ID the Future Intelligent Design, Evolution, and Science Podcast
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Stephen J. Gould

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Neil Thomas Talks Darwin, Aquinas, OOL and … Young Frankenstein

On this ID the Future, Taking Leave of Darwin author Neil Thomas continues a lively conversation with radio host Hank Hanegraaff. In this second in a three-part series, the two touch on the fossil record’s challenge to Darwinism, Gould and Eldredge’s rescue attempt, the question of whether Darwin’s best known contemporary defender is dishonest or merely self-deluded, the wishful thinking surrounding origin-of-life studies, the failed attempts to reduce the mind to mere brain chemistry, and the morally repugnant pro-eugenics ideas rooted in Darwinism and touted in the textbook at the heart of the famous Scopes Monkey Trial. The conversation is posted here by permission of Hank Hanegraaff. Get Neil Thomas’s book here.

Casey Luskin Reviews Three Views on Christianity and Science

On today’s ID the Future, host Tom Gilson and guest Casey Luskin discuss a new book Luskin recently reviewed at Evolution News, Three Views on Christianity and Science. Luskin, associate director of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture, summarizes the three views covered in the book: the independence view presented by Michael Ruse, the dialogue view presented by Alister McGrath, and the constrained integration view presented by Bruce Gordon. Luskin critiques the first two and argues that the dialogue view, in practice, quickly devolves into a monologue where religion is supposed to sit down and shut up the moment there is a point of difference between religion and consensus science. He says this is doubly problematic because (a) scientists are fallible and the scientific consensus changes; it’s not an infallible guide; and (b) key founders of modern science were inspired by a genuine cross-fertilization between scientific and theological reflection as opposed to a faux dialogue where all the influence moves only in one direction, from scientific consensus to religion. Luskin further points out that theistic evolutionists, such as those involved with the BioLogos group, promote the dialogue view but tend to quickly cede ground when evolutionary materialists muscle their way into an area previously claimed by a religious explanation. Luskin gives the example of theistic evolutionist and BioLogos founder Francis Collins pointing to universal human morality as something best explained not but by blind evolution but by the idea of humans made in the image of God. Luskin adds that this explanation apparently even played a role in bringing Collins to belief in God. In contrast, evolutionary psychology insists on explaining human personality in purely materialistic evolutionary terms, and as it has expanded its influence in recent years, BioLogos has tended to steer away from this very argument that helped bring their founder to belief in God. A better approach, Luskin argues, is the third one in the book, the constrained integration view advocated by CSC senior fellow Bruce Gordon.

Richard Weikart on Michael Ruse’s “Compromise” with Christianity

On this episode of ID the Future, From Darwin to Hitler author and historian Richard Weikart returns to his conversation with Mike Keas about a recent book on Darwinism, Christianity, and war by Michael Ruse. Ruse aims at a surprising conclusion in this book.

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Storey's Way and the main entrance of Churchill College, Cambridge in June 2019.
Storey's Way and the main entrance of Churchill College, Cambridge in June 2019.

First the Royal Society Meeting, Now Cambridge’s “Evolution Evolves”: Paul Nelson Reports

On this episode of ID the Future, intelligent design proponent and philosopher of biology Paul Nelson reports on a recent conference he attended at the University of Cambridge, “Evolution Evolving: An International Conference on the Evolving Mechanisms and Theoretical Framework of Evolutionary Biology.” Scientists from around the globe gathered under the operating assumption that the modern evolutionary synthesis is sorely lacking. As with many of the biologists who attended the 2016 Royal Society meeting “New Trends in Evolutionary Biology,” many of the attendees of the Cambridge event find themselves disenchanted with Neo-Darwinism and weighing their options. They’re still not looking outside the walls of the “City of Naturalism,” Nelson says, but it’s fascinating and encouraging to witness the increased openness to ideas that reach beyond modern Darwinian dogma.