Scientism as religion. Really.

[_Analytics]

I pulled an example of how "scientism" frequently gets used in evangelical apologetics from a random book review of Uncommon Dissent, a pro intelligent design book Dr. Peterson liked so much that he may have confused his own thoughts for passages that appear on its pages....

An invective with multiple uses. How convenient!

A couple of years ago, a BYU biology professor by the name of Steven L. Peck gave a presentation at an Interpreter conference about how "Evolution and LDS thought are fully compatible."

The presentation was remarkable. Peck's basic argument was that evolution is true, period. Since Mormonism embraces all truth, Mormonism can embrace evolution (when asked about the theological details of how this could be done, he essentially said he didn't know and that that wasn't his department).

He fielded a question about the difference between mico-evolution and macro-evolution and provided the quote of the night: saying you believe in micro-evolution but not macro-evolution is like saying you believe in inches but not miles.

Turning the topic back to that blogger and not meaning to be snide, I don't know what his actual views are and how they compare to various anti-scientism writers. A few things are clear. He wants to be allies with the evangelicals in the bigger war against naturalists. He believes in NDEs. In dualism. In Pascal's Wager. In fine-tuning. He wants to write a book about these things, but he has few original ideas. He might be afraid that if he clearly says something about naturalism, it will come back around and bite him in the ass.

Perhaps he is still in the process of figuring out his own views on this? He's reading these various apologetics, taking notes of what he likes, and hoping that it will eventually coalesce into something coherent.

[_Gadianton]

It may be pretty rational. As we've discussed previously, a good meme is worth far more than a good argument. You've heard the saying "baptism them all and let God sort them out". I wonder if some people just feel this sense that there is a God or something greater, and not too invested in any given argument for it, and so "baptize them all", shotgun anything and everything you've got that counts for faith, until God sets everyone straight directly.

[_Philo Sofee]

In the spirit of helping the poor blogger, I would strenuously and quite sincerely tell him it is critical (if he cares about credibility) to use Carlo Rovelli's book, but most especially, quit reading the ding-a-ling anti-scientists, and see what science really is and what it really does. Rovelli's final chapter in his book Reality is Not What it Seems. The entire book really is very well researched and written. The blogger needs to seriously read Lee Smolin Three Roads to Quantum Gravity in conjunction with Rovelli so as to have the cutting edge updated information on how science works, and exactly why it works. He would seriously also profit (as many of you know) from including Sean Carroll's masterpiece The Big Picture.

So can we use something along these lines as a basis for seeing if this blogger is at all serious, or is he going to fart around stupidly wasting his and our time by quoting idiots like the utterly discredited Behe still? I mean, surely as well read and knowing the blogger is, he by this time grasps that Behe has been discredited, yes?