Justin Brierley & Casey Luskin: Making a Case of Why God Exists | Takeaways with Kirk Cameron

August 4, 2025 | 54:47

Kirk Cameron is joined by broadcaster Justin Brierley and scientist Casey Luskin to discuss how recent scientific discoveries bring further proof of the existence of intelligent design.

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Takeaways with Kirk Cameron | Justin Brierley & Casey Luskin: Making a Case of Why God Exists | Takeaways with Kirk Cameron | August 4, 2025
  • Kirk cameron: when it comes to your faith, do you know why you
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  • Believe what you believe?
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  • If someone asked you why do you believe in god, would you know
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  • How to answer?
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  • We're gonna talk with speaker and author justin brierley and
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  • Scientist casey luskin sharing their insights on how we can
  • 00:00:13.993 --> 00:00:18.364
  • Share our faith with even greater confidence based on the
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  • Scientific evidence supporting intelligent design.
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  • Let's talk about it right now on "takeaways."
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  • Justin brierley: the vast majority of people do say that
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  • There is a point to life, suggests that there's a purpose
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  • Giver and that we're not here purely by accident.
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  • Casey luskin: so we're talking about some super intelligent
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  • Cause has fine tuned the laws of nature, crafted the laws of
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  • The universe.
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  • So again, we could be here having this conversation so that
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  • Life can exist.
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  • Kirk: my first guest, justin brierley is a uk based author,
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  • Speaker, and broadcaster known for hosting dialogues between
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  • Christians and non-christians.
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  • He's passionate about creating conversations around faith,
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  • Science, theology, and culture.
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  • He's my kind of guy.
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  • His most recent book, "why i'm still a christian," is all about
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  • Why believing in god makes the most sense and showcases an
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  • Intellectually compelling case for christianity.
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  • Justin, thanks so much for coming on "takeaways."
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  • Justin: it's an absolute pleasure to be with you, kirk.
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  • Thank you.
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  • Kirk: i'm so fascinated by the life that you have led over two
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  • Decades interviewing christians, non-christians, atheists,
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  • Skeptics, unbelievers, muslims, hindus, buddhists, and those who
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  • Would challenge the christian worldview.
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  • In your book, justin, you've titled it, "why i'm still
  • 00:01:42.282 --> 00:01:46.619
  • A christian: after two decades of conversations with skeptics
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  • And atheists."
  • 00:01:50.823 --> 00:01:52.425
  • So justin, right out of the gates, why do you still believe
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  • And remain a christian?
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  • Justin: well, it's a great question because in a way,
  • 00:02:00.200 --> 00:02:03.102
  • I really did put myself in the firing line for the best part of
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  • Two decades, hosting a show called "unbelievable" here in
  • 00:02:06.039 --> 00:02:08.875
  • The uk where i purposefully every week brought on christians
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  • And non-christians, very often they were atheists, skeptics,
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  • People of other faiths, and it was really so that we could look
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  • At the claims of christianity and ask, can it stand on its own
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  • Two feet intellectually?
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  • And while there were plenty of, you know, interesting puzzling
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  • Questions and objections along the way, and i had to learn an
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  • Awful lot, i also learned that there is this incredible
  • 00:02:29.562 --> 00:02:32.432
  • Intellectual core to christianity that actually
  • 00:02:32.432 --> 00:02:35.602
  • Really makes sense.
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  • It makes sense of us, our experience, it makes sense of
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  • The universe, it makes sense of history, it makes sense
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  • Philosophically, theologically, ethically.
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  • And so i found actually what we have in the christian tradition
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  • Is not something you just have to kind of will yourself into
  • 00:02:48.314 --> 00:02:51.384
  • Believing against all the odds, but we have something that
  • 00:02:51.384 --> 00:02:53.953
  • Actually makes sense, not only of us, but the world we live in.
  • 00:02:53.953 --> 00:02:57.090
  • And so that's why even after two decades of hosting these
  • 00:02:57.090 --> 00:03:00.660
  • Conversations with some of the best known atheists in the
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  • World, i felt absolutely comfortable saying, i'm a
  • 00:03:02.862 --> 00:03:06.266
  • Christian and i've got every good reason to be a christian.
  • 00:03:06.266 --> 00:03:10.703
  • Kirk: justin, you also say in your book that people are much
  • 00:03:10.703 --> 00:03:14.073
  • More open to spiritual conversations than many of us
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  • Think they are.
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  • Why do you think we are so hesitant to share our faith and
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  • Let others question our faith.
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  • Justin: i think it's because sadly we live in an age where
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  • Online especially, it can feel quite daunting to talk about
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  • Things because things get so polarized and so oppositional
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  • Very quickly and it can often leave us feeling like we need to
  • 00:03:36.195 --> 00:03:39.299
  • Have all of the answers at our disposal and so that often means
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  • Many christians fail to ever begin a conversation 'cause
  • 00:03:42.735 --> 00:03:45.305
  • They're worried that they won't be able to provide the answers
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  • To the questions that come.
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  • But actually, in my experience, you know, people are actually
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  • More human than they often appear online and they're
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  • Actually full of questions, they're full of queries, they're
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  • People who are on a search very often for truth themselves.
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  • And so it's not that we have to have all of the answers, but we
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  • Have to be at least open to having the conversation
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  • With people.
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  • And if the best answer we can give to a difficult question is,
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  • I don't know, the next thing you can say is, but let me go away,
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  • Look into that and come back and let's continue the conversation.
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  • The tragedy is if we never begin the conversation because of
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  • Our fears.
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  • So i would say, what you need to do is exactly what 1 peter 3:15
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  • Tells us to do, which is to always be ready to give an
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  • Answer to anyone who asks you about the reason for the hope
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  • That you have, but do this with gentleness and respect.
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  • And one of the things that often comes out of that is the
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  • Question, well, are people asking you, you know, are you
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  • Living the kind of life where people would actually ask you
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  • About the reason for the hope that you have?
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  • And if they're not asking you, it may be because you're not
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  • Putting yourself in situations where there's an opportunity for
  • 00:04:49.402 --> 00:04:52.472
  • People to do that, maybe you live in too much of a kind of
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  • Christian bubble to begin with, to actually engage with people
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  • Outside of the faith.
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  • So i think it's a challenge to us to say actually there is an
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  • Opportunity, people do have questions, and are we going to
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  • Do what the bible asks us to do and be ready to give an answer?
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  • Kirk: i agree with you.
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  • I've found that people are very interested in spiritual things
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  • And yet they're hesitant to talk about it just like we are
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  • Because many people just don't want to get into a fight.
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  • That's why we say don't talk about politics and religion and
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  • You'll be fine.
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  • But really what else matters but politics and religion.
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  • It shapes everything else in our world from family to philosophy
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  • To science and the economy and everything else.
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  • Justin, in your book, you outline three aspects of
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  • Humanity and reality that you claim are best explained by the
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  • Revelation of god in the bible.
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  • Can you unpack that for us?
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  • Justin: yeah, absolutely.
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  • I think one of the first things i learned in hosting these
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  • Conversations between atheists and christians was that actually
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  • We're all approaching life through a worldview and for most
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  • Of the atheist guests i had on my show, that was materialism.
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  • It was the idea that all that ultimately exists is the laws of
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  • Nature and the physical stuff of the universe.
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  • And that's a very interesting perspective, but it's also has
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  • All kinds of consequences.
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  • It means that essentially the universe came from nowhere and
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  • It's heading nowhere, there's no ultimate purpose to life,
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  • There's no such thing in the end actually as beauty or justice or
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  • Love or even truth actually.
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  • It's very hard to kind of fathom how you make sense of those
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  • Ideas on this purely material basis.
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  • And from that point of view, there are these three areas
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  • Which i think sit better, they're just more coherent when
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  • You believe there's a god, when you think of there being a god
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  • Behind the universe.
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  • And so the three areas that i outlined specifically are human
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  • Existence, human value, and human purpose.
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  • Human existence simply because the fact that we're here kind of
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  • Needs an explanation and the materialist view that
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  • Essentially we came about by chance and time just doesn't
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  • Really make sense when you look at the extraordinary
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  • Improbability of what it took to produce us in the universe.
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  • There's lots of aspects to that.
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  • There's the way in which life itself began in this
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  • Extraordinary way, the way in which the universe itself
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  • Appears to have come into existence with this
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  • Extraordinarily precisely styled set of numbers that would allow
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  • Life to develop in the cosmos.
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  • There's all kinds of pieces of evidence that point towards the
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  • Christian view rather than the atheist materialist view
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  • Of reality.
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  • So human existence is one area, but human value, why do we
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  • Believe that humans have inherent worth, dignity?
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  • Why do we create whole bills of human rights to kind of
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  • Safeguard those?
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  • Again, i've never met a satisfactory, purely atheist
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  • Explanation for that.
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  • Whereas it makes perfect sense if what's written on page one of
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  • The bible is true, that all humans are made in god's image.
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  • It makes perfect sense that you would have this view of
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  • Human value.
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  • And finding human purpose is just that sense of why are
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  • We here?
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  • Is there a point to life in the end?
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  • And again, the fact that the vast majority of people do say
  • 00:08:00.159 --> 00:08:03.062
  • That there is a point to life suggests that there's a purpose
  • 00:08:03.062 --> 00:08:06.632
  • Giver and that we're not here purely by accident and that
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  • There's a meaning behind the universe.
  • 00:08:10.269 --> 00:08:12.104
  • So for me, these are three specific areas that i try to
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  • Unpack in more detail in the book as to why it would make
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  • Sense to choose the god option, if you like, rather than the
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  • Atheist option.
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  • Kirk: that's beautiful, justin.
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  • I love that.
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  • It just produces a song in my heart when i hear you talk about
  • 00:08:24.817 --> 00:08:28.020
  • These things because i've wrestled for years and years as
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  • A new believer, as a young believer, and i'm flooded with
  • 00:08:31.357 --> 00:08:34.393
  • These emotions of fear and worry and anxiety that perhaps there
  • 00:08:34.393 --> 00:08:38.464
  • Is an argument out there in the materialist worldview or the
  • 00:08:38.464 --> 00:08:41.467
  • Muslim worldview that will unravel, that will just pull the
  • 00:08:41.467 --> 00:08:45.471
  • Thread of truth out of the fabric of christianity and it
  • 00:08:45.471 --> 00:08:49.942
  • Will all just dismantle in front of me.
  • 00:08:49.942 --> 00:08:52.545
  • And yet the more i've questioned why i believe what i believe and
  • 00:08:52.545 --> 00:08:57.149
  • The more i have looked at the alternative worldviews to the
  • 00:08:57.149 --> 00:09:00.119
  • Christian worldview, the more i am convinced that my trust
  • 00:09:00.119 --> 00:09:05.591
  • Placed in jesus christ and in the bible has been very well
  • 00:09:05.591 --> 00:09:09.895
  • Placed because everything else seems to eliminate itself after
  • 00:09:09.895 --> 00:09:13.699
  • A while like you just demonstrated.
  • 00:09:13.699 --> 00:09:16.168
  • Where is the grounding for purpose or even our very
  • 00:09:16.168 --> 00:09:19.672
  • Existence or value or morality or even the laws of logic
  • 00:09:19.672 --> 00:09:24.677
  • And mathematics?
  • 00:09:24.677 --> 00:09:26.412
  • How can we even assert that these things are true and even
  • 00:09:26.412 --> 00:09:30.950
  • An argument against god as an evil being for allowing
  • 00:09:30.950 --> 00:09:34.086
  • Suffering to happen is without merit unless you can define what
  • 00:09:34.086 --> 00:09:38.491
  • Goodness actually is, without which you can't even determine
  • 00:09:38.491 --> 00:09:42.294
  • That anything is evil.
  • 00:09:42.294 --> 00:09:44.063
  • So your whole argument implodes without a christian worldview.
  • 00:09:44.063 --> 00:09:48.534
  • We're gonna talk more with justin after the break.
  • 00:09:48.534 --> 00:09:50.703
  • And later in the program, scientist casey luskin will join
  • 00:09:50.703 --> 00:09:53.773
  • Us to share his thoughts on the debate over intelligent design
  • 00:09:53.773 --> 00:09:57.677
  • And evolution.
  • 00:09:57.677 --> 00:09:59.011
  • Stay with us.
  • 00:09:59.011 --> 00:10:00.379
  • Casey: even evidence that is accepted by mainstream science
  • 00:10:00.379 --> 00:10:02.815
  • Shows a need for an intelligent cause, a creator behind
  • 00:10:02.815 --> 00:10:06.585
  • Life in the universe.
  • 00:10:06.585 --> 00:10:12.997
  • Life in the universe.
  • 00:10:12.997 --> 00:10:19.066
  • Kirk: we're back with speaker and broadcaster justin brierley.
  • 00:10:20.534 --> 00:10:24.604
  • Justin, we were talking all about christian worldview and
  • 00:10:24.604 --> 00:10:28.775
  • How it really best explains the things that are most valuable to
  • 00:10:28.775 --> 00:10:33.513
  • Us, the things that we see around us.
  • 00:10:33.513 --> 00:10:36.316
  • And i remember hearing an interview with richard dawkins,
  • 00:10:36.316 --> 00:10:39.920
  • Maybe the world's most famous current proponent of
  • 00:10:39.920 --> 00:10:44.558
  • Neo-darwinian evolution.
  • 00:10:44.558 --> 00:10:46.560
  • And he was asked, "what kind of culture would you like to
  • 00:10:46.560 --> 00:10:49.796
  • Live in?"
  • 00:10:49.796 --> 00:10:51.131
  • Of all the cultures in the world, you know, the asian
  • 00:10:51.131 --> 00:10:52.766
  • Culture, the buddhist culture, the muslim culture.
  • 00:10:52.766 --> 00:10:56.436
  • And he said, "oh, hands down a christian culture."
  • 00:10:56.436 --> 00:11:00.407
  • Even talked about wearing the label of a cultural christian,
  • 00:11:00.407 --> 00:11:03.777
  • Even though he does not believe in the claims of christianity
  • 00:11:03.777 --> 00:11:07.848
  • And the bible.
  • 00:11:07.848 --> 00:11:09.216
  • You had an experience with richard as well and you talk
  • 00:11:09.216 --> 00:11:10.817
  • About it in your book.
  • 00:11:10.817 --> 00:11:12.185
  • Share that with us.
  • 00:11:12.185 --> 00:11:13.520
  • Justin: yes, the very first time i had a conversation with
  • 00:11:13.520 --> 00:11:15.655
  • Richard dawkins, who, as you say, is probably the most famous
  • 00:11:15.655 --> 00:11:18.024
  • Atheist on the planet in many ways, was back in 2008 and he'd
  • 00:11:18.024 --> 00:11:22.896
  • Just had a fantastic debate at oxford university with john
  • 00:11:22.896 --> 00:11:26.466
  • Lennox, who's a well-known professor of science.
  • 00:11:26.466 --> 00:11:28.268
  • Kirk: love john lennox.
  • 00:11:28.268 --> 00:11:29.636
  • Justin: science and mathematics, wonderful guy,
  • 00:11:29.636 --> 00:11:32.072
  • A christian thinker.
  • 00:11:32.072 --> 00:11:33.406
  • And i got to kind of go to the after debate party at a local
  • 00:11:33.406 --> 00:11:37.177
  • Oxford college.
  • 00:11:37.177 --> 00:11:38.545
  • But interestingly, one of the most significant parts that then
  • 00:11:38.545 --> 00:11:41.081
  • Kind of went viral actually is an audio clip.
  • 00:11:41.081 --> 00:11:44.484
  • Was where i asked him about this question of morality and how as
  • 00:11:44.484 --> 00:11:47.254
  • An atheist he grounds his beliefs in right and wrong.
  • 00:11:47.254 --> 00:11:51.258
  • And the particular issue i raised was this, and i'll just
  • 00:11:51.258 --> 00:11:54.094
  • Give you verbatim how the conversation went between
  • 00:11:54.094 --> 00:11:56.463
  • Us, kirk.
  • 00:11:56.463 --> 00:11:57.798
  • I said to richard, "but if we'd evolved into a society where
  • 00:11:57.798 --> 00:12:00.901
  • Rape was considered fine, would that mean that rape is fine?"
  • 00:12:00.901 --> 00:12:04.938
  • And he said, "well, i don't want to answer that question.
  • 00:12:04.938 --> 00:12:07.407
  • It's enough for me to say that we live in a society where it's
  • 00:12:07.407 --> 00:12:10.043
  • Not considered fine.
  • 00:12:10.043 --> 00:12:11.444
  • We live in a society where selfishness, failure to pay your
  • 00:12:11.444 --> 00:12:14.047
  • Debts, failure to reciprocate favors is regarded as stance.
  • 00:12:14.047 --> 00:12:17.884
  • That is the society in which we live.
  • 00:12:17.884 --> 00:12:19.853
  • I'm very glad that's a value judgment.
  • 00:12:19.853 --> 00:12:22.489
  • Glad that i live in such a society."
  • 00:12:22.489 --> 00:12:25.025
  • And i responded, "but richard, when you make a value judgment,
  • 00:12:25.025 --> 00:12:27.961
  • Don't you immediately step outside of this evolutionary
  • 00:12:27.961 --> 00:12:30.764
  • Process and say the reason this is good is that it's good and
  • 00:12:30.764 --> 00:12:34.534
  • You don't have any way to stand on that statement."
  • 00:12:34.534 --> 00:12:36.536
  • Kirk: that's right.
  • 00:12:36.536 --> 00:12:37.904
  • Justin: and he responded, "well, my value judgment itself
  • 00:12:37.904 --> 00:12:39.739
  • Could come from my evolutionary past."
  • 00:12:39.739 --> 00:12:42.242
  • And i said, "but therefore, it's just as random in a sense as any
  • 00:12:42.242 --> 00:12:45.145
  • Product of evolution."
  • 00:12:45.145 --> 00:12:46.546
  • He said, "you could say that, but in any case, nothing about
  • 00:12:46.546 --> 00:12:48.982
  • It makes it more probable that there's anything supernatural."
  • 00:12:48.982 --> 00:12:52.385
  • And i finished by saying, "okay, but ultimately, your belief that
  • 00:12:52.385 --> 00:12:56.056
  • Rape is wrong is as arbitrary as the fact we've developed five
  • 00:12:56.056 --> 00:12:59.893
  • Fingers rather than six."
  • 00:12:59.893 --> 00:13:01.461
  • And he said, "you could say that, yes."
  • 00:13:01.461 --> 00:13:04.631
  • And that was, i think, a really interesting admission on the
  • 00:13:04.631 --> 00:13:07.434
  • Part of richard dawkins.
  • 00:13:07.434 --> 00:13:08.768
  • You could say that and i think you should say that if you're
  • 00:13:08.768 --> 00:13:11.738
  • A thoroughgoing atheist materialist as he is.
  • 00:13:11.738 --> 00:13:14.741
  • And yet most of us recoil with horror that the idea that our
  • 00:13:14.741 --> 00:13:17.777
  • Belief that rape is wrong is just one of those things.
  • 00:13:17.777 --> 00:13:20.647
  • Now, we kind of know that there are certain ways we should and
  • 00:13:20.647 --> 00:13:24.150
  • Shouldn't treat each other.
  • 00:13:24.150 --> 00:13:25.518
  • And that's why i think dawkins kind of tacitly had to admit
  • 00:13:25.518 --> 00:13:29.356
  • That atheism cannot support that idea.
  • 00:13:29.356 --> 00:13:31.791
  • Kirk: that's right.
  • 00:13:31.791 --> 00:13:33.126
  • Justin: that actually if there is real right and wrong, if
  • 00:13:33.126 --> 00:13:35.962
  • There are such things as human rights, then you have to have
  • 00:13:35.962 --> 00:13:39.566
  • A foundation that goes beyond nature, goes beyond evolution,
  • 00:13:39.566 --> 00:13:42.135
  • Goes beyond just the stuff of the universe.
  • 00:13:42.135 --> 00:13:44.671
  • You have to have a moral law giver.
  • 00:13:44.671 --> 00:13:46.806
  • And that was obviously the insight that led, you know, one
  • 00:13:46.806 --> 00:13:49.609
  • Of his forebears at oxford, c.s. lewis to to faith, actually.
  • 00:13:49.609 --> 00:13:53.280
  • He realized, i can't claim to believe in justice and truth and
  • 00:13:53.280 --> 00:13:57.150
  • Beauty unless there's a foundation for this in god and
  • 00:13:57.150 --> 00:14:00.553
  • That's what led him away from his atheism.
  • 00:14:00.553 --> 00:14:02.555
  • Kirk: that's right. that's right.
  • 00:14:02.555 --> 00:14:05.292
  • I found myself on that exact same journey asking myself these
  • 00:14:05.292 --> 00:14:07.694
  • Very same questions as the young christian who then began to ask,
  • 00:14:07.694 --> 00:14:11.064
  • Why do i really believe the claims of this bible?
  • 00:14:11.064 --> 00:14:13.967
  • And it's i can't go anywhere else.
  • 00:14:13.967 --> 00:14:16.136
  • Nothing else makes sense.
  • 00:14:16.136 --> 00:14:17.504
  • Nothing else lines up with reality.
  • 00:14:17.504 --> 00:14:19.372
  • Justin, what advice would you give to people who have loved
  • 00:14:19.372 --> 00:14:22.609
  • Ones, maybe their children or their parents or siblings who
  • 00:14:22.609 --> 00:14:27.013
  • Are stuck in an echo chamber?
  • 00:14:27.013 --> 00:14:28.782
  • They are only listening to people who believe like they do
  • 00:14:28.782 --> 00:14:33.153
  • Outside of the knowledge of god and it's hard to get into
  • 00:14:33.153 --> 00:14:37.590
  • Their world.
  • 00:14:37.590 --> 00:14:38.925
  • Justin: i think it's a great question because it's so hard
  • 00:14:38.925 --> 00:14:41.561
  • For all of us these days to escape our echo chambers.
  • 00:14:41.561 --> 00:14:44.197
  • It's kind of what social media and online influencers do.
  • 00:14:44.197 --> 00:14:47.834
  • It's kind of they feed you the same things you wanna hear.
  • 00:14:47.834 --> 00:14:50.704
  • And what i was trying to do in hosting these conversations was
  • 00:14:50.704 --> 00:14:53.573
  • To get people outside of those echo chambers and hear the best
  • 00:14:53.573 --> 00:14:56.710
  • Case both for and against their perspectives.
  • 00:14:56.710 --> 00:14:59.713
  • And so i would say the best thing you can do for someone
  • 00:14:59.713 --> 00:15:01.982
  • Who's in that position is to engage in real life offline
  • 00:15:01.982 --> 00:15:06.553
  • Conversations because i think that's where the rubber really
  • 00:15:06.553 --> 00:15:08.855
  • Hits the road, that you actually stop kind of this kind of
  • 00:15:08.855 --> 00:15:12.392
  • Algorithmic sense in which we only ever hear from people who
  • 00:15:12.392 --> 00:15:15.695
  • Have the same views as us.
  • 00:15:15.695 --> 00:15:17.630
  • It's really important i think to sit down and have genuine face
  • 00:15:17.630 --> 00:15:20.300
  • To face conversations.
  • 00:15:20.300 --> 00:15:21.634
  • So i think we should model that, but we need to do it with grace
  • 00:15:21.634 --> 00:15:24.971
  • And generosity because very often again, one of the worst
  • 00:15:24.971 --> 00:15:28.575
  • Things about the digital social media age we live in is the way
  • 00:15:28.575 --> 00:15:32.379
  • In which the polarization happens, but it kind of brings
  • 00:15:32.379 --> 00:15:34.781
  • Out the worst in people and you have to kind of demolish your
  • 00:15:34.781 --> 00:15:37.784
  • Opponent and their ideology.
  • 00:15:37.784 --> 00:15:39.619
  • So i would say just make sure that as we engage people in
  • 00:15:39.619 --> 00:15:42.622
  • Those hopefully gracious conversations, we season it with
  • 00:15:42.622 --> 00:15:45.792
  • That christ likeness, which as you said, was willing to go
  • 00:15:45.792 --> 00:15:48.695
  • Outside of the bubble and encounter people who the
  • 00:15:48.695 --> 00:15:51.631
  • Religious authorities viewed with suspicion and distrust.
  • 00:15:51.631 --> 00:15:54.968
  • We should do the same.
  • 00:15:54.968 --> 00:15:56.336
  • We should be open to the fact that, yeah, of course people
  • 00:15:56.336 --> 00:15:58.338
  • Aren't gonna share all the same views as us, but jesus calls us
  • 00:15:58.338 --> 00:16:01.741
  • To go and have those kinds of conversations that can be
  • 00:16:01.741 --> 00:16:04.711
  • Challenging, that can be difficult for us, but actually
  • 00:16:04.711 --> 00:16:07.580
  • Where if we go in his grace, in his love, and also knowing that
  • 00:16:07.580 --> 00:16:11.284
  • Actually we've got a really wonderful story to actually
  • 00:16:11.284 --> 00:16:14.521
  • Share with people, then amazing things can happen.
  • 00:16:14.521 --> 00:16:16.890
  • And i've always been surprised actually, just how incredibly
  • 00:16:16.890 --> 00:16:21.394
  • God can move when we actually step out and talk to someone
  • 00:16:21.394 --> 00:16:24.831
  • That we wouldn't necessarily think might have anything to say
  • 00:16:24.831 --> 00:16:28.034
  • To us.
  • 00:16:28.034 --> 00:16:30.236
  • And the foundation of that is not just good arguments and
  • 00:16:30.236 --> 00:16:33.740
  • Intellectual reasons for god.
  • 00:16:33.740 --> 00:16:35.175
  • Those are great.
  • 00:16:35.175 --> 00:16:36.543
  • Make sure that you're kind of, you've got something in the tank
  • 00:16:36.543 --> 00:16:38.545
  • For that.
  • 00:16:38.545 --> 00:16:39.913
  • But go--but always undergird it with prayer because for me, it's
  • 00:16:39.913 --> 00:16:43.950
  • When you join that prayer and the life of the mind that some
  • 00:16:43.950 --> 00:16:49.556
  • Incredible things can happen in my experience and you really do
  • 00:16:49.556 --> 00:16:52.358
  • See god moving both at an intellectual and a spiritual
  • 00:16:52.358 --> 00:16:55.395
  • Level in people's lives.
  • 00:16:55.395 --> 00:16:57.163
  • Kirk: because of these conversations that you've had
  • 00:16:57.163 --> 00:16:59.232
  • With people who are formidable opponents to many christians who
  • 00:16:59.232 --> 00:17:03.937
  • Try to debate them, you've come out with your faith in christ
  • 00:17:03.937 --> 00:17:08.875
  • And in the bible, strengthened.
  • 00:17:08.875 --> 00:17:11.111
  • But one of the worst nightmares for a parent is the thought of
  • 00:17:11.111 --> 00:17:15.515
  • Their child going off to college and being under the influence of
  • 00:17:15.515 --> 00:17:20.053
  • Some atheistic professor or some radical leftist ideology that
  • 00:17:20.053 --> 00:17:26.292
  • Will send them careening off a cliff abandoning their faith.
  • 00:17:26.292 --> 00:17:31.664
  • So how is it that you come out stronger and 80% of kids who go
  • 00:17:31.664 --> 00:17:38.238
  • Through college end up losing their faith in today's culture?
  • 00:17:38.238 --> 00:17:42.175
  • How can we engage in these conversations outside of our
  • 00:17:42.175 --> 00:17:45.245
  • Echo chamber and have confidence that we will have a net positive
  • 00:17:45.245 --> 00:17:51.584
  • Result, not a net negative?
  • 00:17:51.584 --> 00:17:54.020
  • Justin: yeah, it's a huge and important question because i
  • 00:17:54.020 --> 00:17:58.658
  • Think the reason why, if you like, i and many people, i guess
  • 00:17:58.658 --> 00:18:03.630
  • More here on this side of the pond, if you like, in the uk,
  • 00:18:03.630 --> 00:18:06.232
  • Have been able to withstand, if you like, all of those forces
  • 00:18:06.232 --> 00:18:09.269
  • That you talk about, is i think because it's harder to actually
  • 00:18:09.269 --> 00:18:12.505
  • Live in a kind of christian bubble in the uk.
  • 00:18:12.505 --> 00:18:15.909
  • And i think that's always the danger sometimes, especially in
  • 00:18:15.909 --> 00:18:18.511
  • Parts of america, especially there is more of a kind of a
  • 00:18:18.511 --> 00:18:21.848
  • Christian culture and you can be raised in a church where perhaps
  • 00:18:21.848 --> 00:18:25.251
  • Most of your influences are christian, then it's very easy
  • 00:18:25.251 --> 00:18:28.888
  • If you do then go off to college or enter a suddenly a secular
  • 00:18:28.888 --> 00:18:31.991
  • Environment to suddenly, it's kind of like
  • 00:18:31.991 --> 00:18:34.160
  • Cognitive dissonance.
  • 00:18:34.160 --> 00:18:35.495
  • You can't put together what you're hearing now with what you
  • 00:18:35.495 --> 00:18:38.464
  • Had learned as you grew up.
  • 00:18:38.464 --> 00:18:39.832
  • So i think the antidote to that is actually because we cannot
  • 00:18:39.832 --> 00:18:43.336
  • Shield our children and wrap them in a bubble, especially in
  • 00:18:43.336 --> 00:18:46.439
  • The age of the internet, you have to begin those
  • 00:18:46.439 --> 00:18:49.008
  • Conversations from early on.
  • 00:18:49.008 --> 00:18:50.743
  • You have to do it around the dinner table.
  • 00:18:50.743 --> 00:18:52.779
  • And you have to start to talk about the fact there are people
  • 00:18:52.779 --> 00:18:55.481
  • Who believe different things and maybe we believe in this family
  • 00:18:55.481 --> 00:18:57.817
  • Or at our church.
  • 00:18:57.817 --> 00:18:59.152
  • So let's have a good conversation about that.
  • 00:18:59.152 --> 00:19:01.254
  • Let's put that out on the table and let's work out what we would
  • 00:19:01.254 --> 00:19:04.257
  • Say, how we engage, what are some of the responses.
  • 00:19:04.257 --> 00:19:07.360
  • Because if you can do that from an early age, it means that
  • 00:19:07.360 --> 00:19:09.929
  • You're not setting up your children for a fall because
  • 00:19:09.929 --> 00:19:12.565
  • They've been prepared, they've had the opportunity to think
  • 00:19:12.565 --> 00:19:16.035
  • About it and to engage it and have thought through them by the
  • 00:19:16.035 --> 00:19:19.606
  • Time they actually encounter them in the big wide world.
  • 00:19:19.606 --> 00:19:23.009
  • Kirk: and finally, justin, you share in your book that one of
  • 00:19:23.009 --> 00:19:25.478
  • The most important lessons you've learned through these two
  • 00:19:25.478 --> 00:19:27.981
  • Decades of speaking with doubters, unbelievers, skeptics,
  • 00:19:27.981 --> 00:19:32.986
  • Is the importance of living by faith and not by sight.
  • 00:19:32.986 --> 00:19:36.623
  • If you have come to the conclusion that christianity is
  • 00:19:36.623 --> 00:19:39.592
  • The best explanation of reality in front of you, what then is
  • 00:19:39.592 --> 00:19:45.298
  • The value of living by faith when you can see that it's the
  • 00:19:45.298 --> 00:19:50.536
  • Best explanation?
  • 00:19:50.536 --> 00:19:51.938
  • Why do you still require faith?
  • 00:19:51.938 --> 00:19:53.973
  • Justin: i think the there is a difference between simply kind
  • 00:19:53.973 --> 00:19:56.576
  • Of seeing that something makes sense and faith because faith is
  • 00:19:56.576 --> 00:20:00.280
  • Not just believing in something, it's actually putting your trust
  • 00:20:00.280 --> 00:20:03.716
  • In it and it's doing something about it.
  • 00:20:03.716 --> 00:20:05.652
  • So i think of faith as a very active kind of thing.
  • 00:20:05.652 --> 00:20:08.888
  • So it's kind of the difference between knowing that this
  • 00:20:08.888 --> 00:20:12.425
  • Parachute is gonna hold you up when you jump out of a plane and
  • 00:20:12.425 --> 00:20:16.596
  • The difference between that and actually jumping out of the
  • 00:20:16.596 --> 00:20:18.698
  • Plane because then you're actually testing the hypothesis,
  • 00:20:18.698 --> 00:20:21.234
  • You're seeing what happens when you put some weight on this
  • 00:20:21.234 --> 00:20:23.870
  • Theoretical belief that you kind of have been convinced
  • 00:20:23.870 --> 00:20:26.039
  • Of intellectually.
  • 00:20:26.039 --> 00:20:27.540
  • Because that's what faith is.
  • 00:20:27.540 --> 00:20:28.975
  • You know, the book of james says, "even the demons believe
  • 00:20:28.975 --> 00:20:33.112
  • And tremble."
  • 00:20:33.112 --> 00:20:34.447
  • Belief isn't really what god's after in the end.
  • 00:20:34.447 --> 00:20:36.316
  • It's faith, it's trusting in him.
  • 00:20:36.316 --> 00:20:38.217
  • It's actually doing something with what you've found to
  • 00:20:38.217 --> 00:20:41.954
  • Be true.
  • 00:20:41.954 --> 00:20:43.289
  • And that will usually involve committing your life to it in
  • 00:20:43.289 --> 00:20:45.458
  • All kinds of radical and quite costly ways.
  • 00:20:45.458 --> 00:20:48.027
  • So for me, that is the most exciting part of the
  • 00:20:48.027 --> 00:20:50.563
  • Christian journey.
  • 00:20:50.563 --> 00:20:51.931
  • It's not having arguments and debates about atheism and faith,
  • 00:20:51.931 --> 00:20:53.933
  • They're fun, but actually it's when people get that this is
  • 00:20:53.933 --> 00:20:57.036
  • True and then stake something on it, live their life as if it's
  • 00:20:57.036 --> 00:21:00.540
  • True, and see what happens.
  • 00:21:00.540 --> 00:21:02.141
  • Kirk: that's right.
  • 00:21:02.141 --> 00:21:03.710
  • And the great revelation to the atheists, to the christian, to
  • 00:21:03.710 --> 00:21:09.349
  • The muslim who is honest, is that we've all got skin in the
  • 00:21:09.349 --> 00:21:13.820
  • Game and all of us have placed our faith in something and we
  • 00:21:13.820 --> 00:21:17.857
  • Will all test the validity of our hypothesis when we die and
  • 00:21:17.857 --> 00:21:23.429
  • We find out what happens next.
  • 00:21:23.429 --> 00:21:25.498
  • Either we'll stand before god and there will be the judgment,
  • 00:21:25.498 --> 00:21:29.669
  • Or nothing will happen at all or something worse.
  • 00:21:29.669 --> 00:21:34.674
  • And at the end of the day, i would never wanna put on the
  • 00:21:34.674 --> 00:21:38.578
  • Parachute of atheism because when i pull the lever, there is
  • 00:21:38.578 --> 00:21:45.418
  • No parachute.
  • 00:21:45.418 --> 00:21:46.786
  • Christianity has one and it's strong and i believe that it'll
  • 00:21:46.786 --> 00:21:49.989
  • Hold me.
  • 00:21:49.989 --> 00:21:51.324
  • And i believe it so much, i've put my faith in it.
  • 00:21:51.324 --> 00:21:53.793
  • Justin, thank you so much for our conversation today here
  • 00:21:53.793 --> 00:21:57.230
  • On "takeaways."
  • 00:21:57.230 --> 00:21:58.564
  • Justin: thank you so much, kirk.
  • 00:21:58.564 --> 00:21:59.932
  • It's been an absolute pleasure being with you.
  • 00:21:59.932 --> 00:22:01.534
  • God bless you, and thank you so much for the conversation.
  • 00:22:01.534 --> 00:22:04.804
  • Kirk: i hope you all get justin's book and up next, casey
  • 00:22:04.804 --> 00:22:07.707
  • Luskin is gonna join us to share recent discoveries that strongly
  • 00:22:07.707 --> 00:22:11.444
  • Support intelligent design theories.
  • 00:22:11.444 --> 00:22:13.413
  • Stay with us.
  • 00:22:13.413 --> 00:22:14.847
  • We wanna welcome katie miller, director of brand development
  • 00:22:17.784 --> 00:22:20.953
  • For sight and sound.
  • 00:22:20.953 --> 00:22:22.655
  • This is a storytelling company passionate about bringing true
  • 00:22:22.655 --> 00:22:26.125
  • Stories of redemption to life on the stage and on screen that
  • 00:22:26.125 --> 00:22:30.129
  • Reveal the power of the gospel.
  • 00:22:30.129 --> 00:22:32.932
  • Since its beginning, as a traveling multimedia show in
  • 00:22:32.932 --> 00:22:35.701
  • 1976, sight and sound has inspired over 30 million people
  • 00:22:35.701 --> 00:22:40.773
  • With stories from the pages of scripture and history.
  • 00:22:40.773 --> 00:22:44.744
  • In 2020, it launched an online streaming platform welcoming a
  • 00:22:44.744 --> 00:22:49.048
  • New global audience from over 175 countries around the world.
  • 00:22:49.048 --> 00:22:53.820
  • Katie, i'm so excited to be talking with you.
  • 00:22:53.820 --> 00:22:55.955
  • Katie miller: i'm so grateful to be here.
  • 00:22:55.955 --> 00:22:57.290
  • Thank you for taking time.
  • 00:22:57.290 --> 00:22:58.658
  • Kirk: sight and sound is amazing.
  • 00:22:58.658 --> 00:23:01.260
  • It is stunning.
  • 00:23:01.260 --> 00:23:02.595
  • It is brilliant and beautiful.
  • 00:23:02.595 --> 00:23:03.963
  • I've been there several times in lancaster, pennsylvania.
  • 00:23:03.963 --> 00:23:06.766
  • Can you describe it for people who have never been there and
  • 00:23:06.766 --> 00:23:09.535
  • Don't know what it is?
  • 00:23:09.535 --> 00:23:10.937
  • Katie: i sure can.
  • 00:23:10.937 --> 00:23:12.271
  • I always try.
  • 00:23:12.271 --> 00:23:13.639
  • It always feels like a little bit of a hard thing, but,
  • 00:23:13.639 --> 00:23:15.274
  • You know, we are coming up on celebrating 50 years and for
  • 00:23:15.274 --> 00:23:18.177
  • The most part we're known for the place where the bible comes
  • 00:23:18.177 --> 00:23:20.746
  • To life on stage.
  • 00:23:20.746 --> 00:23:22.081
  • So we stage bible stories in a big spectacular way with a 300
  • 00:23:22.081 --> 00:23:25.485
  • Foot wraparound stage, live animals that go up and down the
  • 00:23:25.485 --> 00:23:28.654
  • Aisles, a cast of 50, and lots of special effects.
  • 00:23:28.654 --> 00:23:31.991
  • However, our heart is really to immerse families and audiences
  • 00:23:31.991 --> 00:23:36.929
  • In the heart of the story and the message that comes to life
  • 00:23:36.929 --> 00:23:40.933
  • Right before their eyes from the bible.
  • 00:23:40.933 --> 00:23:42.568
  • So that's what our hope is.
  • 00:23:42.568 --> 00:23:44.136
  • Kirk: well, i also know that this is the second year that
  • 00:23:44.136 --> 00:23:46.772
  • Sight and sound is broadcasting live into movie theaters around
  • 00:23:46.772 --> 00:23:50.610
  • The country.
  • 00:23:50.610 --> 00:23:51.944
  • So if you can't go to sight and sound, sight and sound is now
  • 00:23:51.944 --> 00:23:54.313
  • Coming to your neighborhood.
  • 00:23:54.313 --> 00:23:56.315
  • Talk to us about what inspired you to make this move.
  • 00:23:56.315 --> 00:23:58.918
  • Katie: yeah, so noah is on stage in lancaster this year and it's
  • 00:23:58.918 --> 00:24:02.355
  • 30th anniversary.
  • 00:24:02.355 --> 00:24:03.990
  • And up until we did noah back in 1995, we had been doing review
  • 00:24:03.990 --> 00:24:07.627
  • Style shows, multimedia shows, and my grandfather is very
  • 00:24:07.627 --> 00:24:11.397
  • Innovative and had this crazy idea to do a larger than life
  • 00:24:11.397 --> 00:24:15.768
  • Bible story and he wanted to do noah and he loves to tell
  • 00:24:15.768 --> 00:24:18.738
  • The story.
  • 00:24:18.738 --> 00:24:20.072
  • People all of his team said, "i don't think it
  • 00:24:20.072 --> 00:24:21.440
  • Can be done, glenn."
  • 00:24:21.440 --> 00:24:22.775
  • And he said, "i think it can. let's try."
  • 00:24:22.775 --> 00:24:25.478
  • Kirk: we can do this.
  • 00:24:25.478 --> 00:24:26.812
  • Katie: we can do this.
  • 00:24:26.812 --> 00:24:28.180
  • And i remember like i remember being an 11-year-old standing
  • 00:24:28.180 --> 00:24:29.782
  • In the theater just going, i don't know what we just did.
  • 00:24:29.782 --> 00:24:31.384
  • I was standing inside this ark with hundreds of animals
  • 00:24:31.384 --> 00:24:33.452
  • Around me.
  • 00:24:33.452 --> 00:24:34.787
  • And it really did.
  • 00:24:34.787 --> 00:24:36.656
  • It was a moment for us in sight and sound history to say this is
  • 00:24:36.656 --> 00:24:39.859
  • What we're called to do.
  • 00:24:39.859 --> 00:24:41.193
  • Like bringing the bible to life on stage and we've never looked
  • 00:24:41.193 --> 00:24:43.462
  • Back so we've been doing bible stories ever since.
  • 00:24:43.462 --> 00:24:46.032
  • And this year is it's 30 years since it first premiered.
  • 00:24:46.032 --> 00:24:49.368
  • We refreshed the whole show.
  • 00:24:49.368 --> 00:24:51.203
  • We are sold out.
  • 00:24:51.203 --> 00:24:52.572
  • It has been--we are just overwhelmed.
  • 00:24:52.572 --> 00:24:53.906
  • We're so grateful and we said, "okay, we've got to do something
  • 00:24:53.906 --> 00:24:57.310
  • To celebrate this show."
  • 00:24:57.310 --> 00:24:58.678
  • So we are bringing it into movie theaters with a true live
  • 00:24:58.678 --> 00:25:02.248
  • Broadcast and then a bunch of encore performances as well to
  • 00:25:02.248 --> 00:25:05.251
  • Celebrate its 30th year.
  • 00:25:05.251 --> 00:25:07.453
  • Kirk: what do you hope that families will experience when
  • 00:25:07.453 --> 00:25:10.790
  • They leave a sight and sound live performance?
  • 00:25:10.790 --> 00:25:14.493
  • Katie: yeah, there's nothing like watching the wonder in the
  • 00:25:14.493 --> 00:25:17.396
  • Kids' eyes when the animals are running up and down the aisles.
  • 00:25:17.396 --> 00:25:19.632
  • We have skunks, live skunks in the show that walk up.
  • 00:25:19.632 --> 00:25:21.867
  • Kirk: they have been deskunked?
  • 00:25:21.867 --> 00:25:23.235
  • Katie: they have been deskunked, but they walk up into the ark.
  • 00:25:23.235 --> 00:25:24.870
  • It's so endearing.
  • 00:25:24.870 --> 00:25:26.205
  • But for me, the thing that always means the most is when we
  • 00:25:26.205 --> 00:25:29.241
  • Get letters or emails or comments afterwards of parents
  • 00:25:29.241 --> 00:25:31.611
  • Who said, "i left today and we talked the whole way home about
  • 00:25:31.611 --> 00:25:36.649
  • How does it mean to live like noah in the world we're in
  • 00:25:36.649 --> 00:25:39.986
  • Today" or what, you know, how did noah process when that ark
  • 00:25:39.986 --> 00:25:44.323
  • Door shut.
  • 00:25:44.323 --> 00:25:45.691
  • We've talked so much about his family being celebrated and
  • 00:25:45.691 --> 00:25:47.793
  • Saved and that's true, but they lost so much.
  • 00:25:47.793 --> 00:25:50.663
  • It was their neighbors.
  • 00:25:50.663 --> 00:25:51.998
  • It was their extended family who chose not to come on board
  • 00:25:51.998 --> 00:25:54.400
  • With them.
  • 00:25:54.400 --> 00:25:55.768
  • And so there's, while this show is beautiful and fun and funny,
  • 00:25:55.768 --> 00:25:59.639
  • There's comedy through it, there is like a thread of grief as
  • 00:25:59.639 --> 00:26:02.875
  • Well that you watch noah's family experience.
  • 00:26:02.875 --> 00:26:04.844
  • And so to hear parents say, "we went home and read the story
  • 00:26:04.844 --> 00:26:08.114
  • Together with our kids or we decided to do a devotional
  • 00:26:08.114 --> 00:26:11.417
  • Together to talk through what we watched on stage.
  • 00:26:11.417 --> 00:26:14.186
  • We wanna read it for ourselves now."
  • 00:26:14.186 --> 00:26:15.588
  • Like, that's what means something to us.
  • 00:26:15.588 --> 00:26:17.223
  • That's when we're like, thank you, lord, that's the work right
  • 00:26:17.223 --> 00:26:20.159
  • There is families having tools to be able to grow their
  • 00:26:20.159 --> 00:26:23.295
  • Family's faith.
  • 00:26:23.295 --> 00:26:24.664
  • Kirk: well, katie, i have so much respect for sight and sound
  • 00:26:24.664 --> 00:26:27.700
  • And for you and for all the actors and everyone involved in
  • 00:26:27.700 --> 00:26:30.369
  • These productions because of all the things you could be bringing
  • 00:26:30.369 --> 00:26:34.240
  • To life, you're bringing to life the most redemptive stories in
  • 00:26:34.240 --> 00:26:37.910
  • The world and nothing can transform the heart of mankind,
  • 00:26:37.910 --> 00:26:42.581
  • But the gospel.
  • 00:26:42.581 --> 00:26:43.949
  • And that's what you are committed to.
  • 00:26:43.949 --> 00:26:46.318
  • And stories like noah help all of us teach our children about
  • 00:26:46.318 --> 00:26:49.989
  • How the bible really does explain reality.
  • 00:26:49.989 --> 00:26:52.425
  • And that flood helps us to understand so much about the
  • 00:26:52.425 --> 00:26:56.429
  • Different races of people.
  • 00:26:56.429 --> 00:26:58.064
  • It helps us understand about ecology.
  • 00:26:58.064 --> 00:27:00.232
  • It helps us understand about the world that we live in, what may
  • 00:27:00.232 --> 00:27:02.935
  • Have started the ice age, which we learn about in science
  • 00:27:02.935 --> 00:27:06.005
  • Classes and these are the stories that start the
  • 00:27:06.005 --> 00:27:09.175
  • Conversations we hope and pray for as parents and grandparents
  • 00:27:09.175 --> 00:27:12.044
  • With our kids.
  • 00:27:12.044 --> 00:27:13.412
  • Katie: yeah, and you know one of the things that blows my mind
  • 00:27:13.412 --> 00:27:16.015
  • Is, and this is such a thing that our story team just brought
  • 00:27:16.015 --> 00:27:20.119
  • Out of the story in a beautiful way.
  • 00:27:20.119 --> 00:27:22.688
  • You know, we forget sometimes that noah, god talked to noah
  • 00:27:22.688 --> 00:27:26.025
  • And told him to build an ark, but that did not--it did not
  • 00:27:26.025 --> 00:27:28.260
  • Start raining.
  • 00:27:28.260 --> 00:27:29.595
  • They did not have that ark finished for nearly 100 years.
  • 00:27:29.595 --> 00:27:31.897
  • It was what they assume between 75 to 100 years of building
  • 00:27:31.897 --> 00:27:35.134
  • An ark.
  • 00:27:35.134 --> 00:27:36.469
  • And the faithfulness that was required for noah to live with
  • 00:27:36.469 --> 00:27:40.239
  • All the opposition that was around him, it says he was the
  • 00:27:40.239 --> 00:27:42.808
  • Last righteous man on earth.
  • 00:27:42.808 --> 00:27:45.010
  • And so for 100 years of living faithfully in the midst of the
  • 00:27:45.010 --> 00:27:49.515
  • Faithless world around him is so inspiring and i think just as
  • 00:27:49.515 --> 00:27:54.186
  • Relevant today as it ever has been and it's something that you
  • 00:27:54.186 --> 00:27:57.490
  • Know even i have a 12-year-old, he's my youngest and after he
  • 00:27:57.490 --> 00:28:00.292
  • Watched the show this year, he's not stopped talking about it.
  • 00:28:00.292 --> 00:28:02.661
  • It's been months now and he's still going, "mom, like, how do
  • 00:28:02.661 --> 00:28:04.997
  • You think it was when noah, you know, when his brother chose not
  • 00:28:04.997 --> 00:28:07.967
  • To get on the ark with him or when his neighbor, you know, and
  • 00:28:07.967 --> 00:28:11.237
  • How can we be that light to the world for our neighbors, you
  • 00:28:11.237 --> 00:28:15.641
  • Know, and our family members."
  • 00:28:15.641 --> 00:28:16.976
  • Kirk: and it all comes to life in such a beautiful way together
  • 00:28:16.976 --> 00:28:18.944
  • With your family and all sorts of other families.
  • 00:28:18.944 --> 00:28:21.347
  • It is glorious.
  • 00:28:21.347 --> 00:28:23.349
  • If you would like to learn more about sight and sound, go to
  • 00:28:23.349 --> 00:28:25.985
  • Their website site-sound.com.
  • 00:28:25.985 --> 00:28:29.922
  • We'll be right back with more on "takeaways."
  • 00:28:29.922 --> 00:28:34.992
  • We'll be right back with more on "takeaways."
  • 00:28:34.992 --> 00:28:38.327
  • Kirk: my next guest is casey luskin, the associate director
  • 00:28:42.565 --> 00:28:46.102
  • Of the center for science and culture.
  • 00:28:46.102 --> 00:28:48.404
  • Casey assists and defends scientists, educators, and
  • 00:28:48.404 --> 00:28:52.375
  • Students who seek to freely study, research, and teach about
  • 00:28:52.375 --> 00:28:56.846
  • The scientific debate over darwinian evolution and
  • 00:28:56.846 --> 00:28:59.816
  • Intelligent design.
  • 00:28:59.816 --> 00:29:01.317
  • He's also one of the co-editors of the "comprehensive guide to
  • 00:29:01.317 --> 00:29:05.188
  • Science and faith: exploring the ultimate questions about life
  • 00:29:05.188 --> 00:29:09.592
  • And the cosmos."
  • 00:29:09.592 --> 00:29:11.394
  • Casey, i'm so excited to have you here on "takeaways."
  • 00:29:11.394 --> 00:29:13.830
  • Casey: thanks for having me, kirk.
  • 00:29:13.830 --> 00:29:15.398
  • Kirk: well, this has been a topic that i've been fascinated
  • 00:29:15.398 --> 00:29:19.235
  • By for years and years and years and i'm so glad that now
  • 00:29:19.235 --> 00:29:24.307
  • Scientists can't ignore the intelligent design argument
  • 00:29:24.307 --> 00:29:27.877
  • Anymore and it's really getting traction.
  • 00:29:27.877 --> 00:29:30.213
  • Can you talk to us about what is the buzz about intelligent
  • 00:29:30.213 --> 00:29:35.418
  • Design within the traditional scientific community?
  • 00:29:35.418 --> 00:29:38.921
  • Casey: yeah, so i work as the research director
  • 00:29:38.921 --> 00:29:41.390
  • At discovery institute.
  • 00:29:41.390 --> 00:29:42.725
  • And so what we're really excited about is we are seeing
  • 00:29:42.725 --> 00:29:45.361
  • Scientists all around the world doing research that's
  • 00:29:45.361 --> 00:29:48.264
  • Discovering evidence for intelligent design in nature.
  • 00:29:48.264 --> 00:29:50.800
  • We're talking about looking at the amount of information that
  • 00:29:50.800 --> 00:29:53.302
  • We see in dna or how the universe is fine tuned for life
  • 00:29:53.302 --> 00:29:57.039
  • Or how there are certain features of cells that defy
  • 00:29:57.039 --> 00:30:01.644
  • A darwinian gradual explanation, molecular machines that are
  • 00:30:01.644 --> 00:30:04.513
  • Incredibly complex.
  • 00:30:04.513 --> 00:30:06.115
  • And so what scientists are recognizing is that there's all
  • 00:30:06.115 --> 00:30:08.751
  • Kinds of features in nature that can't arise through this sort of
  • 00:30:08.751 --> 00:30:11.621
  • Unguided darwinian mechanism that's been around for so
  • 00:30:11.621 --> 00:30:15.024
  • Many years.
  • 00:30:15.024 --> 00:30:16.392
  • They're realizing that that mechanism doesn't work and they
  • 00:30:16.392 --> 00:30:18.427
  • Need to find better ways to explain what we see in nature.
  • 00:30:18.427 --> 00:30:21.264
  • Kirk: wow.
  • 00:30:21.264 --> 00:30:22.632
  • So what i'm hearing you say is that the very theory of
  • 00:30:22.632 --> 00:30:26.102
  • Darwinian evolution that we have been told is essentially fact.
  • 00:30:26.102 --> 00:30:31.173
  • It's science.
  • 00:30:31.173 --> 00:30:32.575
  • You know, when people say, "well, i don't have faith.
  • 00:30:32.575 --> 00:30:34.510
  • I'm not a faith guy.
  • 00:30:34.510 --> 00:30:36.078
  • I'm a science guy," and they equate that with
  • 00:30:36.078 --> 00:30:38.080
  • Darwinian evolution.
  • 00:30:38.080 --> 00:30:39.448
  • You're saying the evidence actually is not backing up that
  • 00:30:39.448 --> 00:30:41.884
  • Theory because there's not a right mechanism or there's not
  • 00:30:41.884 --> 00:30:46.122
  • A right whatever, and intelligent design is maybe
  • 00:30:46.122 --> 00:30:50.493
  • A better explanation.
  • 00:30:50.493 --> 00:30:51.994
  • Of course, i think it is too, but is intelligent design now
  • 00:30:51.994 --> 00:30:56.599
  • A scientific theory?
  • 00:30:56.599 --> 00:30:58.734
  • Casey: yes, absolutely.
  • 00:30:58.734 --> 00:31:00.069
  • Intelligent design uses the scientific method to make
  • 00:31:00.069 --> 00:31:02.872
  • Its claims.
  • 00:31:02.872 --> 00:31:04.240
  • And so the way intelligent design works is basically
  • 00:31:04.240 --> 00:31:06.142
  • Like this.
  • 00:31:06.142 --> 00:31:07.510
  • We start by observing the kind of information and complexity
  • 00:31:07.510 --> 00:31:10.613
  • That intelligent agents produce when they act.
  • 00:31:10.613 --> 00:31:12.848
  • And what we find is that when intelligent agents act, they
  • 00:31:12.848 --> 00:31:15.351
  • Produce things like language-based code
  • 00:31:15.351 --> 00:31:18.054
  • Or machine-like structures.
  • 00:31:18.054 --> 00:31:19.422
  • So we can then make a hypothesis that says, okay, when we look at
  • 00:31:19.422 --> 00:31:22.358
  • Biology, we're gonna find language-based code and
  • 00:31:22.358 --> 00:31:25.161
  • Machine-like structures in living systems.
  • 00:31:25.161 --> 00:31:27.697
  • And what they're finding is that let's talk about proteins, okay?
  • 00:31:27.697 --> 00:31:30.366
  • What is a protein, kirk?
  • 00:31:30.366 --> 00:31:31.734
  • A protein is basically a very long chain of amino acids that
  • 00:31:31.734 --> 00:31:35.604
  • Is folded up into a very specific shape to form a very
  • 00:31:35.604 --> 00:31:38.641
  • Important function in your cells, right?
  • 00:31:38.641 --> 00:31:40.609
  • So we take amino acids in our vitamins 'cause they form the
  • 00:31:40.609 --> 00:31:43.212
  • Building blocks of our proteins.
  • 00:31:43.212 --> 00:31:45.114
  • It turns out, and this is some of the research that intelligent
  • 00:31:45.114 --> 00:31:47.717
  • Science theorists are doing, that the ordering of those amino
  • 00:31:47.717 --> 00:31:50.753
  • Acids and proteins has to be just right.
  • 00:31:50.753 --> 00:31:53.222
  • Those amino acids have to be in precisely the right order in
  • 00:31:53.222 --> 00:31:56.425
  • Order for proteins to be able to do their functions.
  • 00:31:56.425 --> 00:31:59.328
  • In fact, one, id theorist, a protein scientist named douglas
  • 00:31:59.328 --> 00:32:02.565
  • Axe, got his phd at caltech, he found that for a very typical
  • 00:32:02.565 --> 00:32:07.436
  • Protein, the likelihood of chance generating the amino
  • 00:32:07.436 --> 00:32:11.340
  • Acids in just the right order for those proteins to be able to
  • 00:32:11.340 --> 00:32:14.176
  • Work is less than one in ten of the 77th power, okay?
  • 00:32:14.176 --> 00:32:17.880
  • So we can ask is, what is generating those amino acids to
  • 00:32:17.880 --> 00:32:21.617
  • Be in the right order?
  • 00:32:21.617 --> 00:32:22.952
  • Well, in our experience, the only kind of cause that can
  • 00:32:22.952 --> 00:32:25.354
  • Generate the information that we see in these proteins is
  • 00:32:25.354 --> 00:32:28.824
  • An intelligent cause.
  • 00:32:28.824 --> 00:32:30.159
  • So then we make a conclusion and that conclusion is that an
  • 00:32:30.159 --> 00:32:32.428
  • Intelligence is the best explanation for the information
  • 00:32:32.428 --> 00:32:35.865
  • That we see in living systems.
  • 00:32:35.865 --> 00:32:37.199
  • And so ideas using the scientific method, it's doing
  • 00:32:37.199 --> 00:32:40.569
  • Research to back up our findings and it's being done by
  • 00:32:40.569 --> 00:32:43.072
  • Scientists from highly credible institutions.
  • 00:32:43.072 --> 00:32:45.508
  • So i think by any reasonable measure, intelligent design is
  • 00:32:45.508 --> 00:32:49.111
  • A scientific theory.
  • 00:32:49.111 --> 00:32:50.479
  • Kirk: wow.
  • 00:32:50.479 --> 00:32:51.814
  • I just, i absolutely love this.
  • 00:32:51.814 --> 00:32:53.182
  • I geek out on this kind of stuff and i always want to hear what's
  • 00:32:53.182 --> 00:32:57.286
  • Next, what's next.
  • 00:32:57.286 --> 00:32:58.654
  • So, what would you say are the top lines of arguments that
  • 00:32:58.654 --> 00:33:03.225
  • Support intelligent design.
  • 00:33:03.225 --> 00:33:04.560
  • Right now you're talking about the fine tuning of proteins and
  • 00:33:04.560 --> 00:33:07.463
  • Amino acids.
  • 00:33:07.463 --> 00:33:08.798
  • What are some of the other top lines of argumentation for id?
  • 00:33:08.798 --> 00:33:13.135
  • Casey: sure.
  • 00:33:13.135 --> 00:33:14.470
  • So i would give three main lines of evidence that i like to talk
  • 00:33:14.470 --> 00:33:16.572
  • About as the evidence for intelligent design.
  • 00:33:16.572 --> 00:33:18.541
  • The first line of evidence is that our universe had
  • 00:33:18.541 --> 00:33:20.776
  • A beginning.
  • 00:33:20.776 --> 00:33:22.111
  • But one of the greatest discoveries of physics and
  • 00:33:22.111 --> 00:33:23.479
  • Cosmology over the last 100 years is that our universe had
  • 00:33:23.479 --> 00:33:26.082
  • A beginning.
  • 00:33:26.082 --> 00:33:27.450
  • And if it had a beginning, that implies some super powerful
  • 00:33:27.450 --> 00:33:30.152
  • First cause that exists outside of space and time to get our
  • 00:33:30.152 --> 00:33:33.722
  • Universe going.
  • 00:33:33.722 --> 00:33:35.057
  • That's really what we would call god in many cases, right?
  • 00:33:35.057 --> 00:33:37.593
  • So i think that an intelligent cause, super intelligent outside
  • 00:33:37.593 --> 00:33:40.996
  • Of space and time is the best explanation for the beginning to
  • 00:33:40.996 --> 00:33:43.899
  • The universe.
  • 00:33:43.899 --> 00:33:45.267
  • The next line of evidence would be the fine tuning of the laws
  • 00:33:45.267 --> 00:33:47.703
  • Of nature.
  • 00:33:47.703 --> 00:33:49.038
  • Again, a major discovery in physics and cosmology over the
  • 00:33:49.038 --> 00:33:51.874
  • Last 100 years is that the laws of nature have to have very
  • 00:33:51.874 --> 00:33:55.044
  • Precise values if we can live in a universe where life can exist.
  • 00:33:55.044 --> 00:33:58.414
  • We're talking about things like the fundamental laws and
  • 00:33:58.414 --> 00:34:01.684
  • Concepts of nature like the strength of the force of gravity
  • 00:34:01.684 --> 00:34:04.887
  • Or the strength of the electromagnetic force.
  • 00:34:04.887 --> 00:34:07.623
  • But all of the fine tuning of nature is kind of blown away by
  • 00:34:07.623 --> 00:34:10.826
  • One particular fine tuning parameter and that is the
  • 00:34:10.826 --> 00:34:13.762
  • Initial entropy of the universe.
  • 00:34:13.762 --> 00:34:15.464
  • And it turns out that if you're to be able to form things like
  • 00:34:15.464 --> 00:34:18.901
  • Galaxies and stars and planets, the initial entropy of the
  • 00:34:18.901 --> 00:34:21.604
  • Universe has to be fine-tuned to within one part in ten raised to
  • 00:34:21.604 --> 00:34:25.508
  • The power of ten to the 123rd power.
  • 00:34:25.508 --> 00:34:29.011
  • Okay, kirk, we can't even write out numbers like that.
  • 00:34:29.011 --> 00:34:31.981
  • They're so, so small.
  • 00:34:31.981 --> 00:34:33.916
  • If you were to try to write out that number, writing 1000 zeros
  • 00:34:33.916 --> 00:34:37.119
  • Per second, you would die trillions and trillions and
  • 00:34:37.119 --> 00:34:39.788
  • Trillions of years before we could finish writing out that
  • 00:34:39.788 --> 00:34:42.391
  • Number, okay?
  • 00:34:42.391 --> 00:34:43.759
  • So we're talking about some super intelligent cause has fine
  • 00:34:43.759 --> 00:34:47.096
  • Tuned the laws of nature, crafted the laws of
  • 00:34:47.096 --> 00:34:49.765
  • The universe.
  • 00:34:49.765 --> 00:34:51.100
  • This shows an incredible amount of care and really intelligence
  • 00:34:51.100 --> 00:34:54.803
  • That was necessary to create our universe.
  • 00:34:54.803 --> 00:34:56.972
  • So again, this is where intelligent design comes in.
  • 00:34:56.972 --> 00:34:59.708
  • I don't wanna to go on and on.
  • 00:34:59.708 --> 00:35:01.076
  • We can talk also about the information in life.
  • 00:35:01.076 --> 00:35:03.345
  • Life runs on information.
  • 00:35:03.345 --> 00:35:04.713
  • That's one of the greatest discoveries of the last 50 or
  • 00:35:04.713 --> 00:35:07.082
  • 60 years.
  • 00:35:07.082 --> 00:35:08.417
  • Again, we have information in our dna.
  • 00:35:08.417 --> 00:35:10.052
  • But kirk, a dna molecule by itself it's kind of like having
  • 00:35:10.052 --> 00:35:13.355
  • A dvd.
  • 00:35:13.355 --> 00:35:14.723
  • Remember we used to watch dvds to watch movies?
  • 00:35:14.723 --> 00:35:16.458
  • Yeah, so a dvd by itself is basically useless, right?
  • 00:35:16.458 --> 00:35:19.161
  • You need some machinery to read and interpret that information,
  • 00:35:19.161 --> 00:35:23.098
  • Those instructions on the dvd to give you some kind of
  • 00:35:23.098 --> 00:35:25.935
  • A useful output.
  • 00:35:25.935 --> 00:35:27.269
  • Well, it turns out dna is exactly the same.
  • 00:35:27.269 --> 00:35:29.872
  • A dna molecule by itself is not going to do anything for you.
  • 00:35:29.872 --> 00:35:33.442
  • You need machinery in your cells to read the information on the
  • 00:35:33.442 --> 00:35:37.746
  • Dna and give you some kind of useful output.
  • 00:35:37.746 --> 00:35:40.482
  • So we literally have molecular machines in our cells that can
  • 00:35:40.482 --> 00:35:43.752
  • Read commands and codes in our dna, interpret those
  • 00:35:43.752 --> 00:35:47.389
  • Instructions, and then execute them and produce the output.
  • 00:35:47.389 --> 00:35:50.726
  • But where in our experience to things like computer-like code,
  • 00:35:50.726 --> 00:35:53.796
  • You know, language-based code and then information processing
  • 00:35:53.796 --> 00:35:57.466
  • To read, interpret, and execute those commands.
  • 00:35:57.466 --> 00:35:59.902
  • And then machine like structures.
  • 00:35:59.902 --> 00:36:01.604
  • Where in our experience do those things come from?
  • 00:36:01.604 --> 00:36:03.772
  • In all of our experience they have only one--
  • 00:36:03.772 --> 00:36:05.441
  • Kirk: i know. i know.
  • 00:36:05.441 --> 00:36:08.110
  • Casey: what do you think? kirk: intelligence.
  • 00:36:08.110 --> 00:36:09.511
  • Casey: intelligence, exactly, kirk.
  • 00:36:09.511 --> 00:36:11.180
  • So intelligence is the best explanation for what we see
  • 00:36:11.180 --> 00:36:13.215
  • At the very heart of life.
  • 00:36:13.215 --> 00:36:14.550
  • Kirk: oh, i love this. i love this.
  • 00:36:14.550 --> 00:36:17.253
  • Are you loving this like i'm loving this?
  • 00:36:17.253 --> 00:36:18.954
  • Okay, i have heard that now, today, in our lifetime, there's
  • 00:36:18.954 --> 00:36:22.925
  • Never been a better opportunity for intelligent design
  • 00:36:22.925 --> 00:36:28.764
  • Scientists to posit that the human origins line up with what
  • 00:36:28.764 --> 00:36:35.337
  • We see in the bible in the book of genesis with adam and eve.
  • 00:36:35.337 --> 00:36:39.241
  • Can you unpack that for us?
  • 00:36:39.241 --> 00:36:40.943
  • Casey: sure. so i am a christian.
  • 00:36:40.943 --> 00:36:42.978
  • I do believe in adam and eve.
  • 00:36:42.978 --> 00:36:44.313
  • I don't know if i can prove to you, you know,
  • 00:36:44.313 --> 00:36:46.348
  • Scientifically that adam and eve existed.
  • 00:36:46.348 --> 00:36:47.750
  • What i can say is that the evidence is very consistent with
  • 00:36:47.750 --> 00:36:51.320
  • The biblical view that we originated from just an initial
  • 00:36:51.320 --> 00:36:54.089
  • Pair of two individuals, okay?
  • 00:36:54.089 --> 00:36:56.058
  • So one of my favorite lines of evidence to talk about here is
  • 00:36:56.058 --> 00:36:58.861
  • From the fossil record.
  • 00:36:58.861 --> 00:37:00.195
  • When we look at the fossil record, we see a distinct break
  • 00:37:00.195 --> 00:37:03.499
  • In the fossil record between what i would call ape-like
  • 00:37:03.499 --> 00:37:06.068
  • Creatures and human-like creatures.
  • 00:37:06.068 --> 00:37:08.170
  • That alone shows, i think, a design event in the history of
  • 00:37:08.170 --> 00:37:11.840
  • Life that shows that basically we were divinely created by an
  • 00:37:11.840 --> 00:37:17.112
  • Intelligent cause by god, basically, 'cause we see the
  • 00:37:17.112 --> 00:37:20.349
  • Human-like body plan appearing very abruptly in the fossil
  • 00:37:20.349 --> 00:37:24.153
  • Record and that is not compatible with the
  • 00:37:24.153 --> 00:37:26.388
  • Darwinian explanation.
  • 00:37:26.388 --> 00:37:27.756
  • It's much more compatible with intelligent design.
  • 00:37:27.756 --> 00:37:30.526
  • Secondly, let's talk about human genetics, okay?
  • 00:37:30.526 --> 00:37:32.895
  • You've heard that old statistic that says that we are 99%
  • 00:37:32.895 --> 00:37:36.332
  • Genetically similar to chimps.
  • 00:37:36.332 --> 00:37:37.800
  • Well, guess what?
  • 00:37:37.800 --> 00:37:39.134
  • There was a paper that came out very recently in april of this
  • 00:37:39.134 --> 00:37:41.637
  • Year, 2025, which found that actually we are somewhere
  • 00:37:41.637 --> 00:37:45.341
  • Between 14% to 15% genetically different from chimps.
  • 00:37:45.341 --> 00:37:49.845
  • That old 99% statistic that we're 99% the same is no
  • 00:37:49.845 --> 00:37:53.549
  • Longer true.
  • 00:37:53.549 --> 00:37:54.883
  • The true degree of genetic difference between humans and
  • 00:37:54.883 --> 00:37:57.786
  • Chimps is an order of magnitude greater, ten times greater than
  • 00:37:57.786 --> 00:38:01.623
  • What we've been told.
  • 00:38:01.623 --> 00:38:02.991
  • It's more like 14% to 15% genetically different between
  • 00:38:02.991 --> 00:38:05.527
  • Humans and chimps.
  • 00:38:05.527 --> 00:38:06.862
  • Then finally, think about human psychology.
  • 00:38:06.862 --> 00:38:09.765
  • Sometimes we talk--we hear about this field of evolutionary
  • 00:38:09.765 --> 00:38:11.834
  • Psychology which says that human behavior can be explained in
  • 00:38:11.834 --> 00:38:15.604
  • Evolutionary terms.
  • 00:38:15.604 --> 00:38:16.939
  • But why do humans do things like building cathedrals, studying
  • 00:38:16.939 --> 00:38:20.876
  • Science, creating music, worshiping god?
  • 00:38:20.876 --> 00:38:23.746
  • None of these very precious and cherished behaviors of human
  • 00:38:23.746 --> 00:38:27.750
  • Beings have any survival value if all our ancestors had to do
  • 00:38:27.750 --> 00:38:32.187
  • Was, you know, basically survive and reproduce on the savannah.
  • 00:38:32.187 --> 00:38:36.024
  • Kirk: why are they making stain glass windows and orchestras?
  • 00:38:36.024 --> 00:38:37.793
  • Casey: why are we painting the sistine chapel?
  • 00:38:37.793 --> 00:38:39.995
  • Why does every culture around the world, i don't care where we
  • 00:38:39.995 --> 00:38:42.197
  • Go, we create music, we worship divine beings?
  • 00:38:42.197 --> 00:38:46.101
  • None of these traits have any survival value under basically
  • 00:38:46.101 --> 00:38:49.938
  • An evolutionary worldview.
  • 00:38:49.938 --> 00:38:51.440
  • So i think this shows that humans were designed for higher
  • 00:38:51.440 --> 00:38:54.076
  • Purposes and we're not just around here to survive
  • 00:38:54.076 --> 00:38:56.912
  • And reproduce.
  • 00:38:56.912 --> 00:38:58.247
  • We're created for something greater than that.
  • 00:38:58.247 --> 00:38:59.615
  • Kirk: that's right.
  • 00:38:59.615 --> 00:39:00.949
  • Wow, that is fascinating.
  • 00:39:00.949 --> 00:39:02.317
  • Before we go to a break, how should christians think
  • 00:39:02.317 --> 00:39:05.821
  • About origins?
  • 00:39:05.821 --> 00:39:07.856
  • I know some hold a view of a relatively young earth between
  • 00:39:07.856 --> 00:39:11.627
  • 6000, 10,000 years old and others will hold a relatively
  • 00:39:11.627 --> 00:39:16.098
  • Older view of the earth.
  • 00:39:16.098 --> 00:39:19.201
  • How do you look at that subject and does it matter?
  • 00:39:19.201 --> 00:39:22.271
  • Casey: yeah, exactly, kirk.
  • 00:39:22.271 --> 00:39:23.772
  • I respect the fact that christians hold different views
  • 00:39:23.772 --> 00:39:26.308
  • On the topic of the age of the earth.
  • 00:39:26.308 --> 00:39:28.110
  • But for me, a far more important question than the age of the
  • 00:39:28.110 --> 00:39:31.046
  • Earth is whether or not there is a designer and a creator behind
  • 00:39:31.046 --> 00:39:34.850
  • Life in the universe.
  • 00:39:34.850 --> 00:39:36.218
  • If you go out and talk to your next door neighbor who's
  • 00:39:36.218 --> 00:39:37.853
  • An atheist and you're trying to share your faith with them, you
  • 00:39:37.853 --> 00:39:40.556
  • Know, they're not gonna really care how old the earth is.
  • 00:39:40.556 --> 00:39:42.825
  • Or if you say, look, i think that this is how you fit the
  • 00:39:42.825 --> 00:39:44.726
  • Bible and science together, those are important questions,
  • 00:39:44.726 --> 00:39:47.329
  • Don't get me wrong, but they're gonna say, "well, i don't accept
  • 00:39:47.329 --> 00:39:49.631
  • The bible."
  • 00:39:49.631 --> 00:39:50.999
  • What you can do when you're talking to next door neighbors
  • 00:39:50.999 --> 00:39:52.468
  • You can say, "look, the scientific evidence, even
  • 00:39:52.468 --> 00:39:54.770
  • Evidence that is accepted by mainstream science shows a need
  • 00:39:54.770 --> 00:39:58.674
  • For an intelligent cause, a creator behind life
  • 00:39:58.674 --> 00:40:01.510
  • In the universe."
  • 00:40:01.510 --> 00:40:02.845
  • This, i think, is the kind of evidence that your next door
  • 00:40:02.845 --> 00:40:04.746
  • Neighbor can accept before they're gonna, you know, get
  • 00:40:04.746 --> 00:40:06.882
  • Into talking about whether or not they accept the bible, they
  • 00:40:06.882 --> 00:40:09.651
  • Will accept scientific evidence that shows there's evidence for
  • 00:40:09.651 --> 00:40:12.588
  • Life and a universe being designed by a creator.
  • 00:40:12.588 --> 00:40:17.059
  • Kirk: this is so good and this is bringing up even more
  • 00:40:17.059 --> 00:40:19.595
  • Questions in my mind, but i am so thankful that as a former
  • 00:40:19.595 --> 00:40:24.633
  • Atheist, someone was able to present the argument for
  • 00:40:24.633 --> 00:40:28.437
  • Intelligent design to me in such a way that helped me open up the
  • 00:40:28.437 --> 00:40:32.474
  • Door intellectually, where i didn't feel like i had to check
  • 00:40:32.474 --> 00:40:35.744
  • My brain at the door in order to become a christian.
  • 00:40:35.744 --> 00:40:39.348
  • And this book that you've written or co-written together
  • 00:40:39.348 --> 00:40:43.151
  • With your colleagues is, you know, it's a lot to digest, but
  • 00:40:43.151 --> 00:40:47.623
  • We can take it bit by bit and get some of these arguments
  • 00:40:47.623 --> 00:40:50.826
  • Under our belt to share our faith.
  • 00:40:50.826 --> 00:40:52.494
  • After the break, we're gonna talk more with casey about how
  • 00:40:52.494 --> 00:40:55.564
  • We as christians can use science to share our faith.
  • 00:40:55.564 --> 00:40:58.967
  • So don't go away.
  • 00:40:58.967 --> 00:41:05.994
  • So don't go away.
  • 00:41:05.994 --> 00:41:09.879
  • Kirk: oh, we're having such a good time.
  • 00:41:13.783 --> 00:41:15.818
  • We're back with casey luskin discussing the evidence that
  • 00:41:15.818 --> 00:41:19.122
  • Supports intelligent design.
  • 00:41:19.122 --> 00:41:21.524
  • Okay, casey, bottom line, are science and faith compatible?
  • 00:41:21.524 --> 00:41:27.730
  • Do we have to choose one or the other or can they be friends?
  • 00:41:27.730 --> 00:41:31.634
  • Casey: i would say that science and faith are very compatible
  • 00:41:31.634 --> 00:41:34.070
  • And in fact, they mutually reinforce one another.
  • 00:41:34.070 --> 00:41:36.839
  • I'm a scientist, not a theologian, so i come at this
  • 00:41:36.839 --> 00:41:39.242
  • From the scientific perspective.
  • 00:41:39.242 --> 00:41:41.210
  • But i would say that what we find in nature, again,
  • 00:41:41.210 --> 00:41:44.347
  • Is evidence for an intelligent cause from the microscopic, you
  • 00:41:44.347 --> 00:41:47.750
  • Know, molecules that we see in ourselves to the macro
  • 00:41:47.750 --> 00:41:50.286
  • Architecture of the universe, we are seeing evidence for design
  • 00:41:50.286 --> 00:41:52.889
  • And nature.
  • 00:41:52.889 --> 00:41:54.257
  • And from a christian perspective, this is consistent
  • 00:41:54.257 --> 00:41:55.925
  • With what the bible says, romans 1:20, which says that god is
  • 00:41:55.925 --> 00:41:59.362
  • Clearly seen in what has been made, i think that we find that
  • 00:41:59.362 --> 00:42:02.498
  • Being affirmed by science.
  • 00:42:02.498 --> 00:42:04.133
  • So yeah, absolutely, science and faith are compatible.
  • 00:42:04.133 --> 00:42:06.869
  • Kirk: would you agree with me that i actually had faith as
  • 00:42:06.869 --> 00:42:12.909
  • An atheist, but in a different sense i had faith that there was
  • 00:42:12.909 --> 00:42:17.146
  • No god.
  • 00:42:17.146 --> 00:42:18.481
  • And now in light of the evidence, i think it takes more
  • 00:42:18.481 --> 00:42:20.850
  • Faith, blind faith to remain an atheist than it does to be
  • 00:42:20.850 --> 00:42:26.222
  • A christian.
  • 00:42:26.222 --> 00:42:27.557
  • So, would you agree that even secular humanist, atheist
  • 00:42:27.557 --> 00:42:31.961
  • Scientists have some version of faith?
  • 00:42:31.961 --> 00:42:35.231
  • Casey: absolutely.
  • 00:42:35.231 --> 00:42:36.599
  • I mean, everybody has faith in some kind of a foundation of
  • 00:42:36.599 --> 00:42:38.568
  • Their worldview, okay?
  • 00:42:38.568 --> 00:42:40.036
  • And so, what--and you can see that in some of the answers that
  • 00:42:40.036 --> 00:42:43.272
  • Atheists are coming up with to respond to the arguments for
  • 00:42:43.272 --> 00:42:46.209
  • Intelligent design, okay.
  • 00:42:46.209 --> 00:42:47.543
  • So we talked about the origin of the universe.
  • 00:42:47.543 --> 00:42:49.846
  • We think that an intelligent cause, a first cause is the best
  • 00:42:49.846 --> 00:42:52.949
  • Explanation, something outside of space and time that created
  • 00:42:52.949 --> 00:42:55.785
  • The universe.
  • 00:42:55.785 --> 00:42:57.153
  • Well, how did the atheists respond to that?
  • 00:42:57.153 --> 00:42:58.488
  • They will say that the universe created itself, okay.
  • 00:42:58.488 --> 00:43:00.923
  • Well, where in our experience do we see universes coming into
  • 00:43:00.923 --> 00:43:04.627
  • Existence on their own or matter creating itself?
  • 00:43:04.627 --> 00:43:07.296
  • We have no experience with that.
  • 00:43:07.296 --> 00:43:08.665
  • So this is not a good rebuttal.
  • 00:43:08.665 --> 00:43:09.999
  • Kirk: you can't test it.
  • 00:43:09.999 --> 00:43:11.334
  • We've never observed it.
  • 00:43:11.334 --> 00:43:12.702
  • So why do you have faith in it?
  • 00:43:12.702 --> 00:43:14.137
  • This year is the 100th anniversary of the scopes trial.
  • 00:43:14.137 --> 00:43:18.508
  • And just really quickly, the scopes trial was a trial that
  • 00:43:18.508 --> 00:43:23.946
  • Took place in dayton, tennessee 100 years ago in 1925 when there
  • 00:43:23.946 --> 00:43:28.384
  • Was a teacher in dayton, tennessee who was accused of the
  • 00:43:28.384 --> 00:43:32.288
  • Crime of teaching darwinian evolution.
  • 00:43:32.288 --> 00:43:36.092
  • This was an alternative view to the origin of the universe and
  • 00:43:36.092 --> 00:43:39.562
  • The planet, then the biblical view.
  • 00:43:39.562 --> 00:43:42.899
  • And now today, big science is now being criticized for
  • 00:43:42.899 --> 00:43:48.171
  • Censoring and canceling what you as a scientist and others at the
  • 00:43:48.171 --> 00:43:52.341
  • Discovery institute are positing as a better explanation for the
  • 00:43:52.341 --> 00:43:57.013
  • Evidence of the origins of the world.
  • 00:43:57.013 --> 00:43:58.781
  • So can you give us an update on this whole subject?
  • 00:43:58.781 --> 00:44:01.551
  • Casey: yeah, absolutely, kirk.
  • 00:44:01.551 --> 00:44:02.919
  • And i'm really glad that you brought this up 'cause it's
  • 00:44:02.919 --> 00:44:04.721
  • Important for people to understand the dynamics, sort of
  • 00:44:04.721 --> 00:44:07.256
  • The power dynamics that are going on in the scientific
  • 00:44:07.256 --> 00:44:09.325
  • Community today to suppress the idea of intelligent design.
  • 00:44:09.325 --> 00:44:12.929
  • So in the scopes trial, as you said, what was that trial about?
  • 00:44:12.929 --> 00:44:15.932
  • It was about a group of folks 100 years ago basically tried to
  • 00:44:15.932 --> 00:44:19.202
  • Make it a crime to teach evolution.
  • 00:44:19.202 --> 00:44:21.404
  • Now, of course, that was wrong.
  • 00:44:21.404 --> 00:44:22.772
  • We should never be making it a crime to talk about
  • 00:44:22.772 --> 00:44:24.607
  • A scientific theory.
  • 00:44:24.607 --> 00:44:25.975
  • Even if we disagree with that idea, we should never be making
  • 00:44:25.975 --> 00:44:27.744
  • It, you know, illegal to talk about science, okay?
  • 00:44:27.744 --> 00:44:30.646
  • But what we have today is what a former us supreme court justice
  • 00:44:30.646 --> 00:44:34.851
  • Scalia called scopes in reverse, which basically we see that the
  • 00:44:34.851 --> 00:44:39.355
  • Pro-intelligent design viewpoint is being censored
  • 00:44:39.355 --> 00:44:42.024
  • And suppressed.
  • 00:44:42.024 --> 00:44:43.359
  • And so there are many cases of scientists who have been
  • 00:44:43.359 --> 00:44:45.495
  • Discriminated against and faced persecution because of their
  • 00:44:45.495 --> 00:44:48.731
  • Support for intelligent design.
  • 00:44:48.731 --> 00:44:50.299
  • A very famous example was richard sternberg.
  • 00:44:50.299 --> 00:44:52.335
  • He was at the smithsonian institution, and when it came
  • 00:44:52.335 --> 00:44:55.304
  • Out that he was a supporter of intelligent design, they
  • 00:44:55.304 --> 00:44:57.740
  • Basically made his life miserable, hounded him out until
  • 00:44:57.740 --> 00:45:00.543
  • He was forced to resign from the smithsonian.
  • 00:45:00.543 --> 00:45:02.745
  • We even have seen speech codes being adopted at universities.
  • 00:45:02.745 --> 00:45:06.682
  • At the university of idaho, there was a biology professor
  • 00:45:06.682 --> 00:45:09.519
  • Named scott minnick who testified in favor of the
  • 00:45:09.519 --> 00:45:12.655
  • Constitutionality of teaching id in public schools.
  • 00:45:12.655 --> 00:45:15.725
  • And in retaliation for that, they adopted a speech code which
  • 00:45:15.725 --> 00:45:18.828
  • Basically said that evolution was the only view that they were
  • 00:45:18.828 --> 00:45:22.031
  • Going to allow in their schools.
  • 00:45:22.031 --> 00:45:24.133
  • Same thing happened to erica dean, a former professor of
  • 00:45:24.133 --> 00:45:26.803
  • Physics at ball state university.
  • 00:45:26.803 --> 00:45:28.805
  • He was basically shut down from teaching an interdisciplinary
  • 00:45:28.805 --> 00:45:32.108
  • Class that mentioned intelligent design.
  • 00:45:32.108 --> 00:45:34.577
  • And the freedom from religion foundation sent a letter to
  • 00:45:34.577 --> 00:45:37.180
  • Their school and they ended up adopting a speech code saying
  • 00:45:37.180 --> 00:45:39.882
  • That intelligent design was not allowed in their
  • 00:45:39.882 --> 00:45:42.451
  • Science classes.
  • 00:45:42.451 --> 00:45:43.820
  • So we've seen this over--this is just a tip of the iceberg, kirk.
  • 00:45:43.820 --> 00:45:46.155
  • We've seen many cases of scientists being persecuted
  • 00:45:46.155 --> 00:45:49.458
  • Because of their pro-id views.
  • 00:45:49.458 --> 00:45:51.093
  • And this gets back to a really much larger problem that is the
  • 00:45:51.093 --> 00:45:54.330
  • Politicization of science.
  • 00:45:54.330 --> 00:45:56.265
  • This has been talked about a lot in the last few years that
  • 00:45:56.265 --> 00:45:58.568
  • Science has become politicized and it is basically trying to
  • 00:45:58.568 --> 00:46:01.971
  • Suppress credible minority scientific viewpoints.
  • 00:46:01.971 --> 00:46:05.074
  • And this is really not good for science.
  • 00:46:05.074 --> 00:46:06.909
  • Science needs to allow itself to hear minority
  • 00:46:06.909 --> 00:46:09.412
  • Scientific viewpoints.
  • 00:46:09.412 --> 00:46:10.746
  • Every single scientific revolution that has ever taken
  • 00:46:10.746 --> 00:46:13.216
  • Place happened because scientists were able to hear
  • 00:46:13.216 --> 00:46:16.485
  • From those minority scientific views.
  • 00:46:16.485 --> 00:46:18.454
  • And if minority scientific views don't have the opportunity to be
  • 00:46:18.454 --> 00:46:21.457
  • Heard, then new ideas can never take root or be heard in the
  • 00:46:21.457 --> 00:46:24.927
  • Scientific community.
  • 00:46:24.927 --> 00:46:26.295
  • Kirk: that's a really, really good point.
  • 00:46:26.295 --> 00:46:28.664
  • Let's talk on a very practical level for everyday guys like me,
  • 00:46:28.664 --> 00:46:33.369
  • The dad, the mom, the student who would like to be able to at
  • 00:46:33.369 --> 00:46:38.074
  • Least have one well rehearsed argument from science to help
  • 00:46:38.074 --> 00:46:44.981
  • Share their faith with a friend.
  • 00:46:44.981 --> 00:46:48.050
  • What would you recommend as that entry level argument?
  • 00:46:48.050 --> 00:46:52.488
  • Casey: sure.
  • 00:46:52.488 --> 00:46:53.856
  • I think my personal favorite argument is the information that
  • 00:46:53.856 --> 00:46:56.659
  • We see in dna.
  • 00:46:56.659 --> 00:46:57.994
  • And we talked about this a little bit earlier, but what do
  • 00:46:57.994 --> 00:47:00.263
  • We see at the very heart of life?
  • 00:47:00.263 --> 00:47:02.231
  • We see in our dna a language-based code.
  • 00:47:02.231 --> 00:47:05.468
  • Bill gates has said that dna is like computer software but far,
  • 00:47:05.468 --> 00:47:09.205
  • Far more advanced than any software we've ever created.
  • 00:47:09.205 --> 00:47:12.241
  • The information we see in life, the complexity of the simplest
  • 00:47:12.241 --> 00:47:15.378
  • Bacterial cell, kirk, is far more complicated than any human
  • 00:47:15.378 --> 00:47:19.515
  • Technology we've ever devised.
  • 00:47:19.515 --> 00:47:20.883
  • Cell phones don't hold a candle compared to the simplest living
  • 00:47:20.883 --> 00:47:24.320
  • Cell that we've discovered.
  • 00:47:24.320 --> 00:47:25.721
  • So, you know, i think that what we see in life just points that
  • 00:47:25.721 --> 00:47:28.925
  • There is an incredibly intelligent creator behind life
  • 00:47:28.925 --> 00:47:32.161
  • And also behind the universe.
  • 00:47:32.161 --> 00:47:34.263
  • Kirk: i think it was a scientist named berlinsky who said in
  • 00:47:34.263 --> 00:47:38.434
  • A documentary that i saw about the fine tuned nature
  • 00:47:38.434 --> 00:47:43.372
  • Of the universe.
  • 00:47:43.372 --> 00:47:44.707
  • And he was asked, "if in darwin's day, when he spoke
  • 00:47:44.707 --> 00:47:47.910
  • About the simple cell, if that could be equated to
  • 00:47:47.910 --> 00:47:52.048
  • An oldsmobile in terms of complexity, what do we know now
  • 00:47:52.048 --> 00:47:55.885
  • About the human cell?
  • 00:47:55.885 --> 00:47:57.219
  • What would you liken it to?"
  • 00:47:57.219 --> 00:47:58.587
  • And he said, "a universe."
  • 00:47:58.587 --> 00:48:01.424
  • Casey: i think that's a very fair comparison.
  • 00:48:01.424 --> 00:48:03.592
  • We're still discovering the complexity of life.
  • 00:48:03.592 --> 00:48:05.861
  • And the amazing thing is that the more and more we discover
  • 00:48:05.861 --> 00:48:08.230
  • About cells, about living systems, the deeper we untangle
  • 00:48:08.230 --> 00:48:11.901
  • The complexity of life, the more complex it gets.
  • 00:48:11.901 --> 00:48:14.971
  • Kirk: this is so exciting.
  • 00:48:14.971 --> 00:48:16.305
  • We could talk for hours, but thank you so much for coming
  • 00:48:16.305 --> 00:48:18.407
  • On and sharing all this with us today.
  • 00:48:18.407 --> 00:48:19.742
  • Casey: thank you, kirk.
  • 00:48:19.742 --> 00:48:21.077
  • It was a lot of fun.
  • 00:48:21.077 --> 00:48:22.411
  • Kirk: we'll review today's "takeaways" right after
  • 00:48:22.411 --> 00:48:23.746
  • The break.
  • 00:48:23.746 --> 00:48:30.987
  • The break.
  • 00:48:30.987 --> 00:48:38.751
  • Kirk: welcome back.
  • 00:48:38.884 --> 00:48:39.218
  • I wanna thank our guests justin brierley and casey luskin for
  • 00:48:40.419 --> 00:48:43.656
  • Giving us so much to think about on the topics of the existence
  • 00:48:43.656 --> 00:48:47.360
  • Of god, christian worldview, science, and intelligent design.
  • 00:48:47.360 --> 00:48:52.231
  • Here's a few of our takeaways.
  • 00:48:52.231 --> 00:48:54.633
  • Begin the conversation.
  • 00:48:54.633 --> 00:48:56.635
  • What a practical challenge from justin.
  • 00:48:56.635 --> 00:48:58.904
  • After sharing why he's confident, the christian
  • 00:48:58.904 --> 00:49:01.841
  • Worldview is not only reasonable, but compelling.
  • 00:49:01.841 --> 00:49:05.378
  • It just makes sense of us and the world we live in.
  • 00:49:05.378 --> 00:49:09.615
  • Now, for many, the idea of beginning the conversation can
  • 00:49:09.615 --> 00:49:13.552
  • Feel intimidating, maybe even a little scary, but remember what
  • 00:49:13.552 --> 00:49:18.190
  • Justin reminded us.
  • 00:49:18.190 --> 00:49:20.159
  • Most people have questions about faith or are on a spiritual
  • 00:49:20.159 --> 00:49:24.630
  • Journey searching for meaning.
  • 00:49:24.630 --> 00:49:27.666
  • More people are open to these conversations than we
  • 00:49:27.666 --> 00:49:30.436
  • Often realize.
  • 00:49:30.436 --> 00:49:32.571
  • Most importantly, we also have a story to share one of truth,
  • 00:49:32.571 --> 00:49:36.675
  • Love, and redemption, and people want to hear it.
  • 00:49:36.675 --> 00:49:40.212
  • So if you go into your week prayed up full of grace with
  • 00:49:40.212 --> 00:49:44.450
  • These truths in mind, beginning a spiritual conversation may not
  • 00:49:44.450 --> 00:49:48.921
  • Feel like a burden.
  • 00:49:48.921 --> 00:49:50.256
  • It might feel like a privilege, something we can't believe we
  • 00:49:50.256 --> 00:49:54.627
  • Get to do.
  • 00:49:54.627 --> 00:49:55.995
  • This week ask god for opportunities to begin
  • 00:49:55.995 --> 00:49:59.498
  • The conversation.
  • 00:49:59.498 --> 00:50:01.901
  • Faith is active.
  • 00:50:01.901 --> 00:50:04.170
  • Justin brierley reminded us of something important.
  • 00:50:04.170 --> 00:50:07.339
  • God is not ultimately after just our belief that he exists, even
  • 00:50:07.339 --> 00:50:12.344
  • The devil believes in god.
  • 00:50:12.344 --> 00:50:15.581
  • God desires our faith, our trust in him.
  • 00:50:15.581 --> 00:50:19.718
  • Real faith is more than just agreement, it's action.
  • 00:50:19.718 --> 00:50:23.823
  • It means trusting in something and doing something about it.
  • 00:50:23.823 --> 00:50:28.461
  • It's a real commitment to live god's way even when it's
  • 00:50:28.461 --> 00:50:32.598
  • Difficult or countercultural.
  • 00:50:32.598 --> 00:50:35.301
  • Thankfully, scripture is filled with examples that show our
  • 00:50:35.301 --> 00:50:39.171
  • Trust in god is not blind trust.
  • 00:50:39.171 --> 00:50:42.241
  • We see his faithfulness time and time again.
  • 00:50:42.241 --> 00:50:45.311
  • We see his wisdom and how he's designed the world to work.
  • 00:50:45.311 --> 00:50:49.281
  • And when we follow his ways, we don't just survive, we flourish.
  • 00:50:49.281 --> 00:50:54.286
  • That is the good life and that's what it means to have
  • 00:50:54.286 --> 00:50:58.124
  • A worldview that's not only true, but strong,
  • 00:50:58.124 --> 00:51:02.628
  • An intellectual parachute that holds.
  • 00:51:02.628 --> 00:51:06.065
  • Information needs intelligence.
  • 00:51:06.065 --> 00:51:08.534
  • I loved this point from casey luskin.
  • 00:51:08.534 --> 00:51:11.403
  • This is an incredible insight into the complexities of nature,
  • 00:51:11.403 --> 00:51:15.741
  • The fine tuning of the universe for life, the molecular
  • 00:51:15.741 --> 00:51:19.445
  • Machinery inside of our own cells.
  • 00:51:19.445 --> 00:51:21.480
  • It is all amazing.
  • 00:51:21.480 --> 00:51:23.849
  • One example that always inspires awe and curiosity in me is dna.
  • 00:51:23.849 --> 00:51:30.523
  • Within every strand of dna is a language-based code like
  • 00:51:30.523 --> 00:51:35.761
  • Computer software only far more advanced and that raises
  • 00:51:35.761 --> 00:51:39.865
  • An obvious question, but it's a powerful one.
  • 00:51:39.865 --> 00:51:43.102
  • Where did all the information come from?
  • 00:51:43.102 --> 00:51:45.538
  • In our everyday human experience, we know that new
  • 00:51:45.538 --> 00:51:49.708
  • Information only comes from a mind, from intelligence.
  • 00:51:49.708 --> 00:51:54.947
  • That's why remembering a simple phrase like, "information needs
  • 00:51:54.947 --> 00:52:00.052
  • An intelligence," can be such a powerful tool.
  • 00:52:00.052 --> 00:52:03.322
  • It's easy to remember and it opens up all kinds of doors
  • 00:52:03.322 --> 00:52:06.992
  • In conversations.
  • 00:52:06.992 --> 00:52:08.561
  • So whether you're geeking out with friends about the beauty of
  • 00:52:08.561 --> 00:52:11.897
  • God's design or you're stepping into a deeper conversation about
  • 00:52:11.897 --> 00:52:15.801
  • Faith and science, this little phrase can be
  • 00:52:15.801 --> 00:52:19.071
  • A great springboard.
  • 00:52:19.071 --> 00:52:21.073
  • So this week, let's not just hold our faith in our hearts,
  • 00:52:21.073 --> 00:52:25.211
  • Let's live it out loud, speak it boldly, and be ready to begin
  • 00:52:25.211 --> 00:52:30.716
  • The conversation.
  • 00:52:30.716 --> 00:52:32.218
  • That's all for this episode of "takeaways."
  • 00:52:32.218 --> 00:52:34.153
  • Thank you for watching and if you've enjoyed this show, please
  • 00:52:34.153 --> 00:52:37.323
  • Don't forget to set your dvr so you never miss an episode.
  • 00:52:37.323 --> 00:52:41.126
  • And of course you can always catch up on past episodes by
  • 00:52:41.126 --> 00:52:43.796
  • Searching for "takeaways" on tbn+ or by visiting the kirk
  • 00:52:43.796 --> 00:52:48.033
  • Cameron on tbn youtube channel.
  • 00:52:48.033 --> 00:52:50.869
  • We'll see you here next time for more great conversations.
  • 00:52:50.869 --> 00:52:54.773
  • ♪♪♪
  • 00:52:54.773 --> 00:52:54.773