In Papua New Guinea the Umeda village that Alfred Gell studied was a complexly patterned community, really a complex of hamlets in a larger area, that had evolved culture to fit the circumstances. The people themselves were physically evolved to survive, sturdy sun-darkened folks who probably had a lot of inner physiological molecular mutations that allowed them to live...

Compromise is a hoary old bear who messes up rebellion and status quo alike. It is at the heart of democracy. Sometimes if the compromise fails, one side or the other gets its way entirely, but at what cost? It’s better than warfare, but sometimes only barely. (Bearly. Bear market. I always get jokey when I’m worried.) Sometimes the compromise means lose/lose. Sometimes...

Dr. Mohler, in reading my book and blog, claims that I reject the notion of a personal God. Given his traditional sense of a personal God, I do not fault him for that conclusion. Here, however, I wish to offer an alternate (and, I assert, a fuller and more compelling) sense of what a personal God could entail in our modern, evolutionary world.   St. Thomas Aquinas, one...

Last September, the day I learned I had an especially aggressive form of cancer, I pondered, “If I have only one message left to communicate to the world, what would it be?” The answer that came: “Preach the New Atheists as God’s prophets.” A few hours later, I recorded a 30-minute podcast with that title. Ten months later, with cancer in remission, this is still...