Similarities Between Leonard Brand And David Jarnes

On the Topic of Science and Faith In today’s secular society, it is commonly believed that science and faith are completely unrelated entities. However, Beginnings by Leonard Brand and David Jarnes argues the opposite.” The main purpose of Beginnings is to display ways in which faith can give some valuable insight in the subject area of science. The book does so by including faith and religion in the dialogue concerning topics that appear to be areas of conflict between science and faith. It efficiently tackles topics like Darwinism, the geological column and microevolution in an honest manner, presenting both the strengths and weakness of a purely faith based understanding of the topics and a purely evolutionary understanding. Through their
By demonstrating their knowledge in the material that is discussed in Beginnings, Brand and Jarnes add more weight to their arguments. For example, in their discussion of the origin of species and the role of microevolution, they start off by giving a brief overview of the subject area and define key terms. Another example is their handling of the topic of Darwinism. According to Brand and Jarnes “Darwinian Theory attempts to attempts to explain how mutation and natural selection “created” new genes, structures, and behavioral patterns” (79). There is nothing in this statement that presents Darwinian Theory as a completely illogical theory. In fact, the writers simply offer an impartial understanding of Darwinian Theory and in so doing indicate their familiarity with the way natural selection is commonly understood. Since it is very important to know the topic well in order to effectively engage in a successful dialogue over it, Brand and Jarnes are able to first establish their credibility as critics of the scientific concepts discussed in
This is illustrated particular in their discussion of the geological record. When handling this topic, Jarnes and Brand separate the understanding of the geological record into two; a purely evolutionary understanding of the topic and a more faith based understanding of the topic. They also incorporate a brief discussion of the weakness of both point of views. For instance, for the more faith based understanding of the geological record, they state that “many unanswered questions remain” when following this view, such as why the fossils are distributed in the manner seen in the geological record. For the more evolutionary understanding of the record they indicate that the transitional fossils expected in the geological column is not seen. Thus, Jarnes and Brand seem to take a distinct characteristic approach in organizing the content of their discussion. They first define ways that the topic of discussion can be understood and the weaknesses of such understanding. In the case of the geological column, this method is effective in showing that there is a way that faith can be incorporated into the dialogue concerning the geological column. Since they also incorporate a discussion on the weaknesses of each viewpoint, Brand and Jarnes are able to show that although there are main components that are not well understood, science and faith can