Science Speaks

Peter Stoner was the former chairman of the Department of Mathematics and Astronomy at Pasadena City College, and later Professor Emeritus of Science at Westmont College. Robert C. Newman (author of Genesis One and the Origin of Earth, as well as other books of science and apologetics) is a physicist who studied at Cornell with Carl Sagan. This book has been published several times, in various editions; first in 1952, then in 1958, 1963, 1968, and 1976 (the edition I have), and probably others. It is only the last edition that was co-written with Dr. Newman. The book was famously used by Josh McDowell in his lectures on Bible prophecy, as well as in his book, Evidence That Demands a Verdict: Historical Evidences for the Christian Faith. The first section is on "Changes in Science," in which the authors cite thirteen statements from the book of Genesis, and show them to be consistent with the scientific picture (particularly regarding the order of events) of the universe, and our planet. (They believe in an "old universe," of course, and the "Day/Age" theory of Genesis; Stoner/Newman write, "My own personal belief is that most of the days of Genesis are very short periods of time, separated by extremely long periods.") Newman's own book on Genesis One goes into such matters in more detail. The second chapter of "Prophetic Accuracy" deals with Old Testament historical prophecies, and does the math to show that fulfillment of all of these by chance is very improbable. (But the strength of this claim is weakened when Stoner tells us how he computes the "probability" of, say, Nebuchadnezzar taking the city of Tyre: "The probability of the fulfillment of the items for various prophecies is difficult to arrive at.... The author has used the mean of the estimates given him by some seven hundred college students over a period of more than ten years as a starting point, but he has carefully weighed these and changed all that seemed questionable.") The final (and most famous) chapter is on "The Christ of Prophecy," and computes the probability of anyone other than Jesus fulfilling eight Messianic prophecies, and again concludes that it is very unlikely. (But again, these "probability" estimates were simply obtained by asking students in a class on Christian Evidences at the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship at Pasadena City College to make estimates. Few of them---expect perhaps the estimate of the Messiah being born in Bethlehem---have much of a "factual" basis, other than conjecture.) The final chapter, "Conclusions," makes a strong evangelistic presentation. (Perhaps too strong.) I can only suggest that you read the book, and decide for yourself how persuasive it is.