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Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth Miller

I decided to read Finding Darwin's God by Kenneth Miller, as Dr. Miller is the special speaker at our Fall MSTA Conference. Now, I must tell you that it does not read fast like The DaVinci Code, but I did get through it. I like the way Dr. Miller approaches the “controversy.”

If you are a very conservative Christian, this book might help you understand why creationism and intelligent design are not scientific. It won't do away your concerns about the influence of atheists in society but you might like knowing that there are Christians such as Dr. Miller who can champion evolution.

If you are a moderate/liberal Christian, you might learn more about evolution and how to explain to others that creationism and intelligent design are not science, as well as helping others understand what evolution is. You might like knowing that God could have created a world in which evolution operates and can be studied scientifically, and that evolution could have been God's mechanism for creation.

If you are consider yourself “none-of-the-above,” you might also learn more about evolution, what it is and is not. You might feel good knowing that Dr. Miller is convincing Christians that evolution doesn't conflict with the beliefs and Christians like Dr Miller might teach their children.

Enter Kenneth Miller, who is both a committed Catholic and evolutionary biologist. Not surprisingly, he has a issues with folks from opposing "camps." His first issue is with those who champion the theory of intelligent design, which suggests that evolution is a flawed theory, and that a designer is the only thing capable of explaining evidence of design in nature. On the other side, Miller is unhappy with those who too often equate evolution with atheism (and I resent this, too) and too often conflate METHODOLOGICAL naturalism with naturalism AS A WAY OF LIFE.

I believe Dr. Miller's argument - that a God who gives us freedom of action and thought; a God who made the world and life sufficient to evolve without needing intervention; and a God who can still choose to act in our world using the undetectable tools of space, time, chance and indeterminacy - is well thought out and well argued< and one that I have argued the same way many times. It is a very important point that so many people seem to miss and this is why I think this book is very important. We cannot allow immature thinking to leave us with opinions that either deny overwhelming scientific evidence or declare that life has no meaning and morality may not even exist.

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