[PatrickHenry]

The article is a couple of weeks old, from the Wall Street Journal, but they only allow exerpts, and you'd need a subscription to read the whole thing. This is a reprint from another newspaper. The article I copied has a different title: "God made evolution, prof says." The title of the thread is from the WSJ's article. (The bold and underlining is added by me.)

I like this Richard Colling. He says what some of us have been saying around here for years.

[PatrickHenry]

EvolutionPing

Not a list for the creationism side of the debate. See the list's description in my freeper homepage. Then FReepmail to be added/dropped.

[Cicero]

As a Catholic, I don't feel obliged to believe that God created the universe 6,000 years ago. Geology and astrophysics and the evident age of many species make that idea hard to support. But frankly, the Theory of Evolution is full of holes. It's not a matter of religious belief in my case, it's a matter of bad science.

Partial evolution of bird beaks, sure. General evolution right up the chain of being from primordial soup to man, no. It just doesn't make sense. The harder you look at it, the less sense it makes.

[loboinok]

I am one of those he speaks of.
He would have an easier time force feeding pork to a well armed muslim then selling me on this theory.

The most deceptive lie,is the lie that lies closest to the truth.

[inkling]

Nazarenes are fundamentalist? News to me. Looks like once again the press doesn't know the difference is between fundies and evangelicals.

[Bombardier]

I have no problem whatsoever with evolution. The Bible tells the "why" and science the "how." This past summer, I drove out to Nevada. While in western Wyoming, I saw the stratification of the rocks....and it showed me that the Earth was far older than the 5 or 6 thousand years the literalists would want us to believe. The sheer might of God was apparent in those rocks....and I came away with a stronger belief in the Almighty after seeing that.

[Fatalis]

He finds a place for God in evolution by positing a "random designer" who harnesses the laws of nature he created. "What the designer designed is the random-design process," or Darwinian evolution, Prof. Colling says. "God devised these natural laws, and uses evolution to accomplish his goals." God is not in there with a divine screwdriver and spare parts every time a new species or a wondrous biological structure appears.

Unlike those who see evolution as an assault on faith, Prof. Colling finds it strengthens his own. "A God who can harness the laws of randomness and chaos, and create beauty and wonder and all of these marvelous structures, is a lot more creative than fundamentalists give him credit for," he told me. Creating the laws of physics and chemistry that, over the eons, coaxed life from nonliving molecules is something he finds just as awe inspiring as the idea that God instantly and supernaturally created life from nonlife.

It's a good approach, but here's a question:

If random is designed, and random-design is a process, and if random and chaos have laws, how is it all actually "random?"

[contemplator]

Refreshing article, thanks for the ping

[VadeRetro]

In addition, as he bluntly told me, "denying science makes us [Conservative Christians] look stupid."

Says it neatly. There is no good way to deny a thing for which science has accumulated massive amounts of evidence over more than a century.

[carlr]

Where to start?
evolution has stood the test of time and considerable scrutiny
It has not, it was almost immediately accepted by the atheist/humanist community because it filled a needed gap in the explanation of life.Any scrutiny has been derided as unscientific.

the evolution of species according to the process of random mutation and natural selection are "fully compatible with the available scientific evidence and also contemporary religious beliefs"
This is ludicrous.Natural selection (Darwinism)has been thrown out because it requires more time than even the evolutionist time frame allows ie;to be correct the sun would be exhausted before the process would get us to where we are.This was supplanted by the "hopeful monster"theory to explain how evolution could make huge jumps in a short period of time.In other word beneficial random mutation.
Neither abides by science or observation.
The two laws of thermodynamics say that 1)new matter is not being created and 2)all matter is in a state of decay.What this means is there is no scientific basis for a fish to grow claws,a reptile to grow hair or feathers.The gene that causes these traits would have to have appeared out of nothing and repeated the process again and again.
Mutations when occurring are almost always regressive in nature and are not beneficial to the original species.They are also usually sterile so that the mutation stops with that individual whether animal or human.

evolution is no more the work of the devil than is Newton`s theory of gravity
Evolution can no more be compared to gravity than a horse to a unicorn.Gravity is the name given to the force one mass exerts on another,call it anything you like but it can be demonstrated by anyone dropping a ball.Evolution cannot nor has been demonstrated by any means what so ever.That is no one has seen or found evidence of the vast numbers of "missing links" that natural selection or random beneficial mutation would require.

Evolution is the religion of those who would elevate man above God.That is why when challenged on the merits no rational argument is presented only assumptions and presumptions that require as much or more faith in the unseen or unprovable as intelligent creation.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Teaching complex numbers to Fundamentalists (inter alia) isn't easy either.

[DestroytheDemocrats]

If the world evolved then it was set in motion by God and he planned it that way.

Problem solved.

[Central Scrutiniser]

Teaching science to creationists?

Better to teach algebra to a donkey.

[Hetty_Fauxvert]

He finds a place for God in evolution by positing a "random designer" who harnesses the laws of nature he created. "What the designer designed is the random-design process," or Darwinian evolution, Prof. Colling says. "God devised these natural laws, and uses evolution to accomplish his goals." God is not in there with a divine screwdriver and spare parts every time a new species or a wondrous biological structure appears.

Hear, hear! I will have to search out and read Prof. Colling's works. He says what I have been thinking for years. I myself stand amazed at the subtlety and omniscience of a God who can set these forces in motion and then stand back, content to let His forces roll along on their own until they produce His masterwork -- a creation who is self-aware and can (someday) hope to understand the universe on two levels -- the physical and the spiritual -- and who can love and revere the original Creator in the way He deserves.

[ovrtaxt]

This article makes the assumption that creationists are just ignorant of the THEORY of evolution. The fact is, the whole country has had this crammed down it's throat in public school for decades.

Evolution is being rejected because of what people know about it, not because of what we don't know.

Similar mistake is made by the Democrats-- they think they just didn't get their message out. Right.

[Just mythoughts]

"I like this Richard Colling. He says what some of us have been saying around here for years."

LOL, I like what 'God' says. Nothing Christian in placing a theory above 'God', who says HE created everything. He also says there will be problems BIG TIME 'if' little old flesh man does not listen!

E's better hurry up cause that hour glass of "GOD's" time is nigh on to empty.

[bert]

The fallacy in the title is that you can't teach fundamentalist, be they Christian or Moslem, any thing.

The rind surrounding their brains prevents entry of any knowledge from unapproved sources.

[LadyDoc]

Catholics have been "allowed" to believe in "intelligent design" since the days of Augustine.

When I was in college, our professor told us that Darwinian evoluation was a theory, and that although we had to understand and know about it, we didn't have to believe it.

In the Philosophy of science, theories are the way we desribe what we find in experimentation. These theories use the philosophy of the one making the theory. So Darwin, who was seeking a way to explain God didn't exist, found blind evolution, while Pasteur, a Christian, did experiments to explain why "spontaneous evolution" of life didn't exist, and Mendel, who was also a Christian, did experiments to explain why all life inherited all traits from parents via genes, which went against an early "evolutionary theory" that acquired traits were inherited (i.e. if your parents go t sunburned, you would be born with the genetic trait to be dark skinned)...

[DoctorMichael]

rec·on·cile    ( P )  Pronunciation Key  (rkn-sl)
v. rec·on·ciled, rec·on·cil·ing, rec·on·ciles
v. tr.

1. To reestablish a close relationship between.
2. To settle or resolve.
3. To bring (oneself) to accept: He finally reconciled himself to the change in management.
4. To make compatible or consistent: reconcile my way of thinking with yours. See Synonyms at adapt.
5. Something Creationists are incapable of doing with respect to Evolution.
   

v. intr.

1. To reestablish a close relationship, as in marriage: The estranged couple reconciled after a year.
2. To become compatible or consistent: The figures would not reconcile.

---

[Middle English reconcilen, from Old French reconcilier, from Latin reconcilire : re-, re- + concilire, to conciliate; see conciliate.]

---

recon·cilement n.
recon·ciler n.
recon·cili·a·tory (-sl--tôr, -tr) adj.

[Iowegian]

These threads are pointless. You aren't going to win anyone over to your side with the constant rhetoric of "believing in creationism makes conservatives look stupid".

I think you just like to bash those who believe differently that you do. Grow up.

[jwalsh07]

"Soon -- and it's already happening with the flagellum -- science is going to come along and explain" how a seemingly miraculous bit of biological engineering in fact could have evolved by Darwinian mechanisms. And that will leave intelligent design backed into an ever-shrinking corner.

Interesting, according to the Prof, ID is falsifiable. Now I wonder, is RD be falsifiable?