Finding Darwin's God

[Bulldog]

I am speaking of the book Finding Darwin's God by Christian biologist Kennith Miller.

Anyone read it?

Any thoughts/opinions on it?

Would you recommend the book?

 

[herev]

never read it, sorry

 

[gluadys]

I am speaking of the book Finding Darwin's God by Christian biologist Kennith Miller.

Anyone read it?

Any thoughts/opinions on it?

Would you recommend the book?

Yes, I have read it and recommend it highly. Miller spends most of the book simply explaining many of the details about how we know the earth is as old as it is, and that species evolved. He also has a section on the theological problems posed by YECism.

If there is one weakness in the book, it is that his theology is not quite as strong as his science. While he does a good job of showing where the theology of creationism is wrong, he doesn't do as good a job of making a positive theological case for theistic evolution.

I would love to see a scientist of Miller's calibre get together with someone who is strong in the theological issues and do a joint production. Until then, Finding Darwin's God is an excellent introduction to evolution from a theistic perspective.

 

[Karl - Liberal Backslider]

I agree with Gluadys.

It's not entirely clear in Miller's book, to me at any rate, whether he is saying that God does influence, supernaturally, the course of evolution by "fixing" quantum events that affect mutation, whether He does not, or whether he's just leaving the door open to the possibility.

But his explanation of the way God can work through a truly randomly influenced process, in the same way as He works through the chance and contingency of history to work His purpose out is excellent. Evolution, he shows, can be truly random from a scientific frame of reference and yet still produce the creatures that God intended it to.

 

[rmwilliamsll]

The heart of the book is the last few chapters where he tries to show that the kind of rearguard, god-of-the-gaps reasoning is not the only path people of a biblical faith need take when confronting evolutionary theory. His idea is that evolution allows us to see the radical separation of god and his creation for what it really is; an act of love and a grant of true freedom to creatures. The universe is free from the manipulation of a supreme being, for evolution shows that life then consciousness (necessary for worship and to love god) evolved in a distinctly materialist fashion free from the miraculous. i hope he is right for the gaps available for bible literalists to hide god in are getting rarer with every discovery. Soon religion ought to switch to the winning side and be a part of the light of scientific discovery rather than fearing it as so many do currently. This book is a good start on this quest to realign religion alongside science rather than being such an adversary as the creationist would have it. To anyone with a heart felt commitment to both science and a biblical faith this book is an extraordinary find. Full of hope and faith it rises above most of this topic's dialogue to inspire and motivate the reader. Certainly a book worth moving to the top of the current reading pile. But i am afraid it will manage to turn off a lot of people since it takes science and faith seriously, and demands some intellectual exertion from it's readers, something people who want to hear comfortable and reassuring words don't normally do. If evolution bothers your faith then this is a good book to start with.



this is a long extract from keith miller's book _finding darwin's god_ p 172-173
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Are such opponents of evolution sincere? Several years ago, I was invited to Tampa, Florida, to debate the issue of evolution with Henry Morris, founder of the Institute for Creation Research and one of the most influential of the young-earth creationists. The debate had been occa�sioned by the passage of a curriculum mandating the inclusion of so-called creation science in high school biology. In front of a large audience, I ham�mered Morris repeatedly with the many errors of "flood geology" and did my best to show the enormous weight of scientific evidence behind evolu�tion. One never knows how such a debate goes, but the local science teach�ers in attendance were jubilant that I scored a scientific victory.17

As luck would have it, the organizers of this event had booked rooms for both Dr. Morris and myself in a local motel. When I walked into the coffee shop the next morning, I noticed Morris at a table by himself fin�ishing breakfast. Flushed with confidence from the debate, I asked if I might join him. The elderly Morris was a bit shaken, but he agreed. I ordered a nice breakfast, and then got right to the point. "Do you actually believe all this stuff?"

I suppose I might have expected a wink and a nod. We had both been paid for our debate appearances, and perhaps I expected him to acknowledge that he made a pretty good living from the creation business. He did nothing of the sort. Henry Morris made it clear to me that he believed everything he had said the night before. "But Dr. Morris, so much of what you argued is wrong, starting with the age of the earth!" Morris had been unable to answer the geological data on the earth's age I had presented the night before, and it had badly damaged his credibil�ity with the audience. Nonetheless, he looked me straight in the eyes. "Ken, you're intelligent, you're well-meaning, and you're energetic. But you are also young, and you don't realize what's at stake. In a question of such importance, scientific data aren't the ultimate authority. Even you know that science is wrong sometimes."

Indeed I did. Morris continued so that I could get a feeling for what that ultimate authority was. "Scripture tells us what the right conclusion is. And if science, momentarily, doesn't agree with it, then we have to keep work�ing until we get the right answer. But I have no doubts as to what that answer will be." Morris then excused himself, and I was left to ponder what he had said. I had sat down thinking the man a charlatan, but I left appreciating the depth, the power; and the sincerity of his convictions. Nonetheless, however one might admire Morris's strength of character; convictions that allow science to be bent beyond recognition are not merely unjustified - they are dangerous in the intellectual and even in the moral sense, because they corrupt and compromise the integrity of human reason.

My impromptu breakfast with Henry Morris taught me an important lesson-the appeal of creationism is emotional, not scientific. I might be able to lay out graphs and charts and diagrams, to cite laboratory experiments and field observations, to describe the details of one evolutionary sequence after another; but to the true believers of creationism, these would all be sound and fury, signifying nothing. The truth would always be somewhere else.

 

[Singing Bush]

If I may add some quick comments to a dated thread...

I read the book about a year or two ago. I had heard a lot of hype about it and in many ways it impressed while simultaneously it in many ways let down. I think it's greatest plus though is in providing a concise, easily understandable rebuking of creationism in conjunction with a similarly well presented explanation of evolution by someone that is not only not antagonistic of Christianity (can I get a huzza for the double negative there?), but wholly supportive of it and a brother in Christ.