DAVID ADAMS reads Melissa Cain Travis’ book on how science and philosophy support the ‘Maker thesis’…
Melissa Cain Travis
Science and the Mind of the Maker: What the Conversation Between Faith and Science Reveals About God
Harvest House Publishers, Eugene, Oregon, 2018
ISBN-13: 978-0736971287
“An sightful survey of some of the key arguments in favour of a universe created at the hands of a purposeful God (as opposed to the materialistic view that life came about through purely natural, random processes), this book draws back the curtain to take a deeper look at some of the key questions our very existence poses.”
An essay aimed at showing how science and philosophy support the ‘Maker thesis’, Melissa Cain Travis’ book is a fascinating walk-through some of the key arguments in support of the idea that there is a creative and powerful mind behind the existence of the universe (aka life as we know it).
Travis, an assistant professor of Christian apologetics at Houston Baptist University, describes the book as a putting together pieces of a puzzle and cites, in support of her approach, GK Chesterton, who wrote with regard to his own journey of faith that it wasn’t any one specific piece of evidence which convinced him of the truth of Christianity, rather it was “an enormous accumulation of small but unanimous facts”.
The evidence presented in the book – the puzzle pieces as Travis calls them, are found in a range of arguments put forward in support of the ‘Maker thesis’ and include everything from an examination of whether the universe is finite to how the universe is “fine-tuned” for life, and the evidence for a mathematically structured and, therefore, comprehensible universe.
We’re taken on a journey through history as these ideas are explored with the views of everyone from Plato and Copernicus, Charles Darwin and evolutionary creationist Francis Collins under discussion and, in one of the book’s strengths, Travis doesn’t shy away from tackling positions put forward by those who have argued against any possibility of a God in the universe but rather, confronts them head-on.
If, at times, the science becomes overwhelming – the examination of how DNA works, for example, gets fairly intense for a while there, Travis has helpfully included short ‘key point’ summaries at the end of each chapter which concisely convey the main arguments she drawn upon.
There’s obviously plenty here for those seeking answers to wrestle through but there’s also plenty for those who may not need to be convinced that there is a Maker behind the universe but are perhaps looking for some scientific evidence to support that conviction. And there’s just lots of really interesting facts including why the other planets in our solar system are so important to the survival of Earth (no, you’ll have to read it to find out!).
Only a short book at slightly more than 200 pages, it’s broken into 11 chapters and these in turn are broken up by various asides, all of which means that while it certainly gets into the nitty-gritty of scientific detail at times, it shouldn’t be too overwhelming.
An sightful survey of some of the key arguments in favour of a universe created at the hands of a purposeful God (as opposed to the materialistic view that life came about through purely natural, random processes), this book draws back the curtain to take a deeper look at some of the key questions our very existence poses.
