debated intelligent design in biology before, I decided to take on this debate to try at least to set the record straight. The last few months I prepared diligently for this debate, reading Ayala's work, familiarizing myself with relevant new developments in biology, studying the recent works of ID proponents, conferring with colleagues who work in this field, and formulating the best strategy for the debate. For more details on the approach I adopted, click here. In his published work, Ayala tries to disqualify ID both scientifically and theologically. So my opening response fell neatly into two parts. First, I argued that Ayala fails to disqualify ID scientifically because he cannot show that the Darwinian mechanisms of random mutation and natural selection are capable of producing the sort of biological complexity we see on earth. Then I argued that the theological arguments he presents against the designer's being all-powerful and all-good are simply irrelevant to drawing a design inference because the design argument doesn't aspire to show that the designer is all-powerful or all-good. To my surprise, the debate turned out to be virtually one-sided! Ayala failed utterly to engage with my arguments. It was almost as if I wasn't even there! It was pretty obvious to everyone that he was just presenting canned arguments which I had already refuted in my opening statement. I responded to all his points and even went beyond them to tackle the theological problem of natural evil as well. I was gratified that the debate went so remarkably well and am glad that it was recorded and will be distributed to a far wider audience. For more colorful details and final reflections on the contest click here. I want to close this month's letter by drawing your attention to the wonderful opportunity which we have of doubling every gift to Reasonable Faith for the remainder of this year up to $65,000. This generous grant, if matched, will be a tremendous help in funding our website, podcasts, and speaking next year. So do consider strategically investing in this ministry before the year's end! For Christ and His Kingdom, Bill & Jan The Resurrection of Theism What is the Relation between Science and Religion? Nature's Flaws and Cruelties More Questions on Free Will » The Doctrine of the Last Things (Part 6) » (links go to audio files) • Argument from Biogenesis • Jesus and the Law • The Emergent Church -- A talk on Postmodernism and Christianity Visit the online forums   Homepage  |  Tell-a-Friend  |  Donate  |  Unsubscribe  |  Privacy Policy

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Received on Thu Nov 12 06:57:54 2009