Of logic and faith: prelude

Logic and faith, as it turns out, are not mutually exclusive.

I'm working on another Uberpost which will hopefully explain how I reconcile my newfound Christianity with that whole 'reason' thing.  In the meantime, IAmDagny aka Hottie With An Evil Pink Rifle has given a pretty solid explanation on HoneyTrail.

In a nutshell, whenever you read Rand and she is talking about “reason” or “logic”, she is actually (unwittingly) talking about Christ. John 1:1 specifically identifies Christ as “the Word”, which is “Logos” in Greek. Logos is the Greek word for “logic” and “reason”. God is, in Himself, logic and reason, and we are made in His image. The fact that humans possess the capability to reason and think logically is the attribute that makes us “made in the image of God”. Rand was so close. She knew that our ability to reason lifted us to infinite dignity, but she missed that it was Christ indwelling in our minds and giving us that “spark” of reason. She thought that human minds self-generated reason and that there was no outside Source.

Re-read Atlas making that substitution and it will knock you on the floor.

And another Christian libertarian, Don't Tread On Mike, brings us evidence that even according to the Bible, the Earth is not 6000 years old.

Whatever you choose to believe, if you don’t take anything else away from this article, understand this: The theories that some Young-Earth Creationists come up with are flat out stupid. Not only are the completely unscientific, they aren’t even grounded in the Bible. Where do the Biblical authors mention a giant ice canopy that melted and fell to earth and caused a flood?

So before you go making scientific claims, make sure you understand basic high school science…if you want to be taken seriously that is. And don’t believe Young-Earth Creationists just because they’re Christians. A lot of them have no idea what they’re talking about, even in terms of scientific theories that everyone knows are facts.

As I said, I'll be putting forth my own thoughts on the subject when I have time--things are a little busy right now.  But just as Christians need to quit dismissing science out of hand, so do secularists of all stripes need to quit slamming their minds shut at the mention of faith.  That's the only way we can ever have any form of civilized debate.