Throughout various points in this blog I’ve mentioned my self-study journey to learn more about the interplay between science and theology, especially in relationship to evolution. In a recent post I mentioned that the journey reached a time to pause, but I wasn’t willing to post about the topic yet. Interestingly, a reader (Rad) commented that he wants to know more, which to me means I should inform readers more about where I’ve been and what I’m now doing – so here goes.
In order to know more about any topic, one has to be willing to learn – and even better when the motivation is driven from within. I’ve always believed that the more you learn, the more you discover how much you don’t know. In other words, when digging deeper into a topic, you discover a bottomless pit.
Another thing you learn is the overwhelming knowledge that leaders in the field have on the topic – again, verifying how little you actually know. I know I’ve learned and learned a lot, but I still stand in awe at the knowledge of others and the totality of the body of knowledge. Plus I know I was reading the right people because of the way these authors referred to one another.
I maintained a bibliography tracking my journey so I can comfortably say that I used the following:
- 7 full books
- 13 essays and selected chapters from books
- 16 professional articles
- 5 lecture, portion of lectures, and speech transcripts
- 2 polls and associated resources of past polls
- 2 court transcripts of testimonies
- 12 position statements and catechisms
- Email with 2 correspondents
In order to demonstrate my learning I recently wrote a paper. The paper is currently being reviewed by people I selected who are laypeople, pastors, or have a science background. I will take their comments and improve the paper. Then I will attempt to seek a review from some of the authors I read. If I’m lucky enough to be successful, I again will work to improve the paper and eventually publish it somewhere … maybe here.
Thanks Rad.
Frank,
First let me say thank you for going to great lengths to possibly enlighten us with the findings of all this research. That’s a pretty extensive and impressive list.
It seems like we share a natural curiosity when it comes to think we don’t fully understand, which is why I asked about your research in the 1st place. My wife is always asking me why I research things I hear on television or on the radio, is it really that important? I always answer “because I have to know…” I can’t really explain it, it’s just a need to understand and gain as much knowledge as possible in this ever expanding universe of available information.
I humbly say you’re welcome, but all thanks should go to you my man. Hope to see the paper soon.
Rad,
Thanks for the kind words … and we’re on the same page on about need to know. Well said.
Recently I described my resources as “not a list of newspaper and magazine articles” … not offense to those common sources, but they have a tendency to be more superficial.
Once I get further along, I can identify some good starter resources on the topic.
Thanks for stimulating this post!
“I’ve always believed that the more you learn, the more you discover how much you don’t know.”
Frank, this is why I enjoy reading your blog — your posts tell us that you ARE a researcher. Because you are a researcher no matter the topic your work is always informative.
Evolution is a D-E-E-P topic and I believe that there are layers and layers of information that is right in front of us but we can’t comprehend because we have not evolved enough (as yet) in this dimension to understand what we are seeing right in front of us.
For example Ezekiel 1:
“4 And I looked, and, behold, a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire infolding [3] itself, and a brightness was about it, and out of the midst thereof as the color of amber, out of the midst of the fire. 5 Also out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures. And this was their appearance; they had the likeness of a man. 6 And every one had four faces, and every one had four wings. 7 And their feet were straight [4] feet; and the sole of their feet was like the sole of a calf’s foot: and they sparkled like the color of burnished brass. 8 And they had the hands of a man under their wings on their four sides; and they four had their faces and their wings. 9 Their wings were joined one to another; they turned not when they went; they went every one straight forward. 10 As for the likeness of their faces, they four had the face of a man, and the face of a lion, on the right side: and they four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four also had the face of an eagle. 11 Thus were their faces: and their wings were stretched [5] upward; two wings of every one were joined one to another, and two covered their bodies. 12 And they went every one straight forward: whither the spirit was to go, they went; and they turned not when they went. 13 As for the likeness of the living creatures, their appearance was like burning coals of fire, and like the appearance of lamps: it went up and down among the living creatures; and the fire was bright, and out of the fire went forth lightning. 14 And the living creatures ran and returned as the appearance of a flash of lightning.”
I personally believe that what Ezekiel saw were four airplanes or flying machines of some sort landing and he used the vocabulary that he had to describe something he didn’t quite understand.
I believe that the Ezekiel saw was the brightness from the engine of the ‘jet’.
The faces he saw was the heads of the pilots in the cockpit and the wings he saw were the wings of the plane.
The appearance of lamps is the light from the airplane or jet headlights.
And what he described as fire ‘that was bright’ and ‘lightening’ was the blast from the engine of the jet when it lifted off.
This is the only way how he could describe using his words something that he wasn’t familiar with but it seems clear to me that that is what I see whenever I go to the airport. Ezekiel’s mind could not conceive a flying machine that men controlled and flew into the heavens; but we know it exists.
I won’t delve into this more because my response is already waaay too long.
We humans are more evolved than we know and less evolved than we should be.
Paulette,
Many thanks for the kind words.
Your “layers of information” analogy is so true as evolution is such a big topic. As I’ve said before, so many know so little about it, yet how can one be against something they don’t know about.
Just imagine the layers of information when examining the overlap of evolution and theology! Simply mind boggling.
We both know people like to talk, thus many times so their ignorance. Want to see ignorance and misinformation, just watch the current town hall meetings! (Well, I know you know that … but I did cause you to laugh too!)
As for Ezekiel – I respectfully won’t touch that one … or another topic or another day.
As always, thanks for visiting and I always appreciate your comments.
PS: Just letting you know, I’m planning a movie review for tomorrow.
Frank – I look forward to tomorrow’s review.
I’ve always liked the balloon analogy for knowledge. When we fill a balloon with more air the surface of the balloon gets larger. Inside the balloon of learning is knowledge and the surface of the balloon represents questions. So, as we gain knowledge we also gain more questions.
I couldn’t find an attribution for this analogy but I seem to remember that Einstein had something to do with it.
Thersites … thanks for another analogy.