hell’s handmaiden

Yes, Bill Dembski, Intelligent Design powerhouse and all around smart guy (who knows better than all the rest of science combined), has opted to let Jerry Bergman, who “teaches Sunday school at a Mennonite church in West Unity, Ohio” and who “is a former lay speaker at St. Paul’s United Methodist Church in Montpelier, Ohio” speak for ID. Bergman, to be fair, also teaches at Northwest State College in Archbold, Ohio.

Bergman, interestingly, starts his article in Journal Gazzette by stating precisely what ID theorists deny with oaths on their mother’s graves.

Dembski demonstrates once again that he is an incompetent biologist.

He quotes an article, from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which concerns the ideas of “Jeffrey Schwartz, a noted anthropologist at the University of Pittsburgh and one of a growing group of critics of standard Darwinian theory.” He subtitles the article– titled in the Post-Gazette, “Pitt anthropologist thinks Darwin’s theory needs to evolve on some points”– “Presenting a united front — Evolutionists are finding it more and more difficult”.

Dembski’s wordplay with the title ought to send up some red flags. Schwartz, as is obvious from the original title alone, wants to alter the theory of evolution. Dembski paints it as if the sky is falling.

Well…

… unless one happens to be a Biblical Patriarch, in which case marriage equals one man and several women, or even one man, several women and free use of slave girls called concubines.

Or if one happens to be a legendary Israelite King then marriage equals one man and hundreds of women plus slave girls.

Or if one happens to be a Jew up until the tenth century, marriage could mean one man and several wives.

Much the same held in China for century upon century.

Strange that living with a child would shed light on a bit of anthropology; that of the origin of religion. Of course, the idea is nothing new. Intellectually, I had this worked out more than a decade ago. I can’t even take credit. My humble insight has been oft repeated. But the emotion…. the emotion behind it. That is new, and that is fuel for this fire.

But let me back up a bit.

For most of my life I have been childless– childlike, but childless. This was acceptable to me. Never thought much about it really. That changed awhile back and now, I am living with me a ten year old.