Random Design author at Calvin

Some of you might remember the disheartening events at Olivet Nazarene University several months ago: a biology professor's book banned and the professor removed from intro classrooms, due to his authorship of a book that was unpopular with donors and trustees. The professor is Richard Colling, and the book is Random Designer. You'll find a lot of information at Threads from Henry's Web, including a series of blogs on the book and extensive commentary by Colling in response.

Well, Prof. Colling will be visiting Calvin next Friday, speaking in our Christian Perspectives in Science seminar series. Here's his abstract:

The history books of life – fossils and DNA – reveal a most remarkable creation story. Over unfathomable eons of prescribed life and death cycles, single-celled life has advanced as a divine, majestic, and interconnected web. Filling every niche of our dynamic ever-changing planet, evolutionary creation has miraculously culminated in sentient beings capable of self and God-awareness – us! As Christians desiring to remain faithful and culturally credible in our claim that God is the creator and that all truth is God’s truth, we are challenged to work together across faith boundaries seeking ways to effectively integrate knowledge from science into a dynamic and coherent faith. This talk introduces a new creation “logos” – Random (Equal Opportunity) Design. Simple, but ultimately profound, random design reflects a God-ordained and sustained paradigm of astonishing creative genius that produces an integrated network of unrivaled biological development. The talk includes defining appropriate definitions of randomness, the importance of adequate information/dot development, examples of randomness generating remarkable biological order, and a call to expand traditional views of scripture and science to accommodate a bigger, more profound God.

Looking forward to it.