NEWSLETTER

of the

AMERICAN SCIENTIFIC AFFILIATION - CANADIAN SCIENTIFIC & CHRISTIAN AFFILIATION 

Volume 27 Number 2   April / May 1985

A FEW LINES ABOUT THE NEXT ONE

Hurry! There's still time to register for ASA's 40th ANNUAL MEETING, this year a Joint Conference with the Research Scientists' Christian Fellowship, to be held at St. Catherine's College, OXFORD, ENGLAND, on JULY 26-29, 1985. Theme: "Christian Faith and Science in Society." Keynoters: Donald M. MacKay, emeritus professor of communications, Keele University, England; and Walter R. Thorson, professor of chemistry, U. of Alberta, Canada. Registration materials were mailed in January. Write to ASA, P.O. Box J, Ipswich, MA 01938 for full particulars.

Note for families with young children (under 16): there are facilities for your housing at St. Catherine's, (contrary to our earlier information), but there are only a few spaces. Contact the ASA national office right away if you are interested.

-Jay Weygandt (of Logos Bookstore of Springfield, Ohio, who ran the book table at our 1984 Annual Meeting at Miami U.): "I had a great time. I felt more like a participant than an outsider. The existence of ASA holds hope that Christians need not compromise either their faith or their science. I'm thankful for your ministry, and hope that the relationship between ASA and the Logos Association can be strengthened. And I loved the quality of the group's sense of humor."

-Jim Hefley, getting up to speak after Russ Heddendorf had wowed the crowd with a very polished paper: "I feel like the old Indian in the Southwest who had been communicating all his life by smoke signals. One day when he saw a huge, mushroom-shaped cloud rising over New Mexico, he said, "Gee, I wish I could speak like that!" The new form of religious dogmatism, Jim said, goes like this: "Carl Sagan said it on TV; I believe it; and that settles it."

-Jerry Bergman: "No case charging religious discrimination in a secular institution has ever been won in a U.S. court, although many cases of race, sex, and age discrimination have been won." (So Jerry could make history by winning his case against Ohio's Bowling Green State U.-Ed.)

-Fred Van Dyke, on the linkage between liberty and law: "Few realize that the motto 'Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land' on the U.S. Liberty Bell was taken from Leviticus, the Old Testament book of the law." On outnumbered Christians working with those who operate from different ethical principles): "When you're in bed with an elephant, no matter how affectionate, one wrong turn and you're in trouble."

-D. K. Pace, citing some heavy statistics about the approximately one percent of the U.S. population in the prison system: "Of those, about 10% (200,000) are in a jail, 20% (400,000) are in a prison, 10% (200,000) are on parole, and 50% (1,000,000) are on probation" (if we got the numbers right-Ed.). D. K. pegged the cost of all that incarceration at about $30 billion a year and said that a half to two-thirds of those in the system are repeaters, with up to 10% being "career criminals who have no other profession."

-Adrian Clark, on ESP experimentation: "It has not been 100% successful."

FROM OUR 1984 NOTEBOOK

-Speaking of intelligence, it came out at the 1984 Annual Meeting that not all our members have figured out how to look up an address in the ASA Membership Directory. (in fact Alton Everest, ASA's first president and first editor of this Newsletter, once told us he thought members were listed according to number of wisdom teeth-Ed.) Here's the plot: The states are listed alphabetically, and under each state its cities are listed alphabetically (not by ZIP); after that the members in each city are listed alphabetically. Computers may do it differently but humans should use the alphabetical list of names at the back to find a member's city and state, then turn to that state in the front, go through the cities (third line) to the member's city, finally check the names (first line) in that city and read the address from the second line.

-Some interesting statistics: with 2,500 ASA members,  About 400 usually vote, and only about 600 have ever attended an Annual Meeting. In 1984, 67 members responded to our appeal to contribute 1% of their income or $200 per year to support ASA. We are grateful for their participation and hope more people will join them to reach our goal of 200 sustaining members.

-Words, words. In addition to that generic "man" in ASA's Statement of Faith, our attention was called to some other words that can sometimes be stumbling blocks. Calling the Bible our "only unerring guide" probably excludes many Protestant scientists who honor the Scriptures alone as God's revelation, but doubt the wisdom of using the term "unerring" or "inerrant."

-Another note on nomenclature: Some wag told Bob Herrmann how he and Owen Gingerich could attract more people to the dinner-meetings being held around the country in support of a "contra-Cosmos" television series: quit referring to them as "TV-dinners." (Actually, we shouldn't be calling that proposed series "contra-Cosmos," either, because by the time it is funded, produced, and shown, viewers will have forgotten Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" series. "in the Beginning" and "Of Time and Space" are two titles being considered-Ed.)

-Historical note: In 1984 science historian Ronald Numbers interviewed a number of ASA senior citizens for a book he's writing on the history of the "scientific creationism" movement. After a visit to Ipswich he suggested that ASA should find a suitable place to deposit archival material important to historians. One possibility is the Billy Graham Center at Wheaton College, which is building collections on evangelical organizations and institutions. The library at Iowa State University has started a collection on creation/evolution, but so far that seems to be limited to published materials. The Executive Council is also considering publication of a history of ASA, wondering what kind would be useful and how it could be marketed. Should it be largely reminiscences of oldtimers (whom Alton Everest calls the ASA "Fossil Club") or should it be written by a more objective professional historian?

ASA/CSCA may not be a "sleeping giant" but we're not exactly a "dozing dwarf," either. We're waking up, but who can guess our full potential for constructively bridging the scientific and Christian communities? More members seem ready to experiment, to see what kinds of bridges we can build together. The spacework is frequently being done by small task-oriented groups meeting locally or regionally, then corresponding. Executive director Bob Herrmann's travels have enabled him to meet with several of the ASA commissions, or at least with the chair and a few interested members from one area.

In January, for example, to coincide with Bob's presence on the west coast for the Gingerich lecture at Stanford University, the Commission on Arms Control held an allday meeting at Stanford. Commission chair Stan Moore brought several others with him from southern California; local ASAers put them up overnight. Interested members from the Bay area brought the total to nine, enough to express widely divergent viewpoints and begin groping toward understanding, if not unity. A primary task of each commission is to assess the range of positions taken by informed Christians on major controversial issues. Without advocating any particular position the commissions can explore the technological bases underlying the various positions and also the biblical principles that apply to all of them. Another task is to find ways to communicate useful information.

The Executive Council is encouraging the Commission on Industrial and Engineering Ethics chaired by Robert Voss to prepare a symposium for the 1986 Annual Meeting at Houghton College. For the 1987 meeting at Wheaton College the Commission on Global Resources chaired by Ray Brand has been asked to take charge. At Pepperdine in 1988 the Commission on Bioethics chaired by Jerry Albert and the Commission on Arms Control chaired by Stan Moore may be called on. In 1989 one of the other Commissions may take responsibility for a joint meeting with CSCA in Canada.

The Committee on Integrity in Science Education established at the November Council meeting has already embarked on a publication program, believe it or not. The Council agreed to experiment with letting the committee publish in its own name; that's to get around ASA's perennial inhibition about saying anything not fully endorsed by every member. Certain safeguards are built in, including manuscript review by designated ASA officials-and the understanding that the committee could be disbanded if it should get too far "out of line."

The committee's first project is to prepare a well-illustrated publication similar to Science and Creationism: A View from the National Academy of Sciences but showing how both a pseudoscientific creationism and a pseudoreligious evolutionism violate the integrity of science. In December, committee chair David Price spent two days at John Wiester's California ranch working with John and Walt Hearn, with Jim Buswell sitting in for one of the days. Writing assignments have been made-with expectation of having camera-ready copy completed by July 1985.

The committee hopes a carefully-worded, widely-distributed publication as "classy" as the NAS book will help public school teachers and others find their way through current controversies-and put ASA "on the map" in the process. For prepublication expenses the ASA set up a special account and "seeded" it with $2000. The "Integrity in Science Education" fund has now grown to $10,000, with $3000 in contributions from interested individuals, and a $5000 matching grant from a small private foundation.

Printing and distribution on a scale approaching that for the NAS booklet (40,000 copies; a free one to every school system in the country, the rest sold at quantity discounts) could take another $40,000. John Wiester is approaching individuals and foundations for major support. But contributions of any size, made out to ASA and designated for "Integrity in Science Education," are welcomed. Send to the Ipswich office or to Dr. David Price, Chair, ASA Committee on Integrity in Science Education, P.O. Box 157, Springville, CA 93265.

Meanwhile, the Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation plans to include the kind of popularly-written insert many have proposed as a basic step toward meeting our responsibility to the general Christian public. Such inserts, with short, nontechnical articles on science/faith issues, could be pulled out and handed to a pastor or any other person who might find them helpful. Extra copies could be produced in quantity for distribution in churches, at ASA booths at Sunday school conventions, or in other ways.

Members willing to write for the insert or to "translate" regular JASA articles in your field into popular language should contact the newly appointed editor of that project: Dr. Frank Roberts, Delaware County Christian School, Malin Rd., Newton Square, PA 07019.

John R . Wood has provided some details of the four week interterm course on "The Great Origins Debate" he offered at Simpson College last year. The title attracted enough students so that enrollment was closed at 25. The class met for three hours each morning during January.

Simpson is a liberal arts college of the Christian & Missionary Alliance. Many of John's students had heard only the position of ICR (institute for Creation Research) on questions of origins. So he chose textbooks and other materials to give them a look at a range of viewpoints, using the third edition of A Case for Creation (Moody, 1983) by Wayne Frair and Paul Davis as a non-ICR source for the special-creationist position. Philip Kitcher's Abusing Science: The Case Against Creationism (M.I.T., 1983) represented the opposite extreme. Kitcher's acerbic style evoked responses in kind. Some of the students with a limited science background saw the situation simply as "Christians versus non-Christians." Other materials included articles from JASA (Dick Bube's editorial "We Believe in Creation"), Christianity Today (Ed Olson), Eternity (Davis Young), and Scientific American (Owen Gingerich).

Richard Leakey's The Illustrated Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin (Hill and Wang, 1979) is more intelligible to non-scientists than unabridged versions, according to John, who urged his students to read Darwin first-hand in preference to repeating second-hand criticisms. The class responded warmly to the openness of Duane Thurman's approach in How to Think About Evolution (IVP, 1978). Several films and two field trips (to the California Academy of Science museum and the San Francisco zoo) constituted a "mini-voyage of the Beagle" to help students face the problems Darwin faced: the clash of fact and theory, of world and world-view.

In the few lectures he gave, John emphasized (a) the question of the age of the earth and (b) the nature of science. But he also posed five questions for debate in class, and assigned teams. Having the students debate gave them plenty of motivation to read their assignments but also had an unexpected result. It convinced them that a debate format probably isn't the best way to explore scientific issues. Students also submitted a paper (2-4 pages) in support of their position on the questi6n debated, plus a 2-page response to questions raised by the opposing side.

The success of that experimental course encouraged John to design an inter-term course for January 1985 on "The Question of Science." He wasn't sure it would have the intrinsic interest or drawing power of his 1984 course, but he'll let us know how it came out. (John would probably be glad to discuss these courses or your own pedagogical experiments: Prof. John R. Wood, Simpson College, 801 Silver Ave., San Francisco, CA 94134.)

Meanwhile, "the great origins debate" has moved ahead in court. On 10 January 1985, U.S. District Court Judge Adrian Duplantier issued a summary judgment declaring Louisiana's "Balanced Treatment Act" unconstitutional because "it promotes the beliefs of some theistic sects to the detriment of others." On January 11, in the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, an appeal of Judge Duplantier's ruling was filed by Wendell Conrad and other defense attorneys in the case. (In Louisiana it was the defendants who favored "creation science"-Ed.)

2. Two groups of Christians in sociology have formed in recent years. The Christian Sociological Society (CSS), which meets in conjunction with the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association (another "ASA" Ed.), has scheduled a June 7-9 retreat for those interested in CSS goals. Jack Balswick of Fuller Seminary and Russ Heddendorf of Covenant College are on the CSS steering committee and Dave Moberg of Marquette is book review editor of the Newsletter. Contact: Dr. George A. Hillery, Jr., Dept. of Sociology, VPI & State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061.

3. A second group, now calling itself the Association of Christians Teaching Sociology (ACTS) is composed of sociologists teaching at Christian colleges. ACTS is holding its 10th annual conference June 13-16, at St. Olaf College. Besides papers and discussions on "Christian Integration in One's Life and Courses," this year's gathering will visit Bethany Fellowship (a Christian commune with over 100 members in its 30th year of existence) and possibly a broadcast of Garrison Keillor's "Prairie Home Companion" (our favorite radio program!-Ed.). Contact: Dr. Michael Leming, Dept. of Sociology, St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN 55057.

4. For those attending the ASA/RSCF CONFERENCE at Oxford this summer, David Barnes, biology prof at Roberts Wesleyan College in New York, calls attention to the Oxford Science Studies Summer Seminars. Spon-

sored by the Dept. of External Studies of Oxford University, the seminars are held at The Queen's College, Oxford. Either the July 13-20 seminar on "Scientific Controversies" or the July 20-27 seminar on "Medicine, Ethics, and Society" would be of interest to many of our members. Both come before our conference, the second overlapping slightly.

5. Glen J. Kuban is writing a monograph on the controversy over certain "humanlike" tracks among the dinosaur footprints at the Paluxy River in Texas. One of his key conclusions is that some of the alleged human tracks, including the well-publicized "Taylor trail," were made by dinosaurs that walked in a plantigrade fashion (placing weight on the "heel" of the foot). Ronnie Hastings and Gerhard Nickel have both been of assistance to Glen in some of his research. He would welcome any information, photographs, or other items related to the Paluxy controversy, before June 1985. Address: 1127 Manitoulin Pike, Brunswick, OH 44212.

6. Another person interested in the Paluxy River footprints is geologist John W. DeVilbiss, who is convinced that the Paluxy data corroborate "the contemporaneous coexistence of dinosaur and man in antiquity." His new organization "seeks to show within the geological field how objective research can dispel controversy for the benefit of the Christian testimony and the truth itself." It publishes an occasional newsletter ($10 per year). Address: The Office for Research on Origins, P.O. Box 722153, Houston, TX 77272-2153.

7. The Christian College Coalition (of 70 schools) deserves a full report for the many good things it's doing (and an apology for our confusing it with the 13-school Christian College Consortium-Ed.). For now we'll merely call attention to its free brochure aimed at prospective students, "Have You Considered a Christian College?" It lists the Coalition colleges, outlines what such colleges have to offer, mentions financial aid, and recommends A Guide to Christian Colleges (Eerdmans). The 3rd (1984-5) edition of that full Coalition book is also available (at $12.95 postpaid) from: Christian College Coalition, 1776 Massachusetts Ave., N.W., Washington, DC 20036.

8. ASA Council member Charles Hummel calls attention to a new program for relating Christianity to contemporary issues called "Christianity Today Institute." Christianity Today magazine is establishing the institute "to draw upon the knowledge and wisdom of Christian thinkers in a wide range of institutions and to present our findings in a series of 32-page publications, each addressing one issue of significance." To "register" as a prospective participant, send your name, institution, position, degrees, and field of specialty to: V. Gilbert Beers, Executive Director, Christianity Today Institute, Christianity Today, 465 Gundersen Drive, Carol Stream, IL 60188.

9. D. Wayne Linn, on leave from Oregon State as professor of biology at the U. of Swaziland in Africa, writes about a worthy Christian student, now in his second year in math and physics, who wants to do his last two years at a U.S. college or university, preparing, to teach math in Swaziland. Good English, better than average grades, needs full scholarship aid. Warmly recommended by Wayne. If your school can help, write (airmail) to Pentecost Nkhoma, University of Swaziland, Private Bag, Kwaluseni, Swaziland, Africa (or to Wayne at the same address).

While reading 0. Gareth Jones's excellent treatment of "Ethical Issues at the Commencement of Life" in Brave New People (IVP, 1984), we heard that the book had been withdrawn because of "pro-life" objections. We were heartened by criticisms of the withdrawal from Lewis Smedes in the October Reformed Journal, by Steve Lawhead ("What? Ban My Book?") in the December CT, and by Dick Bube (and Wilbur Bullock) in the December JASA. ASA Publications Committee chair Jim Neidhardt and probably many others wrote personal letters of dismay at IVCF's action.

Then we learned that Eerdmans will publish Brave New People in the U.S. (British InterVarsity, its first publisher, never did drop it.)

The book-banning shook us up, we admit. New policy: we'll no longer insist on reading every book by an ASA author beforehand (it might go out of print!). And we're starting a regular section for brief notices of new books of ASA interest. We'll begin clearing out our backlog next issue-or could we count this as the beginning? Ed.

Last summer's opportunity to buy a complete computer system at half price forced some reality into our fantasies of owning a word processor. We had to "shop around" quickly to see if we should accept. That experience showed us how hard it is for a novice to make an intelligent decision about a personal computer (PC), or even to ask intelligent questions about it. Sales personnel were seldom much help, at least at the beginning. Most guides to buying a PC say you should first decide on the software ("programs") you want to run, then shop for appropriate hardware (the computer itself). That would make sense-if our anxiety over buying something weren't proportional to its cost; software costs tens to hundreds of dollars, hardware thousands. Few people can afford a two-kilobuck mistake.

Having a limited goal helped narrow our choices. The first decision we made was actually a hardware decision: we needed a letter-quality ("daisywheel") printer rather than a "dot-matrix" printer. We could do without color or "graphics" but our text had to look as good as something typed on a good electric. That meant also settling for a slower printing speed. Since a dot-matrix printer came with the half-price deal, and adding another printer would push the total cost too high, that settled one question. By then we were serious, though, so we kept shopping. We also kept talking to people already "into computers."

Everybody we knew who used a word processor assured us that the program they used was the best one. (Now we see why: whichever one you use is such an improvement over typing, it's hard to imagine anything better.) The most helpful thing we read was a book on one sored by the Dept. of External Studies of Oxford University, the seminars are held at The Queen's College, Oxford. Either the July 13-20 seminar on "Scientific Controversies" or the July 20-27 seminar on "Medicine, Ethics, and Society" would be of interest to many of our members. Both come before our conference, the second overlapping slightly.

5. Glen J. Kuban is writing a monograph on the controversy over certain "humanlike" tracks among the dinosaur footprints at the Paluxy River in Texas. One of his key conclusions is that some of the alleged human tracks, including the well-publicized "Taylor trail," were made by dinosaurs that walked in a plantigrade fashion (placing weight on the "heel" of the foot). Ronnie Hastings and Gerhard Nickel have both been of assistance to Glen in some of his research. He would welcome any information, photographs, or other items related to the Paluxy controversy, before June 1985. Address: 1127 Manitoulin Pike, Brunswick, OH 44212.

6. Another person interested in the Paluxy River footprints is geologist John W. DeVilbiss, who is convinced that the Paluxy data corroborate "the contemporaneous coexistence of dinosaur and man in antiquity." His new organization "seeks to show within the geological field how objective research can dispel controversy for the benefit of the Christian testimony and the truth itself." It publishes an occasional newsletter ($10 per year). Address: The Office for Research on Origins, P.O. Box 722153, Houston, TX 77272-2153.

7. The Christian College Coalition (of 70 schools) deserves a full report for the many good things it's doing (and an apology for our confusing it with the 13-school Christian College Consortium -Ed.). For now we'll merely call attention to its free brochure aimed at prospective students, "Have You Considered a Christian College?" It lists the Coalition colleges, outlines what such colleges have to offer, mentions financial aid, and recommends A Guide to Christian Colleges (Eerdmans). The 3rd (1984-5) edition of that full Coalition book is also available (at $12.95 postpaid) from: Christian College Coalition, 1776 Massachusetts Ave., N.W., Washington, DC 20036.

8. ASA Council member Charles Hummel calls attention to a new program for relating Christianity to contemporary issues called "Christianity Today Institute." Christianity Today magazine is establishing the institute "to draw upon the knowledge and wisdom of Christian thinkers in a wide range of institutions and to present our findings in a series of 32-page publications, each addressing one issue of significance." To "register" as a prospective participant, send your name, institution, position, degrees, and field of specialty to: V. Gilbert Beers, Executive Director, Christianity Today Institute, Christianity Today, 465 Gundersen Drive, Carol Stream, IL 60188.

9. D, Wayne Linn, on leave from Oregon State as professor of biology at the U. of Swaziland in Africa, writes about a worthy Christian student, now in his second year in math and physics, who wants to do his last two years at a U.S. college or university, preparing to teach math in Swaziland. Good English, better than average grades, needs full scholarship aid. Warmly recommended by Wayne. If your school can help, write (airmail) to Pentecost Nkhoma, University of Swaziland, Private Bag, Kwaluseni, Swaziland, Africa (or to Wayne at the same address).

While reading D. Gareth Jones's excellent treatment of "Ethical Issues at the Commencement of Life" in Brave New People (IVP, 1984), we heard that the book had been withdrawn because of "pro-life" objections. We were heartened by criticisms of the withdrawal from Lewis Smedes in the October Reformed Journal, by Steve Lawhead ("What? Ban My Book?") in the December CT, and by Dick Bube (and Wilbur Bullock) in the December JASA. ASA Publications Committee chair Jim Neidhardt and probably many others wrote personal letters of dismay at IVCF's action.

Then we learned that Eerdmans will publish Brave New People in the U.S. (British InterVarsity, its first publisher, never did drop it.)

The book-banning shook us up, we admit. New policy: we'll no longer insist on reading every book by an ASA author beforehand (it might go out of print!). And we're starting a regular section for brief notices of new books of ASA interest. We'll begin clearing out our backlog next issue-or could we count this as the beginning? Ed.

Last summer's opportunity to buy a complete computer system at half price forced some reality into our fantasies of owning a word processor. We had to "shop around" quickly to see if we should accept. That experience showed us how hard it is for a novice to make an intelligent decision about a personal computer (PC), or even to ask intelligent questions about it. Sales personnel were seldom much help, at least at the beginning. Most guides to buying a PC say you should first decide on the software ("programs") you want to run, then shop for appropriate hardware (the computer itself). That would make sense-if our anxiety over buying something weren't proportional to its cost; software costs tens to hundreds of dollars, hardware thousands. Few people can afford a two-kilobuck mistake.

Having a limited goal helped narrow our choices. The first decision we made was actually a hardware decision: we needed a letter-quality ("daisywheel") printer rather than a "dot-matrix" printer. We could do without color or "graphics" but our text had to look as good as something typed on a good electric. That meant also settling for a slower printing speed. Since a dot-matrix printer came with the half-price deal, and adding another printer would push the total cost too high, that settled one question. By then we were serious, though, so we kept shopping. We also kept talking to people already "into computers."

Everybody we knew who used a word processor assured us that the program they used was the best one. (Now we see why: whichever one you use is such an improvement over typing, it's hard to imagine anything better.) The most helpful thing we read was a book on one

Roberts Wesleyan College in New York has a position in computer science requiring an M.S. but Ph.D. preferred, with teaching experience. Contact: Dr. Oscar Lenning, Academic Dean, Roberts Wesleyan College, 2301 Westside Dr., Rochester, NY 14624. Tel. (716) 594-9471. (Received December 1984. March deadline, but you might check anyway.)

Warner Pacific College in Oregon seeks someone in physical science, Ph.D. preferred, to teach introductory courses in physics, general chemistry, and organic chemistry, plus math and computer science if you're up to it. Contact: Joyce Q. Erickson, Dean of Faculty, Warner Pacific College, 2219 S.E. 68th, Portland, OR 97215. (Received January 1985.)

Eastern College in Pennsylvania has one tenure-track opening in biology (cell, developmental, physiology, histology) and one in computer science (business emphasis), Ph.D. preferred. By April 15, contact: Dr. Jean B. Kim, Academic Dean, Eastern College, St. Davids, PA 19087. Tel.: (215) 341-5800. (Rcvd Feb. 1985.)

Gordon College in Massachusetts has a new position in psychology (physiological, research methods, statistics, learning), Ph.D. and teaching experience required. Contact: Dr. R. Judson Carlberg, Dean of Faculty, Gordon College, Grapevine Road, Wenham, MA 01984; or call Dr. Bert Hodges, Chair, at (617) 927-2300. (Received February 1985.)

anon. returned to Massachusetts in December from three months in Ivory Coast, Sudan, and Cameroon, applying her anthropological training to various cultural problems encountered by Wycliffe Bible translation teams. She has resumed her Ph.D. program in anthropology at Brandeis, is now digging through old records and documents to uncover close-kin marriage patterns among early New Englanders of 1640-1725 or so. She hopes to make it to Oxford (Old England) for the ASA/ RSCF Conference in July.

Gretchen Berggren is a pediatrician with the Health, Nutrition and Family Planning Unit of Save the Children/ USA, headquartered in Westport, Connecticut. Working with Save the Children/UK and their sister organization, Redd Barna of Norway, they have been trying to encourage some farmers in Ethiopia to stay on their land rather than fleeing to refugee camps, in the hope that February rains (?) might save some lives. A November letter quoted Warren Berggren on the tragic conditions of hunger he was seeing in the camps-with no ships carrying grain then in harbor. According to a November story in the New York Times, a U.N. official said that of the 800,000 tons of grain desperately needed, only 430,000 tons had been pledged by the U.S., the Soviet Union, and other countries-and only half of what had been pledged had arrived in Ethiopia. Even if the long-awaited rains were to come in February, Gretchen said, the emergency situation will continue for at least another year. (Will well-fed westerners get tired of hearing the plight of 6 to 7 million people at risk of starvation? We wonder. Ed.)

James R. Berney is general director of the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship of Canada, headquartered in Toronto. Jim was trained as an engineer but had a long career with IVCF-USA before moving to Canada a few years ago. He has made contact with Canadian Scientific & Christian Affiliation members and has attended several CSCA meetings. After several recurrences of a rather puzzling illness, Jim had a cholecystectomy in November to take care of a gallstone problem. We hope he recovered in time to attend Urbana '84 and speak at the IVCF-USA National Staff Conference following the Missionary Convention.

Donald G. Davis, Jr., associate professor of library and information science at the U. of Texas in Austin, and editor of the Journal of Library History, was coordinator of the Library History Seminar VII on "Books, Libraries & Culture" held at the U. of North Carolina in Chapel Hill in March. In December Don presented a paper at a meeting of the Association for the Bibliography of History in conjunction with the American Historical Association meeting in Chicago.

Norman L. Geisler teaches systematic theology at Dallas Theological Seminary in Texas. He has written some twenty-two books and testified in support of the Arkansas "Balanced Treatment" Act in 1981. In October he was in Taipei, Taiwan, to speak at a biblical inerrancy conference. Recently Norm has engaged in a sort of published debate on "the argument from design" in the pages of CreationlEvolution. Norm's article, "A Scientific Basis for Creation: The Principle of Uniformity," appeared in CIE XIII, with a response by Fred Edwords and an accompanying article by William Thwaites. In the fall 1984 issue (CIE XIV) Norm comes back with "Uniformity and Creation: A Response to Edwords and Thwaites," to which Edwords offers "Apples and Oranges: A Response to Geisler."

Elmer Hartgerink of South Haven, Michigan, says he hasn't paid much attention to ASA over the past five years because he's been working hard to salvage a Christian chemical corporation. Maybe that means his company has turned the corner, so he's coming up for air. Elmer is president of Wyckoff Chemical Company, Inc., of South Haven. (We haven't paid much attention to organic chemistry in recent years but the structural formula on Elmer's business card looks to us like a tetramethyl cyclohexene. We're not sure what Wyckoff produces.-Ed.)

Tim A. Kelly is a research chemist with Bortels Immunodiagnostics of Bellevue, Washington, which produces viral diagnostics using classic microbiological, monoclonal, and recombinant DNA techniques (Tim's specialty). He wants to get in touch with other Christians in the Seattle area for fellowship and encouragement in witnessing to scientific colleagues. Tim's home address is 14301 - 1 01st Pl. N.E., Bothell, WA 98011. (Hey, Tim, how about checking in at The Alternative, at 4510 University Way N.E. in Seattle, the Logos Bookstore that handles the ASA Book Service? Bet they can put you in  touch. Phone (206) 632-8830.-Ed.)

William Brink Monsma is having an active year as director of The Maclaurin Institute For Interdisciplinary Studies at the U. of Minnesota. The last lecture of the series on "1984 and the Future," featuring U.M. geneticist V. Elving Anderson on genetic engineering, nearly filled the lecture hall. The Maclaurin Institute is a ministry to the 3000 faculty and 7000 grad students at Minnesota, trying to serve as a model for Christian witness at other universities. Your financial support would be welcome (address: 3945 - 14th Ave. South, Minneapolis, MN 55407). Bill Monsma, who is also serving as a model "field representative" for ASA, discussed the appeal of Eastern philosophies to modern physicists "In Search of the Lord of the Dance" in the November 1984 issue of Eternity.

Stanley W. Moore of Thousand Oaks, California, teaches political science at Pepperdine, chairs ASA's Commission on Arms Control, and does a lot of other things besides. A year ago he gave a paper on "Budget Priorities, National Security, and Third World Development" at a conference on national security at the Naval Postgraduate School. Before a largely military audience, Stan said we'd get more long-term security by cutting the military budget and using the money to meet the economic and environmental needs of the world's poorest countries. Although the audience responded with total silence, the NPG School judged it as one of the best papers and will include it in a book on The American Military Presence Abroad. Stan is even more pleased that his major work, The Child's Political World: A Longitudinal Perspective, is being released by Praeger in February. Meanwhile, wife Nancy is making progress toward her M.Div. at Fuller Seminary.

Marie-Celeste Roberti of Groton, New York, is a new ASA member anxious for us to go beyond the underlying principles of scientific and biblical understanding ASA so often grapples with. Marie-Celeste, a personnel director in a hospital, sees "scientific medicine" practiced every day-but doesn't always like what she sees, and not only in her own hospital. People need guidance in both the "ethics and politics" of daily life. After seeing RNs covertly disciplined for failing to participate 'in unethical practices, and dealing daily with potential abuses of power, she would like ASA to address some of its attention to such problems as excessive performance of Caesarean sections; inadequate use of lead shielding when X-rays are taken in doctors' and dentists' offices; systematic de-intellectualization of patients; and increasing suggestion of psychopathogenic behavior. (For starters, we put her in touch with ASA's Commission on Bioethics.-Ed.)

Robert Shacklett left a university faculty position in physics a few years ago and is now, one might say, into metaphysics. As executive director of the foundation for Mind-Being Research in Los Altos, California, he's probing the nature of consciousness. Four years ago Bob and Edie bought four acres in rural Santa Cruz County and last year finally received their building permit. They're living there in a trailer while getting started on a 35-foot geodesic dome with two conventional wings for bedrooms. Bob's Christmas letter told the sad story of an unexpected gully-washer that filled their foundation forms with mud; it had to be dug out laboriously so they could pour concrete before the (expected) rains shut down construction for the winter. (Meanwhile, having "joined the 20th century" at about the same time as the Newsletter editor, they enjoy reading about somebody else's adventures with a new word processor.-Ed.)

D. Lynn Shaeffer of Pleasanton, California, has recently joined Physics International of San Leandro, as chief scientist, electromagnetic technology, in the Nuclear Weapons Effects Division. Lynn's research interests include electro-magnetic pulse (EMP), system  generated EMP, microwaves, antenna theory, plasma physics, radiation effects on materials, and radiation simulator fidelity.

James W. Sire has returned to his editorial post at InterVarsity Press in Downers Grove, Illinois, after a "sabbatical" to teach at New College in Berkeley, California. Jim taught a course on "Literature and the Human Condition," another on "World Views" based on his popular 1976 IVP book, The Universe Next Door.

Thomas L. Walters is a physicist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, and also an adjunct professor at Fuller Theological Seminary in the same city. A relatively recent member of ASA, Tom teaches a course on science and Christian faith at Fuller. He hopes to organize a major conference on the "origin of life" at Fuller some time in the future, perhaps in 1986.

Douglas Wiens received his Ph.D. in geological sciences from Northwestern in November and is now associate professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis. He's had a number of papers on seismology published recently in the Journal of Geophysical Research. Doug's wife Debbie teaches junior high school in Clayton, Missouri.

Kurt Wood and his Debbie moved to Casablanca in September. When we last heard from them, Kurt had been making the rounds of Moroccan universities, several of which needed a chemistry professor but none of which seemed to have the funds to hire him. Meanwhile, though, besides practicing their Arabic, the Woods have produced a baby girl, Rachel Noelle, born December 6. (Nice stamp from Royaume du Moroc; we assume the handsome gentleman in coat and tie on it is le roi but the caption is a riddle written in wiggles.-Ed.)

Edwin Yamauchi, professor of history at Miami University in Ohio, has just completed a five-year term on ASA's Executive council and taken up responsibilities as chair of the Institute for Biblical Research, patterned after the (British) Tyndale Fellowship for Biblical Studies. IBR is a broadly evangelical association of biblical scholars. At the annual IBR meeting in Chicago in December Ed gave a paper on "Demons, Diseases and Exorcisms," a contribution to the British series, Gospel Perspectives.

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