Are Christianity and science incompatible? If there is a God, is he only an impersonal starter force? An introductory high school biology class first propelled Lee Strobel toward a life of atheism. God and science, he reasoned, were mutually exclusive. When the former legal editor of the Chicago Tribune converted to Christianity, he decided to investigate the science he had once accepted as truth. Did science point toward or away from God? As Strobel interviews a variety of scientists on everything from debunking evolutionary icons to the implications of the Big Bang to the existence of the human soul, he builds his case: scientific evidence points toward Intelligent Design.

Although the discussion often veers into the academic, Strobel works hard to make it accessible to those without scientific training. Throughout the book, he salts interview transcript information with interesting personal stories of his own spiritual and scientific quest for knowledge, as well as sometimes over-detailed descriptions of the actual interviews (right down to the type of beverages consumed). Each chapter contains suggestions for further reading on particular issues of science and faith.

Dishonesty, dishonesty...

Notice all the five stars this book is getting? And there are a few one-star ratings, which all talk about how dishonest he is for getting all his data from the same side of the question.

Even though it's true that he strictly interviews people who believe in intelligent design, he has done a lot of research, and he throws a lot of question at them, playing "devil's advocate", if you will. And we already know most of the stuff from the naturalist side, since it's been the prevailing voice of science for so long!

But my main problem with those who gave him a one-star rating is that they never take the arguments head-on, to counter-argue. They attack the integrity of the author. But if his integrity was so lousy, his arguments would be easy to dismiss, with evidence from the other side.

My guess is that it's hard to oppose such a solid case. A very good book.

It could have been a good book

Unfortunately, rather than being an open investigation into the evidence for or against the existence of a creator based on science, The Case for a Creator is, from the onset, and attempt to demonstrate that science supports the author's religious beliefs.

To make his case Mr. Strobel restricts his panel of experts to those individuals that hold the same beliefs that he does. No rebuttals are permitted, so the reader is left with only one side of the issues. A better book would present both sides and allow readers to judge the matter for themselves.

Many of the arguments in the book were likewise disappointing to me. In an attempt to debunk scientific theories that Mr. Strobel holds as being hostile to his particular form of religion, the author often attacks errors that were present in theories from a century ago and which were long since revised in light of better data. The author also displays an alarming lack of understanding regarding the physics, statistics, and information theory that underpin some of his arguments. Finally, many of his arguments can be reduced to little more than claiming that since modern science still does not understand "X" then "X" implies the existence of the Creator.

My own study of physics was based in large part on my desire to see the "signature of the artist" within the cosmos, so I was excited to read this book. The lack of scientific literacy on the part of the author and his unwillingness to explore impartially leaves this book unable to support its goal of presenting evidence for the existence of God through science. The poorly constructed arguments leave the reader wondering, "Is the evidence really that poor?"

The book is very readable, however, and proceeds in a story-like fashion. Mr. Strobel presents himself as an atheist who undertook this study only to be surprised at every step by experts that demolished his preconceptions. However, this illusion is wrecked by mentions of previous work he had done to prove the historical existence of Jesus as the Son of God. These small asides ruin the feel of the book as a chronicle of his journey. Instead, the reader is left feeling that the author is being disingenous in order to persuade the reader with arguments that cannot stand on their own.

A Brief, Not An Investigation

Lee Strobel is a former legal journalist and editor. This book reflects this background, as it is no "investigation" of scientific evidence but a work of advocacy for a particular Christian religious viewpoint based on that evidence. Strobel is open about his intention to refute the materialistic and naturalistic worldview that is our legacy from nineteenth-century pioneers such as Darwin, and to establish that the existence of the Judaeo-Christian God is the most reasonable explanation for creation.

Thus, Strobel's book reads like a legal brief, not even for theism as such but for Biblical Christianity. Point is piled on point, evidence that supports his conclusion is marshalled persuasively, and any contra arguments are carefully set up to sound ludicrous, then refuted, or else are disregarded.

Strobel's arguments are not scientific, but philosophical. He builds his case by interviewing only scientists who, like him, advocate intelligent design. He never conducts any interviews with professional scientists who disagree with intelligent design. He provides an extensive bibliography, but only of resources that advocate intelligent design or argue against evolutionary theory.

Strobel never defines what he means by "God." It is clear enough that he is a Christian, and believes in the anthropomorphic personal God found in the Bible. But it is unclear how the existence of the God of Abraham, Moses, and Jesus follows from his arguments in this book, which tend to prove the existence only of a supreme intelligence.

Another major weakness of the book is oversimplication. One gets the impression from Strobel that the scientific community is divided into a monolithic group that believes in evolutionary biology, along with a materialistic and agnostic or atheistic world outlook, on one hand, and Christian theists on the other. In fact, scientists' views about evolution, and philosophical and religious viewpoints, fall on a continuum. Moreover, Christians' beliefs about the literal truth of Biblical accounts vary dramatically. Strobel apparently believes in the Big Bang, the Cambrian explosion, and other theories that contradict the literal truth of the Genesis creation account. This places him outside the pale of the community of Christians who believe that the Bible is literally without error and constitutes, from beginning to end, the word of God. So, it would have made for a clearer and more satisfactory exposition of his arguments if Strobel could have explicated his own beliefs more clearly.

Strobel's methodology is suspect only if you were expecting, as you might have based on the subtitle, an objective "investigation" of scientific evidence. If you come to this book expecting such objectivity, or expecting scientific inductive reasoning, you will be disappointed. However, if you like Christian apologetics based on classical deductive reasoning, and are interested in the "pro" arguments for intelligent design, you may enjoy this book.

Having said all of that, Strobel's arguments for the existence of a creator from biology, physics, cosmology, and especially consciousness, are fascinating, and often persuasive. Strobel reviews a lot of recent discoveries from these fields that tend to show design, as well as traditional proofs of God's existence from classical and medieval philosophy (the kalam argument is an Islamic version of the Aristotelian theory of the first cause, familiar to students of Thomas Aquinas). Strobel's purpose throughout is clear: not to educate the reader about science, but to persuade the reader that a supreme being created everything.

On balance, I believe this is a worthwhile review of the evidentiary basis for the philosophical theory of intelligent design. I recommend it as long as you keep the author's polemical purpose in mind.

I would like to hear, from the naturalistic or materialistic side of the philosophical divide, some counter-arguments as well developed and as cogently made as Strobel's.