You Are Not Alone (YANA): An Organization to Help the Hurting

One of my friends recently founded an organization that I believe is a powerful witness to the hope that we have within us for the hurting.  Here’s a little bit about the organization.

You Are Not Alone, or YANA, was founded in late March 2012 as a result of the eyes of two college students being opened to the reality of domestic abuse.  Charlie Evans and Austin Rahn found themselves in a heartfelt discussion about the friends and family they know who have dealt with abuse, and decided it was time someone did something about it.  Literally overnight, YANA was born.  The two immediately began to put together a Facebook page, Twitter account, YouTube video, etc. in accordance with their slogan, “Speak Up, Speak Out, Speak Now.”  In less than two days the Facebook page had over 100 fans.   

Famous Philosophy Majors

You may be quite surprised to find out which famous people have majored in philosophy.  BestCollegesOnline recently did an article discussing fourteen famous philosophy majors.  Most you’ll probably recognize.  If you don’t, you’re probably familiar with their associations or affects they’ve had in the world.  These people range from politics to comedy.  One person that was not mentioned was Bill Clinton.  When you realize Clinton was a philosophy major you won’t mock him when he asks what the definition of ‘is’ is.  Is ‘is’ an identity claim or is ‘is’ a predication?  Perhaps, we just laughed out of ignorance?  Anyways, enjoy the likes of Alex Trebek, Steve Martin, Bruce Lee, and …

A List of Peer-Reviewed Articles on Intelligent Design

There’s been a long running tradition in the Darwinian anti-ID camp propounding that there are no published peer-reviewed papers on intelligent design.  Ever since this mantra was first popularly proclaimed they’ve been wrong.  Below is a list of peer-reviewed articles cataloged by the Discovery Institute.  For abstracts and more on the articles please visit their site.

Publications Supportive of Intelligent Design Published in Peer-Reviewed Scientific Journals, Conference Proceedings, or Scientific Anthologies.

1. David L. Abel, “Is Life Unique?,” Life, Vol. 2:106-134 (2012).
2. Joseph A. Kuhn, “Dissecting Darwinism,” Baylor University Medical Center Proceedings, Vol. 25(1): 41-47 (2012).
3. Douglas D. Axe, Philip Lu, and Stephanie Flatau, “A Stylus-Generated Artificial Genome with Analogy to Minimal Bacterial Genomes,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2011(3) (2011).
4. Stephen C. Meyer and Paul A. Nelson, “Can the Origin of the Genetic Code Be Explained by Direct RNA Templating?,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2011(2) (2011).
5. Ann K. Gauger and Douglas D. Axe, “The Evolutionary Accessibility of New Enzyme Functions: A Case Study from the Biotin Pathway,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2011(1) (2011).
6. Ann K. Gauger, Stephanie Ebnet, Pamela F. Fahey, and Ralph Seelke, “Reductive Evolution Can Prevent Populations from Taking Simple Adaptive Paths to High Fitness,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2010 (2) (2010).
7. Michael J. Behe, “Experimental Evolution, Loss-of-Function Mutations, and ‘The First Rule of Adaptive Evolution,’” The Quarterly Review of Biology, Vol. 85(4):1-27 (December 2010).
8. Douglas D. Axe, “The Limits of Complex Adaptation: An Analysis Based on a Simple Model of Structured Bacterial Populations,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2010(4):1 (2010).
9. Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig, “Mutagenesis in Physalis pubescens L. ssp. floridana: Some further research on Dollo’s Law and the Law of Recurrent Variation,”Floriculture and Ornamental Biotechnology, 1-21 (2010).
10. George Montañez, Winston Ewert, William A. Dembski, and Robert J. Marks II, “A Vivisection of the ev Computer Organism: Identifying Sources of Active Information,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2010(3) (2010).
11. William A. Dembski and Robert J. Marks II, “The Search for a Search: Measuring the Information Cost of Higher Level Search,” Journal of Advanced Computational Intelligence and Intelligent Informatics, Vol. 14 (5):475-486 (2010).
12. Douglas D. Axe, “The Case Against a Darwinian Origin of Protein Folds,” BIO-Complexity, Vol. 2010 (1) (2010).

Being Catholic at Liberty University

The following is a guest blog post by Shoshana.  She is an art communications major at Liberty University. Her interests include literature, history, and botany. In her spare time, she enjoys watercolor painting, gardening, and reading fiction.

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I am a Catholic student at Liberty University. I am in my sophomore year studying studio art: painting, drawing, sculpture, etc. I very much enjoy my major and Liberty as a whole. I was raised Baptist. When I was eight years old my family entered the Catholic Church. My brother and I decided we wanted to stay at Liberty Christian Academy (LCA–the private Baptist school we had attended since kindergarten) rather than leave our friends and go to a Catholic school. There were times in high school when I regretted my decision to stay at LCA. I had a lot of friends, but none of them understood what I believed. My teachers were all great people, but all of them thought they knew what I as a Catholic believed and were often completely wrong. I cannot recount all the kindly and patiently uttered anti-Catholic speeches I endured, the many unconscious slights against Catholicism, and the few not-so-innocent remarks. One girl in my history class verbally attacked me because I “worshipped Mary”. I wish I had a dime for every time that untruth came up. Instead of asking me what I believed and taking time to listen, this girl assumed that she already knew all of my beliefs. Yet what she “knew” was based on hearsay.  This is perhaps to be overlooked in a teenager, but when the offender was a teacher, he or she needed to be aware that “bearing false witness” (i.e., telling the class that Catholics believe something which they do not believe) is an offense in God’s eyes.  In high school I had a teacher who told me it was his goal to convert me to Protestantism before the year was over. I found that insulting. I was a Christian just as he was (as Dr. Jerry Falwell always said, “Catholics are Christians!”). 

Darwinian Whale Evolution

When evaluating population drift/evolution one must keep in mind a pattern/process distinction.

• To be explained:  A pattern of a sequence of ancestors to present (a phylogenetic sequence)
• Explanation:  High random mutation rates + high selection coefficients –> Incremental genetic change over time (“evolution”)

We now know that the majority of anatomical changes unique to fully aquatic cetaceans (Pelagiceti) appeared during just a few million years.

Here are only a few of the changes that had to have occurred during the transition to a fully marine whale

• Counter-current heat exchanger for intra-abdominal testes
• Ball vertebra
• Tail flukes and musculature
• Blubber for temperature insulation
• Ability to drink sea water (reorganization of kidney tissues)
• Reverse orientation of fetus in the uterus
• Nurse young underwater (modified mammae)

Real Men Like the Ballet

I was speaking with a good friend of mine earlier today and she told me about why her recent ex-boyfriend broke up with her (let’s call her Jane and him Richard).  Jane is in her last year as an undergraduate in theatre.  Richard couldn’t come to terms with an appreciation for theatre and the arts. According to him these things are only useful if used for explicit ministerial purposes.  This led to Richard breaking up with Jane.  This is such a sad state of affairs.  What makes this a curious situation is that I’m fairly confident this ideology is rampant in men.  I often hear that if a man is in theatre, the ballet, or the arts he must be gay or feminine. I’m going to argue on the contrary. It seems that being masculine or manly has become equivocated with being macho or a rough and tough man who likes football and hockey.  There’s nothing wrong with football and hockey, surely real men can like these too, but there’s more to being a masculine man than just that. Men who have an appreciation for theatre, ballet, opera, gymnastics, poetry, and the arts are men who encompass so much more about life.

Let’s primarily consider just a few of these examples.  Ballet is such a beautiful feat.  This is one of the most beautiful expressions of the beauty and ability of the human body. Imagine an adagio, slow graceful movements to slow music, while the woman is performing several movements and entrechats and she comes to rest in battement tendu (sliding her straightened out leg beside her).  While she comes to her last position imagine the man gracefully approaching her for their final coda.  He forms his body to hers for a perfect coupling. The grace, discipline, strength, and the form of dance is a spectacular demonstration of the body.  It’s a presentation of how the beauty of the body can be expressed–the intimacy of the coupling of body to body.

Marriage–Theological and Practical Readiness

The following is a guest blog post by Bryan Raszinski.  Bryan is a Religion undergraduate at Liberty University.

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“Wives, be subject to your own husbands, as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church, He Himself being the Savior of the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless. So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the church, because we are members of His body.” (Ephesians 5:22-30, NASB)

Going back and forth the last few years to college and then home has definitely changed the way I see things and what it takes to be a man of the gospel ; a man who, on a daily basis, declares he is going to take up his cross and follow Jesus no matter the cost. I have also learned a lot about marriage in its self and going back and forth have seen two parts that I think need to be addressed because, for the most, one or the other is given the priority and the one that is not given priority seems to be ignored (this is not the case for every single couple getting engaged to be married I am sure but the trend seems that most are this way). At school I see the practical readiness of marriage set while the theological readiness seems to take a seat it should not and at home I see the exact opposite the theological readiness takes the priority and the practical readiness takes the seat.  Both are essential before tying the knot and while no couple is ever completely ready to be married and knows how everything will go, the important thing remains that in order to even get engaged these two things need to be settled and discussed so both the future husband and wife know what the other expects from them.

The Philosophy of the Job Search

The following is a guest blog post by Doug Andrews.  Doug has been in retail for almost thirty years and is currently runs a side-project of assisting others get better jobs.  You can find more information at his website JobCoachHQ.com and you can follow him on Twitter at @JobCoachHQ.

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The opportunity to write a guest blog is one I couldn’t pass up.

My background is from the business world.   I have a BS in Business Management from Bloomsburg University.   I have worked for 3 of the largest corporations in their respective industries, Foot Locker, Gateway Computers and for the past 10 years I have been with Barnes and Noble.  I have recently been publicly speaking on the topic of Interviewing.  I have a website that promotes my efforts to inform others of the job search process, JobCoachHQ.com. 

The Disputatio–A Response to Norman Geisler in Defense of Mike Licona

In a previous post I expressed my public support and endorsement of Dr. Mike Licona.  This week Dr. Norman Geisler released another letter in response to Christianity Today’s article on Licona and an article comparing Licona to Robert Gundry.  Dr. Geisler presents eleven main points of contention.  This is my response to Dr. Geisler.

Preface.  I understand that I stand before giants of the faith and I exercise my criticism with sincere humility.  The following is intended to be a respectful and constructive criticism of Dr. Geisler’s arguments.  I respect Dr. Geisler and appreciate the contributions he has made to the Christian Church.  It is my belief that we should all encourage constructive criticism and that it should be received well.  These comments do not purport to express the opinions or beliefs of Mike Licona or any associated entities.  These comments are my own.

The Free Exchange in the Marketplace of Ideas

The English poet John Milton did well when he said that “Truth will rise to the top through a free and open exchange in the marketplace of ideas.”  I am so encouraged when I have and see a substantive dialogue with someone concerning an issue.  This is certainly important in every day discussions, blogs, and teaching.  I assist in managing and teaching an Intro. to Philosophy course at university and I always encourage my students to make us work hard to convince them of what we believe to be true.  Do not simply sit there and take what I say and teach prima facie–challenge me, challenge the thoughts, challenge your thinking.