Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Arts and Humanities Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 9 of 9

Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

The Origins Beliefs Of Christian College Students, Emily Wilkinson Apr 2020

The Origins Beliefs Of Christian College Students, Emily Wilkinson

Senior Honors Theses

Many studies have focused on creation and evolution in academia, origins beliefs and biblical interpretation, and how students respond to origins challenges. The author then conducted a phenomenology of Christian college students’ origins beliefs, factors that influence those beliefs, and impacts that the beliefs have on students’ lives. Methods included a 44-Item Big Five Inventory and semi-structured interviews. Participants were eight residential undergraduate students at a Christian university who were currently or previously in a creation studies course. Results indicated that all participants held to young-earth creationism, and that family, Christian faith, education, personality, and academic major influenced the development …


Christian Theistic Anthropology, Anthony T. Vento Dec 2018

Christian Theistic Anthropology, Anthony T. Vento

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

At the present moment, which is prior to conducting any research, I am of the opinion that anthropology has been influenced by certain schools of thought, and each school’s definition establishes a trajectory which definitively determines the adherent’s worldview. The schools of anthropology which are prevalent in today’s world, in my estimation, are the evolutionist’s perspective, the hedonistic perspective, the rationalistic perspective, the dualistic perspective and the Christian perspective. I will seek to objectively and unbiasedly define each perspective’s understanding of man, then I will compare and contrast the main tenets of each school of thought, and finally, I will …


Christian High School Science Teachers' Perspective Transformation: The Journey From Evolution To Creation, Paul Leslie Thorpe Nov 2018

Christian High School Science Teachers' Perspective Transformation: The Journey From Evolution To Creation, Paul Leslie Thorpe

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The purpose of this hermeneutical phenomenology study was to explore and describe the perspective transformations of 11 science instructors teaching at Christian high schools. These science teachers previously believed the evolutionary paradigm of origins. However, they have all experienced a transformation and now hold a young-earth creation perspective and believe the literal six-day creation event in the book of Genesis is accurate and true. Transformation of perspective regarding origins is defined as a phenomenon of transformative faith accompanied by assimilation and accommodation of new knowledge as seen through the lens of Jack Mezirow’s (1991) transformative adult learning theory, and James …


Human Language Origins: Icon For Evolution Or A Higher Order?, Dominique Lopiccolo Nov 2015

Human Language Origins: Icon For Evolution Or A Higher Order?, Dominique Lopiccolo

The Kabod

In his text Icons of Evolution, Jonathan Wells endeavors to reveal some of the many discrepancies supported as scientific fact in current evolution literature. His goal, to discredit such falsely contrived theories as Haeckel’s embryos and Darwin’s finches, is successfully managed through the observance of clear, observational evidence. Meanwhile, Wells renders these so-called “icons” of evolution as nothing more than distorted data. The question of human language origins and the evolutionist’s response serves as another icon in the rhetoric of scientific evolution, yet observations pulled from current scientific research appear to disregard this notion altogether and instead, point towards …


A Teleological Exploration Of The Plausibility Of Moral Knowledge, Kevin Lebel King Jr. Jun 2015

A Teleological Exploration Of The Plausibility Of Moral Knowledge, Kevin Lebel King Jr.

Masters Theses

Natural selection seems to offer a compelling case for the development of evaluative judgments independent of evaluative facts. If such a case can be made, then how do moral judgments correlate to moral facts? It seems that there would be no tight connection from judgments to truth and moral judgments would be unwarranted. Gilbert Harman realized the implications of a probable non-moral genealogy. Richard Joyce goes on to provide a probable non-moral genealogy that would epistemically undermine moral judgments as Harman thought. Joyce argues that in a naturalistic world natural selection can account for moral judgments, but that the truth …


Defeating Naturalism: Defending And Reformulating Plantinga's Eaan, Tyler D. Mcnabb May 2015

Defeating Naturalism: Defending And Reformulating Plantinga's Eaan, Tyler D. Mcnabb

Eleutheria: John W. Rawlings School of Divinity Academic Journal

Abstract: During the past two decades, Alvin Plantinga has formulated an argument against naturalism that focuses on naturalism’s acceptance of contemporary evolutionary theory. Plantinga argues that given naturalism and evolution, our cognitive faculties have been developed to produce beliefs that meet the Darwinian requirement of survival and reproduction. Plantinga argues that accepting this will lead a naturalist to have a defeater for all of their beliefs, including their belief in naturalism. In this paper, I survey and respond to two types of objections that have been given as a response to Plantinga’s argument. The first objection that I interact with …


The Success Of Character Education In Relation To Religion In A Public School District, Joseph Johnson Jan 2014

The Success Of Character Education In Relation To Religion In A Public School District, Joseph Johnson

Doctoral Dissertations and Projects

The history of the United States demonstrates a complicated relationship between civil or national religion and the formation of the common schools. This dissertation uses purposive sampling, survey methodology and description research of a local, public school district with noted high scores on character education. The research uses a Likert scale to document educators' perception of success or failure of character education in relation to religion. In the school district, four schools were chosen for their high scores in character education implementation. A purposive sample of 100 participants was provided an email link to a secure, anonymous, online survey. The …


From A Rodent To A Rhetorician: An Ideological Analysis Of George Alexander Kennedy's Comparative Rhetoric, James Begley Apr 2012

From A Rodent To A Rhetorician: An Ideological Analysis Of George Alexander Kennedy's Comparative Rhetoric, James Begley

Masters Theses

George Alexander Kennedy, a professor of classics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has given birth to a new understanding of rhetorical studies: he argues for the evolution of rhetoric from animals to humans. Using Sonja Foss's methodology of "ideological criticism," this thesis examined Kennedy's case as presented in his book, Comparative Rhetoric: an Historical and Cross-Cultural Introduction. This study discovered that the book was heavily influenced by a secular, pro-evolutionary ideology which dually contributed to its selective use of scientific evidences and production of inconsistent arguments. Evaluated on the basis of Biblical principles, this thesis concluded …


Who Believes What? Clearing Up Confusion Over Intelligent Design And Young-Earth Creationism, Marcus R. Ross Jan 2005

Who Believes What? Clearing Up Confusion Over Intelligent Design And Young-Earth Creationism, Marcus R. Ross

Marcus R. Ross

The question of what differentiates young-Earth creationism (YEC) from Intelligent Design (ID) has resulted in inaccurate and confusing terminology, and hinders both understanding and dialogue. Though both YEC and ID groups have drawn distinctions between themselves, previous attempts to classify design-based positions on origins have been unable to adequately resolve their relationships. The Nested Hierarchy of Design, a multiple-character classification system, categorizes teleological positions according to the strength of claims regarding the reality, detectability, source, method, and timing of design, and results in an accurate and robust classification of numerous positions. This method avoids the philosophical and theological pitfalls of …