Dawkins and Coyne

This is the full uncut interview with the Catholic thinker Fr. George Coyne which was omitted from Richard Dawkins' television program, The Genius of Charles Darwin. It is really interesting indeed:

http://es.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=965C53D2B4BCCCF5

Here are some of the thoughts that Father Coyne leaves with us to think about:

“There is no official position of the Catholic church on the issue of evolution”

“Human beings are not just made of what science discovers human beings are made of”

“There is positive evidence for the supernatural but it goes beyond the scientific methodology”

“We are all subjects to our personal histories” (explaining why he is Catholic instead of Muslim)

“There are ingredients of God speaking to the Muslim tradition, to the Buddhist tradition, to the Hindu tradition… There are elements of God’s true revelation to those people in each of those traditions”

“What that exactly means [about the inspiration of Scripture] is far to difficult to get into”

“The book of Genesis, is fairly established by now, was written by many authors over vast periods of time, it has two creation stories…”

“I tend to get very upset by it, any literalist, fundamentalist interpretation of Scripture… because it reveals a fundamental ignorance of what Scripture is all about”

“The ID movement is a mistaken attempt to use science to establish the implications of science, that is, going beyond science to the philosophical and theological implications… Its fundamental fault is that it steps outside scientific methodology and would not acknowledge its doing it... It’s a religious movement”

“The so-called anthropic principle is not a principle and is not anthropic… We observe that the universe is made in this way and if we change anyone of a series of 20 constants… by a little amount we wouldn’t be here… To me it’s a scientific problem, it’s a scientific observation that does not yet have a scientific answer but to bring in God to explain it is to bring the great ‘God of the gaps’”

“I will accept, in the way that you have presented it, that the God in whom I believe is superfluous. That is: I do no need God. That the God in whom I believe is a God who gave himself superfluously, whether I needed him or not”

“God gave us brains so that we can explore the universe and find answers to the questions we have”

“I don’t believe in the soul; I don’t believe that at some time in the evolutionary process God put a soul… I’d like to think more of the spirit emerging in the whole evolutionary process”

“I believe that I survive death… I don’t believe my soul does; I do”

I wonder how many Christians would agree with these words... I suspect not to many...

Yet another debate

Yet another debate between Christopher Hitchens and a christian thinker:

http://www.wts.edu/flash/media_popup/media_player.php?id=462&paramType=video

Whoever has the patience (and the time) to listen to this (1 hour and 52 minutes) debate will find in the lips of this christian minister all the arguments that separate so many thinking people from Christianity. And even though I still consider myself a believer (in some way), it is very evident to me that arguments such as these don't really help to make the Christian faith more palatable (that is, if you consider yourself a coherent thinking person). The circularity in which this christian speaker constantly falls during the debate ("I believe in miracles because the Bible tells me so, and I believe the Bible because... the Bible tells me to") seems to assume Christianity to be a non-coherent system of thought. I remember a book by J.I. Packer in which he tried to argue that either you should put reason above the Bible or put the Bible above reason (somewhat similar to what this guy says towards the end of the debate). I really can't understand this way of 'thinking'... Can you?