Articles
Editorial
Keith Fox
Pages: 101-101
Interaction between genes and the relational environment during development of the social brain
Graeme Finlay
Pages: 102-115
Abstract
Humans have complex brains. These have evolved over a vast phylogenetic history. Scientists are discovering genetic innovations that may have contributed to brain development over evolutionary time. The science of comparative genomics reveals when during evolution each such formative genomic event occurred and the mechanism by which it arose. However, genetics are necessary but not sufficient to account for our mental capacities. For example, our ability to interact as persons (to practise theory of mind) is not genetically encoded, but is learned. During infancy and childhood, brains cannot follow normal developmental trajectories in the absence of attentive, loving caregiving. Human brain development and function require personal input. We share in the fullness of being human by interpersonal relationship, and a Christian interpretation of this fact is that human flourishing requires that people know, and are known by, God.
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Does the Bible Affirm Scientific Errors? A Reply to Denis Lamoureux
Andrew Loke
Pages: 116-133
Abstract
In recent years a number of scholars have argued that numerous biblical texts affirm what we now know are erroneous scientific notions. The sort of arguments they use and the biblical texts they cite have been well summarised in the writings of Denis Lamoureux. Lamoureux argues that these texts affirm erroneous notions concerning a three-tier universe, the movement of the sun across the sky, a solid firmament, flat earth, the mustard seed being the smallest seed, the death of the seed during germination, preformatism and creation de novo. I show that Lamoureux has not adequately considered Beale’s distinction between what the texts affirm and what the author believes. I develop various arguments based on this distinction and demonstrate that Lamoureux’s arguments fail to refute Beale’s position concerning biblical inerrancy and rule out an alternative view of divine accommodation which uses ancient common ways of expression without affirming scientific errors.
Markers of Human Creaturehood: Soil, Spirit and Salvation
Ted Peters
Pages: 135-146
Abstract
When faced with the invitation for self-transformation through bio-nano-technology, we must pause to ask: just what does it mean to be a human being? Both scripture and evolution make the same point: we humans live at the metaxy, in the tension between soil and spirit. Genesis 2:7 says we live at the in-between where the ineffable God beyond touches the mundane realm of daily existence. Even in salvation, we will be redeemed creatures and not gods. The promise of technological utopianism, then, becomes an empty promise. Even with dramatic bio-enhancements or improved intelligence, we Homo sapiens must still pray that divine grace will provide the ultimate transformation. In the meantime, we should simply enjoy the metaxy.
Penultimate Curiosity in the Pre-Modern World
Peter N. Jordan
Pages: 147-158
Abstract
This is a lightly edited version of a talk given at the 2017 Christians in Science Conference in Oxford. Intended as a response to Roger Wagner and Andrew Briggs’ book The Penultimate Curiosity, it argues that in past circumstances where (as Wagner and Briggs put it) ‘science swims in the slipstream of ultimate questions’, at least one additional factor – a positive view of scientific curiosity – must also have been operative. Curiosity has not always been viewed in a positive light, and projects aimed at obtaining knowledge of nature have often been judged to be problematic. Those who promoted new knowledge acquisition projects often felt a need to defend those projects against accusations of misplaced or misdirected curiosity. Given this, strong slipstream effects – particular theological convictions about the relations between ultimate and penultimate things – alone must have been insufficient to encourage penultimate curiosity.
Obituary R.J. (Sam) Berry
Malcolm Jeeves
Pages: 159-160
Book reviews
Who Needs the Old Testament? Its Enduring Appeal and Why the New Atheists Don’t Get It
Katharine Dell
(Rebecca Watson)
Pages: 161-162
Science and Religion: Beyond Warfare and Toward Understanding
Joshua Moritz
(James R. Hofmann)
Pages: 162-164
Aquinas and Modern Science – A New Synthesis of Faith & Reason
Gerard M. Verschuuren
(Ignacio Silva)
Pages: 165-166
Picking up the Pieces
Philip Bligh
(Stephen Thompson)
Pages: 166-168
Genes, Determinism and God
Denis Alexander
(John Bryant)
Pages: 168-169
The Little Book Of God, Mind, Cosmos And Truth
Kenneth Francis
(Joshua Fountain)
Pages: 169-170
Astrophysics and Creation: Perceiving the Universe through Science and Participation
Arnold Benz
(Eric Priest)
Pages: 170-173
Christianity and the Roots of Morality: Philosophical, Early Christian and Empirical Perspectives
Petri Luomanen
Anne Birgitta Pessi
Ilkka Pyysiäinen (editors)
(Michael Fuller)
Pages: 173-175
Creation Care: A Biblical Theology of the Natural World
Douglas J. Moo
Jonathan A. Moo
(Prof. Robert
(Bob) White)
Pages: 175-176
Questions in the Psychology of Religion
Kevin S. Seybold
(Mark Graves)
Pages: 177-178
Blue Planet Blue God: The Bible and the Sea
Meric Srokosz
Rebecca S Watson
(Nicholas Higgs)
Pages: 178-180
The Luminous Web: Faith, Science and the Experience of Wonder
Barbara Brown Taylor
(Dr Ruth M. Bancewicz)
Pages: 180-180
Science, Evolution and Religion
Michael Peterson
Michael Ruse
(Roger Trigg)
Pages: 181-182
The Gospel according to Dawkins
Graeme Finlay
(Patrick Richmond)
Pages: 182-183
Hope in the Age of Climate Change: creation care this side of the resurrection
Chris Doran
(Rev. Dave Bookless)
Pages: 183-185
The Not-So-Intelligent Designer: Why Evolution Explains the Human Body and Intelligent Design Does Not
Abby Hafer
(Keith Fox)
Pages: 186-186
Wonder, Value and God
Robin Attfield
(Bethany Sollereder)
Pages: 187-188