@Pauluc: Paul, whatever Jeff Bezos personally believes, he allows all …

Comment on Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes by David Read.

@Pauluc: Paul, whatever Jeff Bezos personally believes, he allows all comers to sell through Amazon, including many thousands of Bibles and religiously-oriented books. If Bezos didn’t allow religious books to be marketed on Amazon, I wouldn’t write a secular book and sell it on Amazon.

What Jeff Kent is saying (and it is true) is that the journals he publishes in are not open to creationists; they will not publish material with a creationist point of view. I think that raises an ethical issue of whether creationists should even be supporting that type of journal, when there are at least three different peer-reviewed creationists journals in existence.

By the way, law reviews certainly do allow articles on jurisprudence that discuss issues such as positive law or man-made law as opposed to theories of natural law, or a higher source of law. Certainly, the founders of the United States believed in a higher source of law: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, and that among these are the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Hence, any discussion of the jurisprudence of the founders will necessarily note that they believed in principles of law and justice that were more than merely human, and above, and a corrector of, merely human statutes and decrees.

David Read Also Commented

Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes
@Professor Kent: Jeff, the most recent research is that more people leave the church for doctrinal reasons than because someone has treated them badly:

http://www.adventistreview.org/article/6144/archives/issue-2013-1508/beyond-belief.

“There are many SDA churches,” wrote another former member, “that are open, loving, and focused only on Christ, but this is not the problem. The problem is with the doctrine of the SDA Church. The doctrinal beliefs of the SDA Church are completely unbiblical; this is the reason I will never attend an SDA church again.”


Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes
@Professor Kent: “I’m much closer to Lee Greer’s perspective that science should be taught as science, not religion. I think Pauluc is the same.”

Jeff, Lee Greer teaches that humans and apes descended from a common ancestor. (Louie Bishop gave Greer’s lecture slides to Educate Truth). If you’re closer to Lee Greer’s perspective, then you’re a Darwinist, not a creationist.

You seem to be saying that while you personally believe in Bible history, you think that science should continue to be done pursuant to atheistic assumptions and rules. I keep asking you why that’s okay, and you keep avoiding the question. Because when I phrase the question as “why do you think it is okay for Christians to do science pursuant to the assumption that God has never created or intervened in the material universe,” you realize that your position is indefensible, and you have nothing but your inane invasions to fall back on.


Gary Gilbert, Spectrum, and Pseudogenes
@Professor Kent: Leaving aside the issue of publishing in journals that disallow discussion of creation or design (which George is responding to), my concern is that believing scientists not endorse Darwinism.

And since you’re saying, Jeff, that “I would agree with you wholeheartedly that an SDA-employed scientist should never promote the view that the world was accidentally self-created. I don’t think doing so would be okay” are you thereby saying that we should not hire any Darwinist professors? If that’s what you’re saying, then I agree with you, and wonder why you’re so hostile to this website.

You now seem to be agreeing with me that SDA institutions should not hire Darwinist professors, nor allow Darwinism to be taught as truth, and you’ve repeatedly said that you yourself are not an evolutionist. So I am left to wonder why you so passionately defend La Sierra?


Recent Comments by David Read

La Sierra University gets 3-year AAA Accreditation
@Beatrice: Beatrice, I note that you have posted here a copy of your post at ADvindicate.com.

It’s interesting that you say that John Perumal replaced Lee Grismer as department chairman “a long time ago,” but the first news of that change was your own comment at ADvindicate a couple of days ago. There was no public announcement, and no news from any of the usual sources: the Review, ANN, Spectrum, ADvindicate, or Educate Truth. When I was researching my story, there was nothing on La Sierria’s official website to indicate that the chairmanship had changed; the website was not updated to reflect the change in chairmanship until after my article was posted at ADvindicate on October 17. Am I “lazy” if I don’t telephone La Sierra every couple of months and ask if Wisbey has had a change of heart and demoted the hardened Darwinist that he promoted to department chair two years ago?? I cannot help but wonder why this change in departmental leadership was a closely held secret until AFTER my article started making the rounds and being read by Adventist opinion leaders, but some mysteries will likely remain mysterious.

It’s hardly an excuse for wrecking the Adventist faith of those who take upper division biology courses at La Sierra that most students do not take upper division biology courses. But the information that has been provided by LSU students like Louie Bishop is that even a seminar science-faith course intended for a broad non-specialized student audience–specifically the one instituted in response to the 2009 controversy over the teaching of origins–was destructive of Adventist faith; LSU religion teachers, including John Webster who (at that time) was chairman of the religion department, told students that the Adventist hermeneutic was unhelpful, and that the Genesis narrative should not be taken literally as a description of the creation.

If AAA has witnessed a change of direction at La Sierra–and I very much doubt that–then it is up to them to say what they saw, and why they voted the way they did, in connection with their vote to extend Adventist accreditation for a further three years. There is a very public controversy about La Sierra’s blatant undermining of Adventist beliefs, and if AAA is, in the face of that controversy, going to certify that LSU is fulfilling its Adventist mission and upholding its Adventist identity, then AAA must publicly explain its vote, and justify it by outlining the changes that it observed.

You say that I “have not taken the approach Jesus advocated” and I assume that by that you are referring to Matthew 18. That passage does not apply. No one at La Sierra has wronged me personally; I have no personal stake whatsoever in the matter. The issue is that LSU is publicly undermining Seventh-day Adventist beliefs, and the response to that issue needs to be public. The relevant passage is 1 Tim. 5:20: “Those who are sinning rebuke in the presence of all, that the rest also may fear.” Please look at Testimonies, v. 2, pp. 14-16.

It is not my desire or goal to undermine unity in the church, but there can be no unity except on the basis of sound biblical truth. La Sierra has been sowing the seeds of a very profound disunity, as it has for a generation been training Adventist youth at an Adventist institution (AAA approved!) to lightly regard the word of God. It has been telling the Adventist youth entrusted to it that God’s claim to have created the world in six literal days and rested on the Sabbath day (Gen. 2:2-3; Ex. 20:11) is unsustainable nonsense. This can only lead to disunity on the most fundamental level, as one group, raised and educated in the SDA Church, has an entirely different conception of what the Bible teaches and God requires than another group also raised and educated in the church.

Lay people are under an obligation of conscience to see that those who live off the tithe uphold the religious mission of the church. One very highly placed Adventist official has instructed us to “hold them accountable,” and he is right. In the absence of a vigilant laity, the SDA Church will lapse into corruption as did the post-apostolic Christian Church.


LSU Removes Dr. Lee Grismer as Chairman of the Biology Department
@Paul Giem: Paul I will pray that you are right that there has been a sea change. But it will take more than a (until recently, covert) change in the biology dept. chairmanship to convince me of that.


LSU Removes Dr. Lee Grismer as Chairman of the Biology Department
@gene fortner: That’s a good list, Gene, but do not forget Arthur Chadwick (Ph.D, U. of Miami, geology/sedimentology) and Lee Spencer (Ph.D, biology/paleontology, Loma Linda) and Kurt Wise (Ph.D, geology, Harvard) and Marcus Ross (Ph.D, paleontology, U.R.I.).

The first two are Seventh-day Adventists and very strong creationists; the second two are creationists. Kurt Wise is a good friend of Art Chadwick and has come to SDA-sponsored events before.


LSU Removes Dr. Lee Grismer as Chairman of the Biology Department
It will be interesting to see how much power John Perumal will be given, and will exercise, in reshaping the biology department. He should have veto power over new hires, and he should be able to recommend whether contracts for untenured professors are renewed or not, and whether tenure is granted or not. Typically the academic dean or provost has some say over this as well, but the department chair’s power is considerable.


LSU Removes Dr. Lee Grismer as Chairman of the Biology Department
@Paul Giem: Paul, your theory is indeed very reasonable, but I don’t think it is correct. First, I have argued that WASC’s concerns about autonomy were solicited by Randal Wisbey so that he could get bylaw changes that would give him greater autonomy from the church. One key item of evidence that has become public is that in 2011 one of Wisbey’s minions, then LSU board member Lenny Darnell, recorded himself saying that he planned to write WASC and demand that WASC recommend and insist on changes to the board structure that would dilute the power of the church officers on the board:

http://advindicate.com/articles/2793.

Second, the bylaw changes Wisbey wanted were approved by the constituency back in May, so WASC has no grounds to complain about the lack of institutional autonomy, and has indicated that it is pleased with what was done:

http://advindicate.com/articles/2013/10/13/wasc-visiting-team-commends-la-sierra-for-revisions-to-university-governance-practices

My theory as to why this change of department chairmen has been so hush hush is that, 1) Wisbey didn’t want his liberal base to know that he had thrown any sort of bone to AAA; he wanted them thinking he had gotten an unconditional surrender from AAA, and 2) Wisbey doesn’t want the wider SDA Church to know that AAA thought there was anything wrong at La Sierra that needed changing, much less that the chairman of the biology department needed changing.