I Can't Resist...

Writer's Log Stardate 22-1-12

Like most writers, I cannot resist checking the amazon sales ranking of my books every so often--like every day. I remember the day the op-ed I wrote with Randall Stephens about The Anointed came out in the NY Times. It was great watching the Amazon ranking rise from 20,000 to better than 1000.  (There are more than four million books ranked so getting a scholarly work that high is a big deal.)

Today I noticed that Quantum Leap had jumped from its normally sedate ranking of 200,000 to 10,000.  Such a jump usually indicates some news has just come out, like a review or a mention on a prominent blog. I googled a bit to see if I could find something and found the following comments about the book. I doubt this blog caused the ranking increase, but I must say I was quite flattered by the comments.  Here they are, from a blog called "The Dawg Run."

There are few books that you read and can remember clear as day 20 years later. Dr. Karl Giberson's Worlds Apart: The Unholy War Between Religion and Science is one of those books for me. So when I found out that Giberson was working with my personal friend and hero Dr. Dean Nelson on a book about world-renowned physicist-turned-Anglican-priest Sir John Polkinghorne, I marked the release date on my calendar. As anyone who has read Nelson or Giberson's work would expect, it is wonderful.

This is a great book for those, like me, who sometimes feel as if they are caught between the scientific ignorance of the faith community and the philosophical arrogance of the scientific community. Quantum Leap examines not only the spiritual and scientific thoughts and beliefs of Sir John Polkinghorne but the man himself as well.

In typical Nelson / Giberson fashion, the book takes head on the hard questions of the existence of God, the purpose of prayer, miracles and the afterlife while leaving plenty of room for detractors such as Stephen Weinberg, Richard Dawkins, Stephen Hawking, Carl Sagan, and E. O. Wilson.

It is a great read for anyone interested in approaching the issue of a scientifically informed spirituality and/or a spiritually informed view of science.

Do scientists understand science journalism?

Writer's Log Supplemental: 21-1-12

This is worth reading twice.

Over at the Guardian, Ananyo Bhattacharya, the chief online editor of Nature, answers some common criticisms that scientists have of science journalism.  His piece, called ”Nine ways scientists demonstrate that they don’t understand journalism,” is pretty tame, though, and I think a lot of us would agree that science journalists must write their stories using certain conventions.  Bhattacharya defends the following conventions that, he says, are criticized by scientists (go to his piece to see some others):

• Starting a story with the important results
• Using limited space because of readers’ limited attention spans
• Using headlines that will draw attention to the study
• Quoting scientists who disagree with the highlighted research

And so on.  I have a beef with one of his responses, though:

The story didn’t contain this or that “essential” caveat.

Was the caveat really essential to someone’s understanding of the story? Are you sure? In my experience, it’s rare that it is. Research papers contain all the caveats that are essential for a complete understanding of the science. They are also seldom read. Even by scientists.

Yes, journalists don’t need to put in every caveat that we’re required to add in the discussion, but some of them are important.  Take the use of limited sample sizes to demonstrate the existence of “gay genes” or “depression genes” for example, or the fact that early reports of these genes (later found to be bogus) were limited to single lineages, or used associated markers that were reported by the press to be the genes themselves. These are important problems, not trivial caveats.  And the caveats weren’t seen in most of the breathless news stories about “genes for gayness” of “genes for depression.”

Second, highlighting potential problems brings home to the reader that science is an ongoing enterprise, that no study is perfect, and, most important, all scientific truths are provisional. Too many journalists accepted the “arsenic bacteria” story, or the existence of the Darwinius masillae fossil as a missing link between the two major groups of primates.  A finding can be wrong, or can be revised.

Why aren’t such caveats, or such dissent, presented more often? Well, yes, they could bog down a story, but often I think that journalists aren’t sufficiently trained in science to recognize when a problem is serious. Also, though Bhattacharya rightly emphasizes the need for science journalists to summon dissenting voices in their stories, many journalists are either too lazy to do this or don’t know who to call.  There are some notable counterexamples.  Carl Zimmer does a good job of this at The New York Times, and Faye Flam at The Philadelphia Inquirer.  When reporting a new discovery, scientists should routinely search for dissent,  and should know enough to determine whether that dissent is significant.

So my main complaint about science journalists is fourfold.  First, they often aren’t trained sufficiently to write about science in a meaningful way.  It would be nice if the journalist had a degree in the subject described, preferably an advanced degree.  A journalist should be able to read the paper under consideration and understand it well.

Second, lazy science journlists often just reproduce press releases produced by universities instead of reading a paper and dissecting it themselves. Press releases are not journalism, but puffery.

Third, science journalists are often too lazy to do a proper job of vetting a story (this is related to the preceding beef).

Fourth, journalists often don’t seek out dissent, or make do with a token and meaningless dissent.

On Being a Public Figure

Writer's Log: Stardate 21-1-12

I just responded to this interesting query from Iran:

"I am a PHD student in Iran. My field is philosophy of religion. I am going to choose a subject for my thesis. After consulting with my professors, I decided to set my thesis in the domain of your thoughts. So I would feel honored if you recommend me a topic."

I would love to know the back story of this request.  I have, over the years, had some positive interactions with Islamic scholars, but those have been few and far between and I wonder how my work is on the radar of this graduate student. A book published in Iran titled Can Science Dispense with Religion? has a contribution from me. And when I was the editor of Science & Theology News I actively sought contributions from Islamic scholars. I even co-wrote an editorial with a fellow Islamic academic immediately after 9-11 to make a small statement that our cultures were not at war with each other, regardless of what was happening in the airport security lines.  I also have seen my work quoted in some publications in Iran. But these are hardly enough to explain this inquiry.  I really can't imagine this grad student saying to his advisor "I want to write a dissertation on science & religion" and his advisor telling him "Email Karl Giberson." 

Perhaps the best explanation is that this grad student has emailed 35 scholars in Western countries and I am merely the first one that has responded.

New Adventures

Writer’s Log Stardate 20-1-12

I finished my syllabus today for my writing workshop that starts next Tuesday. Since this is the first time I have taught a writing class I feel like I am going to have to make it up as I go along. I must confess to some nervousness about doing this. Most people who teach writing majored in something that required them to take writing classes. The last writing class I had was in 1974, when I was in the 11^th grade. I tested out of college composition and, because I was in physics, there was no suggestion of any sort that I should take a writing course in college.  I shouldn’t have done that.

My belief that I might not be a disaster at teaching writing comes from some of my colleagues, who have assured me that becoming a successful writer myself has required that I learn the writing techniques I will have to teach. I certainly hope this is true!  In particular, I have to thank my friend Mark Sargent, the outgoing provost at Gordon and an accomplished writer himself, for having the confidence in me to invite me to get involved with Gordon’s very strong writing program.  And I should thank Jo Kadlecek, herself a successful author of more than ten books and the energy behind much of the journalism at Gordon. Jo was quite impatient with my concerns about how I would make out teaching writing, pointing out that I was actively doing the very things I needed to teach, which would give me the background to help students with their writing. She knows more than I do about teaching writing, so I am going with her assessment for now.

Writing Blocks

Writer's Log: Stardate 18/19-1-12

I got distracted last night and forgot to post. In my defense I had a wonderful evening with some good friends--Del Case, Paul Nyce, Brady Millican, Matt Waterman, and Cris Popa. We have a sort of "men's thing" that we do when Paul--now Bruder Albrecht--temporarily escapes from Glastonbury Abbey. Those who know us can guess what we talk about...

I began developing my syllabus for the writing workshop today and was really excited that I was able line up three special guests to drop by, each one bringing a very different and important perspective on writing. Between finishing the syllabus, finishing my grants, and getting ready for my trip to the West Coast, poor Adam has taken a back seat. I have to do something about that.

Dinner Theatre

Writer’s Log Stardate 17-1-12

I just had dinner with some of my writing students at Gordon College who, for some reason, have come back to campus two days before class starts. The dinner was most encouraging, although the food was from the cafeteria. We talked about the structure of the class, the assignments, and what each person wants to get out of the class.

This is a writing workshop, which I described as halfway between an internship, with no syllabus, and a course, with a highly prescribed set of assignments. I want to strike a creative balance, where the students have enough structure they don’t feel lost and unsure about how they are doing, but not so much structure they cannot work on the things that interest them most.

The main thing I want the workshop to do is help the students realize just how satisfying writing can be. If I can communicate some portion of the excitement I have when I am in the midst of a writing assignment I will be happy. But, this is the first writing course I have taught, so who knows how it will go?

Things are really coming together nicely. Two editors have expressed interest in publishing things from the class. My editor at Beacon has agreed to come visit the class and will be interviewing one of my students for an internship. And InterVarsity just today told me they will give the class free copies of my next book, coming out in March.  

Not a bad day, overall.

Writer's Log Supplemental 17-1-12

Dean Nelson just sent me a link to another great review of our book Quantum Leap.  That was probably the most modest of all my writing projects--partly because Dean did so much of the writing--but the book has really surprised us with the great reception and brisk sales.

The Hunger Games

Writer’s Log: Stardate 16-1-10

Today was MLK day.  So I decided to take a bit of a break and spend some time with the novel Hunger Games, enthusiastically recommended to me by my friend Melinda Shaw.  Some 6 hours later I have finished that remarkable story. This is the first time in months that I have been completely lost in a work of fiction and I am relishing the feeling.

I did do a little work though. Dean Nelson and I exchanged a few emails about another book project together. Our Quantum Leap collaboration went very well. And Tom Oord and I continued to work on a major new grant initiative that we will hope will come to life in a year or so.

But mostly I just read a novel, in my big chair by the fire. And made popcorn.  And wondered if I could ever write fiction.

When Writing Scares Me

Writer’s Log Stardate 15-1-12

My career started as a physicist. My graduate education is very narrow—nothing but physics and all that was current physics—no history of physics, philosophy of physics, or even “Writing about Physics.”  Ironically, my last writing course was in high school.

This is a background that, when I look at it too closely, fills me with dread that being a writer might be a really bad idea.

To make matters worse, I don’t even write about physics. If I was a traditional “science popularizer,” explaining complex physics ideas to laypeople, like what Paul Davies and Stephen Weinberg do so well, I would be on my home turf, or at least in sight of it. Instead I write about wide-ranging interdisciplinary topics. My current project about the cultural history and importance of Adam is my most wide-ranging book yet and every chapter is pushing me into new areas—Biblical history and hermeneutics, the great age of exploration, Renaissance poetry, 19^th century racism, higher criticism, even linguistics.

I am doing some reading now as I start to think about the second chapter, which is looking at how St. Paul thought about Adam in the New Testament. I am re-reading The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn’t Say about Human Origins by my friend Peter Enns.  Enns knows so much more than I do about this particular topic that it frightens me to think I have to write this so he won’t be able to laugh at my amateurish presentation.  Thankfully, we read each other’s work and he will see this before my publisher.

It’s still scary though…

The Back Story of Books

Writer’s Log: Stardate 14-1-10

This has been a great day to be a writer. I spent the better part of the day in Rockport at a writing retreat, hanging out with interesting people, sharing ideas about books, blogs, contracts, agents and all the other stuff that goes with being a writer.  Kudos to Alex Foran, one of my former writing students at ENC for her sterling work in organizing the workshop. And kudos to Carolyn Meckbach, one of my current writing students at Gordon College, for coming back to the North Shore—from Pennsylvania—a few days early to attend the workshop.

The writing workshop is the brainchild of my long-term friend and colleague Marianna Krejci-Papa who has been organizing the event for years—a task she successfully passed on to Alex this year.  The workshop this year had a mix of ENC and Gordon participants and there was discussion of some official collaboration next year. I know I am looking forward to it.

Also of interest today, and related to the larger story of how books get written, was a substantial piece in a global news service about the biography of John Polkinghorne that Dean Nelson and I published last fall. This book, Quantum Leap: How John Polkinghorne Found God in Science and Religion, was an interesting collaboration. I do not consider myself a journalist—at least not a very good one—and did not think that I could do the “on the ground” work necessary to produce a biography. And Dean, of course, being a very good journalist and trained as such, did not think he could get all the physics right for such a story. Hence the need for what turned out to be a wonderful collaboration.

Here is the account from the story of how this book was conceptualized.  It matches my recollection but I never thought this story would make it into print.

“The idea for Quantum Leap came from Giberson, who was the editor of the magazine Science and Spirit out of Boston. Nelson had written for the magazine, covering religious persecution in Tibet, among other things. Giberson called Nelson and said that a science/theology conference was coming up in Boston, with Polkinghorne as the main speaker. Giberson wanted to know if Nelson had ever heard of Polkinghorne.

“I had read some of Polkinghorne’s books years ago, and thought he was one of the clearest thinkers I’d encountered,” Nelson said. “I told Karl I’d love to go to the conference and do a story on Polkinghorne.”

Giberson’s idea was bigger, though. Given the culture wars in the U.S. about science and religion, he thought it was time for audiences to hear Polkinghorne’s ideas on a bigger book-length platform. He put Nelson and Polkinghorne in dormitory rooms next to each other at the conference, arranged to have them sit together at meals, and organized social times where Polkinghorne and Nelson would have considerable time to talk.

“It was like literary speed dating,” Nelson said.

At the end of the conference, Giberson sat down with Nelson and Polkinghorne and described his idea for a book. He then asked the other two if they wanted to proceed. Both quickly agreed.

Nelson spent the next two years researching Polkinghorne and following him to speaking engagements, interviewing him in a variety of locations in Europe, as well as spending weeks at a time with him in his home and favorite haunts in Cambridge.

“It’s a daunting thing to spend that kind of time with a person who is such an intellectual giant,” Nelson said. “But his clarity of thought is so attractive, and he’s such a humble guy, that I felt like I was hanging out with greatness itself.”

You can read the full story here.

The Special Pleasure of Book Recognitions

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-13

The morning mail—which usually comes at suppertime—brought two important items. The first was my working glasses, which I had left at my daughter’s apartment in Connecticut on Wednesday.  These are special bifocals with the upper part optimized for a computer screen and the lower part optimized for reading a book. They are not so good for catching fly balls or driving a car, but I love them for working. To read anything except road signs with my regular progressive lenses requires that I tip my head back as if I was trying to stop a nosebleed, or locate a fly on the ceiling.

The second thing in the mail was a notification that The Anointed has been nominated for a 2012 Grawemeyer Award in the category of religion. If the book wins, Randall and I will share a generous cash prize and the enormous satisfaction of having our work recognized. But, even if we don’t win, simply being nominated is an honor in itself.

Being recognized for writing is important feedback. In fact, such recognitions are the reasons I have been able to start thinking of myself as a writer, and not just an “academic who writes books.”  There are many authors that I would not say are writers. Most scholarly books are written so terribly that you would never hand one to a student and say “You can learn to write by emulating this author’s style.” 

I have had several recognitions over the years but the greatest was when the Washington Post Book World—a premier literary publication—called Saving Darwin “One of the Best Books of 2008.” Saving Darwin also got another interesting recognition by being included on the 2011 “Book Lover’s Calendar.” The weekend entry for February 19-20 was a nice comment introducing the book and recommending it.

We don’t find out about the Grawemeyer Award until December 2012 but I will certainly write about it, if it happens.

Writer’s Log Supplemental: Stardate 12-1-13

I got an email from InterVarsity Press today asking for some corrections on the final version of The Wonder of the Universe before it goes to press next week. I find the editorial process very tedious. There seems to be an endless number of steps and everything takes a long time.  And there is so little creativity during this phase. But, it must be taken seriously or a lot of hard work will be compromised by errors and other problems that could have been corrected.

What is an anti-intellectual?

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-10

Ken Ham had one of his associates attack Randall Stephens and I on his website yesterday. It is hard to know what to make of the strange pseudo-engagements with our work coming from Ham’s organization.  I generally ignore this kind of thing, but Georgia Purdom has provided such a powerful illustration of the thesis of The Anointed that I can’t help but comment.

Purdom, who taught biology for several years at Mount Vernon Nazarene University, has taken umbrage, understandably, at Randall and I for labeling her boss, Ken Ham, an anti-intellectual. She then puts on a display of anti-intellectualism worthy of an Oscar. She starts by describing The Anointed as “very anti-academic” and “tabloid-like.” This is a bizarre claim to make about anything published by Harvard University Press.  You can certainly disagree with books from Harvard University Press; you can accuse them of being too liberal, or unfriendly to religion; or insensitive to issues outside the ivory towers of academia. But you can’t call the most academic press in the world “anti-academic.” Our book was edited by Joyce Seltzer who objected vigorously every time Randall or I used language that was not objective.  If Harvard University Press is “tabloid-like” then what word is left to describe the National Enquirer or Glenn Beck—the actual purveyors of tabloid news?

Randall and I were quite careful to define anti-intellectual and nowhere in The Anointed do we reduce it to Purdom’s caricature of people who “do not have advanced degrees.” We expressed concern about this problem, but the real issue is whether one is informed about the consensus of experts, or whether one holds discredited views that experts reject.

Purdom is especially upset at our suggestion that Biblical scholarship is critical to properly understand the Bible. She describes our concern like this:

“An outcome of this supposed anti-intellectualism is that the Bible is not correctly interpreted and understood. In other words, the Bible is not clear and only people with advanced degrees or professionals can tell others what it really means.”

Purdom certainly knows that the Bible was not written in English so she has to know that even she cannot even read the Bible until Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic scholars have translated it. And she also has to know that translations are never perfect but require careful judgments that only scholars can make. This is not to say, of course, that ordinary people cannot benefit from reading the Bible.  Of course they can. But when it comes to understanding the meaning of complex passages—like the creation story in Genesis—scholars are critically important. What does the Bible mean when God says “Let us create man in our image,” using plural pronouns?  Why does the Genesis story, translated literally, say “When God began to create, the earth was without form and void?” This clearly implies that the creation began with pre-existing material. What does that mean?

Such complexities clearly require the specialized knowledge of scholars. To suggest otherwise is the very definition of anti-intellectual.

Favorite Books, Part Two

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-11

1)    The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes.  Far broader than its title suggests, this magisterial 800-page book is a profound and sobering look at the seminal event of the 20^th century.  One chapter contains heartbreaking letters from little Japanese kids who saw their parents mysteriously incinerated from radiation. I read this book on my vacation, sitting beside Indian Lake in Nowheresville, New Brunswick. I liked the book so much that, when I saw a bunch of copies in a bargain bin with cookbooks and manuals on dog grooming, I bought them all to get them out of that untoward neighborhood. The Making of the Atomic Bomb did not belong in a bargain bin with such literary riff-raff.

2)    The Sleepwalkers by Arthur Koestler.  One of the great literary figures of the 20^th century, Koestler produced a history of science that is literally a page-turner.  With a novelist’s narrative flair, Koestler makes Galileo and Kepler into rich human characters.  This book made me fall in love with the history of science.

3)    Longitude by Dava Sobel. This short book about an intriguing episode in the history of our quest to master navigation at sea will surprise you. Sobel is truly a great writer and worth reading for her prose alone. I read this on a hammock in the Bahamas, but I think it would work anywhere.

4)    God’s Funeral by A. N. Wilson. This is a sobering look at the Victorian crisis of faith. Wilson offers an informed and passionate account of the general sadness of many European intellectuals as they realized that the faith that had carried their civilization for so many centuries was slowly passing.  God’s Funeral is a great counter to those who suggest that losing one’s faith is “freeing.”  Don Yerxa and I had the pleasure of interviewing Wilson over lunch for the magazine Books & Culture. He was a dainty eater.

5)    Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet.  Follet is a thriller writer with medieval history as a hobby.  This 1000-page book tells a faithful, although fictional, story about the construction of a medieval cathedral. The premise of the book seemed boring so, when my friend was pushing it on me, I told him I would read the book’s first sentence and then decide if I wanted to read the rest.  The first sentence was: “The small boys came early to the hanging,” as I mentioned in an earlier blog. And it gets steadily better, never betraying the fact that it is teaching the reader a lot about the medieval period.

6)    The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis. I read all seven of these standing up, holding a “Caution” sign on rural roads in New Brunswick.  I was a college student with a summer job on a crew that paved roads with no traffic. I probably would have liked the books better if I had read them at the lake, but even standing up they were pretty good.

This list seems too short, though. Tim Ferris’s Coming of Age in the Milky Way should be on it, as should Robert Wright’s Non-Zero. Desmond and Moore’s biography, Darwin: The Tormented Evolutionist, is really good.  I should also confess that I love John Grisham, Tom Clancy and Robert Ludlum.  The Bourne Identity had me staying up all night and reading at stop lights. I read Tom Wolfe’s Bonfire of the Vanities when I should have been preparing for Mechanics class.

I avoid reading books that are not well-written, which is why none of the books on my list are by “academics,” who generally can’t write. (It’s also why I rarely assign a textbook as reading in my classes.) I also don’t like reading books written a long time ago when English usage was different.  This makes me something of a philistine, of course, because it means I don’t like Shakespeare, Milton, Chaucer and the other important-but-hard-to-read dead white guys.  Don’t tell my colleagues in the English department I said this.

Once upon a time someone told me that my book Saving Darwin was one of their all-time favorites.  I think that is the highest compliment I have ever been paid.  The editor of Religion Dispatches--the publication that declared me one of the "Top Ten Peacemakers in the Science-Religion Wars," also just told Randall and I that she found The Anointed to "un-put-down-able."  I have never seen that word before, but it seems complimentary.

Favorite Books, Part One

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-10

I spent an hour today at MIT in the office of a prominent science writer. In the middle of our conversation he had to take a phone call and I spent an awkward 15 minutes, trying to pretend I wasn’t listening. To amuse myself I inspected his bookcase, one of my favorite exercises and a great window into people’s personalities.

His bookcase had an engaging overlap with mine. I would estimate that more than 25% of his books also sit on my shelves.  Prominently displayed on his shelf was Richard Rhodes’ magisterial volume, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, a sprawling 800 page masterpiece and one of my all-time favorite books. When my friend got off the phone we talked a bit about this book and it turns out it was one of his favorites as well.

This got me thinking—as I often do—about the books that I think are the “best.” What are our favorite books? It is daunting to pick a few samples from the rich bookcase of our memories and set them on a shelf labeled “best.” How do we think about such a list?  Are these books we simply enjoyed reading? Are they books that shaped our ideas? Are they important books? Well-written? Influential? Are these books we want others to read?

I think there should be only one criterion for a book to be “best.” It must be enjoyable. This is misleading, of course, for sometimes the pleasure of reading can come from factors other the book itself. I tend to like books that I read in my gazebo more than ones I read in my car.  But this single criterion saves me the hard work of analyzing why I enjoyed the book. 

I am going to post my list tomorrow, in case something interesting occurs to me while I am sleeping.

Writing Blocks

Writer’s Log: Stardate 1-9-2012

I have never really had “Writer’s Block,” and I don’t really know exactly what it is. Supposedly it means sitting down at your keyboard and not being able to start putting words together. But I can’t quite see how that could be.  Writing is like talking and I cannot imagine being at such a loss for words that you couldn’t say anything.

On the other hand, I know only too well about Writers’ Blocks.  These are the countless things that writers—at least this writer—has to do to keep a writing career going but that interfere with the actual writing you want to do. Today I really wanted to get back to my book about Adam but, although I wrote busily all day, I never made it.

I started out working on a grant to the Templeton Foundation. I am trying to get some financial support from them for some writing I do that fits with their mission. I have often had support from them in the past, which has allowed me to teach part-time instead of full-time, buy books for research, hire student assistants, and even get a computer. Their support is what has allowed me to write five books in the last three years. 

I somehow thought that I could “dash off” this grant in a few hours but I soon realized that the grant probably needs a week of work, not a day, if I was going to do it right. So I worked away on that for a while. Then I got an email from my editor at TheDaily.com. He likes a piece I wrote for him about the “theological implications of finding extraterrestrial life” but wants a few changes and he wants them first thing tomorrow. So, since he is a great editor and pays $300 for these pieces, I went to work immediately to make the changes. I am almost done, but running out of steam.  (I am a morning person and it is 9:30 pm now.)

I then got into an email exchange with Dean Nelson, my co-author on Quantum Leap, the biography of John Polkinghorne that was published a few months ago.  Dean and I want to do some more books together and it occurred to me that a very similar project about George Ellis would be a great new project. Ellis is a leading cosmologist and Christian who was active in the fight against apartheid in South Africa. He has a great personal story. So, I wrote to him to see what he thinks.  And I wrote to the Templeton Foundation to see if they would give us a grant for this book, like they did for the Polkinghorne bio.

And then, of course, there is a writing blog that I committed to produce every day in 2012.  Or was it a writing block?

The Glory of Thick Skin

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-8

The strong review of The Anointed that I mentioned a couple days ago was in the print section of the NY Times today. Randall and I have been watching the Amazon ranking of our book climb steadily all day.  Its low this week was something above 100,000 but right now—Sunday evening—it is 5000.  This is actually really great for a book of this sort. It is, for example, #3 on the “Science and Religion” bestseller list.  And it will certainly never compete with Hunger Games or biographies of Steve Jobs, that occupy the top slots.  So we are pleased.

What is not so pleasant is the childish whining of Ken Ham, head of Answers in Genesis and one of the figures profiled in The Anointed. Ham seems to be a very mean-spirited person who would prefer to attack one’s faith than their ideas. According to Ham believing the earth is “millions of years old” is subscribing to a pagan religion. (I wonder what believing the earth is “billions of years old” might be compared to?)You can read his commentary here, which is really just some annotation on previous commentary—some of which is wrong, like the comment about James Dobson, who we did not claim was a young earth creationist.

Ham has been after me for years, constantly scolding the Church of the Nazarene for giving me a teaching position where I could lead college students astray. This, of course, is how fundamentalists of all stripes operate—they try to create political problems for people they oppose, rather than just engage their ideas. Ham and his ilk, which includes the motley crew that calls themselves the “Concerned Nazarenes,” have been pressuring the administration at Eastern Nazarene College, directly and indirectly, to fire me. Various college presidents over the years have had to stick up for me, gently reminding my critics that I was teaching mainstream science and that my theological ideas were in the mainstream of the denomination. There was much rejoicing in Mudville when the news broke that I was leaving, but they were quite dismayed to discover that I was walking away on my one, and not leaving on a rail, covered in tar and feathers. 

One of my atheist friends, who calls me "Uncle Karl," also posted some critical commentary about me today.  I will let you decide whether the atheist is more or less Christ-like than Ken Ham.

Writer’s Log Supplemental: Stardate 12-1-8

The review in The Times has also resulted in a nice invitation to speak in Washington, DC, and many supportive emails. 

Do you really love writing?

Writer’s Log: Stardate 1-7-2012

For the first time in a few weeks I woke up this morning at 5:30—my usual time—eager to get out of bed and start writing. The reason, I think, is that this first chapter in my Creating Adam book started to come together yesterday.  For a few weeks I have been struggling with how to make the first chapter not seem like a second introduction and yesterday I made enough progress that I began to feel like what I was doing would work. And I was eager to get back at it.  I think the rest of the book will come more naturally, once I get into chapter two.

I have had many conversations over the years with people trying to “become” writers, from students to professional colleagues in the sciences, to people who simply loved the idea of being an “author.”  In those conversations I always try to get the person to think about whether they really want to write, or do they just want to be an author?  Just about everyone has books they love and, on some level, authors that they love. I think this makes us all somewhat attracted to the idea of being an author. But wanting to be an author is not the same thing as loving the work it takes to become an author. I would dearly love to be a bodybuilder with great abs and a chiseled physique but I hate sit-ups, treadmills, tofu, veggie drinks, sweat, gym shorts and all the other stuff associated with acquiring a great physique. 

When students ask me about writing, I always suggest to them that they start a blog as an easy way to find out whether they really have what it takes to be a writer. Most of them don’t follow through, and those that do often run out of steam after 2 blogs. All of which means they don’t really want to be a writer.

The single most important thing to know about writing is that you have to love it to do it. The pay is somewhere between non-existent and terrible and there are so many people willing to do it for free that making a real living at it is basically impossible. Don’t be seduced by the success of J.K. Rowling or Malcolm Gladwell—they are the exceptions and there is almost no chance you will ever play on their team.  Instead check out the Huffington Post where thousands of writers—including me—blog regularly with not one penny of compensation.  Writing is not like lawyering, where you can hate your work but love the money you can make at it. You have to love writing if you want to write. But, if you do, you can wake up on Saturday morning with an eagerness to get back to writing, instead of feeling like you need to sleep in because you hate getting up every morning for your “real job.”

Writer’s Log Supplemental: Stardate 1-7-2012

Brazos sent the copies of Peter Enns Evolving Adam for my writing class. This is so cool that I can get free books for them. And help out my good friend Pete.

The Scary World of Reviews

Writer’s Log: Stardate 1-6-2012

The big event for today in my “Year of Writing Furiously” is a review of The Anointed: Evangelical Truth in a Secular Age in the NY Times.  My co-author, Randall Stephens and I, have been quite fortunate to get some high profile attention for our book. We have had the infamous op-ed in the NY Times that had so many fundamentalists wailing about how evil we were. Less inflammatory pieces appeared in the FrumForum and the Guardian. And there were reviews in the Weekly Standard, Christian Century, Wilson Quarterly, Answers in Genesis website, and a few other places.  Books & Culture has a review in the pipeline, and Insider Higher Ed has an essay from Randall and I ready to go. The Chronicle of Higher Education is also working on a more general story about the issues raised in our book.  And those are just the major outlets.  So we have been pretty fortunate in getting the word out.

Randall and I, like most authors I suspect, hold our breath when we know a review is about to appear. There is simply no way to know how the reviewer will approach the book. Our book was highly critical of the evangelical right wing and we “named names.”  We indicted Ken Ham, David Barton, James Dobson, Tim LaHaye and a few others for contaminating evangelical culture with their particular brands of anti-intellectualism.  But we also applauded Francis Collins, Mark Noll, NT Wright, David Myers and a few others for exemplifying evangelical intellectual excellence.

I was not surprised when Answers in Genesis published a hostile review of The Anointed, for we had been quite critical of them. What did surprise me, though, was how badly written the “review” was, especially since it was co-authored by a former professor at Mount Vernon Nazarene College, who should have known that a review is a not a “selective rant based on a few sentences.” I was also surprised at the Weekly Standard review as that reviewer seemed to not have read the book carefully.  He wrote as if he was oblivious to the fact that we had discussed “both sides” of the conversation and presented numerous evangelical leaders in highly positive light.  Weekly Standard is an aggressive right wing publication that takes pride in fighting the culture wars vigorously. I think the issue there was that culture warriors often don’t acknowledge people in the middle. They tend to see the world as black and white so, if you are gray, they make you whichever color they are not, since you are clearly not the same color as they are.

The NY Times review was really well-done. I even agreed with the criticisms.  Here are some really nice quotes from the piece, some of which I suspect may end up on the back cover of the paperback, whenever Harvard University Press decides to bring that out.

*The authors make a strong case that serious scholars are prophets without honor in a culture in which successful leaders capitalize on “anti-intellectualism, populism, a religious free market, in- and out-group dynamics, endorsement by God and threats from Satan.”

*“The Anointed” condemns the current state of evangelical intellectual life, but Stephens and Giberson avoid monolithic stereotypes. They are careful to note that evangelicals disagree wildly among themselves about almost everything.

*Why would anyone heed ersatz “experts” over trained authorities far more qualified to comment on the origins of life or the worldview of the founding fathers? Drawing on case studies of evangelical gurus, Stephens and Giberson argue that intellectual authority works differently in the “parallel culture” of evangelicalism. In this world of prophecy conferences and home-­schooling curriculums, a dash of charisma, a media empire and a firm stance on the right side of the line between “us” and “them” matter more than a fancy degree.

You can read the full review here

The Challenge of Juggling

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-5

I have long been a multi-tasker. Even now I am watching the financial news out of one eye as I write this, and listening for the occasional “zing” indicating that an email—that will be read immediately—has just arrived. Professionally, I have worn so many hats for the past few years that I literally don’t know how to tell people “what I do.” I have simultaneously taught almost a full load of classes while editing as many as three major publications and doing a lot of writing on the side.

Although multi-tasking can be fun—who doesn’t like to play on their laptop while watching a ball game on TV and chatting with their friends?—there are times when I long for the simplicity of doing just one thing. I think writing is best appreciated when it can be the main thing on your mind. A few times last summer, while writing in my gazebo, I came close to this, but only because I had put other projects out of my mind.

Right now I want to get back to working on my book but life is not that simple. I got a request yesterday to submit an article to Harvard’s Icthyus magazine, a Christian journal produced largely by undergraduates. Their invitation was so winsome that I have to say yes. I also received an announcement for the American Scientific Affiliation’s summer conference at Point Loma Nazarene University, which I think I will attend and probably prepare a paper for. And Gordon College wants me to produce a magazine with undergraduates this spring and they need a template right away.  Tomorrow I meet with Amy Carleton to work on a new non-profit project called acamedia that we hope to launch soon.

The main thing I need to do today though, is get started on a major grant proposal to the Templeton Foundation. I have been invited to submit what they call a “Full Proposal” for three years of part-time support to write blogs and other short pieces on Science & Religion. This is a win-win project that deserves the many hours of time it will take.

I hope to meet up with Adam later today, but it is not looking good right now.

Writer’s Log Supplemental: Stardate 12-1-5

I just got an email from agent in New York. He told me that my editor, who I had lunch with a few weeks ago, said she really liked meeting me. And my publisher told him yesterday that she was really happy that Creating Adam would be published with them. That, as my mother used to say, is “better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.”

Stephen King's Writing Discipline

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-4

For two days I have not written anything on Creating Adam.  This makes me nervous, even though I was busy doing other things, and I am a long ways from being behind.  Writing requires discipline though, and one big difference between a book and a term paper is that you cannot produce a book at the last minute.

Stephen King’s memoir On Writing is the most interesting insider’s account of the discipline of writing I have ever read (but I haven’t read very many….), probably because he is one of the most interesting writers out there. King’s discipline is to work in his “writing room” for long enough every day to produce 2000 words. He prefers a word count, rather than a number of hours. It seems to me that this would work much better with fiction than non-fiction, though, since non-fiction writing must frequently be interrupted by sustained periods of research.

I do find a writing schedule to be helpful though. For my last two books—Wonder of the Universe, coming in April, and God Saw that it was Good, coming in September— I created a spread sheet with targeted word counts for each chapter and dates by which each word count should be reached to stay on target. (In a former life I was a physicist so laying things out on a spreadsheet seems natural to me—you literary types can go ahead and laugh if you want!)I hit my deadline with the first book and came in several months ahead of schedule for the second.

I haven’t yet created this schedule for Creating Adam, which has a contract deadline of December 31, 2012.  I have been hung up getting the early material to work properly, so I can better see how the rest will fit together.  I need to get working on this.

Writer’s Log Supplemental: Stardate 12-1-4

Two more students have signed up for my writing workshop, bringing the number to ten, which is great. And I got two inspiring emails in the last week from my writing students who are getting started on their projects before the semester begins.  It will be a challenge keeping up with them.

Adam's Tribe

Writer’s Log: Stardate 12-1-3

I think I got an introduction for Creating Adam yesterday, but I am not sure—which is to say that one is written but I still think I could do better.  I am trying to grab the reader at the beginning with something with emotional depth. The story of Adam is an interesting story, any way you look at it, but for many people it is bloodless and tame.  More liberal Christians—even many evangelicals—believe that Adam was not a real historical character so his story is simply a modest literary anecdote telling a moral tale, not unlike the story of the prodigal son or the good Samaritan. On the other hand, most Americans grew up thinking of Adam as a completely historical figure but one abstracted into Christian Theology as an idea—the source of sin and death—and so not really human in the sense that we might identify with him.

Adam can be approached in many ways, of course, and probably all of them have some merit. But I think the most powerful aspect of Adam is his role as our ancestor, with all that means.  Our ancestors define who we are and shape the contours of our identity.  They locate the boundaries of our tribe, for better or worse. They define the “other.”  Probably the most important role Adam has played in the last century is in separating us from the rest of the animal kingdom. Most Christians have a visceral rejection of evolution and often invoke the special creation of Adam in the “Image of God” as the guarantor of human uniqueness.

I tried to capture this emotional power with an interesting historical anecdote from 1550 Spain, when the pope dispatched an associate to figure out whether the native Americans—who they called “Indians”—were descended from Adam. This was a powerful application of the tribalizing aspect of the story of Adam. If the Indians were descended from Adam, they were a part of our tribe and should be converted to Christianity, treated respectfully, and “civilized.”  If not, then the Spanish explorers could do whatever they wanted to them.