The theme for the 2018 weekly seminar series was “Purposeful Evolution.” Our intention in these seminars was to explore recent ideas in evolutionary theory that broaden the mechanisms of evolution well beyond the limits of NeoDarwinism or the Modern Synthesis, and which are sometimes referred to under the rubric of the “Extended Evolutionary Synthesis”, or EES. The choice of this theme emerged from numerous discussions and meetings of the Forum’s board members, originally motivated by their study of the book Science and Religion: Beyond Warfare and Toward Understanding (Anselm Academic, 2016), by Joshua Moritz, and by articles in Nature and The Atlantic describing the EES.
Our visiting speaker was Dennis Venema, professor of biology at Trinity Western University in Langley, British Columbia, and author (with Scot McKnight) of Adam and The Genome: Reading Scripture after Genetic Science (Brazos Press, Grand Rapids, MI, 2017). Professor Venema is affiliated with the BioLogos Voices speakers bureau, and writes a series, “Evolution Basics”, on the biologos.org web site.
Prof. Venema’s two evening lectures, presented at Fuller Lodge on Tuesday and Wednesday 10-11 July, were titled “Adam, the Genome, and Evolution” and “Evolution, Intelligent Design, and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis.”The events were attended by about 40 persons each evening.
Los Alamos Faith & Science Forum 