Review:
The Wedge of Truth, By Phillip Johnson,
Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2000
188 pages, endnotes, index, Hardback, $17.99. ISBN:0-8308-2267-4

Phillip Johnson requires no introduction to the readers of this
journal. His fifth book takes aim at the metaphysical roots of
naturalism and materialism, discussing these roots in biology, in
theology, psychology, and in the power politics of modern society as
observed in the Kansas Board of Education decision to remove evolution
from the standards. His major point over and over is that scientists
are overstepping their data by declaring that science has proven God
to be an irrelevancy. In this book he outlines the wedge strategy his
movement intends to use to 'get the right questions on the table.'

 Prior to reading the book, I feared that there would be the usual
 plethora of factual mistakes seen in many of his earlier books. While
 there were some egregious examples (in his Dembski influenced
 treatment of information theory), in general the book remained in the
 realm of philosophy and attacked the metaphysical basis for
 naturalism. Thus, Johnson made the book difficult for a Christian to
 ignore. His plea, that God should be part of the objective universe
 and not relegated to some imaginary place in reality where He can do
 no mischief, struck a strong chord with this Christian.

Johnson is correct that if God has no place influencing the objective
world, how can we understand the incarnation? But this plea is a
double-edged sword that Johnson and his ID colleagues have totally
failed to understand. If the ID group wants God to be an active agent
in the modern world of objective reality, then the ID group is
obligated to explain exactly how God influenced the development of
life, when God did these items and what materials He used. They need
to offer a coherent scenario matching objective reality with God's
actions. But, as Mark Ptashne noted at The Nature of Nature
Conference, each member of the ID group offers mutually exclusive
solutions to this problem. And in this book while decrying that
evolutionists can't explain things, Johnson continues to avoid
applying the same standard (the other side of the sword) to his own
agenda and movement.

 Johnson also strikes a deep chord when discussing the origin of the
 soul. If the soul does not exist or is entirely an epiphenomenon of
 material complexity, then what is to become of the Christian theology
 of an afterlife? Johnson rightly argues that those who see our
 humanness as nothing but the development of a particular circuit in
 the brain have little to offer in way of explanation for our
 appreciation of beauty or in our obvious human need for moral values
 and justice.  I find it extremely difficult to see how natural
 selection can evolve a sense of artistic or even religious feeling.
 Of what value is art appreciation to survival?

 Johnson is at his best and most resonant when he discusses his
 theological reasons for rejecting naturalism. He quotes John 1:1, 'In
 the beginning was the Word=85" as a reason Christians should hold that
 intelligence and soul are prior to the material universe. What
 Christian can disagree?

 His discussion of the theological modernist is also interesting as he
 defends a cognitive territory for Christian revelation and teaching.
 He rails against those in science who wish to relegate religious
 thought to the realm of the faeries and fantasies, having no
 connection with objective reality. If that is the place of Christian
 revelation, we should all go fishing on Sunday.

 One of the poorer sections of the book is his treatment of the Kansas
 Board 's decision on evolution. He painted the issue as one of the
 masses rising up in arms against the educational and scientific elite
 to bring down the restrictions placed upon them by the scientific
 nobility. The evil nobility, played by the scientists, were
 oppressing the people (played by the Board of Education). He waxed
 jubilant about this decision and one could hear the boos and hisses
 for that evil scientific nobility. It was wonderful melodrama.
 Unfortunately, for Johnson's case, I was reading this chapter the day
 after the people of Kansas rose up and voted all those creationist
 board members out of office.  It seems that the reality is that the
 three board members were imposing their views on the majority of the
 Kansans, who refused to play the part scripted by Johnson.

 The biggest flaw in the book is the way Johnson treats his
 adversaries and the way he paints his own horse and hat white.
 Johnson, the non-scientist, has always viewed the scientific endeavor
 as being one in which the scientific emperors dictates what the
 lesser luminaries will believe. And then in the chapter entitled "The
 Empire Strikes Back" he paints himself as a Quixotic character on a
 white horse who will bring about the demise of this hated system
 which he over and over says will fall any minute now. This is a
 prediction he has made for over 10 years and one must wonder where is
 the evidence for this impending doom of evolution and why Johnson who
 demands evidence from the evolutionist offers none for this
 prediction.

 All in all, this is an important book and those involved in the
 creation/evolution issues should read it, indeed, own it. For all his
 faults, Johnson is a major player in this area and what he says will
 have a big impact. It is a pleasurable read but it would have been
 more pleasurable if, upon demanding historical explanations from his
 opponents, Johnson had actually offered some detailed explanations
 from his perspective for what God actually did in the world. That is
 what would achieve his goal of making God part of the objective
 universe.

Reviewed by Glenn R. Morton, Aberdeen Pouch, C/O. Kerr McGee, 16666
Northchase, Houston, TX 77060

---------------------------

Salt and light: Christian involvement in academia
David J. Tyler
[to be published in "Origins" (U.K.) in 2001]

Review of "Wedge of Truth"
Phillip E. Johnson
InterVarsity Press, Downers Grove, 2000

Why is it that so many young people go into Higher Education and
emerge as agnostics or atheists?  Is it really a case of exposure to
truth - an experience that sweeps away the "childish mentality"
associated with a religious upbringing?  Many seem to view it like
this and consider that scholarship can liberate people to escape, as
they put it, from the superstition and ignorance on which religion
thrives.

Phillip Johnson begins his challenging book with the story of Philip
Wentworth, who went to Harvard University in 1924 to prepare himself
for the Christian ministry and ended up rejecting the faith that had
nurtured him.  Johnson shows that instead of examining the issues in a
scholarly way, Wentworth welcomed the critical environment that
enabled him to justify his desire to become a sceptic.  Far from his
educational experience helping him towards maturity of thought, it
undermined his ability to make a sound judgment.  According to
Johnson, Harvard did not help him to ask the right questions, nor to
find rigorous ways of answering those questions.

Johnson then takes up the theme of "asking the right questions" and
visits numerous topics demonstrating that the problem is widespread
among intellectuals.  The first example comes from evolutionary
biology.  Advocates of origins via incremental transformation point to
"change" as proof of the theory.  The real issue, however, concerns
the origin of biological information.  Where does it come from?  Do
evidences of "change" (as presented in the textbooks, for example)
cast light on increases in information and the origins of complexity?
An incident in the life of Richard Dawkins reveals him protesting
against the right questions being asked.  In a recent book, Paul
Davies correctly puts his finger on the information challenge
necessary to address when thinking about "the origin of life", but
then he pulls back from the revolutionary implications of his own
logic.  Davies started well in asking the right questions, but
stumbled when he came to answering them.

Surveys of the religious views of scientists reveal that many
scientists do not consider science neutral about religious matters.
Some others will say that religion occupies a distinct and separate
domain from science, but this position leaves room only for deism and
existentialism (definitely not biblical Christianity).  The key
question here is: "Does theology provide any objective knowledge?"  If
the answer is "Yes" (and all biblical Christians agree that God has
revealed truth and that there is a source of authority outside of
science), then there is a tension between the basic tenets of
Christianity and the widely held view of what constitutes science.
Johnson's chapter on this subject provides an important challenge for
Christians to engage with contemporary culture.  "If theologians are
unwilling or unable to challenge the materialist definition of
"knowledge" implicit in evolutionary science, then they deserve no
more cognitive status than Gould or Dawkins are willing to give them"
(p.103).

In his chapter on "Darwinism of the mind", Johnson examines the views
of some intellectual gatekeepers in the sciences of humanity:
cognitive psychology and the neurosciences.  Dawkins' views on selfish
genes and ourselves as robot survival machines are discussed.  But
when Dawkins advocates a robot rebellion, for us to "upset" the
designs of our selfish genes, Johnson concludes that "this is both
scientifically absurd and morally na=EFve." (p. 107).  This leads on to
a discussion of memes, of the way Steven Pinker has attempted to
handle infanticide using evolutionary psychology, and several other
current issues.  The key question in this area is "Is the thinking,
choosing self an illusion?"  The dominant response in the intellectual
world is to answer "Yes".  Johnson concludes by throwing down the
gauntlet: "It is time for an effective challenge to this constricting,
authoritarian, self-contradictory ideology."  (p.124).

The world of scholarship has moved far from its roots.  Most
Christians appear to be unaware of the mindset of today's intellectual
leaders.  According to Johnson, academia has moved beyond atheism.  It
is not even important to people that they debate the existence of God.
 This is because knowledge is defined in naturalistic terms.
Consequently, if God exists, he must be subject to the laws of nature
and must be accessible to man's intellectual probing.  It is into this
marketplace of ideas that Christians must enter and find ways of
contributing confidently.

Clearly, Christians need to be involved in the debate about what
science is.  Progress with the discipline of science will make it much
easier to address related issues facing scholars in the humanities.
These debates are important for the intellectual health of these
different disciplines, because the present culture is increasingly
resistant to rational debate and more conducive to power struggles.
This degeneration is widespread.  Reason gets us from premises to
conclusions but it does not tell us what premises to rely on.
Modernists try to derive ultimate premises by reasoning from other
premises and they end up with circular arguments.  The Christian has a
better way.  Reason needs to build on a solid foundation of truth, and
this is exactly what God has given us by revealing Himself in Jesus
Christ and in the Scriptures.  Our starting point has been given us by
Solomon: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" (Proverbs
1:7).  In the latter chapters, Johnson presents his thoughts on what
this revealed foundation looks like.

This is an excellent book.  Anyone involved with the world of
scholarship, including students, will find benefit in thinking through
the varied issues presented.  Johnson has his finger on the pulse of
the debates he describes, and always has a refreshing and interesting
perspective to contribute.