thoughtful ideas on life's big questions
March 6th, 2013
People trafficking is the coercive trade of human beings to provide cheap or free labour – effectively slavery. It is happening around the world, and leaves millions of powerless people in misery.
March 3rd, 2013
In a discussion on another post (on archaeology at Nazareth), a reader referred to first century Jewish historian, Josephus. He suggested that Josephus had not mentioned Jesus in his history, and that this was “telling”. I felt the comment merited a separate post. Did Josephus refer to Jesus? What is the current consensus of relevant […]
February 28th, 2013
It’s more or less a stereotype, especially in the US: christians are thought to be anti-science. Except the evidence apparently says something different.
February 25th, 2013
I have never really worried much about evolution. I had decided the Genesis origins account was not literal history before I ever thought the scientific account of evolution was true, so the two were never really in conflict for me. But many christians, and a few atheists too, think God and evolution are incompatible. Why?
February 21st, 2013
I’ve been reading a little about DNA lately, particularly about how DNA testing can establish family lines and patterns of migration around the world. It has been fascinating, and it also raises some interesting questions and challenges about belief in God.
February 19th, 2013
Readers will know that courtesy in discussions between believers and unbelievers is something dear to my heart (see, for example, Atheists vs christians: does it have to be war? So when Matt, who has a blog titled Confessions Of A (former) Young Earth Creationist, asked me to write a post on Conversing with atheists and […]
February 14th, 2013
For many people it is virtually an unquestioned assumption – science and christian belief are incompatible. But this book by eminent philosopher Alvin Plantinga turns that on its head – he argues that science and theism are very compatible while it is science and atheism/naturalism that are incompatible. Does he succeed?
February 12th, 2013
This website has been online, in one form or another, for almost 7 years. In that time it has mostly been about evidence and reasons for believing in the God of christianity. My idea was to offer readers food for thought from a reasonably fair-minded viewpoint. But I haven’t indicated what people might do with […]
February 8th, 2013
It has been long established by research that religious observance provides a number of health and wellbeing benefits, including a higher level of happiness. But why is this so?
February 3rd, 2013
We all know that the number of committed religious people is dropping in most western countries (see, e.g. Who believes in God?). And it’s not too hard to find stories on the internet of people who were brought up religious, but now disbelieve. It may be less well known that, at the same time, a […]
A list of all blog posts, in reverse chronological order, is on the Blog archive page.