FREE Intelligent Design Conference in San Diego Tomorrow

Don’t forget if you’re in the Southern California area that you can attend a free intelligent design conference tomorrow. Speakers from the Discovery Institute will be teaching. Get more details here or register here.

I’m going!

FREE Intelligent Design Event in San Diego

Some of my friends from the Discovery Institute will be teaching a one-day conference on intelligent design at the Rock Church in San Diego (Point Loma campus) on Saturday, September 15. Jay Richards, Casey Luskin, John West, Ray Bohlin, and others will be covering topics like junk DNA, science and faith, intelligent design 2.0, C.S. Lewis and scientism, human origins, and more.

The event is FREE and you can get more info at the Discovery Institute’s site or the church’s registration page. But here are some essential details.

• What? Intelligent Design Conference at The Rock Church with Discovery Institute Speakers: “Science and Faith: Friends or Foes?”
• Who? Speakers include Dr. Jay Richards, Dr. John West, Dr. Ray Bohlin, and Casey Luskin
• When? Saturday, September 15th, 8:30 am-4:30 pm
• Where? The Rock Church (Point Loma Campus), 2277 Rosecrans St., San Diego, CA 92106
• How Much? Admission is free.
  

UPDATE: There’s incentive to be one of the first 200 attendees.

How Old Is the Earth?

R.C. Sproul of Ligonier Ministries explains how he approaches this question:

Challenge Response: God’s Checklist

As I mentioned on Tuesday, Brett and Alan are out of town, so for the response today I’ve collected the challenge responses from the past that touch on objections brought up in the video challenge (posted again below for easy reference)…and then added a couple other videos and some articles from STR Place for good measure. Enjoy!

Challenge videos:

Then Why Is There Evil? (challenge, response)
Biblical Law Is Immoral (challenge, response)
God Is Sexist (challenge, response)
Bad Design = No Design (challenge, response)
100% Man or 100% God? (challenge, response)
Why Blood Sacrifice? (challenge, response)
The Crucifixion Is Immoral (challenge, response)
We Can’t Know Jesus Rose from the Dead (challenge, response)
Faith is gullibility (challenge, response)
The Bible Has Been Changed (challenge, response)
God Should Make Himself More Obvious (challenge, response)

Other videos:

What is the Trinity?
Were the Gospels Based on Eyewitness Accounts?

Articles:

Did God Condone Slavery?
Jesus Is the Only Cure for Our Disease
Dead or Alive?
What We Have Is What Was Written
Should God Appear to Atheists?
Why Would God Want Us to Praise Him?
More thoughts on “Then Why Is There Evil?”
More thoughts on “God Is Sexist”
Links to more on the relationship between Christians and the Old Testament Law

Challenge: God’s Checklist

Because Brett and Alan are speaking on the STR cruise this week, the challenge today will be a little different from usual. Christopher wrote in to suggest we cover the video posted below, but since it brings up way too many topics for us to answer in one challenge response, I thought I’d post the video today and let you all take a shot at whichever topic you wish. Then on Thursday, I’ll post links to several of our challenge responses (and some articles) that address the various objections in this video, because fortunately, we’ve already covered a lot of them!

So I guess, think of this as a pop quiz. If you’ve been joining in our challenges for a while, you’ll be ready!

Is Intelligent Design Creationism?

Is Intelligent Design just Creationism in disguise? Or are there important distinctions to be made? Uber-smart guy William Dembksi explains.

What is Intelligent Design?

What is the theory of Intelligent Design?  Super-smart guy Dr. William Dembski (he actually has TWO Ph.D.s) offers a helpful definition:

Challenge Response: Bad Design=No Design

Here’s my response to this week’s challenge:

Challenge: Bad Design=No Design

Here’s an argument against intelligent design from a comment on a Wired article:

[O]ne of the best arguments against the “theory” of intelligent design: the shared opening to the esophagus and trachea in humans (and many other mammals). Hundreds of choking deaths occur in the US every year due to food obstructions in the trachea. Doesn’t seem too intelligent to purposefully design such a hazard.

Is this just bad design? Is it evidence of randomness, and therefore, no design? What do you think? Take your best shot, and we’ll hear from Brett on Thursday.

Grading Your Biology Book

 Want to know if your biology textbook makes the grade?  Casey Luskin of the Discovery  Institute evaluates 22 recent biology textbooks and their use of selected “icons of evolution.”  This is an updated review that uses Jonathan Wells’ evaluation criteria.  Basically, Casey finds that most biology books are “grossly inaccurate and biased when presenting the evidence regarding neo-Darwinian evolution.”

So, do you see your biology book on the list?